Game of Thrones season 6 episode 4: Littlefinger actor Aidan Gillan insists he is now a force for good
'For me ... there’s a level of atonement.'
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Your support makes all the difference.Petyr Baelish is one of Game of Thrones’ most interesting and more complicated characters, flitting between good intentions and pure self interest.
So what will his motivation be when he returns this Sunday in S06E04 ‘Book of the Stranger’?
According to actor Aidan Gillen, he genuinely wants to make up for giving Sansa over to a tyrant.
“For me, this time out, there’s a level of atonement in relation to Sansa and my misjudgment of Ramsay Bolton,” he told Entertainment Weekly. “A lot of what I’m up to is atonement and really trying to align myself the right people … I left Sansa married to a psychopath. It’s probably the one time we’ve seen Littlefinger slip up. He really didn’t know about him. He should have.”
Many fans were skeptical of Littlefinger marrying Sansa to Ramsay and accused him of being disingenuous, but Gillen insists that his character was genuinely clueless to the Bolton’s true nature.
“[In] the world of our story everyone does not know [about Ramsay’s behavior]. A lot happens behind closed doors, or closed gates,” he sadded. “I know it seems unlikely Petyr Baelish, who knows everything, would be unaware of his reputation and the depths of his cruelty. In a way, this shows a new side of him, a faltering, and I do want to make amends.”
Bealish is know for betraying people, and approaching situations in terms of what he can get out of them, but he apparently does have a genuine “paternal warmth” for Sansa.
“I like Sansa, you know?,” Gillen said, “So I’m trying to find something humane and gentle and maybe even warm in the midst of my treachery and calculation – which is pathological … But you can only do what’s on the page.”
His words should be taken with a pinch of salt though, as I’m sure HBO would have him saying this even if he murders everyone in Westeros this season. At any rate, judging by the trailer it looks as though Sansa’s creepy cousin Robin Arryn will be pulled into Littlefinger’s web.
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