Game Of Thrones: Sophie Turner On Sansa’s First Kill

Game of Thrones Season 6 was a major turning point for Sansa Stark, played by Sophie Turner. Ater escaping her tormentor, Ramsay Bolton, at the end of Game of Thrones Season 5, Sansa finally made it to the safety of Castle Black and reunited with her half-brother, Jon Snow.

By the end of Game of Thrones Season 6, Sansa Stark had gone from valuable hostage to being reinstated at her ancestral home of Winterfell, but she quickly fell into Jon’s shadow after Jon was proclaimed the new King in the North. So what does this all mean for Sansa in Game of Thrones Season 7?

“At the end of the [Season 6], Sansa gets a taste of power — and it’s the first time that she’s had that ever, really,” Turner tells Vulture. “She feels like it’s deserved because she did so much for Jon and the North, so when she saves the day and doesn’t get any recognition for it, it was like she had that first taste of power and then was immediately stripped of it. She was stripped of the respect that she really feels she deserves. She was trying to give her input to Jon and trying to be a collaborative leader, but it’s difficult when it’s a patriarchy and when there’s sexism. It would be a real adjustment for Jon to listen to her and do what she says. So she was looking to Littlefinger like, oh, you’re right. Maybe that pretty picture you painted of me on the throne and you by my side isn’t such a bad one.

“And then there’s the smile as well, her walking away after killing Ramsay,” Turner continues. “That’s also quite interesting. You wonder if it’s just a smile because it’s her first kill, because this man is out of her life, or whether she’s going to get a taste for it. Whether she enjoyed it. Whether it’s a power trip. But she definitely is a lot more powerful, and it’ll be very interesting to see how she handles that coming up this season.

But now that Sansa has killed once, could it happen again? Littlefinger seems to be trying to manipulate Sansa, though out of genuine concern or self-interest is always unclear with Littlefinger.

“She holds a power over him,” Turner explains. “And after she confronted him about selling her to the Boltons, he owes her big time. He knows he has to be loyal to her now, and he has to serve her well, because she holds so much over him. It would destroy his reputation if she revealed any of the stuff that she knows about him. It’s tricky. She has power, but it’s a question of whether people listen to her or not. You’ll see more of that in this upcoming season.”

Game of Thrones Season 7 is currently in production and will air on HBO in summer 2017.