HBO sent out a press release this afternoon that’s been poured over like it was “Sgt. Pepper” being played backwards.
On “Game of Thrones” first episode of the new season: first there’s a summary of what happened at the end of season 5– “Jon Snow’s bloody fate at the hands of Castle Black mutineers”– which doesn’t really say anything.
Then later, a definitive “Jon Snow is dead” in the episode summary. Hmmm….All will be known this Sunday in Los Angeles at 5pm Pacific Time, when there’s a red carpet premiere. Maybe.
Except: actor Kit Harington is listed in the IMDB Internet Movie Database as an actor in the episode. And there are no other cast lists for future episodes, which is odd unless HBO held back rather than expose the truth that somehow JON SNOW IS ALIVE!
And what fun! It still seems hard to believe that Harington is back for the new episode just playing a dead Snow, as he has suggested in recent interviews. He certainly wouldn’t be listed with the cast.
Also since “Game of Thrones” stopped shooting season 5, Harington has shot just one movie. If he’d left for a big career, you’d think it would have started. Another clue: he’s also been AWOL from photo ops most of the last nine months. And he still has Jon Snow’s hairdo– which you know he’d have cut off if he were trying to change his image.
One last clue: an HBO insider didn’t shoot me down when I suggested that Snow was not dead after all.
Plus, does a hit show, a hot show, really kill off its heart-throb at the height of the show’s popularity? Nope, they don’t.
All this may be a ploy to drive record breaking ratings on April 24th, when “Game of Thrones” returns. Keep hope alive!