Hodor

*******GAME OF THRONES SPOILERS*******

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Last chance-- if you haven't seen season six, episode 5, The Door, you should super stop reading right now.

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Listen, no one spoiled the Red Wedding for me and I just want to pay that forward.

Okay, so now that it's just us up-to-date fans (or those that don't care about spoilers), let's talk about Hodor. Let's talk about what happened to Hodor. Let's talk about destiny and plans.

The Door has a thread of destiny running through it. Sansa takes charge of hers in her rejection of Littlefinger; Arya and Jaqen H'ghar have that exchange about how death comes to everyone, not just those who deserve it; the Red Priestess called in by Tyrion has a clear destiny in mind for Danerys, even though the servants of R'hllor have gotten it wrong before. Varys even seems to have had a destiny set out for him long ago, or so the priestess thinks. Mixed in with that are characters making their own way-- Yara lived the Ironborn life, Euron has a plan for taking his life forward, Davos begins to believe the North can rise up again through their efforts, and we see the Children of the Forest create the Night's King, taking the destiny of the world into their own hands.

And then we have Hodor.

When the episode ended, one of my friends was sad, but content. This was his destiny, she said. That was what he was meant to do. I was adamantly opposite that idea. This was Bran's fault. He broke Wylis by messing around in these dumb visions. It was not a sacrifice Wylis ever chose to make. His mind was taken over against his will, pulled from this poor teenage stable boy into a man at the end of his life, whose only choice is to faithfully obey the order being shouted at him. And as much as I love and believe in Hodor, you know that Bran and Meera won't be saved forever from the white walkers. He can only hold the door for so long.

Was it his destiny, though? I think you have to dig into what Bran actually did. Did he time travel? The wikipedia summary of the episode says that he split his consciousness, staying in both the past and present, until he can't handle that anymore and accidentally wargs into Wylis. But this had always happened, so we're clearly dealing with a block time universe and in block time, the past is set. Bran always makes (what I deem to be a mistake but you can call) this choice and the person Wylis could have been is snuffed out. Hodor would have always ended the way he did.

But that does not to me mean destiny. Destiny is being part of a bigger plan; Hodor's life seems the tragic result of a boy messing around with powers he doesn't understand and terrible timing. Yes, it always would have ended this way, but was it destined, designed with a purpose and a plan? I don't think so. George R. R. Martin may have known from the start where Hodor's name came from, but that's not the same as Dany or Jon or anyone being the Lord of Light's chosen one. It may have been a noble sacrifice and a necessary cog in Bran's story, but Hodor's death wasn't destined. It wasn't purposed. It just was.

As with all Game of Thrones talk on the internet these days, tell me your thoughts! We're all just throwing out guesses into the night, which is dark and full of terrors.