Summary
- The final seasons of
Game of Thrones
veered off from George R.R. Martin’s original story, disappointing many fans. - Showrunners Benioff and Weiss considered a theatrical finale for the series, but HBO stuck to the TV format due to the name.
- The idea of ending
Game of Thrones
with cinematic movies was scrapped, resulting in a rushed conclusion with a reduced episode count.
Almost five years on from the divisive Game of Thrones finale, debate around the way the series crafted its ending is still ongoing. Now in a new profile piece by The Wall Street Journal showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss have confirmed a long rumored fact about the final season of the fantasy series.
Game of Thrones was adapted from George R.R. Martin’s unfinished book series A Song of Ice and Fire. After the series hit the point where Martin’s official story ended, the final seasons were allegedly based on the bare bones of Martin’s continuation of the story, but for many fans, they veered off from its source material in directions they did not want.
Although there have been many calls for the final season of Game of Thrones to be completely remade, that is not going to happen. Martin himself hinted in 2020 that there had originally been a potential theatrical conclusion to the story discussed instead of the two reduced seasons that played out the final act of the saga, an idea that Benioff and Weiss have now confirmed was indeed their plan.
According to Benioff, a plan was pitched to HBO to conclude the series with a trilogy of theatrical movies, but they were reminded that HBO stands for “Home Box Office.” Of course, the line between TV and cinema is becoming more blurred all the time, and that has included many TV shows that have considered or gone through with cinematic releases, such as Downton Abbey, while others that were planned, like The Walking Dead’s Rick Grimes story, ultimately fell through and ended up reverting to a TV show instead.
Would Game of Thrones Movies Have Resulted in a Better Ending?
The duo’s vision for a grand cinematic finale stemmed from a desire to explore the stories of the show’s characters in more depth and an epic scope than a TV budget could handle, but it was not an idea that HBO wanted to explore. While there is a strong argument that the final chapters of the story could have been given a supersized movie budget that they deserved, it is unlikely that the final result would have been much different.
The final two seasons of Game of Thrones were marked by a reduced episode count, with season seven containing seven episodes and season eight only six, compared to the ten-episode format of its predecessors. This resulted in around 13 hours for the show to conclude several intricately linked tales. If Benioff and Weiss had been granted three movies to do this instead, the chances are that this would have resulted in a runtime closer to nine hours, leaving even less time for the conclusion to play out.
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Considering one of the major complaints about the ending of the series was the lack of time given to some characters, with long-standing narratives being simply ended in a few scenes, then it is probable that the movie route would have made this even worse. Perhaps in the end, even with all the criticism that followed, the finale of Game of Thrones was better as it was, than anything it could have been with a theatrical release.
Of course, the controversies surrounding the conclusion of the series has not stopped HBO returning to the franchise with the prequel series The House of the Dragon, which mostly pleased fans and is gearing up to release a second season this year. Plans have also been revealed for the next spin-off, The Hedge Knight, which is set to start production soon with the aim of airing sometime in 2025.
Watch Game of Thrones
We’ve wanted a Game of Thrones movie for a while, and here’s our video why it’s time to make one:
