Beware! This post will contain confirmation of characters for Game of Thrones season six, spoiler-laden casting info, and a fascinating encounter with Nikolaj Coster-Waldau reported by a fan.

Game of Thrones is hunting for another character, and the description points toward the filming of a key scene next week.

We’ve gotten our hands on a casting breakdown detailing the role of a rugged pirate in his 30’s. He’s a tough sort with a violent temper. They require “a tall and rugged actor.” This actor has to be able to stand up in a crowd and make himself heard because he’s got a lot of forceful dialogue in one scene with leading cast members. They’re searching for a man with a “sharp mind and machismo.” This character shoots next week in Northern Ireland.

Spoilers and speculation beyond this point!

With this description of the actor and scene, I’m guessing the Kingsmoot (or an equivalent scene) is being filmed next week! We should always speculate on other possibilities, but how many scenes are there where a lot of pirates stand around arguing?

If this is the Kingsmoot, the ‘leading cast members’ referred to are most likely Yara and Euron Greyjoy. It makes the sense the show would need to cast disagreeable pirates. I know some will see this description and scream “Victarion!” but I tend to doubt that a one-off character like this appears to be would be a Greyjoy brother. I think he’s just one of the louder pirates taking on a similar role in the meeting- a voice of opposition or aggressive support to one of the candidates.

Character confirmations news:

We heard whispers of this a while back, but waited to share until we had more confirmation from sources.

Since the second huge casting list dropped into our laps, fans have been guessing which characters in the North were those “northern Lords” mentioned. These are the original descriptions:

Lord of Noble Northern House: (Casting age anywhere between 25-50) The lord is a savage warrior, and he rules a distinguished house in the very far North, and the role is said to be an impactful one. He’s described as a massive bear of a man with a beard and temper to match, and hatred that run deep, and he can be violent. The show’s looking for someone with a powerful physique who can tower over other cast members, a Northern English Accent and specifies he has to be at least 180 cm tall. The role will be on 2 episodes. Lord of Northern Stronghold: The show’s looking for an actor in his late thirties or forties to play another lord, one that’s ruthless and calculating. The frightening lord rules a vassal household with a castle stronghold. He’ll be in 3 episodes this year, with 20 days of filming this summer and fall.

We can now confirm for our readers that, as many suspected, the savage bear-like Noble lord is Smalljon Umber. This is a change from the novels, since Smalljon Umber was killed at the Red Wedding in A Storm of Swords. Since we never met Smalljon on the show, however, that leaves Game of Thrones free to introduce his character, since the Greatjon disappeared after the first season (and a reported actor-scheduling difficulty for season 2).

The second Northern Lord is the new Lord Karstark. Robb Stark executed the previous Lord Karstark in season 3 for leading the killing of two young hostages. It’s not clear if this new Karstark is connected to the books’ current Karstarks or if the show has developed their own character. There are some shenanigans around the lordship of Karstark in the later novels, and Northern Stronghold lord doesn’t sound in description like a direct match to any one character. Unfortunately, we didn’t hear anything about a first name for this character so there’s something of a mystery there, but he is Lord Karstark.

From the rumor and speculation pile:

Yesterday, a friend of WotW reader Michael spotted Nikolaj Coster-Waldau in the bookshop at Belfast International Airport, where he was kind enough to take a photo with her. They wound up chatting for a while, and he mentioned he was off to film additional scenes for GoT somewhere but wasn’t allowed to say where.

She ended up sitting next to him on her flight to Reykjavik, Iceland.

Since no Iceland filming was reported for this year, the story might be classed an unconfirmed rumor but the Iceland sightings have begun, with this tweet from a local:

I just met Nikolaj Coster aka Jaime Lannister from Game Of Thrones — María Gústavsdóttir (@mariagustavs) August 30, 2015

If the fan report is completely accurate, and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau is filming Game of Thrones scenes in Iceland, that is a big surprise. In warmer weather, Iceland was largely used to film the Vale and Riverlands scenes such as the ones for Brienne and Pod, and Arya and the Hound’s travels. They’ve used the country for colder scenes and had intended to film portions of Hardhome with the actors there last year, but the limited daylight forced the show to transfer those scenes back to Northern Ireland.

Has Game of Thrones returned to Iceland? If so…is Jaime Lannister headed to the Riverlands?

Random sightings:

Conleth Hill has been spotted around Northern Ireland without his head shaved yet so it doesn’t seem like Varys has been needed yet.

And for those deeply invested in #HairWatch and Kit Harington (#Hairington), he was seen in London today.

About that newest LSH-commanding-an-army rumor…

It’s fake. All our top sources say no.

(Armies? Doesn’t that sound just a little too organized for a barely reanimated corpse? Honestly.)

The Stoneheart hype train will always roll on though.