J.J. Abrams on the possibility of bringing his talents to Westeros

JJ Abrams

Superstar writer-director J.J. Abrams is out and about promoting the new film Overlord ( which he’s produced), and dropped a fun Thrones-related tidbit in one interview. While speaking with MTV International’s Bex April May, the interviewer brought up Game of Thrones, naturally since Overlord co-stars Pilou Asbæk (Euron) and Jacob Anderson (Grey Worm), and utilizes one of GoT’s best cinematographers, Fabian Wagner. Overlord director Julius Avery and Abrams are both big fans of GoT, apparently, and Abrams went so far as to say he’d be “honored” to direct a Thrones prequel series.

Though he’s excited by what Thrones does, Abrams is also reluctant to see behind the mysteries of the show, so alas, it may never come to pass. Still, it’s an interesting thought. Benioff and Weiss crossed over to Star Wars; maybe Westeros could use one of Abrams’ mystery boxes?

Sue the Fury
Susan Miller, Editor in Chief of WatchersOnTheWall.com

30 Comments

  1. No, please no! If he has shown something with the terrible Star Trek reboot and the 7th Star Wars movie, it is that he does not care about the established world at all or retells old stuff in a more flashy (literally, given the number of his lensflares…) but shallower way.
    It is good that he is not very directly involved in Westworld as otherwise that would also have started to become shallow.

    Also: Hodor!

  2. Alba:
    Thanks, but no, thanks!

    Really! My thoughts exactly when I read that headline. (“Please, please stay away. Go mess up some other superhero reboot movie. Just stay far away from the GoT universe.”)

  3. I liked Person of Interest. He (JJA) was also involved with Westworld which I haven’t seen but I’ve heard good things about it. Perhaps he is stronger with a TV series than a movie franchise.

  4. Lol that photo of JJ looks exactly like the botched photoshop version of Jon Snow on the new EW cover! It’s like he’s spoofing it.

  5. I am glad I am not the only one who went “hope not” when I read this. I am not that impressed with anything he has done and thought I might feel the sting of Ice for saying so.

  6. I have never seen any movie by JAbrams and had to look him up to see exactly what he has done. However, from his numbers, he certainly knows how to fill cinemas and to earn lots of money for studios. Many GOT fans would rush to see his stuff. Not me though, but I think he would attract many to a prequel or movie. If there is a sequel – they may go for movies.

    It reflects how GOT has evolved. Over time it is less character-driven and more action-oriented. As this has occurred the GOT viewership has also risen – I am not sure if this is “in spite of” OR “because of”.

    For Season 8, how many articles have we seen about the big battle and 55 days filming action sequences? In previous seasons, a lot of Kit’s best work is in the battle sequences. Much of Kit’s fan following is driven by his action work. They may not think so, but this is where he consistently shines.

  7. People are finally coming to see that the emperor has no clothes.

    Abrams makes very attractive and often entertaining films / TV shows, but they are routinely shallow and prone to rapid decay.

    And he surrounds himself with a toxic clique that includes the likes of Lindelof and Kurtzman.

    Abrams would be a very, very bad fit for Game of Thrones.

  8. Yeah I can’t wait see “flashbacks” (that are very confusing and hard to understand) every other scene for the very beginning of Game of Thrones… JJ is very over rated

  9. He is one of those overrated hollywood darlings. Everyone in the film industry says nice things about him because all know there is no real prowess in this stinking pile of a city anymore. R`hllor save us from this abominal `´artist`´.

  10. Personally I would want to see a GoT prequel of him than of Jane Goldman.

    I read many negative reactions of him, but I have to say, I don’t agree a bit.
    Lost was much better when he was involved. Fringe is also a master piece, Person of interest the same. Maybe he is better with a story of his own making than with a known franchise. But still I don’t even understand the hate there. Can’t really talk about Star Trek never watched that. But I was always a Star Wars fan. Had the boxes on dvd, watched them multiple times. But even I have to agree with a certain main cast member of that franchise (we all know which one), the first movies aren’t even that great. It’s a nice children movie but nothing more, characters are very one-dimensional except maybe Anakin. JJ abrams never destroyed the franchise because the franchise was never that great to begin with.

    As for JaneGoldman, I looked at her list of films, and the only 2 franchises I already knew were of her. Kingsman which is a parody comedy. And I think we don’t want a parody of GoT but a drama. And X-men. Which I liked Days of Futures past, but still those 2 movies of her are more of a special-effect action based movies than about the characters. So is that what we want for a GoT prequel? I think not.

    So if we have faith in Jane Goldman, which I have, and we think she can make a more serious serie than we would expect of her, why not have faith in a man who already have made 3 succesful tv-shows?

    Ramsay’s 20th Good Man:
    People are finally coming to see that the emperor has no clothes.

    Abrams makes very attractive and often entertaining films /TV shows, but they are routinely shallow and prone to rapid decay.

    And he surrounds himself with a toxic clique that includes the likes of Lindelof and Kurtzman.

    Abrams would be a very, very bad fit for Game of Thrones.

    How can you dislike Lindelof? It’s an writer that really care about his writing. He even felt shitty because he felt that he let down the fans of lost, even when the fault was ABC and the writer Strike.
    Even Leftovers season 2 and 3 was one of the best hours of Television produced. With lot of critical acclaim and high ratings of the episodes on imdb.

    I think he is the only one that really can bring a good GoT prequel, because he really care about source material and about characters. He is even a major GoT fan and read all the books and if he ever will make a GoT prequel we can be sure of one thing. He will always follow GRRM advice.

  11. This is a short off topic interruption, but it’s about ASNAWP…

    I just read a Mashable interview/article with Sean Bean being asked which Stark kid he thinks has the best chance to survive and his answer sounds like some of us:

    But he still has some thoughts on which of his former TV children will make it to the end.

    “Who’s left?” he said, jogging his memory of the endless blood bath brought upon his house. “Jon Snow is left, isn’t he? But Arya would have to be it. Yeah Arya will last — maybe she’ll be on the throne.”

    With all her assassin training, Arya definitely does have a pretty good shot at surviving the Many-Faced God of death. And doesn’t Queen Arya have a nice ring to it? With all her stealth and disguise skills, she might even be able to give Hitman’s Agent 47 a few tips.

  12. If JJ directs then, we are going to have a TON of unanswered questions! You guys remember the show Lost? It was great show overall BUT, it had a terrible ending. I do not know how he could get an ending of a show to be convoluted and very ambiguous at the same time, that must have taken a lot of effort! He also did the same thing for Castle Rock. 9 out of the 10 episodes were amazing but, the finale was trash. Not as bad as Lost but, still pretty bad. I still have about 30 unanswered questions and I probably will never get them answered since it will be an anthology series. Ugh! He needs to fix that before he moves to any other show, especially the Game of Thrones prequel.

  13. This guy’s already ruined Star Wars for me. No need for him to kill my other favorite story ever, thank you very much.

  14. JJ Abrams ruined Star Trek for me by taking all the “science” out of the “science fiction” – not to mention plot plausibility. Then he plunged his light saber into Star Wars, making a science-fiction-flavored fantasy into a senseless hash of superhero smash-ups. Let him at Game of Thrones (in any way) and George RR might even be moved to take his name off the credits, or sign on as “Cordwainer Bird.”

  15. Raoul_Duke: opped a fun Thrones-related tidbit in one interview. While speaking with MTV International’s Bex April May, the interviewer brought up Game of

    I wouldn’t want JJ Abrahams running a GOT prequel but I would say I felt he did a solid job with both the initial Star Wars and Star Trek reboots, it’s what happened with their sequels which concerned me.

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