Westeros

MTV reporter Kara Warner had a chance to talk with George R.R. Martin and Richard Madden during the Emmys, and she received some choice quotes from both. Visit the site to read the transcript of the remarks, and see the video interviews below. Beware, spoilerish material below, though somewhat obfuscated!

The Making Game of Thrones production blog has a great interview with Will Simpson, storyboard artist for the series. Simspon’s worked in comics over the years (I just realized he drew some Hellblazer arcs written by Garth Ennis!) and has largely shifted into storyboard and animation work. Some of his storyboard work is featured in Inside HBO’s Game of Thrones, the production companion book that HBO has recently released.

The interview also refers to a book containing Simpson’s storyboards… and that, too, has recently been revealed as part of a special collector’s edition (Pre-order: Amazon US, Amazon UK), paired with Inside HBO’s Game of Thrones, two maps, and a presentation box. The portfolio sounded as if it wasn’t all that many pages… but reading the details more closely, it suggests the book is just as large as Inside…, which would be quite a lot of storyboards indeed!

Filming for season 3 of Game of Thrones has begun in Dubrovnik, and as usual with filming there, the local press gets quite a lot of scoops—it’s hard to hide what you’re doing in a small, busy city filled with historic sites. The Dubrovnik Times already reported on early filming involving boats and a special (expensive) camera rig for shots on the water.

More notably, however, have been our very first glimpses (English article hereof the lead actors in costume, as Aidan Gillen, Lena Headey, Peter Dinklage, Jerome Flynn, and Daniel Portman were led through the streets and up hills to a filming location. Of particular note in the article’s accompanying photo gallery? Aidan Gillen’s costume looks much the same… but Peter Dinklage is sporting a prosthetic scar, and Lena Headey has a brand new dress (gorgeous fabrics) which may reflect Michelle Clapton’s remark in Inside HBO’s Game of Thrones that there’s a new trend-setter at court now in the form of Margaery Tyrell; the scoop top of the gown certainly reminds one of the more extreme dress last season.

This past weekend was Titancon in Belfast, and according to all reports, it was a smashing success. A few of the guests from the first Titancon made an appearance again…. and a few new ones appeared. Among them? Ian McElhinney, Ser Barristan the Bold himself, who revealed that he is indeed getting ready to film for season 3.

Thanks to Ian and his nephew Manfonse, we have three signed photos from Ian to give away, and we decided to try a new contest format: fan art. The contest will run for 7 days (why 7? Do you need to ask?), and we’ll announce winners shortly afterward. So, to be clear, last entrys will be at 11:59PM, October 2nd—anything coming after will be disregarded, alas. Winners will be contacted for mailing information and (hopefully) personalization requests

At last, Chronicle Books and HBO have published Inside HBO’s Game of Thrones (order: Amazon US, Amazon UK). We’ve had a chance to give it a look at it early, and give some thoughts on it.

The short version for those who’d rather: beautiful and informative, with interesting tidbits… but there’s too much already-seen photography and too little concept art, plus space constraints mean it often only scratches the surface. Variety rather than depth seems have been the aim.

A new and somewhat mysterious entry at the Making Game of Thrones production blog, as we get a random sampling of quotes overheard on the set. Doubtless as consolation for Game of Thrones scoring nil at the Prime Time Emmys (though, with 6 Creative Arts Awards, it turned out to be the drama with the most individual awards by the end of the show), but there’s some interesting bits.

The muddy sinkhole would almost surely be the quagmire that is the Maghermorne Quarry where scenes for Castle Black (and some other things) have been shot. And the cave built inside Paint Hall… well, there’s a couple of things that could be, if they’re sticking to the books. I’ll leave that up to you, though!

This is quite cool.

The HBO Store (in the US)  has a special set of Inside HBO’s Game of Thrones (Pre-order: Amazon US, Amazon UK) with bookplates signed by story editor, writer, and all-around good guy Bryan Cogman…

...plus some very special additional goodies: two of HBO’s maps (there’s a map I saw them making when I visited the production office that I’m still hoping to see published some day, but these are pretty good—if not accurate to what the official Lands of Ice and Fire map set (Pre-order: Amazon US, Amazon UK) will be revealing), and perhaps much more interestingly, a portfolio featuring never-before-published storyboards from storyboard and concept artist Will Simpson. Simpson’ll be at Titancon in Belfast tomorrow, so maybe there’ll be some questions about the storyboards that will be in the portfolio.

Jace Lacob at the Daily Beast has a fun article with quotes from numerous comedy show writers (including writers and producers from Modern Family, Parks and Recreation, and The Mindy Project

Game of Thrones took over some of their writers’ rooms.

Here’s a brief excerpt:

While he sets the dragons to dancing and stokes the winds of winter (and gets ready to sit in the audience at the Emmys), it should be noted that today is George R.R. Martin‘s nameday

birthday. He’s a jolly good fellow, and may he have many more! And what better way to celebrate a birthday, than with a song? Shared by Gigamesh, the Spanish publishers of A Song of Ice and Fire, is this terrific Spanish-language version of “The Bear and the Maiden Fair”, titled “El Oso y la Doncella”

May there be many more songs to come!

Amin, Mimi, and Ashley of the Podcast of Ice and Fire have once again been kind enough to invite Linda and I back to talk shop with them. Not only do we join them in discussing a particularly interesting Tyrion chapter from A Clash of Kings, but we also chat about Game of Thrones, the fandom, The World of Ice and Fire, the climate of Essos, and quite a lot more.

Check out the podcast!

(Note: There are spoilers discussing all novels in the series, and occasionally adult language and topics are mentioned, so… maybe not for the workplace.)

Hot on the heels of the Emmys Creative Arts Awards, where Game of Thrones took six awards, the VFX house responsible for one of those victories has made available its VFX breakdown video for the second season. Pixomondo, an international effects house with studios across the globe, really went to town with the visual effects for the series, as you’ll see in the breakdown below:

Pixomondo Breaks Down VFX for Game of Thrones Season 2

There was a great deal of excitement when we shared the news that Funko was producing Game of Thrones vinyl figures as part of their Pop! line… and now it turns out that they’ve become available for pre-order on Amazon. And not just that—Dark Horse’s large Iron Throne replica statue (14” tall!) is available at TFAW, which ships globally, as is the Stark shield pin.

None of these items are shipping this month, but the Funko figures are out at the end of November for looking for that perfect holiday present (the Iron Throne will have to wait until January).

You can find links for the Iron Throne replica, shields pins, Tyrion and Dany bust from Dark Horse, as well as the Funko Pop! figures (and many other items of official Game of Thrones goodness over on our Collectibles store page.

(Speaking of the shield pins, don’t forget to take the shield survey and enter for a chance to win some Game of Thrones swag!)

The Creative Arts Emmys always seemed the place where Game of Thrones was going to leave its mark. Last year, though, Boardwalk Empire was the juggernaut, winning seven total awards. But this year? Game of Thrones all the way, as the award took six of the nine nominated categories (not the most nominated show—far from it, in fact—but that 66% win rate was impressive!)  to be the winningest show this year.

Here’s the list of winners:

Thanks to Peter Sagal’s co-interviewing of George R.R. Martin at Worldcon, Sagal managed to invite GRRM to take part in the popular quiz show he hosts for NPR,  Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me. The quiz has now aired, and is available online… and GRRM’s segment can be found at the official NPR page. It’s just ten minutes, and opens up with a few interview questions with Martin before moving on to the quiz portion.

And now the trickle of information starts coming in from the set: the Making Game of Thrones blog has its first new post in quite awhile, featuring a description of an important scene and a behind-the-back shot of ... someone.

It’s all quite cryptic, of course, but we do know the Clandeboye estate has been used for several things… including, from photos we’ve seen, for regions beyond the Wall and also regions in the south. Not quite sure why there’s no snow, though, in this photo—it may well suggest it’s for something else entirely. I’ll take a completely random guess, based on the “unexpected pairing” implying it might not be anyone paired by the end of season 2…

We recently posted about the fact that Locus Magazine posted a date for the publication of Dangerous Women—containing the fourth Dunk & Egg novella—for May 2013, and that Amazon.de was listing the Dunk & Egg collection for May 2014 following. Alas, that may (may) be jumping the gun. After digging further, I’ve learned that the date is not yet fixed for either of these publications by the publishers; where Locus got its updated date, we do not know, but it may be the sort of prospective date publishers often put on books. That said, May 2013 and May 2014 respectively is entirely possible—I’ve confirmed this—but the final decision lies with the publishers (Tor and Bantam, respectively) who will be making them down the road.

Still, the next Dunk & Egg story is about the “She-Wolves of Winterfell”, we can say that much for certain. Once we get a solid date on the book, we’ll be sure to share it here.

Thanks to some academically-minded fans, we’ve learned that Wiley—the publishers of Game of Thrones and Philosophy, which we provided the foreword for (Order:  US Paperback, US Kindle, UK)—is tackling A Game of Thrones once more as part of its Pop Culture and History series with a book aptly named A Game of Thrones and History.

On an academic mailing list, a call for papers from academics in history and related fields has gone out, with the book to be edited by Professor Janice Liedl of Laurentian University. You’ll find the full details of the call for papers below; there are some very interesting suggested topics.

See the correction here.

Yesterday, we posted about a pin-up calendar for charity that GRRM and a number of other authors had provided their support for, and mentioned in passing the 2013 A Song of Ice and Fire Calendar (Order: US, UK) calendar by Marc Simonetti. This morning, we saw Sweden’s SF Bokhandeln tweet about the fact that Random House has put up a video to promote the calendar, produced by Simonetti. It’s a fine speed-painting video, depicting the painting of a scene from A Dance with Dragons that graces the cover of the calendar. Particularly interesting is the significant change to the composition part way through, and how smoothly Simonetti was able to work it in:

Patrick Rothfuss, whose debut with The Name of the Wind made quite a splash both within and outside the fantasy genre, has organized the Worldbuilders charity drive on an annual basis. Last year, he helped mastermind a unique literary calendar, sales of which directly benefited Worldbuilders: it was a pin-up calendar, featuring photos inspired by works such as Alice in Wonderland, The Wizard of Oz, and Tom Sawyer.

Now Rothfuss has announced a 2013 pin-up calendar, but this one’s done with the support and permission of a number of contemporary authors… and, specifically, genre authors. So why is this here? Besides the fact that it’s a good cause, one of the authors who has given his support and permission is George R.R. Martin.

Just over a week and a half for now, the second annual Titancon convention will be taking place in Belfast. Last year’s event was a big success, and this year’s will be no different by the looks of it—the coach tour of shooting locations has already sold out, but memberships to the Saturday event remain, while Friday’s Culture Night (free entry) should be good fun. Among guests to this year’s Titancon will be actors Ron Donachie (Ser Rodrik Cassel), Miltos Yerolemou (Syrio Forel), Kristian Nairn (Hodor), Art Parkinson (Rickon Stark), and Aimee Richardson ((Princess Myrcella Baratheon) from the cast, as well as storyboard artist William Simpson, and a host of extras from the series who’ll share the kinds of stories only extras can tell. And, by the looks of the program, a whole lote more will be going on. Like the raffle, in which George R.R. Martin and his wife Parris are donating quite a few items.

If you’re planning on going, or even just considering it, do drop by the Brotherhood without Banners forum where you’ll find a general Titancon thread as well as a very handy coordination thead to help people with ride or taxi sharing, hotel check-in, and so on.

(For those wondering, Linda and I won’t be there in person due to work obligations, but we’ll be there in jealous spirit. There’s always next year…)

Dark Horse, well-known producers of comics and collectibles, revealed some of their newest offerings at Comic-Con.

Among the items revealed were the Tyrion Lannister at the Blackwater statue due in February (and now available for pre-order at 20% off from TFAW, who ship internationally), a protoype of Jon Snow with Ghost, Stark and Greyjyoy shield pins, and more.

One of the things reporter Amy Marie noted was that those two pins were also being shown with several other prototypes which they hadn’t quite decided on in terms of when they would be released…

.... and now you—yes, you, the fans of Game of Thrones—are going to help them decide! From the horse’s mouth:

Take the survey below:

Funko, a well-known maker of pop culture toys such as bobbleheads and vinyl figures, has just sent out a press release revealing that they’ve licensed rights to produce a series of vinyl figures based on HBO’s Game of Thrones.

They are, to say the least, amazing (and amazingly cute). These are going to make amazing stocking stuffers come the holidays, I expect.

Looking around on-line, these vinyl figures are also likely to be very affordably priced, which is all the better. The only question is, why not make bobbleheads? Though I suppose a Ned Stark bobblehead would tend to have its head fall off…

To see the rest of the figures joining the Imp— Eddard Stark, Daenerys Targaryen (with dragon!), Khal Drogo, Sandor Clegane, and a White Walker (an interesting choice, that one)—just visit the gallery. And hopefully these will do well enough to merit more in the series! What characters would you like to see added to the collection, if a second series is released? Arya, surely. Jon seems pretty likely. Jaime, of course. I’d like to see Varys and Littlefinger, myself.

Thanks to the splendid Maureen Ryan of the Huffington Post, she has shared her post and recording from her hour+-long interview with George R.R. Martin at Chicon 7 , this year’s Worldcon. The post provides a great synopsis and guide to the full interview, and it’s much recommended. Some good stuff in there—anecdotes about writing “Blackwater”, the role of prophecy on the TV show as compared to the novels, and more—that you should really make time to listen to.

Just after we returned from our vacation and were buried under work to catch up on, there was a very interesting announcement picked up by the media and fellow fan sites: UK digital movice service Blinkbox announced that they had negotiated the right to start streaming the second easons of Boardwalk Empire and Game of Thrones right now, well ahead of the DVD and Bluray releases for those two award-winning original series. For those who didn’t have Sky Atlantic and were never able to watch the series, or would love to watch the episodes again, this seems like a terrific opportunity.

The press release is below… but before we get to that, a contest: in partnership with blinkbox, we’re offering 10 movie vouchers! This one’s going to be a Twitter contest, and the rules are simple: follow westerosorg and tweet the hashtag #GOTBlink. We’ll pick ten random winners. This is UK ONLY, so don’t use the hashtag if you’re not entering the draw! Winners will be contacted at the end of the week.

We’ve updated the So Spake Martin collection with a lengthy report from George R.R. Martin’s reading at Chicon. There, he read a lengthy extract from The World of Ice and Fire, which Linda and I are co-authoring with him. You can find the update here, provided from long-time forum member Trebla (much appreciated, Treb!)

As an aside, you’ll also notice something new on this and other So Spake Martin entries: we’ve opened up Facebook comments for those who would like to comment on or discuss entries. We’ve similar made comments available on the FAQ and Prophecies sections.

Via Bleeding Cool, we’ve an interesting quote from co-executive producer and writer Vanessa Taylor regarding the writing of season 3:

Big visuals to open episodes? If I had a guess, the tremendous success and impact of “Blackwater” and the skills of VFX house Pixomondo (recently discussed in a Variety article on German-based VFX houses) have opened them up to the possibilities of spectacle in the series.

The quote from Taylor is from Jeff Goldsmith’s Q&A podcast, which is predominantly focused on Hope Springs, Vanessa Taylor’s first feature film. You can listen to in full; we’ll be checking it out to see if any more Game of Thrones tidbits came out of it.

(Thanks to Marcelo Cordova for the pointer!)

Though the livestream was sadly marred by a ridiculous claim of "copyright violation" that led to it being shut down—made all the more ridiculous by the fact that the Dramatic Presentation clips shown were all used with permission of the copyright holders, and were surely brief enough to merit a Fair Use argument—the Hugo Awards rolled on. Here’s the results for the fans:

It’s that time again, folks: the World Science Fiction Convention is presenting the Hugo Awards, the oldest literary award for works of science fiction and fantasy. A number of the nominees may be of particular fans of George R.R. Martin, A Song of Ice and Fire, and HBO’s Game of Thrones: