Martin Offers Updates On “Thrones” Series
Author George R.R. Martin has returned to the online blogging world where he takes time out from his schedule to offer a status update on HBO’s various “Game of Thrones” prequel series in development.
The other week came word that the network was moving forward with one of the five or so in development, the one penned by Jane Goldman and Martin himself. In the new post on
his official site, Martin confirms three of the others are still under consideration and one is outright dead:
“Yes, this is a prequel, not a sequel. None of the characters or actors from ‘Game of Thrones’ will appear in the new show…This one really puts the PRE in prequel, since it is set not ninety years before ‘Game of Thrones’ (like ‘Dunk & Egg’), or a few hundred years, but rather ten thousand years (well, assuming the oral histories of the First Men are accurate, but there are maesters at the Citadel who insist it has only been half that long).
We’re very early in the process, of course, with the pilot order just in, so we don’t have a director yet, or a cast, or a location, or even a title. (My vote would be ‘The Long Night,’ which says it all, but I’d be surprised if that’s where we end up. More likely HBO will want to work the phrase “Game of Thrones” in there somewhere. We’ll know sooner or later).
As for the other successor shows… if you have been following along, you know that we started with four, and eventually went to five. One of those has been shelved, I am given to understand, and of course Jane’s pilot is now moving to film. But that does not mean the others are dead.
Three more ‘Game of Thrones’ prequels, set in different periods and featuring different characters and storylines, remain in active development. Everything I am told indicates that we could film at least one more pilot, and maybe more than one, in the years to come. We do have an entire world and tens of thousands of years of history to play with, after all. But this is television, so nothing is certain.”
Martin adds that his sixth novel, “The Winds of Winter,” remains his top priority.