Curtain Call: Art Parkinson

Hindsight is 20/20, but perhaps we should have written a Curtain Call for Art Parkinson back in Season 3.

Now, that’s a little unfair of me. After all, his character, Rickon was not actually dead. He did not die until this week in the “Battle of the Bastards.” But though Rickon was technically part of Season 6, he only showed up twice, and for no more than five minutes altogether. Moreover, he never spoke this season Though Parkinson, like Isaac Hempstead Wright had clearly hit puberty (and puberty hit back), we never even got to hear if his voice had changed.

And that really sucks! And not just because some of us were curious to see how Parkinson had grown as an actor during his two years away from the production. Parkinson also holds the honor of being the youngest actor cast in the show who remained in his role the entire way through the production. (The other child actor who was as young as Parkinson when he was cast, Callum Wharry, was replaced with Dean-Charles Chapman in Season 4.) Perhaps that’s because there was no point is changing him out, since he wouldn’t have that much to do in Season 6.

The worst part is that Parkinson was actually good in the role. Rickon is a character that everyone forgets about–the youngest, most extraneous Stark (this is true in the books too, where he’s much younger–like 3 years old, instead of 8 years old when the story begins) and he’s sort of a toddler appendage to Bran’s band of travelers until Osha decides to take him off to the Umbers. (From where we haven’t seen him again.) Many suspected that Rickon’s direwolf’s name Shaggydog was a hint that the character was a red herring and unimportant (as that is what “shaggydog” means in writing parlance.) And now the show as proved them right.

So I would like to remember Art Parkinson as he was, back in the earlier seasons, as a believable little kid, scared as hell, but brave because he had a direwolf by his side, and always trying to live up to the models presented by Robb, Jon, Bran and his father. Others may have forgotten Rickon, but Parkinson always did a much better job at making an impression that say the original Tommen, or Myrcella (Aimee Richardson, who was also replaced before her final season.)

And Parkinson may yet go on to have a decent career with Game of Thrones as his launchpad. Last year he starred with Mr. The Rock in the San Andreas disaster movie, and his IMDb shows that he’s been working steadily during his time away from the show. I’m only sorry that he wasn’t given even one word for us this year: Farewell. Even if the character was, as Sansa so correctly asserted, already dead.

Via http://winteriscoming.net/2016/06/23/curtain-call-art-parkinson/