It's the question circulating among every "Game of Thrones" fan that won't quit: Is Jon Snow really dead? Is he dead dead? Or is he coming back?
It's time to quash this debate. Whatever verbal trickery the cast and creators of the hit HBO fantasy show use to distract us — saying his fate is right there in his eyes, or simply that he's dead, which avoids the matter of resurrection — fans are pretty sure Snow hasn't inhaled his last breath of Westeros air.
They're right. For an assortment of reasons, from big to small, from the books to a simple understanding of how TV works.
Here's every reason we're confident Jon Snow is being resurrected in season six, which kicks off Sunday:
This is a fantasy show.
Yes, the success of "Game of Thrones" is predicated on the possibility that anyone could die at any moment, and it could be gut-wrenching. But it has also regularly brought people back to life. The Mountain was as good as dead, until Qyburn injected him with some kind of zombie life.
Remember Melisandre at the end of season 5?
Not only have people already been brought back to life on "Game of Thrones," it's been done by a person serving the Lord of Light: Thoros, who brought back Beric Dondarrion of the Brotherhood Without Banners (remember him?) multiple times.
And by the season-five finale, another pupil of the Lord of Light, the red priestess Melisandre, looks ready to do the same. She has traveled to Castle Black, where Jon Snow is, putting her in the perfect position to give him life again after his grisly death at the end of season five.
Actress Carice Van Houten has even hinted at the likely outcome, saying that something "spectacular" is in store when the show comes back.
Melisandre saw Stannis as the one to take the Throne, but in the last episode, she had abandoned him, and she may just be eyeing Jon Snow as her best new hope. If so, she'll have to bring him back from sure death first.
Fans of the books have already been saying Jon Snow will be resurrected for years.
The scene in which Jon Snow is stabbed is in the most recent of the "Game of Thrones" books, published in 2011. And since then, readers have been gathering all sorts of evidence for why he's coming back that's also in the show.
You can read the book fans' full theories here, including Snow's potential warging abilities, but it's certainly illuminating that, back in the day, George R.R. Martin answered a question about why he killed Jon Snow by saying, "Oh, you think he's dead, do you?"
In the book, Jon Snow's fate remains unfinished. The description of the attack simply trails off like so: "He never felt the fourth knife. Only the cold …"
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