Game Of Thrones Season 8 Breakdown: What 'Winterfell' REALLY Means

13. The Tension In The North

When Jon and Dany settle into Winterfell, they call a meeting of their bannermen and it's telling that Sansa takes the lead, instructing young Lord Umber to return to his home and bring his people South to Winterfell. His response, of confusion in who to address, says everything about the situation in the North right now.

Jon's biggest issue at the minute will be rallying his men (again) and proving he hasn't compromised his power or their position to Dany. His bannermen have turned to Sansa for leadership and she's risen to the task, hence Tyrion's strange pride in her (how they're going to navigate their marriage now is an interesting question). But some loyalists have already showed their hands and prefer to stay away now that Jon has bent the knee.

The North is a stubborn place and a backward one (hence the tension at the sight of Grey Worm and Missandei) and it may well be that Jon marrying Dany is the only way forward - if it makes him equally powerful, of course. Their trust has to be earned, as Davos points out. Not that any of that will matter when they're being eaten by wights.

And logistically, as Sansa pointed out, feeding the largest army the world has ever seen is not an easy task - particularly when resources are low already. No amount of pithy lines about dragons eating whatever they want will help remedy that. If anything, they're just going to make it worse.