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How Game of Thrones is shaping up as the new season begins

After an agonising year-and-a-bit wait, Game of Thrones, the biggest TV show on earth bar none, returns in the early hours of tomorrow. Given the prolonged gap between the seasons – necessitated by storylines that have now outrun George R. R. Martin’s source material – here’s a pre-release primer on the situation around Westeros, now that Winter has truly arrived.

In the North:

The start of last season saw the resurrection of Jon Snow – a will-they-won’t-they event that HBO had spent the best part of a year teasing – who was returned to life by Melisandre, one of Westeros’s biggest wildcards. Upon returning to life, Jon proceeds to quit the Night’s Watch, claiming that his ‘watch was ended’ by his brief sojourn into the land of the dead (not sure how that would hold up in court, but the Seven Kingdoms don’t seem a litigious place).

Released from his vows, Jon has become one of the biggest players this side of the narrow sea.

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