Game of Thrones Actor Reveals What He Was Thinking During Ned Stark’s Death Scene

The first season of Game of Thrones premiered on HBO in 2011, with the fantasy series’ blend of drama, action, and romance quickly earning it a passionate following, as the conclusion of that debut season completely shocking fans with the beheading of Sean Bean‘s Ned Stark. While the series would go on to earn a reputation for delivering unsettling and unexpected deaths, fans at the time witnessed who they assumed to be the show’s hero get killed in a brutal way, with Bean himself reflecting on the process of conveying a number of powerful emotions in the moments leading up to his demise.

“It was horror and disbelief — that Joffrey changed his mind [about exiling Ned] — and then resignation and [realizing that he was] seeing his daughter for the last time, Arya,” Bean recalled to Entertainment Weekly. “I was trying to think of all four [things]. It wasn’t just, ‘Oh God, I’m getting my head chopped off.’ Those mix of feelings is what made it what it was, I suppose.”

As if witnessing this scene wasn’t horrifying enough for audiences, the actor himself had to spend an entire day in this disturbing headspace.

“It took like a whole day or so to film it and you so you have to just keep focused on the fact that you’re about to meet your death without messing around,” Bean admitted. “I was very hot at the time, so that probably helped. And everybody else’s reactions were fantastic — Cersei and the kids. It was very moving with a lot of pathos in that scene. Then I put my head in the block and I was finished for the day.”

In the finished scene, Ned can be seen whispering something to himself, with fans having speculated for the past decade what he might have muttered. According to one Game of Thrones director, Bean came up with what he said personally and it wasn’t necessarily directly related to the events of the narrative.

“[Bean] asked somebody what an appropriate prayer would be for somebody of his belief,” Alan Taylor shared in James Hibberd’s book Fire Cannot Kill a Dragon. “People have tried to guess what he said, but it’s something private Sean created based on that.”

While there are multiple Game of Thrones spinoffs being developed, we likely shouldn’t expect to see Bean reprise his role.

Stay tuned for details on the future of the Game of Thrones franchise.

What did you think when you first saw this scene? Let us know in the comments below!