“The dead are coming.”So Davos Seaworth says in the trailer for Game of Thrones: Season 6 , heralding the biggest threat to the Seven Kingdoms that disturbingly few characters on the show seem to be concerned about. Even with infighting in Westeros between the Lannisters, Boltons, Martells and last remaining Starks, the biggest threat to face the world is the army of the dead, led by the Night’s King and White Walkers, ready to invade from the north.

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That’s a conflict that’s been brewing since the opening scene of Season 1, and it seems like it will finally boil over in Season 6. When I had a chance to sit down with the cast of Game of Thrones and preview the new season, I asked each of them what the words “the dead are coming” means to them and their characters, and their answers should put the fear of the Night’s King in each and every viewer.“This is a big thing,” Sophie Turner said. “It's always been battles between the houses and from across the Narrow Sea. This is one of those battles that is kind of unstoppable. It's more ominous than anything. It's looming, and you really get a sense that the end is nigh.”One of the biggest issues with the fact hundreds of thousands of undead wights are ready to indiscriminately wipe out humanity in Westeros is that the king, Tommen Baratheon, isn’t even aware of the threat. “Tommen don't even know what's going on,” Dean-Charles Chapman said with a laugh. “He only knows that he's got to feed Ser Pounce. It's worrying. The living is causing chaos as it is, and now the dead are doing it? You can't win.”The one person who might be able to change the tides against the White Walkers is Bran Stark, who makes his triumphant return in Season 6 after spending a season training off screen. But according to star Isaac Hempstead-Wright, Bran doesn’t necessarily have to be a savior in this war.“For Bran, I think it's a real wake up call. He's north, he's up where the dead are, and he could potentially be the key to making the dead victorious or defeating them,” Hempstead-Wright teased. “There's not much time. Bran has really got to get his act together, and he's still got many teenage, hubristic tendencies. He's still making some silly decisions with his powers. He's got to learn quickly, and he's got to shoulder a tremendous amount of responsibility with these powers which are going to be crucial, I feel like. For Bran, 'the dead are coming' is a real 'you need to step up to the plate.’”If there is one person who we know is going to go out of his way to spread news of the undead army, it’s Davos Seaworth. Liam Cunningham sees parallels between Westeros’s focus on “fighting about silly pieces of turf” instead of focusing on the bigger threat and how our own world is ignoring big global issues like climate change.“In Westeros, it's like that too. The Night's King is coming. You ain't gonna kill him with a bow and arrow. We need to do something, rapidly, but they've all got their heads up their asses with their own little squabbles,” he said.“Don't forget Melisandre's seen it in the flames. She's talking about all these petty squabbles that are going on with the Lannisters and the Boltons, all getting their little piece of turf in the Seven Kingdoms. They refuse to recognize that there's 100,000 of the undead about to come,” Cunningham added. “She's seen it. [Davos] believes the things that she's seen, even though he doesn't like her, but she has her powers.”Many fans picked up on the fact that, in the trailer, Davos is making his case to a Mormont. Cunningham confirmed exactly who he is talking to in that scene. “Who I'm saying that to is a fabulous young actress who you haven't met yet, who's about to come in, who's Lyanna Mormont,” said Cunningham. “He's explaining the situation to her because certain other individuals are making a mess of their parlay. He's very good at lateral thinking and explaining the situation, as we know.”Michael McElhatton and Iwan Rheon, who play Roose and Ramsay Bolton, believe that their characters are aware of the White Walker threat even though they haven’t addressed it. They think the Boltons aren’t concerned with dealing with the undead now because they have bigger immediate issues to face.“Without a doubt they know,” McElhatton said. Rheon added, “It must be [a concern], but it's not the immediate threat because it seems further away to them than the other people -- practically everyone in Westeros -- who wants to get rid of them. They've got a lot more battles to fight before the White Walkers come.”In fact, many actors on the show believe that the awareness of the White Walker threat might be wider than the audience already knows. Tom Wlaschiha, who plays Jaqen H’ghar, is pretty convinced the Faceless Men know the Night’s King is out there and a big problem for the world.“I think the Faceless Men, they know much more than what we've seen so far,” he said. “I’m pretty sure Jaqen knows about the White Walkers and the stuff that's going on in Westeros.”That could be why he’s spending so much effort training Arya, who Maisie Williams believes could play a role in the battle against the Night’s King. “People think it's about men and armies and horses, but that's just more men and armies that you're going to need to feed and that are going to be taken from you. If you can do it on your own, then you don't need all of that,” she said. “I have faith in her. I always have. A lot of people do.”Of the overall thread of “the dead are coming,” Williams explained, “To me, it means that everyone's little personal issues are absolutely meaningless, and Arya's own little selfish storyline means nothing in the overall story of Game of Thrones, and it's true, we have to be turning our weapons north. But you think anyone's going to before it's too late?”

Game of Thrones: Season 6 premieres Sunday, April 24th at 9 p.m. ET/PT on HBO.Terri Schwartz is Entertainment Editor at IGN. Talk to her on Twitter at @Terri_Schwartz.