Game of Thrones will be adding a new major player for its tight-lipped and super secretive sixth season. 

Emmy winning British actor Ian McShane has officially joined the show's cast for the upcoming season, Entertainment Weekly reports. Very few details have been revealed about his character, except for that he will have a relatively small amount of screen-time, though his character will be of key importance.  

The casting news comes after a call for a new role was announced in June shortly after the finale, which made many wonder if a character with potential ties to Jon Snow's past was going to be brought in for a flashback sequence-leading to more intense speculation that the character won't remain dead for long after his shocking death in the final minutes of the season five finale, when he was betrayed by his fellow members of the Night's Watch, who stabbed him multiple times. 

The role that was called for was described at the time as a man in his thirties or forties who is a great swordsman and a paragon of knighthood, which book readers concluded would be the role of Arthur Dayne, Dany's (Emilia Clarke) brother Rhaegar's best friend, who was long dead when the show begins,  

If Dayne was being cast, he would appear only in flashbacks, meaning the show would likely be tackling the Tower of Joy plotline from the books, which occurred when Ned Stark flashed back to it while under the influence of Milk of the Poppy. In that scene, Ned and several others square off at the Tower against Dayne and two other members of the Kingsguard, who are protecting Ned's sister, Lyanna, who is there after her 'abduction' by Rhaegar. Rhaegar was already dead by the time Ned's group arrived, meaning many assumed the Kingsguard was actually protecting someone royal-like his potential child, who was in the tower with Lyanna. Ned is one of the few who survived the battle, and is too late to save Lyanna, but makes her an unspecified promise as she dies-which was inferred to have been to protect the identity of hers and Rhaegar's child-the same one who was later passed off as his own b*****rd, Jon Snow. 

If the show is in fact tackling this storyline and cast McShane in the role of Dayne, it could be a potential sign that Snow could be resurrected at some point, as scenes revealing his actual parentage wouldn't normally be placed on the plot if his character was to remain dead.  

 

 

 

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