7 reasons why Arya Stark was the real hero of 'Game of Thrones'

She's the real GOAT of GoT!

When you play the Game of Thrones (GoT) you either win or you die. But if you're Arya Stark, you mostly end up winning.

Over the course of the super hit HBO fantasy drama, Arya – essayed brilliantly by British starlet Maisie Williams – has blossomed from feisty young kid to a fearless assassin, ready to take on any challenge thrown her way. If anything, she actually goes out and seeks them out.

Off screen, Maisie is a lot like her Arya. "Maisie does almost all of this stuff on her own. She has an excellent stuntwoman for the dangerous stuff but most of it is actually Maisie,” E! News quoted show runner David Benioff as saying. Suffice it to say, Arya (read Maisie) are the true GOAT of GoT. And here are all the reasons why.

She is indifferent about the status quo

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Right from the get go, Arya refuses to follow social etiquettes and what it means to be a lady, despite hailing from House Stark. This trailblazer prefers swords overs dolls and the training she gets from Syrio Forel saves her life time and again throughout GoT.

She is always there for her friends

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We saw this back in season one when the sadistic Joffrey Baratheon is tormenting the butcher’s son. Arya won’t have any of that and stabs the future king with the sword. Later on, the pre-teen warrior befriends The Hound while most others run away from his gruesome appearance. In the second last episode of the show, right before Hound dies, Arya shows him the utmost respect by calling him by his real name, Sandor.

She puts her family first

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After the Red Wedding, wherein her mother, brother and sister-in-law are killed, Arya hits the road and along the way, she encounters the soldiers of Walder Frey, the man behind the mass murders. And of course, she kills them…the first of many kills for her. No one bad mouths the Starks under Arya’s watch, nope.

Oh and later, she kills Walder as well in the most boss manner. Posing as a server, she feeds him pie. The catch is that she killed his sons before him and literally, baked them into the food. Yes, revenge tastes best baked in crust. “The last thing you're ever going to see is a Stark smiling down as you die.”

She’s street smart

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When Arya flees King's Landing after her father Ned’ execution, she chops off her hair and disguises herself as a boy, knowing it's her best chance at survival. Pretty slick for an adolescent girl, right? She poses as a recruit for the Night's Watch and heads out of town and toward (what she hopes is) safety. Along the way, she frees one a prisoners named Jaqen H'ghar, who eventually trains her into a faceless assassin.

She never gives up

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A girl has no name and sometimes, no sight either. Temporarily blind in season six, Arya becomes a beggar on the streets. Life is tough and getting tougher but she endures it all under Jaqen. Eventually, she finds strength and confidence and turns against him too, showing him who the boss is really.

She knows what she wants

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In episode two of season eight, Arya decides to sleep with Gendry, assuming it may be her last night on Earth. After all, the Army of the Dead is upon Winterfell and no one really knows if they’ll make it out of the battle alive. Later, when he's knighted, Gendry proposes to her. But Arya knows what wants in life and it’s not settling down. "You'll be a wonderful lord and any lady will be lucky to have you. But I'm not a lady. I never have been," she says, before walking away from Gendry forever. Talk about being a heartbreaker!

And she saves all of Westeros!



Just as the Night King is about to destroy Winterfell and the rest of Westeros thereafter, Arya pulls a surprise attack on him and kills him with her Dragon-glass dagger. "Just when you think that it's all over and just when you think that Jon Snow is going to be the hero again, we realise that Arya appears through the mist," Maisie said recently. Because, after all, what do we say to death? Not today.

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