The following visualization indicates that there are four communities within Season 7 of Game of Thrones. This certainly makes sense. Furthest left, colored in blue, we have a community that consists of characters such as Cersei Lannister, Jaimie Lannister, Ser Bronn of the Blackwater, Ser Gregor Clegane (the Mountain), and the Greyjoys. For a great part of the season, characters within this cluster are interacting to maintain a firm-grasp on the Lannister-led Westeros, and they are frequently interacting towards this end.

However, as the season progresses and Jon Snow convinces Queen Daenerys Stormborn of the House Targaryen (… the First of Her Name, Queen of the Andals, the Rhoynar and the First Men, Lady of the Seven Kingdoms and Protector of the Realm, Lady of Dragonstone, Queen of Meereen, Khaleesi of the Great Grass Sea, the Unburnt, Breaker of Chains and Mother of Dragons) that Winter is indeed coming, they reach out to the Lannisters in King’s Landing to call a truce and turn their attention to the North. As such, the blue and green communities overlap slightly. This green community, consisting mostly of Jon Snow, Queen Daenerys Stormborn… I won’t repeat the title again for our collective sake, Tyrion, and everyone’s favorite Onion Knight Ser Davos, spends most of the season in Dragonstone.

I also find a community reflecting the interactions within Winterfell, wherein Sansa is attempting to field an army capable of defending the North. This community, colored in yellow, consists largely of Sansa, Littlefinger, Arya, Bran, Brienne of Tarth, and everyone’s favorite squire Podrick. There is certainly some interaction with the Dragonstone community, for example, Jon and Ser Davos spent a good amount of time in Winterfell during Season 7. Nevertheless, the bulk of interactions between members of the Winterfell community occur with other individuals within the Winterfell community.

The final community detected, colored in Red, includes Ser Jorah Momont, Tormund Giantsbane, the Hound, the Night King, and White Walkers. This alludes to a large plot narrative wherein a team is sent north of the Wall to capture living White Walkers as proof for Daenerys and Cersei. You might remember this concluding with a team of White Walkers pulling Viserion (one of Daenerys’ dragons) out of a lake.

This exercise has been good for recapping Season 7, but what can it teach us about Season 8? Quite a bit! First and foremost, these communities, while distinct, are fairly close together. This indicates something that most would expect: Westeros must unify if it is to confront the Night King. There are no totally disconnected components or groups of characters, and as time progressed, three of these communities started to converge and interact with one another with greater frequency. One thing that does become apparent though, it seems that some are far less likely to converge. For example, it may not make sense for those in Dorne, such as Tyene or Ellaria Sand, to interact with those likely to stay in Winterfell, such as Sansa.

To better understand who is likely to interact, or not interact, in Season 8, I use a latent space model to estimate the “affinity” between any two characters. Specifically, I use an Additive Mixed Effects (AME) model introduced by Peter Hoff and implemented in R with the “amen” package. This model allows users to examine which actors within a network are more or less likely to interact, “affinity”, based upon common connections and a variety of complex interdependencies within the network. For an excellent primer, I recommend Minhas, Hoff, and Ward.