Quote:
Originally Posted by
Freya
Arya knocking him out has been set up from season 1.
I don't think so. Remember that in Season 1 they were following the books very closely and the belief was that The Winds of Winter and maybe even A Dream of Spring would be out by now. The Night King is very much a show invention - GRRM has said as much - and doesn't appear until Season 4.
I actually think they've planned it since Season 7 when they introduced the concept that killing a White Walker also kills its Wights. We hadn't seen that when previous White Walkers were killed in previous seasons by Sam and at Hardhome so I think they came up with it as an answer to the "How do you defeat the Army of the Dead?" question. Introducing that concept and having Bran give Arya the dagger was when they started sowing the seeds, I think. That and the Brienne knife trick.
With that said, I don't have a problem with Arya being the one to do it. Jon, Daenerys and maybe even Jaime would be very cliched and predictable. Although 1) I don't really like her smirking remorseless badass show portrayal and 2) a couple of easily missed salty smoky Azor Ahai hints about Arya would've been nice.