HBO Cancels Plans for 'Game of Thrones' Prequel
by EG
AMC is banking on multiple spinoffs of The Walking Dead, but HBO seems to think one spinoff of its biggest hit is enough, at least for now. The network announced this week that it's killing one of its planned Game of Thrones series at the same time it's going ahead with another spinoff. Read on for details.
The untitled Game of Thrones prequel from Jane Goldman is not moving forward at HBO.
Said to focus on the "Age of Heroes" and the first-ever battle between man and White Walker, Goldman's project — which had filmed a pilot over the summer — will not be advancing to series, The Hollywood Reporter has confirmed. According to sources, Goldman e-mailed the cast to share the news. HBO, as it typically does on projects in development, declined comment.
The news comes shortly after word of HBO nearing a deal to produce a second pilot based in the world of Game of Thrones, from the minds of author George R.R. Martin and Ryan J. Condal. The series is said to focus on the reign of Targaryen kings in the lead-up to the events of Game of Thrones, aligning the vision of the project much more closely to the days of Jon Snow (Kit Harington) and Daenerys Targaryen (Emilia Clarke) than the now-scrapped Naomi Watts-starring prequel — though still quite a bit earlier than the events of the Emmy-winning HBO series, which wrapped its final season in May.
Following the series finale, THR spoke with HBO's Casey Bloys for an update on timing for the next iteration in the Thrones franchise. His response at the time: "We're shooting the pilot in June, you can do the math and figure out when it would be on the air. What I'm not doing is working backwards by saying, 'This has to be on the air by this date.' We want to do the best show possible. This is a pilot, so we're doing it the old-fashioned way, which is shooting a pilot. My expectation is it will be great and we'll move forward and it'll move along on a regular TV timetable. I don't want to speculate any dates."
Featuring a sprawling cast including Watts, Miranda Richardson, Joshua Whitehouse, Marquis Rodrigez and more, Goldman's untitled Thrones prequel was said to take place during the Age of Heroes, thousands of years before the events of Thrones. In this period of Westeros history, the Seven Kingdoms weren't even a twinkle in the eye, as the continent was separated into dozens of their own kingdoms. It was an age dominated by heroic figures like Bran the Builder, credited with creating the Wall, and Lann the Clever, credited with founding House Lannister.
Get the rest of the story at The Hollywood Reporter.
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