You Win Or You Die: Ranking the 99 Game of Thrones Deaths

Image credit: HBO/Helen Sloan

Locke

A Bolton loyalist, Locke seems to have much in common with the reprehensible Ramsay (formerly Snow). We learn that Ramsay is an incorrigible sadist, and Locke is more or less the same. He is dispatched to recapture Jaime Lannister in Season 3, after Catelyn frees him in an attempt to save her daughters. Things don’t go well, as is the norm on Game of Thrones. Locke finds Jaime’s promises of health and wealth to be pedantic. So instead of striking a bargain, Locke chops off one of his prisoner’s hands. As you do.

Later, Locke explains to Jaime: “All you lords and ladies still think that the only thing that matters is gold. Well, this makes me happier than all your gold ever could. And that makes me happier than all her sapphires, so go buy yourself a golden hand and fuck yourself with it.”

Clearly, Locke can’t be bought. Like Ramsay, he’s cruel for the fun of it. It’s almost like that Cheap Trick song, but not quite, because at least Cheap Trick intended to be kind all along.

Locke’s death isn’t entirely a surprise. But the way in which it happens is narratively interesting, to say the least. In his efforts to capture Bran Stark and his ragtag group of pals, Locke is faced with Bran’s magical powers. Bran wargs into Hodor and snaps Locke’s neck so effectively that it’s nearly severed from his body. It’s almost retribution for Jaime’s severed hand, despite the fact that Jaime shoved Bran from a window and caused his paralysis.

Well, irony isn’t lost in the Thrones universe, that’s for sure.