Surprising Game of Thrones Character Was the Hardest to Kill for GRRM

Death is a tragedy. When someone close to you passes away, it hits you hard, even though it is a natural occurrence and everyone's final destination in life.

In books and on television, however, death is often used as a plot device to create a sense of drama or suspense and get the audience hooked on the story.

George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire saga is replete with violence and deaths, to such an extent that even the central characters meet violent ends left, right and centre. The same holds for HBO's hit series Game of Thrones, based on the aforementioned series of novels. Consider, for instance, the execution at the end of season 1 (roughly the middle of Martin's first book): Ned Stark has his head chopped off after a failed coup despite having, by that stage, become one of the most popular and likeable characters on the show.

George R. R. Martin is notorious for treating his characters like disposable pawns on a chessboard. He 'swats' them like flies without a hint of remorse or hesitation, as he has admitted on multiple occasions. And it would appear he has never had any qualms about dispatching a character. However, as it turns out, there was one particular moment the author found especially challenging to write.

'The big sequence in the third book, the [Red] Wedding was the hardest thing that I ever wrote; that was very difficult to do. It was the last thing I wrote in that particular book, even though it occurs two-thirds of the way through the book. I had to skip over that chapter and finish the whole rest of the book, and then finally, when it was all done, I came back and made myself write that chapter because it was… it was emotionally wrenching to write even as I know it was for many of you to read,' George R.R. Martin once said during a conference with his fans.

The scene in question sees Robb and Catelyn Stark violently slaughtered at the hands of House Frey. While Ned's heir and the crowned King of the North was universally adored by fans (albeit not as much as John Snow), and so his murder came as a shock to many; we suspect that for George R. R. Martin, it may very well have been the terrible death of Catelyn Stark that made the Red Wedding such a challenging scene to complete.

Source: YouTube.