It may be spring, but winter is coming to Binghamton University.
On Monday night, HBO campus ambassadors held a “Game of Thrones” viewing party, trivia contest, raffle and an attempted costume contest in the Undergrounds Coffeehouse.
Students entered the Undergrounds to the tune of the epic “Game of Thrones” intro music before they were shown the season 3 premiere and second episode.
Kaila Pfister, a junior majoring in history, won the costume contest with her corset and Winterfell-styled cloak, taking home season 2 of the show. However, one could argue that Pfister had an unfair advantage, considering she was the only person to dress up.
“It wasn’t advertised that much,” Pfister said.
Jessica Linda, one of the event’s hosts and a senior majoring in human development, said that getting people to dress up was difficult.
“I sent an email to L.A.R.P.” she said. “Unfortunately we didn’t hear anything back from them.”
A game of “GOT” trivia followed the costume contest, starting out relatively easy for most fans of the show, with questions like, “What is the name of Jon Snow’s albino direwolf?” Nearly all 30 or so students in attendance quickly raised their hands to say “Ghost,” the correct answer.
However, questions got increasingly more obscure, and fewer hands shot up. Few students knew that John Aryn’s last words were “the seed is strong.”
When asked, “Where do the Tullies (one of the numerous families in ‘GOT’) rule,” nobody guessed the correct answer. The host, Monique Thompson, a senior majoring in English, said the correct answer was “the Vale.” But Michael Hickey, a sophomore majoring in computer science, argued that the Tullies do not in fact rule the Vale.
“I don’t know how they confused it. The Tullies rule in Riverrun, which they haven’t showed on the show,” Hickey said, wearing his paper GOT crown and sitting in the center of the front row.
Thomson told the crowd that she got her information directly from HBO.
“You could definitely tell the front row was people who read the book,” said Joseph Clain, a sophomore majoring in history. “There is a huge dichotomy between people who have read the book and people who have just seen the show.”
Hickey had, in fact, read all of the books, and believes the third season will be the best one yet. It will be based on the first half of the mammoth third installment in the “A Song of Fire and Ice” series.
There was also a raffle in which nearly everyone in attendance won some sort of “Game of Thrones” or HBO merchandise.
“I got a pretty sweet dragon poster,” said Travis Lageman, a sophomore majoring in biochemistry.
Linda said she was pleased with the event and with the HBO program at Binghamton in general.
“I was a [HBO] campus ambassador last year also, but we didn’t get to do as much because we didn’t have the support of the University and this semester we are more involved with Binghamton University,” Linda said. “We spoke to the right people this time and we are getting more encouragement from Binghamton.”