Emilia Clarke Reveals Her Reaction to the Game of Thrones Series Finale

Spoilers ahead for the last episode of Game of Thrones!

In last night’s Game of Thrones series finale, the Mother of Dragons-turn-Mad Queen was the last major character to die in the series. Daenerys Targaryen has always been one of the most iconic characters in the series but throughout the final season fans have shared disappointment with how her character arc played out.

In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Emilia Clarke shared her reaction to her character’s emotional journey in season 8, revealing that she first found out about it in October 2017.

“… I’m flabbergasted. Absolutely never saw that coming.” Clarke said. “I cried, and I went for a walk. I walked out of the house and took my keys and phone and walked back with blisters on my feet. I didn’t come back for five hours. I’m like, ‘How am I going to do this?”

When asked about how she truly felt about Daenerys’ unfortunate demise, she answered “It was a f—king struggle reading the scripts. What I was taught at drama school — and if you print this there will be drama school teachers going ‘that’s bulls—t,’ but here we go: I was told that your character is right. Your character makes a choice and you need to be right with that. An actor should never be afraid to look ugly. We have uglier sides to ourselves. And after 10 years of working on this show, it’s logical. Where else can she go? I tried to think what the ending will be. It’s not like she’s suddenly going to go, ‘Okay, I’m gonna put a kettle on and put cookies in the oven and we’ll just sit down and have a lovely time and pop a few kids out.’ That was never going to happen. She’s a Targaryen.”

“I thought she was going to die, I feel very taken care of as a character in that sense. It’s a very beautiful and touching ending. Hopefully, what you’ll see in that last moment as she’s dying is: There’s the vulnerability — there’s the little girl you met in season 1. See? She’s right there. And now, she’s not there anymore…”

“But having said all of the things I’ve just said…” Clarke says. “I stand by Daenerys. I stand by her! I can’t not.”

The final season of Game of Thrones won’t be our last trip to Westeros, as HBO has greenlit a pilot set 1,000 years before the events of the wildly popular sword and sorcery epic. Naomi Watts and Josh Whitehouse have been cast in the prequel series. S.J. Clarkson (The Defenders, Jessica Jones) will direct the pilot.