Robin Arryn was the character, in Game of Thrones; who will forever be remembered as the child who was breastfed until the age of ten. He first appeared alongside his mother Lysa Arryn, residing in the Vale; and demanding to see Tyrion Lannister “fly” aka fall to his death through the Moon Door, in season one. While he maintained his bratty behavior a few seasons later when Littlefinger brought Sansa to the Vale, no one was complaining when realizing that the almost unrecognizable Robin Arryn was sitting alongside the heads of other major Houses in HBO’s Game of Thrones’s series finale.
Lino Facioli was only 14 when we last saw him, now almost 19 years old, and since his appearance in the final episode of season eight, the internet is buzzing that this young actor has “glowed up”.
https://twitter.com/JacFishTweets/status/1130307695024721923
Robin Arryn straight up longbottomed us #GameOfThrones pic.twitter.com/hhFQYGq5Ir
— Em Cee ✨ (@Shaquil_Oatm3al) May 20, 2019
We all deserved an ending to #GameofThrones as powerful as Robin Arryn’s glow up but we didn’t get that. pic.twitter.com/G2uylhUDF1
— Libra’s Groove 🇹🇴 (@lobeyni) May 20, 2019
https://twitter.com/captbrie/status/1130311500654977025
While fans were shocked at this transformation, Facioli was shocked by the online reaction – expressing in an interview with IndieWire:
“Honestly, I’m still a bit in awe of it. There’s always been a response to some extent every year, but then this year was a whole new deal. It still feels a bit unreal. It is crazy that this is happening, but I love it.”
He continued:
“Seeing a meme with your face on it is quite funny. It’s the first time a friend has been like, ‘Oh shit, OK, you’re famous now, Lino’. Obviously, I don’t really realize that I’ve been growing, that I’m changing, but in doing this, I had family members who watched it and didn’t realize it was me.”
Facioli also went into the call that asked him to come back to the show:
“The level of secrecy gets higher and higher because there’s such a danger of leaks each year,” He continued about being reunited with Sophie Turner, who played Sansa over the course of the eight seasons, and who had a scene or two with Robin, “Oh, it was brilliant. I think she was surprised how much I’ve changed as well because we hadn’t worked since four years ago. So coming back was quite a shock for both of us.”
Facioli recalls his audition:
“It was the scene in the first season where Tyrion (Peter Dinklage) comes to the Eyrie, and he’s trying to get a trial by combat, and I’m like, ‘Make the bad man fly!’ I just remember getting really, really into it and coming out of the audition and I was shaking. I just remember channeling the energy of a scared chihuahua, one of those very angry, aggressive, chihuahuas.”
As for what happened to Robin in between the times we had last seen him, where he would be Lord of the Vale and presumably had to strengthen up, Facioli says:
“Everyone I know on set was getting killed off, but somehow, miraculously I made it through. I personally think that he’s actually turned into an amazing warrior, but he doesn’t want that little place at the table at the end, he doesn’t even want the glory. He seems pretty content with himself after having been through a lot in his past with that crazy, psychotic relationship with his mom.”
You can read the whole interview at IndieWire. What did you think of the finale and Robin Arryn’s transformation?
A girl with too many fandoms to count.
