If you’re already champing at the bit for more Game of Thrones, good news, because there are prequels on the way (tentative airdate is TBD as they’re all in the very, very early states of production and development — if all three of them even make it to air, that is). However, if you’re looking for something along the lines of a straight spin-off with the Game of Thrones characters we’ve come to know and love over the last eight seasons, forget about it. None of the potential shows will feature any characters from the OG series, which kills any hope for an Arya Stark (Maisie Williams) series where she’s exploring what’s west of Westeros.
We’ve actually known for a while the proposed series would all be prequels, with author George R. R. Martin even stating so on his blog back in 2018, a year after the spin-offs were first discussed. Now, with renewed interest in finding out what happened to our characters after the final credits, HBO programming president Casey Bloys is stating, for the record, that we’re not going to see any familiar characters or what future Westeros looks like anytime soon — and honestly, probably never.
“Part of it is, I do want this show — this Game of Thrones, David Benioff and D.B. Weiss’s show — to be its own thing,” he explained to The Hollywood Reporter. “I don’t want to take characters from this world that they did beautifully and put them off into another world with someone else creating it. I want to let it be the artistic piece they’ve got. That’s one of reasons why I’m not trying to do the same show over.”
Bloys continued to say that the reason behind this is that HBO is keen on doing “things that feel distinct — and to not try and re-do the same show. That’s probably one of the reasons why, right now, a sequel or picking up any of the other characters doesn’t make sense for us.”
It’s also unclear if Benoiff and Weiss will even stay with HBO. The two are currently slated to helm the next Star Wars trilogy for Disney, and are currently in the process of shopping for an overall deal. While Bloys would like to see them stay with HBO and WarnerMedia, he notes, “We’ll see where they end up.”
Although we’re mired in uncertainty as to where the Game of Thrones Television Universe will go next, one thing we know we’re not going to get is any sort of show about Bronn (Jerome Flynn) opening up his own brothel (which is a shame) or Bran (Isaac Hempstead Wright) ruling over the Six Kingdoms as sometimes a weird bird. Oh well, at least the show will live on forever on HBO Go and HBO Now.
Arya Stark (Maisie Williams) on Game of Thrones Season 8, Episode 6: “The Iron Throne”