*Game of Thrones spoilers ahead*
A week after the series finale of Game of Thrones aired, HBO delivered one last behind-the-scenes offering on Sunday: Game of Thrones: The Last Watch. In the full-length documentary, director Jeanie Finlay chronicles the making of the final season of Thrones, including intimate moments on set and how the cast synchronized one of the season's most pivotal scenes—Arya killing the Night King and ending the Great War.
Many fans wondered how Arya managed to leap so high in the scene when she approaches the Night King, and during the table read for "The Long Night," executive producer Bryan Cogman reveals how i comes together. “Something is hurtling towards him out of the darkness – Arya,” Cogman explains. “She vaults off a pile of dead wights, leaps at the Night King, and she plunges the dagger up through the Night King’s armor. The Night King shatters.”
During an interview with HuffPost, Game of Thrones stunt coordinator Rowley Irlam, explained how he synchronized the action-packed sequences in the final season, including Arya's fateful leap. "I think the training of Maisie has been ongoing since the show started―before I even started," he said when asked about Maisie Williams doing her own stunt with the Night King. "So we trained her, the department trained her, and developed her with the quarterstaff [the sticklike weapon she learns to use in Braavos]."
In the sequence that was ultimately aired, Arya can't be seen leaping from a pile of corpses, which stirred confusion as to how she got so high in the air. As noted by Comic Book, many viewers noticed the dead bodies scattered around the Weirwood tree where Bran was stationed, however no such pile was evident. However, per the script read, it appears her altitude wasn't an overlooked detail, but rather a scene that didn't make it into the final product.
