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Jon Stark may be the protagonist of the 2011 hit series Game of Thrones but there’s no denying who the audience favorite is. From day 1 of the show’s release, many viewers found themselves drawn to the spirited Arya Stark.
As a member of the noble House of Stark, you’d expect Arya to be a lady because she is, in the traditional sense of the word. But unlike her well-mannered sister, Sansa Stark, and more even-tempered brothers, Arya stood out throughout the series for her sharp temper and willingness to fight dirty. She’s basically Avatar: The Last Airbender’s Toph Beifong if the cartoon had a grittier storyline.
With her feisty personality, it’s only expected that Arya’s list is her most (in)famous legacy from the show. But that raises a few questions: Why the grudge and who did she want to kill anyway?
Why Does Arya Stark Have a Hit List?
Arya Stark isn’t necessarily a bad person. If you’ve seen one of the many moral alignment charts floating around the internet, she’s more chaotic neutral than anything. Though Arya has a strong sense of justice, it’s mostly focused on people she’s personally connected to. Her sense of morality isn’t based on any solid ideology unlike, for example, Jon Snow or Daenerys Targaryen.
Her strong desire for justice (or vengeance, if you’re more lawfully aligned) gave Arya the motive to start her kill list. Naturally, Arya’s list only contains names of people who have hurt her, her friends, or her family.
This is the full extent of what we see on the show. But in the book series A Song of Ice and Fire, which is what Game of Thrones is based on, Arya has shown more disturbing traits. Some readers have raised concerns that Arya might be going slightly cuckoo because of her connection to her direwolf Nymeria who was last seen disappearing into the woods.
Later in the series, Nymeria is rumored to be hunting down humans and eating them in the wild hence the speculation that Arya might be developing the same bloodlust that her direwolf has.
Whether or not that’s true is yet to be seen since George R.R. Martin still hasn’t wrapped up the book series. Right now, all we have to go on is the TV show. So, who was on Arya’s list exactly? You’ll likely remember most of these antagonists.
Who Was on Arya’s List and How Did They Die?
Joffrey Baratheon
Joffrey Baratheon was a no-brainer addition to the list. Despite his name, this stag is all lion as he’s the son of twins, Jaime and Cersei Lannister, via incest. That said, the information was never publicly revealed during Joffrey’s reign, letting him rule without any strong claims against his legitimacy as king. Fans of the show will remember Joffrey for being the most punchable character on Game of Thrones because of how blatantly narcissistic and cruel he is.
Why Is He on Arya’s List?
Arya Stark has many reasons for putting Joffrey on her kill list. The sadistic king ordered the execution of her father, Ned Stark, and nearly had Nymeria killed as well. While Nymeria was able to escape from Joffrey’s wild temper tantrums during their journey to King’s Landing, Sansa’s direwolf, Lady, was killed in Nymeria’s place.
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Joffrey later had his just desserts after Olenna Tyrell poisoned him at his own wedding because she couldn’t stand to see her granddaughter, Lady Margaery, married to someone as cruel and violent as him. Can you imagine how things would have ended for Joffrey if Arya got to him, though? We might have seen him skewered on the walls of the Red Keep like her father was.
Ser Meryn Trant
Considering how long it’s been since the first couple seasons of Game of Thrones, you can’t really be blamed if you can’t remember this guy anymore. Meryn Trant was one of the Kingsguard knights tasked with taking care of the Robert Baratheon and his (not quite) sons, Joffrey and Tommen.
It’s kind of shocking that he still has a job considering three kings died under his guardianship. Unlike Barristan Selmy, former Lord Commander of the Kingsguard, Meryn was anything but a chivalrous knight. He’s known for being just as sadistic as Joffrey and takes pleasure in beating women and children, with Sansa Stark being one of his victims.
Why Is He on Arya’s List?
Meryn Trant killed Syrio Forrel, Arya’s “dancing” teacher who was teaching the young Stark the art of water dancing, a fencing-like combat style from Braavos. During the arrests of the Starks, Syrio stepped in to protect Arya, giving her a chance to escape.
His death was one of the key reasons Arya was so determined to fight back in the series and in the books. As one of the few people who believed in her potential to be a great fighter even though she was a girl, Arya saw him as both a dear friend and something of a father figure.
Arya manages to personally cross Meryn off of her hit list by disguising herself as Ghita, a child prostitute who worked at a Braavosi brothel.
Sandor Clegane (a.k.a. the Hound)
Sandor Clegane is one of the most popular, if admittedly morally gray, characters to come out of Game of Thrones. The disfigured swordsman is known for his coarse manners and willingness to get his hands dirty.
That being said, we get several glimpses of his true character throughout the series that shine through his rough exterior, even if Arya is never quite convinced. Though he comes across as a brute, Sandor is one of the few people to show Sansa Stark any kindness in King’s Landing and even goes out of his way to protect her.
Fans of the books might recall that when Joffrey had Sansa stripped naked in public, he was the knight who offered her his cloak. Sandor was also the only knight to return to the riots, even though no one ordered him to, just in time to save Sansa from being raped.
Why Is He on Arya’s List?
Easy. Arya didn’t see as much of Sandor’s morally righteous side as Sansa did. In fact, he got on Arya’s list for murdering the Stark girl’s friend, Micah, under Joffrey’s orders. Sandor’s not exactly blameless either since he purposely taunts the Starks about it when asked.
When Ned Stark asked him why he did it, he just said the butcher boy didn’t run fast enough. Later in Season 4, Sandor goes as far as to tell Arya that Micah begged him for mercy. He also complained that his saddle “smelled like butcher boy for weeks”.
It’s only toward the end of the series that Arya begins to realize that she and Sandor Clegane are a little more alike than she initially thought. She lets Sandor live and even allows him to take his revenge on another person on her list, his brother Gregor Clegane. The confrontation between the brothers, dubbed “Cleganebowl” by fans, ends with both falling from a ledge to their presumed deaths.
Tywin Lannister
Tywin Lannister is the head of House Lannister, the richest family in the entire show thanks to their vast stockpiles of gold and Tywin’s own business smarts. He spends most of the series covering up his children’s scandals, including Tyrion’s marriage to a prostitute and Cersei and Jaime’s incestuous relationship. Like Arya, his family matters to him the most or, at least, his family’s legacy. It’s these values that bring him toe to toe with Arya Stark.
Anyone who watched Game of Thrones‘ Harrenhal episodes, however, understands how much Arya truly owes to Tywin Lannister. The scheming mastermind of Westeros is a favorite among fans for his iron will and sharp sense of political and military tactics.
Why Is He on Arya’s List?
As a Hand of the King during the reign of his grandsons, Joffrey and Tommen Baratheon, Tywin was in charge of leading several military campaigns against Arya’s older brother, Robb Stark, and the lords of the North.
It’s heavily hinted in both the show and books that he planned the Red Wedding and had Walder Frey and Roose Bolton do the dirty work for him. The slaughter at Talisa and Robb’s wedding was a decisive victory for Tywin Lannister as it eliminated several key players in the Northerners’ rebellion, including Robb himself.
Arya never got a chance to kill Tywin but there’s some poetic justice in knowing that it’s the people who think like him the most who wanted him dead. Ultimately, it was his son Tyrion Lannister who shot Tywin with a bow while he was taking a dump. Not a great way to go.
Cersei Lannister
Whether you love her, hate her, or just find her to be an interesting character, Cersei Lannister has a taste for violence and Machiavellianism that she shares with her father Tywin and son Joffrey. After the death of all three of her children, Cersei became queen in her own right and was the first queen regent of the Seven Kingdoms. So uh, gaslight, girlboss, gatekeep, I guess?
Though she rarely played a key role as one of the main plotters in Game of Thrones, Cersei has had a hand in almost every bad thing that happened to the Starks. She was part of the reason why Lady Sansa’s direwolf was killed and why Ned Stark was executed. It definitely doesn’t help that she blatantly encourages Joffrey’s violent outbursts and turns a blind eye to his cruelty towards Sansa Stark.
Why Is She on Arya’s List?
Cersei was one of the people who plotted to execute Ned Stark before he could reveal the truth about Joffrey’s parentage. It isn’t until the last few episodes of the series that Cersei Lannister gets her comeuppance and, in the meantime, she manages to murder Margaery Tyrell and everyone in the Great Sept of Baelor by blowing the place up. It would have been satisfying to see her die by Arya’s Needle but it was gravity that did Cersei Lannister in. She died due to falling debris during the Battle of King’s Landing.
Walder Frey
Walder Frey is the former head of House Frey, one of the families that were set to ally with House Tully and House Stark. His role as the Lord of the Crossing made his cooperation valuable to the Northern rebels since he had control over the Twins, a castle that serves as the only crossing point over a river known as the Green Fork.
He initially struck a deal with Robb Stark that guaranteed him and his army safe passage through the Twins and the help of the Frey army, if Robb married his daughter. But Robb went back on his word after he met Talisa, a medic he married in secret, against literally everyone’s advice.
Robb is later forced to re-ally with House Frey after disagreements with other Northern lords shrunk his army by half. Walder Frey plays off the broken agreement at first and settles with having Robb’s uncle Edmure Tully marry one of his daughters. During the Red Wedding, the Frey’s lock the doors and slaughter the Starks and their allies.
Why Is He on Arya’s List?
Arya’s motive couldn’t be clearer. When you remember that the Tullies, including Catelyn, and Robb were present at the Red Wedding, you’ll realize that the Freys murdered all of the Starks and their relatives in a politically motivated one-stop-shop massacre.
The severity of Walder Frey’s crimes against Arya and her family made it especially satisfying when she finally murdered Walder’s sons and fed their butchered corpses to him in the form of a pie. Arya then revealed her true identity before slitting his throat.
There is a lot of messed up stuff that happens in Game of Thrones that can be even stranger than Arya’s list. Check out the bloody history of the Seven Kingdoms here.
