STACK #158 Dec 2017

FEATURE DVD&BD

WHY THE LONG WAIT FOR SEASON 8? Winter was always coming in Westeros, and it took six years in television time to finally arrive. Although the wait won’t be as long for the eighth and final season of the HBO juggernaut, it will feel like it to fans, with the premiere date currently set for late 2018/early 2019. So what’s with the delay? episodes (the shortest to date), the good news is that these are likely to be longer in duration than the average 50-60 minutes – we could even be looking at feature-length episodes of 80 minutes or more. The bad news is that with events in the Seven Kingdoms coming to an epic conclusion, the post-production work itself will be epic, and will take longer than usual to complete. Moreover, according to actor Iain Glen (Jorah Mormont), the converging storylines of season seven means that the production now only requires one filming unit, not two. Since many of the characters are now in the same scenes together, that means one location and no simultaneous shooting. Production was scheduled commence in October 2017 – later than previous seasons – and GoT - dedicated website Watchers on the Wall recently confirmed that filming is now underway, and that a scene involving the Unsullied has been shot. The gap between seasons is longer than usual, but since this will be the last hurrah for this phenomenal show, do fans really want it to be all over sooner rather than later? Sometimes the anticipation can be just as exciting as the actual viewing. All good things must come to an end, but remember that good things also come to those who wait. While Season 8 has been confirmed as being only six

Did you know? The traditional sigil for House Baelish of the Fingers is the head of the Titan of Braavos, which Petyr changed for the Mockingbird crest he proudly wears.

Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire novels and the fantasy genre at the beginning, but found them a useful starting point, personally, in terms of character reference. “I got what I needed out of them. There came a point when things were differing [from the books] so I kind of didn’t want to be reading them. You don’t really want to know what everyone else is up to all the time either, or finding great scenes that aren’t going to make it in to the thing – although they are always good to read, because then you can imagine your own side story as well. You can make up your own stuff that suits even better, that’s beyond the books, which is a whole different thing.” The series’ potent combination of politics, war, revenge and redemption has genre altogether, and Gillen notes it was a clever strategy to initially withhold the more fantastic elements. “Mostly there’s hardly any of that in the first season. In fact, at the end of the first season it’s so startling when it happens, with the fire, the dragon eggs and all of that, you’re like, “F–k! This is what we’re watching – we’ve just been lured into this other world and we didn’t know.” With one season of Game of Thrones left seen it hook an audience who would otherwise avoid the fantasy

to be played out, and characters continuing to drop like flies, is the actor willing to place a bet on who will finally sit on the Iron Throne? “I suppose the bigger question is, ‘Will there be anything there?’” he offers. “To be honest, I’ve always liked the character of Cersei – I don’t think it’s going to be her but it could be, even though she’s there already. I quite like the Sansa, Arya, Bran triumvirate – Jon also, not to put him before them. Then there could be something, some real bolt out of the blue and that would be more interesting to me. Something that nobody saw coming.”

• Game of Thrones: Season 7 is out on Dec 11

that? Peter Mandelson in 1984.’ They went, ‘Interesting, okay.’ I’m talking purely physical – hair and mustache – although Mandelson had that reputation of being a prince of darkness. “[Littlefinger’s] role in the first season was more political in that he was a member of the small council, which is like a government – he was master of coins, which is treasurer or minister of finance or whatever. So I always thought of him as a politician and a magician, in some way.” The actor admits to being unfamiliar with George R.R.

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Photo credit Helen Sloan-HBO