Over the past few weeks, we’ve seen a lot of stories about how the long-awaited final season of Game Of Thrones is going to be put together, several of them seemingly contradictory, and we’re now at the point where we’re wondering if HBO isn’t deliberately spreading misinformation to throw everybody off.
Last month, it was revealed that Thrones’ final episode would be getting multiple endings, in a bid to prevent hackers, pirates or any unscrupulous individuals involved with the production from leaking key details. That seems fair enough, and well within the scope of season eight’s massive budget.
Earlier this month, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, who plays Jaime Lannister, told a Swedish talk show that the series would be going to even crazier lengths to prevent leaks, and would not be giving out any scripts at all to cast members, but rather feeding them their lines through an earpiece.
That seems like a very heavy-handed approach, and it would appear to be directly contradicted by another story doing the rounds this weekend, which suggests that key cast members have not only seen the script for the finale, but know roughly what’s going to happen.
In an interview with the BBC’s The One Show, Kit Harington, who plays the perpetually-broody Jon Snow on Thrones, said that the cast had assembled to have a look at said script. “We had a read through last week in fact, so I know everything now,” he said.
He didn’t reveal any details of what happens, adding only:
“I cried at the end. You have to remember that eight years of it – no one really cares about it more than us … It’s been an institution longer than any other institution I’ve been in. School, drama school, anything. I get a bit weepy thinking about it. It’s going to be a strange year saying goodbye to everyone and having last scenes with this person and that person. Not only you’re attached to it, loads of people around the world are attached to it.”
So who do we believe in this situation? Was Nikolaj Coster-Waldau just messing with everyone when he mentioned those earpieces? Quite possibly.
Did HBO come to its senses and realise what an insane and time-consuming process it would be to shoot the show line-by line? That also seems likely.
Are Harington and Coster-Waldau both spreading faleshoods at HBO’s behest to throw nosy individuals off the scent? That’s a pretty specific and elaborate ruse, but hey, it could be.
Does the finale script exist but Nikolaj Coster-Waldau hasn’t seen it because he isn’t in it? Oh god, this rigorous detective work is more than I can handle.
Either way, we look forward to Lena Headey‘s next appearance on a talk show, when she revels that the Thrones finale will be shot and broadcast live with cue cards so the actors find out what’s happening at the same time as we do. That’s the only logical next step here I guess.
For your reference, here’s the earlier interview with Coster-Waldau, where he can be seen talking about earpieces at around the seven-minute mark. (If you watch the whole thing, there’s also a clip from a ‘seedy’ Danish music video that he featured in, which is pretty wild).
