Game of Thrones Can Be Told In 80 Hours, According To Creators

Did someone say, marathon?? I’m down. 

Just the other day we were excited to learn Game of Thrones would be getting a fourth season but much like the Game of Thrones, in television, you either win or you (proverbially) die. If you’re not a success, your show could quickly get cancelled. We haven’t had to worry about that with HBO’s GoT just yet but with a long road still to walk, you never know what could happen.

David Benioff and Dan Weiss recently spoke with Mother Jones about the fantasy series which they say took almost four years to bring to fruition. If they’re lucky, they’ve got at least four more to go to finish it. (You’ll have to excuse our use of “they” in the following quotes, the original source didn’t specify which individual was answering.)

“We have the opportunity here to tell a coherent story that lasts for 80 hours,” they said. That’s if HBO greenlights the rest of the story. “And while a canvas of that size presents all sorts of storytelling problems, it also allows us to spend more time with these characters we love than we’ll ever get again.”

Speaking of which, while fans of George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire series may get angry when things are changed or deleted entirely for the show, Benioff and Weiss say it was important to do so. “We gave up other opportunities because we love these books and want to do them justice. So for us, it’s about adapting the books according to our notions of justice—which won’t mesh with the fundamentalist book fans’ notions. Which is fine with us because if the fundamentalists were running the show, there wouldn’t be a show.”

Even though they tried to convince HBO the series would be a hit, they weren’t sure it would appeal to those outside the fantasy realms. But…

“At the end of the day it’s all about the characters. Tyrion Lannister, Arya Stark and the many other compelling characters in George’s books and our show are not beloved because they live in a world where dragons are real,” they said. “They’re beloved because they experience the things we all experience: they feel like outsiders even when they’re on the inside. They love people who don’t love them back. They’re afraid of power, they yearn for power, they end up with power in spite of themselves and find themselves liking it.”

Here’s hoping they get to the finish line. Even Daenerys wants to know how it all ends!

(via Digital Spy)

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