With the Battle of Winterfell [1] finally over, it's time for the last handful of episodes of Game of Thrones [2] to fix their attention on the other major issue at hand: the battle for the Iron Throne. It appears that next week's episode [3] will see Daenerys and the Northern army — or at least what's left of it [4] — heading to King's Landing to deal with Cersei, who now has the advantage of a larger army thanks to her decision to not follow through on her promise to fight alongside the North in Winterfell. As we run the numbers and continue questioning if Daenerys has what it takes to beat Cersei, let's take a second to recap which houses are on which side in the pursuit of the throne.
Which Houses Are Fighting For Daenerys?
According to a very attentive Reddit thread [6], Daenerys starts off season eight with just under 8,000 Unsullied, 100,000 Dothraki, and a small amount of survivors of the Loot Train Attack on the Lannister army [7] last season. With Jon's help, she also manages to bring in 10,000 Northerners and 10,000 Knights of the Vale, not to mention the men Theon arrives with when he returns to Winterfell in episode two [8].
So yeah, assuming that the above numbers were accurate, Dany was pretty stacked with soldiers. But like we mentioned, her army takes quite the hit when they're forced to defend Winterfell from a never-ending horde of zombies [9]. By the episode's end, it isn't made clear just how many people are left standing behind her, but we know for sure that she still has both of her dragons (praise be [10]) and a great majority of the show's main players — that's Jon, Sansa, Arya, Jaime, Tyrion, Brienne, Grey Worm, Missandei, Ser Davos, the Hound, Podrick, Gendry, Samwell, Tormund, and yes, even Ghost [11]. Judging by a few photos that were released ahead of next week's episode [12], she also still has the support of a pretty decent amount of the Unsullied who survived that initial charge, as well as the rest of the Northerners who were still standing once the Night King was finally taken down by Arya [13].
Which Houses Are Fighting For Cersei?
Going into episode four, Cersei has quite a bit more power behind her in terms of the size of her army. She has the remaining soldiers in King's Landing, the 20,000 to 50,000 Ironborn men that Euron brings to her [15], and around 20,000 mercenaries from the Golden Company. But the numbers aren't the only reason that Cersei has a bit of an advantage now: the Golden Company [16] in particular, who's she's seen requesting the services of back in season seven, is considered by many as the most skilled army in Essos. They'd be a pretty good match for the Dothraki and the Unsullied, who are also pretty adept, but whose numbers have been decimated. So, if another battle does end up happening, it's pretty tough to think about what that outcome might look like for the khaleesi.
And let us not forget that Cersei also still has a bunch of wildfire at her disposal [17]. Just as Daenerys can use the strength of her dragons to torch the city in its entirety, Cersei can do the same, arguably on an even more frightening scale [18].
The final season of Game of Thrones is already halfway over, and even though things are looking pretty bleak for the small number of people left on #TeamDaenerys, it's still too soon to tell how everything will play out. We'll have to tune in to the remaining episodes to get a look at all the action that's to come [20].