The actor who plays Bran revealed the secret behind that iconic “Bran stare,” and LOL

Game of Thrones Season 8 has kicked off with plenty of ice and fire. The premiere of the HBO series’ final season was filled with some, well, uncomfortable moments. In fact, fans are still talking about Bran’s decidedly creepy facial expression as he waited for “an old friend” (aka Jaime Lannister). And it turns out that Isaac Hempstead Wright, who plays the youngest surviving Stark, has a pretty reasonable explanation for why the Three-Eyed Raven has such a soul-piercing gaze.

On the April 17th episode of Jimmy Kimmel Live!, Jimmy Kimmel brought up the moment when Bran and Jaime saw each other for the first time since Jaime tried to kill Bran by pushing him out of a tower window. Kimmel specifically mentioned “the look you gave him.”

"I’m kind of getting good at this sort of intense stare," Hempstead Wright told Kimmel. "But it’s kind of aided by the fact that I’m completely blind when I’m on set. I don’t have my glasses, and I don’t have contact lenses."

Hempstead Wright’s Three-Eyed Raven stare was also a feature of Season 7, and he told Kimmel that once, when he was shooting a scene with Sophie Turner, she commented on how creepy it was.

"She said to me, 'Isaac, your stare is like you're staring into my soul,'" he recalled. "And I said, 'I can't see you.'"

The Three-Eyed Raven may be able to see all, but Hempstead Wright, well, can’t. Bran’s thousand-yard stare suddenly feels less scary.