Game Of Thrones' White Walker Mystery Answered 14 Years Later By Star

Published Nov 8, 2026, 9:47 AM EST

Matthew Rudoy is one of ScreenRant's Movie & TV News Editors. He covers the latest in movie & TV news, with a focus on major franchises like Star Wars, The Boys, and Game of Thrones, and also writes some features and reviews. He wrote lists for ScreenRant from 2017-2022, became a news writer in 2023, a senior staff writer in 2024, and an editor in 2025. 

14 years later, a Game of Thrones White Walker mystery has been answered.

While some of the fans' questions weren't answered by the end of the series, a much earlier mystery came about in the season 2 finale when the White Walkers don't kill Samwell Tarly (John Bradley) despite seeing him. Compared to the rest of the show, letting Sam escape with his life is uncharacteristic for the formidable villains, but why they do this is never directly answered, leading to many theories over the years.

In an interview with Kiss, Bradley was asked why the White Walkers don't kill Sam in the season 2 finale. The actor shared that "my theory was always that Samwell was one of the very few people that was literate. He could read and write and he could spread the word. They want people to know about them. It's sort of like a negative PR machine. They wanted Samwell to be their PR arm. Get the word out there that we're not to be messed about with." Check out his response below:

Bradley prefaces his comments by emphasizing that he doesn't know the canon answer to this mystery. Part of the reason the moment remains a source of debate is because it was a creation of the show and does not occur in George R.R. Martin's books. While two more novels, The Winds of Winter and A Dream of Spring, are intended to finish the series, they cannot answer the question due to only being in the show.

In both the source material and the show, though, Sam does make a crucial discovery about the White Walkers, known in the books as Others. While they are impervious to most weapons, he learns that they can be killed by dragonglass, also called obsidian, as he defeats one with a dagger made of this material. During his time at the Citadel in the show, he reads about Dragonstone sitting on a considerable amount of dragonglass, which leads to Jon Snow (Kit Harington) going there and getting the material mined for weapons in the fight ahead.

If Bradley's theory is correct, the White Walkers' plan backfires. Sam does help spread the word of the terrifying Army of the Dead, but more importantly, is able to discover one of the only weapons that can successfully be used against them, and uses his literacy to ensure that more of the weapons are made. This proves to be instrumental in many key characters staying alive and defending Westeros, before culminating in the Night King being defeated by Arya Stark (Maisie Williams) and her Valyrian steel dagger.

The trajectory of this narrative may change in Martin's The Winds of Winter and A Dream of Spring, but since those books have yet to be published, only the show is able to provide the full story of Sam going from being spared by the White Walkers to being integral in the war against them and their eventual defeat.

After the ending of Game of Thrones, Bradley later reunited with showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss for Netflix's hit science-fiction series 3 Body Problem, based on Liu Cixin's Remembrance of Earth's Past trilogy. He also starred in Roland Emmerich's 2022 sci-fi disaster movie Moonfall alongside Halle Berry and Patrick Wilson, and was on Kiss to promote his new film Merry Christmas Aubrey Flint, whose cast features Celia Imrie, Richard E. Grant, Sophia Di Martino, and Jim Broadbent.