Game of Thrones season 8 trailer: Jon Snow’s feather, parentage and other mysteries explained. Read fan reactions

What does the feather in the Game of Thrones season 8 trailer signify? Here’s why Jon Snow’s parentage will play a major role in the show’s final season.

A cameo appearance by a feather has stolen the limelight from the Stark siblings, in the newly released first teaser trailer for the final season of Game of Thrones.

Lyanna Stark’s feather returns in the Game of Thrones season 8 trailer.

The trailer shows the reunited Jon Snow, Sansa and Arya Stark as they walk in the dingy crypts of Winterfell, flanked by statues of fallen Starks - Ned, Catelyn and Lyanna. A feather is prominently featured in the trailer, and it serves as a strong connective tissue to earlier seasons of the HBO show, and hints at a large revelation about Jon’s parentage.

 

According to a report on Insider, the feather first appeared in the show’s very first episode, when it is placed on Lyanna Stark’s crypt by Robert Baratheon. The same feather was picked up by Sansa in the fifth season, when she visits her aunt’s statue.

As Jon walks past Lyanna’s statue, we hear a snippet of her dialogue from an earlier flashback scene, in which she says (to her brother Ned), “You have to protect him.” This was when Lyanna gave birth to Jon, and handed him over to Ned before she died.

It is the series’ worst kept secret that Jon is the son of Rhaegar Targaryen and Lyanna Stark, making him the true heir to the Iron Throne. Season 7 ended with Jon finally crossing paths with his aunt, Daenerys Targaryen.

The Insider report also reminds fans that hints about Jon’s parentage were first made in the show’s pilot episode. When Robert Baratheon says he dreams of killing Rhaegar every night, Ned tells him, “the Targaryens are gone”. “Not all of them,” Robert replies. The scene cuts to Daenerys and Viserys, but it is implied that he was referring to Jon, who was, of course, living with Ned as his illegitimate son.

Game of Thrones lore paints Rhaegar as someone who kidnapped and raped Lyanna in the Tower of Joy, but this was revealed to be inaccurate in the show’s sixth season.

Game of Thrones’ eighth and final season will premiere on April 14, and will consist of six, feature-length episodes.

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