Game of Thrones' Shorter Final Seasons Are 'Extraordinary'

CBR

By Julia Bianco

Published Dec 31, 2016

Actor Iain Glen says the hit HBO drama is devoting as much time to producing seven episodes as it did a full 10.

The final two seasons of "Game of Thrones" may be shorter than the previous ones, but star Iain Glen promises they'll be just as intense.

"They are taking the length of time it takes to shoot ten episodes to shoot just seven this year [for the show's seventh season] and six next year [for the show's eighth and final season]," the actor, who plays Ser Jorah Mormont, told Radio Times.

The HBO hit wrapped its sixth season in June, with the series earning its second consecutive Emmy for outstanding drama and surpassing "Frasier" as the most-awarded scripted show in Emmy history. The season finale hit a series high with 8.9 million viewers in live plus same-day viewership.

Glen said that Season Seven, which will air next summer, and the final season, set to debut in 2018, will maintain the grandiosity of the previous seasons. "I think the scale and size of the set pieces, the world that is being created, it’s just getting more and more extraordinary and they feel they need that time to shoot seven hours as opposed to ten," he said.

He seemed unsurprised that the series' end was approaching.

"We’ve known the end for quite some time and we’re hurtling towards it," Glen said. "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."

"This season you feel that the drama is moving towards its end game, more characters are overlapping so we are seeing a lot more of each other, than perhaps in the past," he said. "In the same scenes and we are going to the same places."

Glen said that, while he's unsure will Jorah will survive until the series finale, he has treasured his time on the show.

"I don’t know of course if I am going to make the last one," he said. "I am sort of doing a head count, but I think it’s certainly under ten people who were in the original pilot and have been in every season since. I have grown very attached to it. I love the people involved. Dan [Brett Weiss] and David [Benioff] are very benign showrunners and very good people."

Based on George R.R. Martin's bestselling "A Song of Ice and Fire" novels, HBO's "Game of Thrones" stars Peter Dinklage, Kit Harington, Emilia Clarke, Lena Headey and Maisie Williams.

(via Screen Rant)