With season six of Game of Thrones in the books, so to speak, fans have been left with plenty of questions and probably a billion theories. This season was satisfying in terms of how many loose ends were tied up and especially how many sick, twisted bastards got what was coming to them. But we’re not actually Game of Thrones fans unless we stomp our feet and demand more, more, MORE! While we wait impatiently for the next season to begin, knowing full well that it’s one of only two seasons remaining, we at least have a thorough interview with the showrunners to pick apart for anything that resembles an answer.
David Benioff and D.B. Weiss opened up about a lot in their season finale conversation with Deadline, and there are some truly interesting points to focus on. For starters, there’s the question of where Cersei goes from here, and Benioff and Weiss acknowledge that next season will focus a lot on learning who she really is, specifically without her children. There’s also the fun fact that Bran had previously hinted at Arya’s method of revenge on Walder Frey, and the humorous revelation that the waitress was smiling at Jaime Lannister because she really wanted to slice his throat. And can you look back now and imagine Iwan Rheon as Jon Snow instead of Ramsay Bolton? Because he almost had that role.
Again, it’s a very thorough interview with plenty to mull over. But when it comes to the stories left to tell, the most important aspect is probably how much time Benioff and Weiss have to tell them. There are two seasons remaining, and we’ve heard that they’ll be shorter seasons, but how short will they be? [Emphasis ours.]
DEADLINE: When you have President Obama asking about plot points and whether Jon Snow would stay dead, it indicates you haven’t overstayed your welcome. You could continue this struggle for a long time.
WEISS: Like President Obama, we want to leave while all the people watching this show are really into it. Get out at a high point and not have it be, well thank god that’s over.
BENIOFF: It’s two more seasons we’re talking about. From pretty close to the beginning, we talked about doing this in 70-75 hours, and that’s what we’ll end up with. Call it 73 for now. What Dan says is really true, but it’s not just trying not to outstay your welcome. We’re trying to tell one cohesive story with a beginning, middle and end. As Dan said, we’ve known the end for quite some time and we’re hurtling towards it. Those last images from the show that aired last night showed that. Daenerys is finally coming back to Westeros; Jon Snow is king of the North and Cersei is sitting on the Iron Throne. And we know the Night King is up there, waiting for all of them. The pieces are on the board now. Some of the pieces have been removed from the board and we are heading toward the end game. The thing that has excited us from the beginning, back to the way we pitched it to HBO is, it’s not supposed to be an ongoing show, where every season it’s trying to figure out new story lines. We wanted it to be one giant story, without padding it out to add an extra 10 hours, or because people are still watching it. We wanted to something where, if people watched it end to end, it would make sense as one continuous story. We’re definitely heading into the end game now.
Benioff also admits that they’ve “been talking about the ending, from the beginning,” so they know what’s in store for everyone who didn’t die in a huge burst of green fire or from being carved up into a human pie. Let’s just hope that they have something good in mind for Gendry, because that dude must be bored out of his mind by now.
