There’s something incredibly luxurious about being the creator of the most-hyped television shows of all time and not actually watching it yourself.
Reports that George R.R. Martin didn’t even watch Game of Thrones hit headlines yesterday. After all, who needs to see Jon and Daenerys incest bone when you’ve already outlined the scene? It’s all up here, in his imagination!
But uh – apparently, that’s not the case. Martin has refuted claims that he doesn’t watch the show, telling Entertainment Weekly he’s not even sure how that report started.
From EW:
Martin told EW via email he can’t recall saying he doesn’t watch the acclaimed HBO drama series and notes that perhaps something was mangled during translation. During his trip abroad he didn’t watch any television — and he’s behind on Thrones‘ current seventh season. So perhaps that was a source of confusion. But Martin does watch the series.
So there you go. The report in question came from an interview Martin did with the UK‘s Metro, which ran with the headline: ‘George R.R. Martin: “I do not watch Game of Thrones”‘.
However, that little nugget of info didn’t come from a direct quote, but merely a paraphrase of their chat.
From Metro:
Despite creating the books upon which [the show is] based, the author does not watch the hugely popular series. The 68-year-old insists he just doesn’t have the time because of writing and “touring”.
Oops.
Despite this titchy mistake, the rest of the Metro interview is pretty enlightening stuff. For example, Martin says the show has killed about 20 characters that are still very much alive in his books.
“The book series and TV adaptation go their separate ways. On the screen characters are killed right and left. About twenty of them have died already, which are quite alive to me and will appear in a new book.”
Indeed.
