All language subtitles for Making Game of Thrones

l've done feature fiIms, and l've not seen
anything on this massive scale. It's just vast.

It's just an epic.

It is huge.

It's never been done before
in teIevision on this scaIe.

It's a character-driven story,

but within a genre
which is rarely seen on television.

It's an epic fantasy. At the core of it,
there's a conflict for power.

It's rich in a way I've never seen
fantasy be rich before.

It's got a brilliant combination
of the fantastical and the real.

It's very much based in character.

And then slowly,
as the season progresses,

we get to see more and more
of this magicaI worId.

It's got action, it's got adventure,
and Iove and passion.

BetrayaI and greed
and murder and sex.

Every character such a full story.
lt's very intense.

There's real emotion,

and there's reaI reIationships
that you can understand and relate to.

And there are so many
twists and turns.

The fantasy fans will love it,

but the HBO audience -
those people are gonna love it, too.

People are going to fall in love
with these characters

and become afraid for them,
and they should be afraid for them.

Nobody's safe.

When you play the game of thrones,
you win. . .

or you die.

There is no middle ground.

- Camera mark.
- Action.

I began this series in 1 991 ,

and the minute the books started
to hit the bestseIIer Iists,

one starts getting inquiries
from producers

who are interested in optioning it
for a feature film.

And I remember talking to my agents
and saying, "It can't be done.

"There's too much.
The books are too big.

"They would have to cut so much,
there wouId be nothing Ieft."

This is a story that's so rich,
and there are so many characters,

and so many different viewpoints
and narratives

aII woven together
with incredible expertise.

And it was such an intricate tapestry
that he was weaving,

that we couldn't imagine mutilating it
to make it into a feature script.

So, the only way to do this
is as a series of series on HBO.

That's where my series belongs.

So, I told my agents,
"Go forth and make it happen."

About three and a half years ago,

George Martin's agent
sent me four books,

and l started reading,
and about 70 pages in,

I got completely hooked.

And a few hundred pages later,
I called Dan.

I said, "Tell me if I'm completely crazy,

"but I'm in the middle of
this book called Game Of Thrones,

"and I think it's the best read
I've had in God knows how long."

The next day,
I said, "You weren't crazy."

And two and a haIf days Iater,
I was done with a 900-page book.

You're always a little bit afraid
when you sell a work of yours

to be adapted to television or film

because, of course,
the history of Hollywood is full of cases

where they just keep the title
and change everything.

George Martin is the creator
of this worId,

and, in a very real sense,
we're all walking in his dream right now.

I think we're cleaving really close
to the source materiaI,

because, to be honest, we really
respect and love the source material.

My fans are going to be very happy,

because they're going to see the story
that I told come alive in a different medium,

played by some fantastic actors.

Our cast is just astonishing.

We felt that, not only in terms
of the principaI casting,

but the background casting,

you should get a sense of
these are the people,

the type of people,
that live in each of these worlds.

I think finding the tone is the real
challenge in casting all of them,

because the material is so epic.

It's an ensemble piece.

You're so dependent on having
good actors to work with.

And we're very blessed on the show.

I'm most amazed with the kids.
The kids are so good.

The biggest challenge on season one
was finding the kids.

It took a long time.

The kids are so essential.

They're going to be
the heart and soul of it as it continues.

Their stories become
more and more important,

and it gives us
a great deal of confidence

to know that we can give them the ball
and they'll run with it

because they're so good.

When I first got the audition
for Game Of Thrones,

my mum heard about the books,
and she started reading them,

and she soon found out
that they were quite adult

and that maybe I shouldn't read them.

She would just tell me what goes on.

And then, coming to the sets,

it was just like how Mum explained it.

lt's unbeIievabIe, reaIIy, because
when you read a scene in the book,

you start to imagine
what it's going to be like.

Then you get on the set,
and it's better.

The palette is varied and fascinating.

You've got the northernmost kingdoms
being covered with snow

and all this harsh landscape.

You've got the middle kingdoms,
which are lush.

And then you've got the southern
dry, arid, deserty sort of places.

We've researched
probably 1 4 different countries

before we settled on Northern Ireland
and MaIta.

The decision to shoot in Northern Ireland

was predicated on being able to find a wide
variety of Iocations very cIose to BeIfast.

There are mountains,
and there are fertile green fields,

and there are beautiful
oId-growth forests,

and there is such a range
of environments.

The great thing about Belfast is you've got
the Paint HaII, where we've been fiIming,

which is just the biggest set
you've ever seen.

And then they find these
incredibIe Iocations.

Certain areas just lend themselves.
They just look so spectacular

that you know that if you could
get the story into them,

that it wouId reflect
the amazing Irish landscape.

AII these years, and l stiII feeI
like an outsider when I come here.

You're not an outsider.

When I got into this job,
there was a call for a spectacular tree.

And I had a folder of sexy trees,
and that was one of them.

And we also had to build
a little pond just in front of it,

which got excavated and reinforced.

The art department is so amazing
with what they've created.

Winterfell is such a huge castle,
and it's so fantasticaIIy detaiIed.

The butchers are there,
and the armorer.

It helps you so much as an actor

to really just believe in where you are
and what you're doing.

The first scenes that we shot were all shot
in an authentic medievaI castIe.

I would think, as an actor,
standing in a place

where actuaI nobIemen
were standing 700 years ago,

must be fairly inspiring.

You feel like you're part of a world here
that's reaI and Iiving and breathing.

For some of the bigger moments -
the king's arrivaI, the main titIe -

all those call for bigger instrumentation.

(Martin)
This is the first time we meet King Robert.

It's the first time
the king has been to Winterfell,

the first time he's really seen
the extent of the North.

(Bean) It's the very beginning of the piece,

and Robert's coming up
with his whole entourage.

But there is a certain tension.

My queen.

Take me to your crypt.
I want to pay my respects.

We've been riding for a month, my love.

Surely the dead can wait.

Ned.

We're dealing
with such a complex world,

so, musically and instrumentation-wise,

there was really a wide range
that l couId puII from.

So, we have everything in this show,

from old instruments,
Western instruments, violin, cello,

but then also a lot of
modern instruments

like a lot of synthesizers

and just sounds that are manipulated
to create really a wide range of sound.

What we've tried to do is be
as ecIectic in our sources

and our choices of references
for everything,

whether it's costumes, props, set,
Iocations we've chosen.

All the worlds that I adore,

I've managed to kind of go into
and pluck out bits

that I think have become appropriate for all our
different worlds that we're trying to create.

We went for a lot of Far Eastern,
a bit of Moroccan,

African, traditional medieval,

but not trying to go for that
Ye OIde EngIish Iook.

But if you mix it up enough, and don't use
too much of one cuIture, then it works.

Gemma was very clear that she wanted
to give every worId its own distinct feeI.

So, when you're at Castle Black,
you know you're at Castle Black.

You're not going
to confuse it for Pentos,

and you're not going
to confuse it for Winterfell.

The Winterfell, of any of them,
is probabIy the cIosest

to a traditionaI
Northern European world,

with kind of thick, strong castle walls,
and big stone.

And l just reaIIy Iooked
at the northern castles of Europe.

The North is a little bit Scandinavian,

but, really, that's the closest you get
to grungy, oId-fashioned medievaI,

because it's dour and dark and nasty.

The architecture of the North
is much rougher,

it's much more decayed.

lt's coId. The weather has got to it.
Everything's going to get eaten away.

So, we brought over 30 truckloads
of saIvaged timber,

most of them over 200 years old,

that worked really well for the North.

It's been eaten away, rotted away.

We used a lot of smoke at Winterfell

to make it feel like people
were working there,

to make it alive and just to create
another dimension to it.

Smoke brings it to Iife,
just makes it Iook Iike peopIe are there,

peopIe are doing things,
people are burning things.

The North basicaIIy
have to cloak themselves

with products they can get
within a 50-miIe radius.

There's not much trading.

So, they tend to wear grays and blues,
quite murky coIors.

lt's very Ieather-based,
very practical, lots of fur.

It's a direwolf.

There are no direwolves
south of the WaII.

Now there are five.

The direwolf's not been seen
for many years around Winterfell,

and so it's kind of an omen -
a dead direwoIf

that's just littered a birth of pups.

And it's a massive creature.

The direwolf is our banner, our sign.

There are five pups.

One for each of the Stark children.

They were meant to have them.

It's obvious to Jon at that point
what this means -

that the direwolf is the sigil
of the Stark House,

that there's five of them,
that there's five Stark children.

This is clearly a sign.

These are aII lnuit dogs,
which is a breed that was developed

basically to have a dog
that Iooks Iike a woIf.

The dogs are supposed
to rip people's throats out

and eviscerate people.

We teach them to do things that will
make them look like they're attacking.

The actors are like a prop.

So, I could take one of these dogs,
and I could take you,

and we could do a go-with

or have them waIk with you Iike
they're your pet, in about five minutes.

By using food and little tricks that we do,
they'll actually get used to it.

We don't really want them to have
a huge relationship with the actors

because that gives them
an excuse to goof off,

and they will take advantage of it.

lt's a big chaIIenge.
There's a lot of attacks.

Plus, they have to work
with little kids.

That's always a scary combination.

We want the dogs to look as fierce
and mean as possibIe,

but then they have to be
with a six-year-old child.

And then otherwise we have ravens.

They're actually as trainable as a dog.

They are so inquisitive
and so interested in food and stuff.

They're Iike a chiId, and they'II find
a way to get in trouble very quickly.

Inevitably, it's a problem.

Somebody has got a sandwich,
and the bird ends up landing on them,

trying to get the sandwich.

So, we have to tell people,
"Sorry, you can't have food on set

"while the ravens are working."

There are scenes where they're supposed
to look like they're soaring in the sky,

and we're going to use a wind machine
with the bluescreen

to make them Iook Iike
they're actually soaring.

Lord Commander.

A raven.

Castle Black is the furthest north
that we go at the moment,

and it sits at the bottom of the ice wall.

It's supposed to be grim.

You get the feeling the whole thing
has gone to rack and ruin.

Castle Black is historically supposed
to be a pIace that was quite grand,

and it's sort of faded
and fallen into disrepair.

It's filthy, it's freezing cold.

The mess haII is fouI,
very brutal, very sparse.

l did some research on peopIe
who lived way up in the Antarctic.

Some of it was from Eskimos,
where they live on whale blubber,

and they're all pale
and everything is white,

and so all the food is just very basic,
sort of colorless stews.

The intention was to build it
somewhere where they could work

and not be constantly worrying about CGI
and greenscreen and the rest of it.

And I think we've been
relatively successful on that.

At the base of the Wall,
we've got Castle Black,

which is an incredibly bleak castle

that you wouId think
no one would want to inhabit.

Our art department have built
a fantastic set here

up to a certain height,

and a certain amount of it contains aII
the action that we are concerned about

for episodes one to ten.

But we want to establish something
a bit grander than that,

so we have to put on towers which top that
up on what we've built here.

So, it's our job to take on
the wider shots here

and add those bits and pieces.

The top of the WaII set
we're building on stage -

that's achieved by building it on a rostrum
about ten foot above the ground.

And then we create plywood formers
to give us the shape of the ice.

Then our plasters go on top of that,
with pIaster, resin,

and lots and lots of sea salt
to give it some sparkIe.

Then our painters come in,
give it some more color and texture,

and then we erect a greenscreen
around 1 80 degrees of it.

And then we put some wind effects
and snow effects.

I wanted to be here
when you saw it for the first time.

The actuaI WaII theme -
or the Night's Watch theme -

we have strings,
we have very low bells.

So, there's something intimidating
about that one,

but also something that, later on,

can turn into something, um,
majestic and honorable

for when Snow and the others
take their vows.

Bear witness to my vow.

Night gathers
and now my watch begins.

It shall not end until my death.

You walk into Castle Black,
and there it is,

and there's the Wall,
there's the lift to the Wall,

and there's all the things
you've read about.

And it's very easy to get immersed
in that world,

with such incredible sets
and detail put in.

One of the biggest challenges
in the Night's Watch

was to be able to tell you something

about the different backgrounds
of these peopIe

by the costume that they had on,

and the costume had to be black.

It's not a uniform, because they're not
funded enough to do that anymore.

The higher peopIe
will bring clothes with them

that are probably more suitable.

The others actually often arrive
in a thin jacket.

That's aII they have,
and you visibly see them freezing.

Then, obviously, as they qualify,
they start gaining more clothes.

Well, Lord Snow, it appears
you're the least useless person here.

We work with a wonderful
fight director called Buster,

and we didn't have much time
to learn the fights,

but Buster was brilliant, and you can
pretend that you're a hard warrior.

I was pretty fortunate with these guys.
They're aII pretty athIetic.

They all seemed to grasp it pretty well.

These fights - it's more like a dance.
You're learning a dance.

And I remember a few times,
we were aII ready to go,

they were just about
to shout out, "Action! "

And I'm thinking in my head, "Oh, my. . .
l can't remember the third move."

And l know in that third move,
there's something coming towards me.

You have to train people
very differentIy.

With Ned and Jaime, we used
a IittIe bit of the knights of oId,

with the hack-and-slash,

versus we used a lot of Japanese
katana style for Jaime's fight -

just the way he heId his sword
and the way he twirIed it.

We both have our different styles.
I have a much more direct style,

whereas Jaime is much more eloquent
and affected in his style of fighting.

You never want to do a flick
for a flick's sake.

You won't stand next to someone
and throw a back somersauIt

for the sake of throwing
a back somersauIt.

So, you try and find cool stuff
that you can believe they needed to do.

We want to make this real.

We want to show the brutality of fighting, and
what really happens when you get stabbed.

For example, in the hill tribe fight,
we wanted to make this really gory.

So, we're going to bash
one of the hill tribesmen's faces in,

and we wanted to actually
show the bashing of the face in.

So, we started the action
with a stuntman with a hit,

shot Peter pounding down on the face,

and aIso now we're shooting Peter
pounding down on the prosthetic face.

So, you'll see it being beaten,
and bIood popping out of it.

It's going to be pretty horrible.

- Jesus! (Laughs)
- Cut there.

We're approaching visual effects
in a very specific way.

We want visuaI effects
to be as real as possible.

Yes, there are fantasy elements,

but what we're trying to do is to make
the fantastical as real as possible.

A lot of what we do is adding
IittIe bits and pieces to shots

that hopefully nobody
would even realize.

We've got some
big crowd scenes happening -

the Sept of BaeIor,
when we do Ned's beheading.

We've got, out at Essos,

when we've got the whoIe camp,
that's going to be a big crowd scene.

Then they did a tournament.
We were doing that.

The tournament set that we built
on Iocation at Shane's CastIe -

that was all built with materials
sourced at Shane's CastIe.

We picked the trees and the wood.
They were feIIed for our job,

brought over, about a quarter-of-a-mile trip,
to the tournament ground.

Then, when we take it down,
we'll cut up the timber on site,

and that'll be given to the people
in that area, really.

I've been sitting here for days!

Start the damn joust before I piss myself!

What they do with animals is amazing.

We rehearse everything very carefully
before we get on set

to make sure everyone
is going to be safe.

I have actors' horses that I use.
They're all trained for the actors,

so they do the job for them.

So, the horse goes from A to B.
lt's very quiet.

He goes on set.
He doesn't notice anything.

Then I have my stunt horses,
which are different.

They're a bit faster,
and one of them is trained to fall over.

Everyone was absolutely gobsmacked.

I didn't know if it was actually supposed
to happen at the beginning,

because they didn't tell any of us.

I was, like, "Oh, my God.
Is someone hurt?"

The fence is all made
out of a type of foam.

As soon as it lands on the fence,
the fence collapses,

so the horse has no harm at all,
there's nothing to it.

And the horse is already trained to fall.

As soon as it's on the floor,
it knows that its job is done.

That horse, all it does is fall over.
That's all it's trained for.

They're very clever. They get used to it.
They know what "rolling" is,

they know what "turn over" is,
and they know what "action" is.

And they go straightaway.
They go on "action".

Action!

I think Renly was very excited

about seeing Ser Loras Tyrell
in his armor for the first time -

wonderful, gleaming armor.

The first time I saw even the costume,
it blew me away.

It's just so beautiful.
It's a work of art.

It's quite interesting to tie together
the structure and the mechanics

that you need for the armor
to actually articulate a move,

the very organic kind of flowing forms
that Michele was looking for.

The armor is great. It looks brilliant.

It's kind of tough to wear, though.

It definitely hurts the shoulders
quite a bit.

It's not even that heavy.
It just constricts you.

It takes a while to get this on.

To imagine that people
actually fight in this is beyond me.

But it looks fantastic.

The guards from King's Landing
and the South

have this kind of elegant, sleek,
tailored look to them.

As you go south,
obviously they're near the sea.

They can trade, they have silks,
they have coIors.

It's a much more sort of
Mediterranean feel.

There's more jewelry.

It's beautiful,

like the one your mother wears.

The whole thing about King's Landing
is that it's supposed to be quite lush.

You've been up in the frozen North,

and down in King's Landing,
people are supposed to be growing things.

King Robert refers to them all
being half-naked

and deliciously sweaty and gorgeous.

You feel that you've come
to a really hot, sexy place,

and there's light coming
through the windows,

a lot of greenery and plants
on the balconies, growing through.

Malta becomes the backdrop
for King's Landing.

We'll take the basis of what's there,

take away what we don't like,

and add bits and features
that we do Iike.

For our abiIity to create a worId
that you couldn't quite pinpoint,

Malta was a fantastic location.

It's been settled successively
by so many different peopIe,

so there are so many different traditions.

Anything Mediterranean,
North African, Southern European,

we can kind of more or less find here,

and we can dress it
to cover any period.

Malta is so exotic and mysterious
and ancient.

I think it really lends itself
to the stories

and gives it a lot of flavor.

Any time you see the Red Keep castle
that's at the end of King's Landing,

that's completely CG.
Nothing exists.

And that's going into a lot of locations
that we're doing here.

We wanted to try and make
the castle itself - the Red Keep -

have a sort of indoor/outdoor feeling.

So, many of the rooms
have got baIconies

and lots of lovely things growing
and beautiful perfumes and flowers,

so that all the time,
they're outside, they're inside.

We have two large sets
for King's Landing.

There's a composite set for aII
the personal quarters in the Red Keep.

And then you have the throne room.

The throne room is magnificent.

It's huge, it's got this pantheon floor,
it's got these great big piIIars.

I wanted to try and make that feel
incredibIy cathedraI-esque.

It's very lavish, very ornate.

As you come in, you go through
some massive bronze doors.

So, as you open that,
you reveal this beautiful throne room,

with marble floors throughout.

Then aII aIong one side you've got
some terrific stained-glass windows

that pour Iight in
across the marble floor.

And then you walk up
to the throne itself,

which is sitting on a bronze dais.

And then behind that is
a beautiful stained-glass window.

So, you get all that light
pouring in over the king.

The centermost prop in Westeros
is the Iron Throne,

so we wanted to get it right.

Obviously, we'd made a model of it
in the art department.

We had a lovely prop-maker here
called Gavin who made it.

It's quite a frightening piece.

It is literally blackened swords
bent into a throne,

and it's melted and pitted
and hammered,

and uncomfortabIe,
which is what it's supposed to be.

The first time I walked
through the throne room,

I was really intimidated.

It's the size of a football field.

I didn't know how
we were going to light it.

I didn't know how we were
going to fill it with people.

l didn't know how l was going
to move them through the space.

Thankfully, we figured it out.

The throne room is pretty amazing.

When you go into a set
that they've built,

and just the sheer size of that
makes you feel

Iike you're in this
sort of mystical story.

Each of these worlds
is a real pleasure to do.

And the other one is the Eyrie.

I was dumbstruck
when I first saw the Eyrie.

It was breathtaking.

It's three-quarters of the way up
an enormous mountain,

and you get to it
by a stone staircase that's carved,

and there are way-forts along the way.

So, it's the ultimate refuge.

The Eyrie - the look of that
had to be quite quirky,

have an uncomfortable feel about it,
and a slightly unhinged atmosphere.

So, a lot of faded tapestries,

and the weirwood throne,
which was the biggest piece for us,

which is actually made
out of reaI wood.

It's actually three different pieces of wood,
aII weIded together,

and it's incredibly heavy.

You have to get a crane
to get it in and out of here.

I like the twisty shapes of it,

which seem to go with
this high height and everything.

Gemma was keen
that we get a verticality into it.

We have a staircase
that's cantilevered out

and rises around the space,
with the moon door at its center -

this kind of execution spot
that the Eyrie has.

lt's a scary environment
with the height of the castle.

There's a cell with no fourth wall,

and the fourth waII Ieads out
into an abyss, a bottomless pit.

And then, just to add to it,

in the ceIIs,
the floor tilts just a little.

So, you go to sleep. . .

Going to sleep would be terrifying,

because if you move in your sleep
and you kind of roll,

you wouId naturaIIy roII
in the direction of the slope.

You wouId wake up
a foot from the edge.

Obviously, there's supposed to be
a thousand-foot drop beneath it,

so we had a lot of wind there,

and we aIso had faIIing water coming
through that set, running down the middle.

lt's supposed to Iook
sort of wet and horrible.

You just get such a feeIing
of this being her kingdom -

the whole throne,
with the gnarly wood, and the grays,

and all the kind of dusty feeling.

The sets are amazing on this.

It's just more than I ever would've
anticipated or expected.

Look where we are.
It's incredible.

We've been very lucky in our locations.

We've been abIe to come to MaIta
and film in a wide range of spaces.

San Anton Palace, for example -
it's the President's palace.

Malta was also chosen
because it had a fantastic coastline.

A Iot of our story has to do with
the continents separated by a narrow sea.

It won't be long now.

Soon you will cross the narrow sea
and take back your father's throne.

When will they be married?

Soon.
The Dothraki never stay still for long.

Dothraki are a bit of a cross
between the Mongols

and some of
the Native American tribes.

They're a horse peopIe,
they live in these great, vast grass plains,

and they make a living
by conquering other people,

much like Genghis Khan
and the MongoI horde.

Khal Drogo is one of the most brutal
and effective warriors

in a worId where vioIence
translates directly to power.

The music for Drogo
and the Dothraki

is compIeteIy different
than any of the other music.

It's very tribal, and we have
a lot of ethnic instruments there.

It's more played on these war horns,
I guess I would call them.

That's almost like a war call.

They're barbarians. They're nomadic.

Although they have a city,
they're on the move most of the time.

So, we looked at lots of different tribes
and people that travel a lot -

grass huts, mud huts,
that sort of thing -

and then mixed all of it up.

So far, we've got rounded tents,
which are more igIoo-shaped,

with skins and cIoths
and all sorts of things.

Then they get into these earthen tents.

So, we've created another kind
of structure, which is really nice.

The temple of the dosh khaleen,
that's been built on stage here in Belfast.

The whole structure
is made from willow,

which we've harvested
from a locally grown field.

lt's a very flexibIe,
very bendy type of wood.

(Speaks Dothraki)

We actuaIIy thought
it would be much more believable

if we heard them speaking
their own language,

rather than have them speak
in heavily accented English.

(Speaks Dothraki)

David Peterson,
a linguistics professor at Berkeley,

essentiaIIy invented
the Dothraki language.

When you're creating a language

that's supposed to look like
a natural language,

first you must start with the culture.

There are actuaIIy, in Dothraki,
more words for "kill" than for "love".

When they first told me that,
I was, like, "Cool. I'll totally do it."

Then I got it, and I was pretty scared.

But it was a great challenge.

(Speaks Dothraki)

It's really worth it to try to do it right,
because it sounds right.

And if you do. . . (BabbIes)
. . it always sounds really crap.

So, it is worth trying to master it.

lt's an incredibIe Ianguage,
getting your mouth around the words.

They're so expressive.

(Speaks Dothraki)

We're building this fantastic
funeraI pyre in MtahIeb,

which is on the west coast
of the island,

and this is where we see
one of our main characters' burial.

It's very kind of sophisticated
in the fact that the whole framework

is welded and made from
speciaI effects.

We had two stuntwomen on fire.

So, it's a complex sequence,
but it went really well.

You're under the impression that she is
going to kill herself and give everything up.

So, musically, it's powerful,
it's tribal, it's emotional.

But then, on the following day,
we realize she's still alive.

And then it unfoIds
that the dragons are hatching,

and she becomes
this very powerful person.

So, at that moment,
we're playing something musically

that we actually
have never heard before.

So, we are playing out her theme
in its full glory.

(Clarke) It's just the best story.

You follow it, you get excited by it.

And when you think you've got it figured,
it completely changes its mind.

lt's encompassing.
Actually, without the costumes,

it could be contemporary life.

It's about people caring, fighting,
Ioving, hating.

You think you know them,

you think you've got them pegged
as what they seemingIy are,

but they really aren't.

To battle!

It's been very satisfying
and exhiIarating

for me to play a part
that has got that much depth,

and I've been able to explore it to that extent.

To have the freedom
to combine traditions

and to combine the fantasy elements
was a great challenge,

and it gave me a whole new respect
for the genre.

There's something about
the depth of the worId

that George has buiIt
such an amazing foundation for,

that tends to pull both fantasy
and non-fantasy fans alike into.

Just the idea of taking this story,
which George Martin created,

and actuaIIy knowing
from the beginning, from now,

the essential shape
of the entire series,

it's an incredibIy Iuxury
for us as screenwriters.

AII of the things that l was trying
to do in it, they got, and they liked,

and they wanted to preserve in it.

So, this is David and Dan's baby.

They're the show runners, and they're
making the ultimate decisions here.

But it's still recognizably my baby, too.

The Starks are always right eventually -

winter is coming.