8 Amazing TV Characters That Were Only Supposed To Appear In One Episode

Considering Game of Thrones' mammoth cast of characters (and how many of them end up dead), it's unsurprising when actors only turn up for a couple of scenes and are never seen again. The world of Westeros is huge, and the writers weren't afraid to discard people once their role in the narrative was fulfilled.

Sometimes though they did manage to make room for actors and characters that really impressed them. Take the latter seasons' standout star, Bella Ramsay, who was initially only drafted in for a single scene in Season 6. Playing Lyanna Mormont, the young head of House Mormont, Ramsay's biting performance made her a striking screen presence, and her excellent single scene impressed the showrunners so much, they had no choice but to flesh out her role in future seasons.

As co-showrunner David Benioff put it in an EW interview:

"Part of what excites me is the performance of these actors. So many of them have been with us since the beginning and they’ve grown—both literally for the kids, and as characters. In many cases, they’re going so far beyond what was expected for them. Some, like Lyanna Mormont, were just supposed to be in one scene. Bella is such an incredible actress that we kept bringing her back because we wanted more Bella."