When the news recently broke that Game of Thrones showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss had signed a deal with Netflix rumored to be “in the 9-figure range, worth as much as $300 million, spanning 5 years,” many of us wondered how they could possibly find the time for their upcoming Star Wars films, which had been quietly announced just a few months beforehand. As it turns out, the answer is that they could not.
Deadline had the exclusive: the showrunners’ deal with Lucasfilm to create a new Star Wars trilogy, which was set to begin in 2022, is off due to their new Netflix deal:
“We love Star Wars,” David and Dan told Deadline. “When George Lucas built it, he built us too. Getting to talk about Star Wars with him and the current Star Wars team was the thrill of a lifetime, and we will always be indebted to the saga that changed everything. There are only so many hours in the day, and we felt we could not do justice to both Star Wars and our Netflix projects, so we are regretfully stepping away.”
Meanwhile, Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy wasn’t as final about it, insinuating they could eventually come back–when they have the time, that is: “David Benioff and Dan Weiss are incredible storytellers. We hope to include them in the journey forward when they are able to step away from their busy schedule to focus on Star Wars.”
In other news, Deborah Riley, production designer for Game of Thrones from season four onward, just did a really nice, technically-minded interview for Backstage magazine in which she discusses what her work as a production designer on the show means and, in retrospect, what her favorite designs and finished sets turned out to be:
“To this day, I still get quite emotional thinking about the Meereen audience chamber,” Riley says of her first big design project coming into season four. “I was very nervous about my position at that point. Then once that was built, it was like, ‘I’m going to be fine.’ It was a relief to survive. I’ll never forget that one for that. Before it was brought down, I went and said a little quiet goodbye to it because I was very fond of it.”
“Working all the way through to Dragonstone, I loved,” Riley says of the castle’s amazing throne room first seen in season seven. “Even what we did in Season 8, it was such an emotional experience not only in terms of the story we were telling but in terms of the art department. To build something and then destroy it, and to destroy this throne room that had been standing for so many years, I found it quite traumatic to do all of that.”
For a much deeper look at what her job entailed, read the whole interview at Backstage.
In the long run this can be probably smartest move for them.
They need their “The Leftovers” show now, like Lindelof had after controversial ending of Lost, to prove that despite what people thought about the ending of Lost, he is still good writer.
They need something like The Crown. Show with smaller audience, but with prestige. You can’t prove that you are capable writer while working on big blockbuster movie.
On the other hand, Lucasfilm continues to change directors all the time. I feel at this point that The Rise of Skywalker will underperform. The whole franchise is in not so great position.
Lucasfilm dumped them.
They did not have the time to do movies for one of the biggest movie franchises? Instead, they are going to doing streaming TV with a network that many doubt its future. Good PR work but we were not all born yesterday.
And after that interview in Texas, they need to excel in their next effort. All they have done so far is fail upward.
Oh, Beinoff’s next effort is already a dud.
Gemini Man where Beinihoff is credited as a lead writer is a major critical and audience failure. The writing is reported to be laughably bad. That could not have helped with Star Wars, even if other writers not named Weiss were also involved.
Riley always did a great job. And the throne-room of Meereen is brilliant. One of the things that made this show that great. It felt real when you watch it because the locations are perfectly made.
But when it comes to Dragonstone-counsil room, I prefer the season 2 vibe it had.
You can’t hold two watermelons under the same armpit, they say in my country.
(it’d be to the detriment of both)
So they did well. I suppose the “divorse” was a soft one.
I wish them that they keep making money for their new channel and jobs for people.
kevin1989,
I think the set for Eyrie is underrated. But since it was made for S1 with different set disagner it makes sense Riley won’t talks about it.
All throne rooms were unique and interesting. Iconic KL’s, Dragonstone, Meereen and Eyrie.
Watermelons under the same armpit, lol!
These are two guys with 4 armpits between them but I get the picture you are painting.
Mango,
Script for that movie was written before GoT.
And it had 7 different rewrites with 7 different writers, because it was in development since 1997.
Just like with X man movie its not fair to put blame on one writer, especially if we know that director is the most responsible person in movies.
Great job Mrs Rilley! I hope there’s more productions for you to unfold this unique talent.
I loved the Meereenese throne room (in my imagination I pictured it somewhere in ancient Egypt, lol, or Persia), Dragonstone was more captivating for its meaning, suggesting power and terror, harshness and rigidness.
I also loved the library at WF! (perhaps because I’m a bookworm like Sam)
While I don’t believe the reasoning, I think D&D are better off away from SW. If people think GOT fans are bad, they haven’t seen the (worst) SW fans in action, they have an added dose of pure misogyny. Saying that though, if D&D were women… oh boy.
Going from one highly strung fanbase to another seemed crazy to me from the get go. I think mau is right, work on something smaller and see where that takes them.
kevin1989,
I love the Dragonstone throne, and I think I prefer the council room in S7, but only because of the sea view. Everywhere is better with a sea view.
Mango,
Yeah, we produce them over here. We know what we’re talking about. Imagine them big, as big as they get -and no, tiny little ones looking like socker footballs are too small, rather put two of these next to one another and you’ve got a picture of how big a watermelon can be.
I love that one too. I think all the seasons has great designs. Wonderful crew working on GoT.
Jenny,
That’s right but didn’t the old one also have sea view? I remember that they changed the square pillars for round pillars. I prefer the square because it felt more what dragonstone is, a empty dark place that doesn’t feel to warm (warm as in embracing not as in temperature). Or was this introduced in season 3? The open counsil room?
Yes, I know he was not fully to blame. But it would have helped if G-Man was a big success. He would have been given some credit.
It did not help to have his name listed as a lead writer even if he was involved in the source material in 1997. It was released after GOT and so falls into his current resume as well. Unless we agree count GOT as 200 years ago because that is when GRRM wrote the source material.
I still wish them both good fortune with the scripts to come. (This melon conversation has put me in a mellow mood.)
Jenny,
SW fans are horrible. Somehow TLJ became part of these culture wars so defending TLJ became like a political statement against alt-right trolls. Haters of TLJ are even worse, but I dislike it’s fans as well.
I don’t hate TLJ like many do, it has some good things in it, but it’s messy movie and some people are treating it as some misunderstood masterpiece. Lol
They think they are really smart when they say TLJ is the best SW movie ever, which is a complete nonsense.
It would be like treating GoT S8 as some masterpiece of television writing, which it clearly wasn’t. But since GoT wasn’t part of culture wars in USA, critics didn’t need to overpraise it.
MonsterMelons!
Maybe we can write a movie about the world being attacked by monster melons. We will be rich!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I will get started. Maybe name the main character, Efi?
Mango,
I don’t think it matters that much because that movie is a flop on box office and no one cares about it. Writings credits on movies are strange things because writers don’t have real power. Just like Craig Mazin had so many movies that he wrote with bad reviews, but once when he had full creative control over Chernobyl it worked really well.
The first real D&D job post-Thrones will be new netflix show or movie. Not this.
mau,
All good points.
Craig’s movies have some bad critical reviews but some have been popular with audiences. (Yes, critics are more demanding!) He seems to like writing these goofball movies.
For Chernobyl, he moved to a non-fiction (ish!) genre and had more creative control. It worked and I think this may be his best medium. I notice that he is going to Pirates of the Caribbean soon – so back to goofy stuff.
D&D had creative control for GOT. GOT was stunning because their team (and maybe some of these were HBO recommendations/hires!) were top notch. The set design, the costume, casting – the production values were great. (HBO programs always win awards for production values.) The weakest link was theirs – the writing.
mau,
Yeah, SW has that added political element which makes it so much worse. It’s divisiveness is quite amazing, because it didn’t seem to be making any grand statements that I could see. I don’t quite know how it happened. I know people who like TLJ far more than I do, I put it in the distinctly ‘fine’ category. I just think half of it is boring, the Finn/Rose plot was boring and a failure, so its pretty unforgivable filler. The only part worth watching is Rey/Luke/Kylo, which I really enjoyed, but a lot of people didn’t like that either. I think TLJ was ambitious, so it gets credit for that, I think that is why some people go the extra mile to defend it, when it was just fine/good. Return of the Jedi is the best movie anyway.
kevin1989,
I’ll have to have a look, I think it was always night in S2, I can only remember it being really dark so probably missed the details.
Mango,
Well I expect that they will build great team for Netflix shows as well.
Writing is the hardest and the most divisive part of every movie/show/book. It’s always much easier to agree about costimes, sets and music. And almost the entire show did have great reviews. Only at the end it became mixed because critics didn’t like treatment of female characters and POC.
I believe you’re quite right. Let me add my two cents [if this reply doesn’t get zapped like the one that just vanished into the ether a few minutes ago 🤢]:
to be cont.
Cont. from 10:42 am:
• I’m still clinging to my tinfoil prediction that Netflix is going to implode. I cannot fathom how Netflix can throw $100 million dollar development deals to Ryan Murphy (I think), Benioff & Weiss, and other “big name” showrunners and still expect to generate enough revenue to recoup its costs – especially with so many other streaming services and “platforms” coming online.
• I’m curious whether other companies that search out young, relatively untested creative talent with fresh ideas (and at more modest prices) will ultimately do better than high rollers like Netflix.
• And…
to be cont.
Cont. from 10:50 am
• And… (Wishful thinking):
Wouldn’t it be just wonderful if a bunch of young unknowns collaborate through Maisie Williams’s Daise app and create from scratch a series that catches fire and outperforms the big budget dinosaurs?
Oh my goodness…this is building to something big.
I am not exactly young but I am unknown. I will write a script about monster melons attacking Earth. I will persuade Maise to play the main character called Efi and then I will pitch to Netflix. We will run the repeats on the Daisie app.
Rich, I can see it now.
Mango,
Disney & James Gunn a year or so back – THAT is what a “dumping” looks like. Disney thought/knew that Gunn had fucked up, so they issued press statements explaining why they let him go. They don’t have to be super polite about that sort of thing.
There are no such parallels with that situation and the situation between Disney and D&D. In all honesty, Netflix probably gave them a better deal than Disney.
But please, don’t mind me. It’s always amusing to see you in every comment section concerning D&D, seeing shadows and lies and conspiracies everywhere, desperately trying to twist every single thing that concerns them to suit your narrative.
After all, there’s no way the two showrunners of a decade-long epoch-defining television show that all the way through its final season won hundreds of awards and was nominated for hundreds more and was viewed religiously by countless tens of millions around the world from all walks of life, adapted from a previously-somewhat-well-known incomplete weirdo fantasy book series created all but specifically to be unadaptable for television… would be in-demand in any way shape or form. No way. Inconceivable.
Can’t really dispute anything you wrote. 🤓 (See my previous comments above…) I’ll just add that:
Whether “Lucasfilm dumped them” or not, the Star Wars “franchise” blows. “The Force Awakens” was a hokey, derivative retread, and from others’ comments “The Last Jedi” was more of the same, e.g., a cookie cutter repeat of plot lines from prior SW films.
It’s probably a blessing that Benioff & Weiss have been untethered from Star Wars. Benioff & Weiss arguably (and understandably) suffered from creative exhaustion towards the end of GoT.* Jumping into an already-stale, played-out fictional universe like Star Wars wouldn’t be such a great idea now, would it?
* More on that some other time, but I found it telling that in their recent comments at the Austin Film Festival, B&W revealed that they deflected HBO’s encouragement to expand their writing team.
Instead, with the exception of a few episodes written by Bryan Cogman, Dave Hill, and maybe Vanessa Taylor (?), Benioff & Weiss stuck with their routine of writing the GoT scripts themselves, i.e., each writing half of an episode, and then re-tooling each other’s drafts.
It’d be no wonder that after 60 or so episodes B & W might have been played out and creatively exhausted – though unable to see that without “fresh eyes” in the room to provide objective assessments and new ideas.
That’s true, but the condition for writers was to be on the set all the time, like Cogman and Hill were and for a lot of writers that wasn’t something they would do.
mau,
But I agree that big writers room in the last 4 seasons would have been a good thing. The fact that they wrote like 85% of the show is crazy. Vince Gilligan takes credit for Breaking Bad, but majority of best episodes weren’t written by him.
mau,
D&D wrote 80% of S1, 60% of S2, 70% of S3, 70% of S4, 70% of S5, 70% of S6, 5/7 of S7, and 4/6 of S8. They’ve consistently written almost three quarters of the show the entire way through. And for most of the run the vast majority of the audience was on board.
I agree that it’s probably for the best that D&D aren’t doing Star Wars. Just about anyone who has touched that franchise since the prequels has done a terrible job, IMO. As others have noted, if they thought the GoT fans were tough, it pales nothing in comparison to Star Wars fans.
On the other hand, D&D could’ve been the ones to….ahem…”make Star Wars great again”, which would catapult them to legendary status to even the most ardent D&D haters.
Personally, I wish they would just let Star Wars rest in peace and stop resurrecting the franchise. Do something new and original for a change. Stop bringing it back. Every time it comes back it’s a bit less. Pieces get chipped away.
Farimer123,
I was on board until that Jon Snow’s smile at the end of 806.
Which may be illustrated by this classic scene from “Dirty Dancing”
[at 0:00 – 4:42: Staffer struggling to hold three watermelons asks hotel guest “Baby” (Jennifer Grey) for help bringing them into a staff dance party.]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aB6NUK3TZqY
Especially at 4:32 – 4:42: After watching Johnny (Patrick Swayze) dance, Baby is taken aback when he comes over to her. She blurts out: “I carried a watermelon.”
Then a beat later, can’t believing she said something so lame, she mocks herself: “‘I carried a watermelon’?”
Mango,
” (This melon conversation has put me in a mellow mood.)”
Here you go then…
“Mellow Yellow” (Donovan)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bb3WpOJvsug
…A soundtrack for your mood.
Works for me! It can’t be any less intriguing than Bran becoming king because he has the best story.
mau,
“WHAT?! JON SNOW IS NOT SUPPOSED TO SMILE!!!! THEY’VE RUINED THE SHOW!!! REEEEEEEEE”
Hehe jk
Mr Derp,
They make the universe seem awfully small, If they are going to carry on, i’d rather see stories not involving the OT characters. Other people exist in that galaxy I assume lol. That said I’m on board with the Obi-Wan series because I love him and I’m a hypocrite.
Jenny,
Tbh I don’t have very strong feelings one way or another. As long as it’s well-made overall, I’m game for whatever SW the powers-that-be serve us. Idk if it’ll ever be as big as the Skywalker saga again tho.
Thank you for the statistics.
And yes, for most of the run the vast majority of the audience was on board.
Still, (based on your stats), would it really be surprising that after writing 42 of the episodes in S1 – S6, Benioff & Weiss were running on fumes by the time they got to S7 and S8?
Remaining engaged and invigorated after all that effort and all that time is almost too much to ask in any human endeavor.
P.S. I forgot to mention earlier that GRRM had contributed scripts (forgot how many) to the early seasons. I really liked the episodes he’d scripted.
In retrospect, as I’ve said before, maybe it would have been better if he had continued to write scripts for the show. After all, his reason for discontinuing writing scripts was that he wanted to devote his time to writing TWOW. How did that work out? 🤔
I was expecting this was going to happen after their Netflix deal was announced. Still, I’m a little disappointed. I was excited about seeing what they can do with Star Wars, though a lot of you make really good points as to why it’s for the best. I am looking forward to their new Netflix show, though.
Mr Derp,
”Personally, I wish they would just let Star Wars rest in peace and stop resurrecting the franchise. Do something new and original for a change. Stop bringing it back. Every time it comes back it’s a bit less. Pieces get chipped away.”
Right? At this point, even the Lord of Light (channeling Sandor) would say “F*ck it. I’m done.”
We’re still waiting to see how that worked out…? 🙂
I remember this Vanity Fair article from a while back looking at the stuff that was pared down from the final script GRRM wrote for GoT:
It may have been too surreal for the show? The description of Arya’s melting face sounds like a certain melting watch from a certain surrealist painter… 😉
(1) I thought B & W said they abandoned that condition, e.g., when they were discussing Sapochnik filming “The Long Night.”
(2) Were the writers really on set during Mylod’s unfortunate tweaking of the S6 “The Broken Man” and “No One” scripts? His interviews made it sound like he had free rein to reinterpret what was on the page.
Ten Bears,
Of the first four episodes of S7 (which pretty much everyone adored), three of them were written by D&D. Rewatch the scene of Jaime and Olenna – does that sound like the writers were “running on fumes”?
I’m realizing more and more that it’s usually not the actual writing people have trouble with – it’s the broad strokes and major beats not going the way they wanted/expected.
Adrianacandle,
The final script GRRM wrote for GoT was 4×2, and most of that stuff made it into the vision Bran had toward the end of that episode.
Parts were left in, yes, but not the Jon & Ghost/Lyanna and Benjen/Robb & Greywind/Jaime & Cersei/Shaggydog/Arya bits. I think the Robb and Arya bits were some of the strangest parts of the visions with their melting/dead transforming faces.
The article also mentions GRRM’s original script was far longer than the typical GoT script.
Parring it down is totally understandable (TV has limitations books do not) but what GRRM originally had in there is interesting.
Adrianacandle,
Thanks for that link to the 12/7/18 Vanity Fair article by Joanna Robison. The whole article is kind of long. I think she analyzes the differences between the 4 GoT episode scripts as penned by GRRM vs. what we saw on the screen, especially his last script, S4’s “The Lion and the Rose.” I’ll have to read it some other time; it looks interesting.
However, at first glance it seems Joanna Robinson is suggesting that GRRM’s publicly stated intention to devote all of his time to writing the books wasn’t the only reason why he stopped writing scripts for the show.
Hmmm… 🤔
Adrianacandle,
The Arya melting/changing scene may not have been practical – considerable CGI resources would have to be spent to make it not look wonky as hell. That’s the sorta of thing you could easily do in animation, but not live-action.
But in exchange for those cut things we got Ned with Ice in the Godswood, Ned in the dungeons, our first glimpse of the Night King, Bran’s first glimpse of a wight, and the ruined Iron Throne room.
Ten Bears,
Oh nobody believed that.
I also think you should watch the Last Jedi and write a review for my entertainment.
No. I don’t disagree with you. I’d suggest that midway through S7 is when the “fatigue” started becoming noticeable.
I am NOT whinging about disappointed expectations concerning the broad strokes and major beats. All I’m saying is that it would be unrealistic to expect that after taking on such a huge burden for so many years on end, B & W wouldn’t start to show a little wear and tear.
Ten Bears,
“The Lion and the Rose” might actually be my favorite episode in the entire series. It’s definitely a top 5 episode for me either way.
The only episodes that might beat that one for me would be “The Winds of Winter”, “Hardhome”, “Blackwater”, or “The Rains of Castamere”.
After that, there are a number of episodes that could vie for top 10 status:
“A Golden Crown”
“Valar Morghulis”
“And Now His Watch is Ended”
“Kissed By Fire”
“The Climb”
“The Children”
Ten Bears,
You’re right; that wasn’t the only reason. Because GRRM knew that the story was going to alter course significantly after it finished adapting SoS with S4. Hell, he probably encouraged such a change himself.
It was during the early stages of writing S4 that D&D met with GRRM and learned all the major beats of what would happen in WoW and beyond. At that point, GRRM probably agreed not to write anymore scripts beyond S4, because he knew it would have been very difficult for him to distill anything from the sprawling FfC/DoD into a feasible and effective television script.
NOT because as some conspiracy theorists would suggest: he quit writing scripts out of protest of D&D diverging from his books post S4. Like he would do something that petty.
Ten Bears,
Yes! She goes over the differences between GRRM’s script and the edited-down version. I do understand the reason for the edits — especially if the episode were overly long as it is and D&D do tone down the more magical elements of the show.
But things of interest for me: there’s this note that at one point, the direwolves may be expected to go against Ramsay’s hounds in the future. And that Joffrey might have been the true culprit behind Bran’s assassination attempt in season 1.
It’s interesting!
Oh, I totally get the reasons for the changes — some of this stuff doesn’t translate well to screen and there’d be a definite need to edit down an overly long script, stuff ends up on the cutting room floor all the time! It’s just an interesting article to read about some of the stuff GRRM wanted to show 🙂
– Nobody believed what? GRRM’s excuse for stepping away from script writing?
– Review “The Last Jedi”? Well I had sworn off Star Wars after “The Force Awakens” lit up my Internal Bad Movie Barometer* so severely that I thought I’d have to go to the hospital.
*( As I wrote a while back, for some reason watching a bad movie makes my right foot throb in pain. Sort of like how certain changes in air pressure or humidity aggravate joint pain in some people with arthritis and other rheumatoid conditions.)
Still, now that you’ve asked, I will watch “The Last Jedi” if and when it’s on cable, and let you know my reactions.
Mr Derp,
S4e7 “Mockingbird” is definitely in my Top Ten, if not #1. That’s probably because I’m a sucker for “high thread count” interpersonal scenes, and that episode is packed with them. (E.g. “I will be your champion” – Oberyn & Tyrion; “The pain was bad. The smell was worse. But the worse thing is that it was my brother who did it…” – Sandor & Arya).
Ten Bears,
Yay! Success! I hope you do watch it, when it’s on TV or something. Even if its a scathing review, I will enjoy reading it. You said Atonement made your foot fall asleep and I was SHOCKED lol. We agree on Pride and Prejudice though.
Yeah, it was more than just time. I don’t know what the full reason was but I think there was more to it than that. He seems happy enough to write TV shows now.
Adrianacandle,
”… But things of interest for me: there’s this note that at one point, the direwolves may be expected to go against Ramsay’s hounds in the future. And that Joffrey might have been the true culprit behind Bran’s assassination attempt in season 1.”
Gotta go. Real life calls. 😡
However, let me just say that I do wish that it had been made clear that Joffrey was the culprit behind the assassination attempt on Bran. I found the theories that emerged after S7e7 that LF had engineered it to be geographically and chronologically impossible – unless two African or European laden swallows flying in tandem had carried the dagger from KL to WF.
Ten Bears,
S7E1-4: I call it the Dragonstone arc. Or “The Last War, Part 1”. ~4h long. I would include the first ten minutes of E5 in this arc too (Dany burning the Tarlys – ending the arc on a bad omen of what’s to come).
S7E5-7: I call it the Eastwatch arc. Or “The Great War, Part 1”. ~3h20m long.
S8E1-3: I call it the Winterfell arc. Or “The Great War, Part 2.” ~3h20m long.
S8E4-6: I call it the King’s Landing arc. Or “The Last War, Part 2.” ~4h long. In my opinion, these four hours should have been divided into 4 hour-length episodes instead of 3 extended episodes. Even if the content had been exactly the same, it would have made stuff feel less rushed for many viewers.
I think it has much less to do with “wear and tear” and writer burnout and much more to do with how the mini-arcs of S7 & S8 were approached, created, and structured. Each of those arcs had distinctive reception: people loved the Dragonstone arc, generally liked the Eastwatch arc even if they thought certain logical aspects in E6 were wonky, generally liked the Winterfell arc even if some noisy people didn’t like how the Long Night played out, and were very mixed on the King’s Landing arc as a whole.
Jenny,
Yes! Good memory. “Atonement” also made my foot hurt, and was a huge disappointment after I had so enjoyed Joe Wright’s prior film, “Pride & Prejudice.”
Ten Bears,
So many great scenes in so many episodes that it’s hard for me to finalize any sort of top 10 list. Even my least favorite episodes in the show’s entirety have some great scenes. The first half of season 2 is probably my least favorite portion of GoT (possibly along with the first half of season 5), but it’s got great scenes like:
Tyrion banishing Janos to the Wall
Yoren/Arya conversation
Tyrion fleshing out that Pycelle is a spy for Cersei
Tyrion blackmailing Lancel
The beginning of Tywin/Arya conversations
Tyrion’s discovery of wildfire
In retrospect, Tyrion carried much of the weight of season 2 and it was probably Tyrion at his best.
Ten Bears,
Thank you, thank you.
When I collect my Nobel Prize for movie making (they will introduce one to honour me and my melon movie) I will be sure to mention that I could not have done it without your support. Particularly the Mellow Yellow at a critical point at the very start of my career. Very inspirational!
((((Keep this quiet…but I think I already have a fanatic, Farmeri (or whatever the name was. (See, I am already practicing superstar dismissiveness) is enjoying my conspiracy work.)))
Ten Bears,
D&D weren’t on set for The Long Night that much because they were directing The Iron Throne.
1) I do not enjoy Star Wars. Well, I have only seen some of one – made when Luke was a kid. I have never understood SW appeal but alas many love it.
2) I think that it is a good decision for D&D NOT to do Star Wars. I simply do not think they made the decision. It appears that SW and GOT may have quite an overlap in the target audience and the audience reaction to GOT was brutal. The owners of the SW franchise do not need to agitate their fandom anymore. D&D would have gotten the job because many thought they were masters of fantasy – until it was demonstrated that they were amateur comedians.
3) I am not sure why they would be so creatively burnt out. They pitched a second series on the Confederacy to HBO while GOT was still ongoing. This would be another melon in the armpit!
4) For GOT 8, they had endless material to adapt, they were not creating from zero. They had characters, storylines and the world building already provided. The first 4 seasons they stuck with the book and had GRRM to help them. They had to write from 5-7? (They really did no real writing for Season 8.) Two of them could not write 3 seasons of TV? Or hire talent?
Ten Bears,
For some reason I remember things like that about people, it just stays in there. It comes in very handy when having to make small talk with people I don’t see very often.
Mr Derp,
Tyrion and Cersei were brilliant in S2, you could just tell Peter and Lena were having a great time. They are my standout memory of that season, along with Sansa and Joffrey. There was some great stuff in KL.
S3 was all about Jon and Ygritte north of the wall, Arya at Harrenhal, the Red Wedding and of course Jaime and Brienne’s journey to KL. I properly love S3, but always skip the Ramsey/Theon stuff, it was just too much.
Lots to agree with here.
After reading the Rolling Stone story, that’s my conclusion as well.
Mango,
“MonsterMelons!
Maybe we can write a movie about the world being attacked by monster melons. We will be rich!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I will get started. Maybe name the main character, Efi?”
hahahahaha!
So, I was thinking of proper names all this time, while all along I had the weirdest deja vu thing… like…
But we’ve done that.
Seriously. We did. There’s a show over here, running for more than 10 years or so, then it’s iterrupted and then continues again when there’s sth new around. Guess what it’s titles are.
Aye. It’s the globe being attacked by gigantic watermelons. (I’m not joking).
It’s a political satire, mocks the events in my country (and all around, we don’t discriminate).
It’s called “The tent news” from the supposed most low-class citizens of my country who supposedly like to sit under a tent and either eat or/and sell watermelons. [this image of course has nothing to do with reality and now that I’m thinking about it, it seems rather racist].
Sorry Mango, you’ll get rich another time; in any case you won’t have the world’s first.
Mango,
They had endless material to adapt for S8? They did no real writing for S8? Whoa, that’s just… wow.
Farimer123,
There is no point in that discussion. His opinion is divorced from reality.
ThisGirlHasNoName,
You have proof? Or do you want to trade gossip like a couple of fishwives?
(i) There is a typo here in Point (4). should read for GOT, they had endless material to adapt.
(ii) They did not “real” writing for Season 8 – meaning their work was failing grade output.
Yea, me too. The biggest cocktease scene in the history of film during “The Bear and the Maiden Fair” and the general torture in season 3 is something that I skip every time I re-watch. It’s similar to season 2’s “Garden of Bones”. I call that the torture episode because it’s got scene after scene of it:
Sansa is publicly beaten
Joffrey has one whore beat the other for his own amusement
“The Tickler” torture scenes at Harrenhal
Talisa cuts a soldier’s leg off
Gotta be the most brutal episode in the show’s run. I think that’s the shadow baby episode as well.
Typo, sweetie!
Efi,
Hahhahhaaaaa! I knew it was too good to be true.
Okay, I will keep my day job.
Sigh.
mau,
Seems that way. He sounds like the lovely people over at r/freefolk. That place has always been filled with entitled shit-tier memers and trolls since well before S8.
I think you’re going to find that title will attract a rather different type of audience 😉
hahhahahhaaaa! You made me choke on my coffee!
Mr Derp,
Amazingly, GRRM wrote that episode (Bear and the Maiden) but didn’t write the Theon scene, that was added in afterwards. That’s how you know you are going too far lol. He did the audio commentary on that episode and said so.
Jenny,
Wow, I never knew that. Interesting to know!
The Bear and the Maiden Fair is one of my least favorite episodes, but it’s still a good one, nevertheless. I think my favorite part of that episode was the one time that Joffrey actually said something intelligent. He saw Dany and her dragons as a threat, but Tywin dismissed his concerns outright.
That, and also Ramin’s interpretation of the song, “The Bear and the Maiden Fair”. I honestly think that Ramin’s score/music might’ve been my favorite aspect of GoT overall.
He gets a lot of credit for “Light of the Seven”, and rightfully so, it’s a masterpiece, but there are so many other pieces he’s contributed to that should be recognized.
For example, the score he used in the beginning of “The Long Night” was perfect. That creepy, droning thump that’s playing while the camera follows Tyrion and others around as they prepare for battle was the perfect mood-setter.
Great decision of D&D. After experiencing the negativity and toxic behaviour of parts of the GoT-fandom it is wise for them to not work for StarWars. The Starwars-fandom is even more toxic.
“The Long Night” was a short one.
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/game-thrones-naomi-watts-led-prequel-dead-at-hbo-1250795?utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&utm_source=Direct
Mr Derp,
Don’t forget the actual bear and maiden! I love that scene.
Ramin is a genius, I loved ‘The Long Night’ but I have a soft spot for ‘Master of War’
The moment when Dany touches the throne, the music cue is just incredible. I love ‘The White Book’ as well, but it includes ‘I am yours and you are mine’ and it makes me cry so I can’t listen to it, its silly but I can’t help it. I appreciate Ramin marrying Jaime and Brienne even though it didn’t work out, it was a nice thing he snuck in.
Word is Naomi Watts GoT prequel (Bloodmoon???) is dead. HBO is deciding not to make it… Not very shocking. The choice of storyline was awful. Out of all the potential stories, they chose that…
Wow Jane Goldman’s pilot will not move forward. Damn that’s depressing news.
It’s the best thing that happened to Star Wars in years.
Aegon the IceDragon,
Yep, just seen that. It did seem odd to me when I found out about it, like they would be showing us what the Long Night should have looked like in S8.
I aren’t interested in the Targ prequel, no more incest for me thanks. Oh well.
The thing I don’t understand is why people hate TLJ but think that The Force Awakens was really good ?!??!
The force awakens was completely unoriginal and, frankly (the worst of sins) boring! The entire plot was a rehash of the original trilogy with a dash of the prequels.
Interesting news. Weren’t there people on here just days ago shitting on GRRM because the prequel was a sure thing, but GRRM’s next book wasn’t?
Wait a second, if they’re not making the Long Night prequel, then what are they making?
Farimer123,
They are apparently moving forward with the Targaryen civil war or something like that, but I don’t think that’s a sure thing yet either.
Mr Derp,
His next book will never be a sure thing. Even if he was chained to the desk, you can’t bring a horse to water and make it drink.
My comment wasn’t about GRRM’s book being a sure thing. What I said was that some posters were bragging that the books will never be done, but the prequels are a sure thing.
Personally, I’m thrilled that the prequel died on the vine. Let GoT rest in peace. Every time it comes back, pieces get chipped away.
Farimer123,
He already stated years ago that with season 5 he didn’t like that they cut that much out and that he urged them to include a certain character because that character would be important for the endgame (We only don’t know what the reason is). He didn’t seem that happy about them not listening to him, but he seem to control it. Also D&D stated that they had a amicable divorce with the source material and with George. In my country when words like that are used in the media it’s more about being professional. Instead of going into detail what really happen, which could hurt both parties. Both George and D&D have a lot to gain with giving a “positive spin” on it. D&D want new projects, and GRRM wants his work with HBO to continue, which also mean that George can’t criticize HBO biggest source of income, the show.
And also George stated that he couldn’t help the show anymore because he wanted to give all his attention to the books. We already know that that was just being professional, because if that was the reason, he wouldn’t be that heavily involved with the prequels. So time is not the issue with George.
But who knows what really happened behind the scenes. I certainly don’t care for it, especially now that it doesn’t change anything. We don’t know what George really think, because we ain’t George.
Ah, all this prequel talk. Reminds me of that part of that Eminem song:
“And there’s a million of us just like me
Who cuss like me, who just don’t give a fuck like me
Who dress like me, walk, talk and act like me
And just might be the next best thing, but not quite me”
Unless they miraculously pull a Better Call Saul and make it truly it’s own – apples and oranges and all that.
That’s news to me. In all my time in the GoT fandom I’ve never once read a word about that.
Could you give me a credible source for that?
It must be an interesting decision for HBO – should they screen a sequel? I think they will. So I will await confirmation on this news. However, GOT8 has made this a more complicated decision than it should have been.
Up to mid-season 7, it seemed to an obvious yes decision. GRRM has enough material already and enough new stories could be written by others to make Westeros the source of a new franchise for TV and maybe movies. However, does it make sense given the near obliteration of the story (and fanbase) that D&D managed to deliver at the end of GOT8?
HBO has more data than we do. They have sales data post-event. They can see how well the downloads, Blu rays etc, books and other licensed stuff are selling. They know that the GOT money spinner is damaged. This the holiday season – they should have been having a bumper season for sale of GOT products for gifts and celebrations. By now they know what the sales projections are and I expect they are well below what they should have been if GOT8 was a success.
Let us see how this evolves.
Farimer123,
And it’s not petty if he stopped writing for the show if they wouldn’t follow his books as it should. It’s his story and he gave it to D&D under the notion that they would take good care of his baby on screen. He turned down many and many who didn’t want to follow the story fully. And only follow certain characters. He wants that 90% of the characters are in (That are main of secondary). He trusted D&D with it. And if they decided that Feast and Dance are not up to follow George intentions with those books, yes I think he has the right to be pissed about it. Because they made a verbal agreement when they started the show that they would follow the books as closely as possible, and that he in return would help them with the story.
It’s the same as for instance a cook. You have a great recipe and you share it with other cooks to use and than they just change the recipe into a completely different meal. That’s what happened with feast and Dance, the intention of those books are completely different in the show than the books.
But for if I would have written the books and sold it when holding onto for so long, and I trusted the writers of the show to take good care of my books/baby, I could understand them not writing for instance the characters of Belwas or such characters. But I think I would be pissed when they exclude half the storylines I wrote in 2 huge books and just push it all into one season. And at the same time I would just play the professional guy when in the media. I would just stop helping them behind the scenes.
You don’t have to insult people. Just use arguments.
There is also the possibility that the pilot just wasn’t very good. Although Jane Goldman is a very good screenwriter.
I just don’t know if there was an appetite for a prequel with no known characters in it. At least people know the conquest.
kevin1989,
Mad Cat.? Right?
You are correct. GRRM has repeatedly said he did not approve.
Yea, there’s really no source material to draw on like they had for GoT. I’m sure there were plenty of creative differences during GoT too, but they at least had the original source material to rely on for the first 4 seasons or so. Probably too many cooks in the kitchen with different ideas for the prequel.
Would be funny if next week GRRM announced that he finished winds of winter.
Farimer123,
Better call Saul is amazing. Only long wait till season 5.
Farimer123,
His blog. I was reading his blog a lot back then. I will try to find it. Wish me luck because there are a lot of blogs he post since then.
Mango,
It seem I made a typo with too many things I wanted to write. I meant who but my though is that he meant LSH or Young Griff. And maybe both. I wonder what their role would be. I just reading clash of kings. around 2/3 in. And what my thoughts is that I really liked season 2 adaption even when lot’s was cut. For instance I just finish reading Davos chapter where he witness the birth of shadow baby. But this is after Renly is dead. And meant for another. I’m glad D&D decided to just go with 1 shadow baby for stannis. And just take over Storms End with Renly’s death. I didn’t have a problem with it. Or the absence of Edric Storm and that season 3 gave the leech scene to Gendry. But I have a huge problem with some things that is absent in season 5. Or the Sansa/Jeyne Poole combination. And I wonder why. I think because the last one had a huge butterfly effect, while shadow baby in storms end serve it’s purpose without having the story alter to much. It stays on the road.
Question? Was the way the Gold Company got comically trounced in the show a spoiler that they’re not really relevant to the books? Or was that a way of saying F. U. to George for his inability to give them more source material because of the extraneous (in some’s minds) side stories & characters he kept filling the books with?
Basically saying not only will we need not stretch book 5 to 2 seasons, we’re actually gonna wrap this thing up in a little over 3 more seasons… If we want some truly inspired ASOIAF content on TV, it’s gonna have to be something in which GRRM can stay directly involved.
If that happens, that show could prove to be better than Thrones to the purists because you know it’s coming from the mind of GRRM himself. If he did something like that, I’d maybe forgive him for not finishing the original series.
kevin1989,
I have heard/read him in interviews say Mad Cat was important. Or LSH as you call her!
I was glad they left her out as I do not like zombies – but he may have had a point. You too!
kevin1989,
The “fishwives” line was ripped directly from something Jaime said in S2E1. I was hoping someone would get the reference, but I guess no one did. =(
Oh…
My…
God.
Again, can (either of) you link me to where he said “I don’t approve”? Even just once? The burden of proof is on you. If not, then you’re just pulling it out of thin air.
Really. Even shorter than the “Long Night” that didn’t last a single evening in S8e3.
The Golden Company got trounced because, as Queen Cersei acknowledged, they didn’t bring the damn elephants!!!
Ten Bears,
What was it Ser Jorah said in 3×3? What was it… it’s on the tip of my tongue… oh yeah:
“A dragon is worth more than any army; Aegon Targaryen proved that!”
Aegon the IceDragon,
I don’t think neither. They didn’t know what George will do with the GC. (And the GC already saw battle in the books and won. They took Storm’s End which is the most difficult castle to take in Westeros. With YG leading them).
I think they just decided to bring in the GC in the show because Cersei needed a story, and the GC was named in earlier seasons, so they just borrow the GC from the books and made them their own version of it.
And showing that a part of the show doesn’t lead to nowhere is not showing that the show is better than the books. If they wanted to show that they were better than the books they would have excluded the GC or include them and gave them a better storyline than the book counterpart.
Mango,
But she is not really a zombie of course, she is alive, but not herself who she was. She can think, and made her intentions know to others who will talk for her. She only is stuck with one mindset, revenge. But I don’t think LSH is truly gone.
lmao good
…test…
None of my posts are coming through at the moment.
Imagine Deb Riley feeling insecure about her job.
That woman is genius. ❤
Mr. Benioff and Mr. Weiss, thank you for 8 marvelous and magnificent seasons and a brilliant finale, I’ll always be grateful 🙂
Good on them! They’ve just spared themselves more abuse, hatred, vitriol and venom being thrown their way.
For these guys it’s a case of “damned if you do, damned if you don’t”.
Besides, the hatred they got at the hands of GOT “fans” was more than enough to last them a lifetime and then some.
Wow, this post isn’t well thought out at all. Think about it for just a second. If Lucasfilm cares about fan backlash, they would have dumped Rian Johnson and Kathleen Kennedy, which they did not do. It’s clear that D&D left for the exact reasons stated, their plate is full with their $200 million Netflix deal. We have no reason to think otherwise.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.hollywoodreporter.com/amp/live-feed/game-thrones-prequel-house-dragon-gets-hbo-series-order-1250974
I think D&D have likely made a smart move here. They haven’t severed potential future ties with the SW universe, and although I’m not sure what their other projects are, Netflix has really been the way to go lately. I don’t see that ending anytime soon. Couple that with SW getting pretty damn saturated with several movies still to come. I kind of hope that Dave writes another book at some point, as I thought City of Thieves and The 25th Hour were really good.
*sympathetic sigh of relief for all the Star Wars fans of the world* 😉
“Schedule’s full.” Sure, Jan.
Shelle,
They left Lucasfilm to work on their Netflix projects. There’s an article about it.
I’m sure that’s all there was to it.
Shelle,
There’s no reason to believe otherwise.
Oh so wait a moment the stuff on social media about D&D getting fired from Star Wars after S8 ratings turns out to be untrue. What a surprise.
Fair play to them though for the Netflix deal, that is an insane amount of money and no doubt they will be set-up for life now, all on the back of the success of GOT.
I saw people talking about this on social media but it seems to have zero substance right now. Also the interview in Texas turned out to be fake and the work of a troll…
Ten Bears,
Netflix is huge, it must have near domination of the market right now so is investing to stay ahead. As I mentioned in a prior article, Netflix and other less legal streaming services have made a massive dent in UK with our Satellite/Cable provider Sky losing over a third of it’s subscription base in the last two years. I’ve no doubt things will continue to evolve but at £7.99 a month Netflix offers amazing value and has no real competition this side of the pond other than a slowly growing Amazon Prime.
If you follow Joanna Robinson, Kim Renfro and even the mad Swedish “super fans” it does seem there was an amicable split between D&D and GRRM. There is nothing to suggest an fall out of any sort however it’s clear they went separate ways as they began to run out of source material, this is almost certainly why they spent 3 days going through what was to come in the future books back at the end of S4.