Cyanide Studios, creators of the officially licensed Game of Thrones: Genesis strategy game and an as-yet-untitled-RPG, have a little Christmas post featuring some familiar words, and what may be some concept art for the frozen lands beyond the Wall.
Merry Christmas, Cyanide!
Updated: We’ve mailed George for a comment, and he confirmed that they are indeed going forward with episode titles, Excellent news! Responding to my question about the episode titles, Bryan Cogman replies that HBO has not officially approved the titles as of yet, so we’ll have to wait on their being revealed, but he believes we’ll be liking them.
Thanks to the gentleman at Television Zombies, we have a new interview with George. Some good stuff there, raging over a number of topics, but something George mentions at the end is of particular interest for those keeping track of developments on HBO’s Game of Thrones. He notes again that he’s written episode 8… and gives its title: “The Pointy End”.
This was the title he originally intended when he sent in the draft, but since then we were informed that the producers were leaning to simply numbering episodes, a fact we’ve seen in various Making Game of Thrones posts. But this interview, from less than a week ago, brings up the title again and we’re guessing (tentatively) that the producers have at last started putting proper titles on the episodes.
When we ran a poll at the A Song of Ice and Fire forum, something north of 90% of those polled disliked the idea of simply having numerals for episodes, so this is a great decision if true. We’re looking forward to a full list of episode titles in the future.
As George has mentioned, he’ll be in California to promote HBO’s Game of Thrones. We’ve been informed that the details of the bookstore signing he noted was in the planning have now been finalized, and have now added it to our calendar. It will take place on January 9th at 5 PM Pacific Time, at Vroman’s Bookstore in Pasadena.
Also as noted in George’s post, at some point that day—not sure if it’ll be before or after the signing yet—he’ll be joining fans for a little mini-meet sort of event, just to hang out with them. If you want more details, check out this thread at the Brotherhood without Banners section of the A Song of Ice and Fire forum.
The Atlantic’s Alyssa Rosenberg has previously covered George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire series for the magazine’s website, and this time she’s back with a thoughtful piece concerning HBO‘s Game of Thrones TV series. Comparing and contrasting the series to other HBO and cable programs, with particular attention to difference in degree between accepting the reality of The Sopranos and The Wire versus that of a full-on, secondary-world fantasy such as Game of Thrones. Rosenberg finishes with the following:
Here’s hoping!
After having won this year’s Suvudu 2010 Villains’ Cage Match, the Mountain that Rides faces his last obstacle to claiming complete domination: last year’s winner, Rand al’Thor from Robert Jordan’s epic Wheel of Time series. If you’ll recall, last years cage match led to a frenzy of voting with the lead changing back and forth as fans argued the merits of George R.R. Martins’ and Brandon Sanderson’s write-ups for how they thought the match should go.
In the end, the Dragon defeated the Kingslayer… but will al’Thor bite off more than he can chew with Ser Gregor Clegane? You decide with your votes! The poll runs through January 2nd, but don’t delay in voting!
Over at Not a Blog, GRRM posts a reminder that the 2011 A Song of Ice and Fire Calendar is available, and can be bought just in time for the holidays. This beautiful calendar features art by the renowned Ted Nasmith, best known for his place as one of the “Big Three” Tolkien artists (along with John Howe and Alan Lee; like them, he was invited to help design Peter Jackson’s LotR films, but wasn’t able to do it). The calendar includes twelve full-sized depictions of famous castles and cities of the Seven Kingdoms, plus a thirteenth, double-sized bonus image. You can get a preview of some of his art here.
And to add on to the festive mood, he features a mock-up cover for next year’s 2012 A Song of Ice and Fire Calendar, using one of the gorgeously-rendered art of award-winning painter John Picacio. Featuring Eddard Stark with Ice before the heart tree of Winterfell, it’s an amazing piece of work, though George notes it may not be the final cover. John later tweeted that he was working on the calendar right at that moment ... at 4:48AM. That’s dedication to his art! The calendar is due to ship in July, and is already available for preorder.
Although filming wrapped last week on HBO’s Game of Thrones, details still come out on occasion concerning the production’s doings. Via DocFourFour, we’ve learned that the Belfast Telegraph-owned Sunday Life newspaper includes a report on the production having filmed at Inch Abbey in Downpatrick. Their report indicates that the site was used for a “renegade camp”, featuring a “Medieval fort” with tents around it, and that there was fake blood at the site.
This is the site where filming took place over at least a couple of days, I believe, around the 10th or 11th. Don’t hold me to it, but I think I recall seeing at the production offices during my set visit in October that Inch Abbey was being used as the site of Moat Cailin in the series. Certainly, I saw Moat Cailin listed, but I’m not 100% positive that Inch Abbey was the real world location associated with it; however, some of the photos of the ruins with tussocks of grass around it strike me as doing reasonably well to indicate the marshy, ruined old citadel of the First Men. If it is Moat Cailin, however, I’m not sure how to reconcile that with the fake blood. Unless different angles or areas of Inch Abbey were used to represent a battle site or something like? Hard to say.
Oh, I’ve been waiting for this one. Simon Brindle, the supervisor of the costume armor department, speaks in some detail about the costume armor for HBO’s Game of Thrones. I had the pleasure of meeting Simon when I visited the Paint Hall facilities, and had a chance to discuss some of the sources and inspirations for the various suits of armor. There’s some truly amazing work being turned out from his shop!
The So Spake Martin section of our site—an archive of correspondence, chats, interviews, and signing and convention reports—has been updated with a link to a podcast interview with GRRM conducted by Bear Swarm!. This is about a month old, recorded at the time of the Days of Ice and Fire event.
Thanks to Conan Stevens, we’ve learned details on where HBO’s Game of Thrones will be airing in Australia. Conan writes that he’s learned the plan at present is for a possible July air date on Showcase, a premium channel which can be found on the Foxtel, Optus, and Austar television platforms.
Another update from GRRM, one of the Angelenos. He’ll be over in Los Angeles in early January (remember, he’s due to attend the TCA Winter Press Tour panel on January 7th) and he’ll be seeing about arranging some public events, such as a signing (probably in the San Fernando Valley area) or a mini-moot. The latter seems almost a certainty, as he adds that David McCaman—a fixture and long-time organizer of the Brotherhood without Banners fan club—will be organizing event on that same day, January 9th.
Keep an eye out here and on the this thread for more details in the days to come.
George adds a tantalizing final note: he may have something exciting to announce ... and maybe two exciting things, “but don’t quote me on that”.
Over at “Not a Blog”, George R.R. Martin provides two brief updates. As previously reported, he confirmed that filming had wrapped on the first season of Game of Thrones. Our congratulations to all the cast and crew!
But before that update, he had a small update concerning A Dance with Dragons. He noted that he had recently finished a chapter, and had revised (and then re-revised) another, and was presently writing material concerning Jon Snow and the “krakens” (referring to the Greyjoys and the ironborn they rule).
As we’ve reported in the past, George had five chapters left to write as of November. So is it four left? Hard to say. As GRRM cautioned, sometimes a chapter needs to be broken up and expanded into two or even three chapters before he’s happy with it. Still, though it’s a “slog” as he calls it, progress continues.
The Northern Ireland government has pledged £5 million to build new studios in support of the film industry there. As the Telegraph reports, efforts will focus on expanding the Paint Hall facilities, which HBO’s Game of Thrones has fully occupied but will be relinquishing this week now that filming is about wrapped.
This article is yet another that vaguely implies that the 2nd season is a certainty, with the only question being where it might film. However, many of these articles build on one another. As we’ve said elsewhere, the production will certainly be laying the groundwork for a second season now… but the greenlight will only come after the April premiere at the earliest, once ratings are in.
Over at the Making Game of Thrones site, David J. Peterson—creator of the Dothraki language for the production—has a lengthy post titled, “Dothraki 101”, which provides just what you’d think: an introductory lesson in the grammar and vocabulary of Dothraki.
David promises to provide more lessons in future posts. The Language Creation Society’s official Dothraki website can be found at their website, while we’d also recommend taking a look at Dothraki.org, an unofficial fan site created to catalog all the details released (and published) so far concerning the Dothraki language.
The Daily Express has a brief interview with Rory McCann, cast in the role of Sandor Clegane. Rather amazing tale there, and it sounds like this role came to him at the best possible time. The one note about the article? Some of the facts and figures are inaccurate—it’s a bit more expensive than £25 million, and it is not an HBO-BBC co-production.