The playwright Anton Chekhov famously quipped that a gun introduced in the first act of a play better bloody well fire by curtain close and, paraphrase aside, it is quite clearly time for HBO’s Game of Thrones to pop a Chekhov-conscious cap or two.

In the show, the biggest element of danger – gradually intensified throughout the past seven seasons – has always been the White Walkers. And they’re now on Westeros’s doorstep.

We know that the mysterious, destructive creatures overran the known world thousands of years ago during a time that became known as the Long Night, subjecting humankind to a nightmarish reign of terror.

Following this period, they lay dormant while a great Wall of ice was raised between the Seven Kingdoms and the wild North to protect southern citizens from further attacks.