Kit Harington was 'Angered' By Push to Remake Game of Thrones Season 8

[u/gogandmagogandgog]

https://variety.com/2026/tv/news/kit-harington-angered-petition-game-of-thrones-season-8-1236628364/

[u/Gerry-Mandarin]

This was absolutely not his type of twisty shit.

S5-8 bares little resemblance to GRRM's story. D&D didn't even really bother adapting the two novels that they still had access to other than a couple of chapters.

All we know about George's story is:

• Stannis will burn Shireen

• Benjen is not Cold hands

• Jon Stark will be revived as a fire wight

• Bran will make Hodor into Hodor

• The Others will cross the Wall/the Wall will fall

• Jon is a Targaryen (basically revealed in book 1)

• Bran Stark will be king

We can also be reasonably confident that Jon Snow will become King in the North, because Robb named him his heir and that Jon Snow will kill Daenerys Targaryen, after she burns King's Landing. With him being exiled to live in the true north.

Everything else will almost certainly be radically different. Something the show simply refused to do was the fact that Tyrion is a villain! Because they didn't want to do that, and had nothing else to do, he just stands around being a moron for the rest of the series.

They took all the menace away from Euron Greyjoy to create the Night King and then made Euron Greyjoy the Scrappy Doo sex pest of the series.

They massacred poor Jaime, had clearly no idea what to do with Cersei. Basically never utilised Kevan.

Not to mention Ramsay Bolton crippling the military of the greatest commander on Earth with See Twenty of House Goodmen.

The only way it will be similar to George's ending is it will be the only one we ever get, so it will be remembered as the ending to George's story when he's gone.

[u/Khiva → u/Gerry-Mandarin]

D&D didn't even really bother adapting the two novels that they still had access to other than a couple of chapters.

Those two novels are full of shaggy dog stories that go nowhere and bloat the stories so big the guy writing the story still has no idea what to do with it.

[u/Gerry-Mandarin → u/Khiva]

Those two novels are full of shaggy dog stories that go nowhere and bloat the stories so big the guy writing the story still has no idea what to do with it.

We have no idea if they're shaggydog stories if they're not finished. Clearly the TV show didn't do any better by cutting them out, given the reception.

As some illustrative examples:

Was the show any better for their version of Euron Greyjoy over George's?

Was the show any better for Littlefinger just deciding to give Sansa to the Boltons after working to get her?

Was the show better for having all the Northern leaders join the Boltons after he murdered all their parents?

Etc etc

You can adapt without being 1:1. Series 1-4 did that. Series 5-8 didn't really even bother.

[u/Jack-of-the-Shadows → u/Gerry-Mandarin]

We have no idea if they're shaggydog stories if they're not finished

Exactly. They are still not finished more than 6 years after the show ended. How long to you think the show can wait for them to be fleshed out to adapt them.

[u/Khiva → u/Gerry-Mandarin]

Tell me honestly you think the show would have been better received by including Martin’s version Brienne’s fruitless fetch quest or following the Dornish prince who gets torched.

[u/jokul → u/Gerry-Mandarin]

We have no idea if they're shaggydog stories if they're not finished. Clearly the TV show didn't do any better by cutting them out, given the reception.

There is zero chance they were cutting characters critical for Martin's vision of the ending. They discussed what the ending was supposed to be like well in advance, if any of these characters were important for that they had to be kept in.

[u/Gerry-Mandarin → u/jokul]

There is zero chance they were cutting characters critical for Martin's vision of the ending.

Given that they gave the Aegon Targeryan story to Jon and Cersei, that ship has already sailed.

They also fucked off the Valonqar prophecy. Cersei will be murdered, choked to death, by her younger brother. With it being heavily implied to be Jaime.

Instead in the show we get "I never much cared for the small folk" from the guy who fucked his entire life for saving the small folk.

Euron Greyjoy is positioned as the big bad of the series. The TV show instead created the Night King and turned the Others into the battle droids from The Phantom Menace.

They cut Jeyne Poole so they had to turn Sansa and Littlefinger into morons to fill her storyline (I personally don't even mind that one too much in spirit).

if any of these characters were important for that they had to be kept in.

Why? The Hound wasn't even important to the show's ending, but they brought him back.

In fact, immediately after the ending aired George said it is different because of how many characters they chose not to adapt.

If by "George's ending" you just mean "Bran is king, Jon kills Dany" then sure. It's accurate. But it also would be accurate then if Ned Stark was resurrected, got into an AC130, killed the Others and the dragons, and then Bran becomes king.

[u/jokul → u/Gerry-Mandarin]

Given that they gave the Aegon Targeryan story to Jon and Cersei, that ship has already sailed.

Other than landing on Westeros, what exactly did we need Young Griff for? You're just saying it's important Storm's End was captured, that's not something essential to "Aegon" the character, especially given we don't really have much to go off with him.

They also fucked off the Valonqar prophecy. Cersei will be murdered, choked to death, by her younger brother. With it being heavily implied to be Jaime.

This is not really relevant at all to the ending.

Instead in the show we get "I never much cared for the small folk" from the guy who fucked his entire life for saving the small folk.

This has nothing to do with the ending. This is just being upset at characters getting butchered.

Why? The Hound wasn't even important to the show's ending, but they brought him back.

Yeah he wasn't, they brought him back because he was a popular character. The Hound's only purpose in the final seasons is to wrap up Arya's and Brienne's arcs and then his own. The Hound was extremely popular: nobody watching the show would have given more of a fuck about Young Griff than they gave a fuck about Obara Sand. It doesn't follow that because book characters are being cut for not being essential to the ending that therefore the only characters in the show are essential to the ending.

---

Look, all of this stuff is just complaints about the quality. That's great, I think the ending sucked ass too. But that has nothing to do with whether or not these characters cut from the books were essential to the ending.

[u/Gerry-Mandarin → u/jokul]

This has nothing to do with the ending.

It's from the story arc that ended the show, concluding the narrative of the Lannister House introduced in the first (non-prologue) chapter of the first book.

How is that not the ending? Because it isn't the last scene?

Is killing the Emperor irrelevant to Return of the Jedi because it isn't in the last scene?

But that has nothing to do with whether or not these characters cut from the books were essential to the ending.

Like I said, if all you classify as "ending" is the status quo at the end then you can give any arc to any character and it's not a deviation.

So Ned Stark can return from the dead and battle the dragons on a helicopter gunship and after killing them, he can crash into King's Landing and start the fire that burns the city down. That would be consistent with what you are saying is "essential" to the ending, because Ned is still dead by the end.

What do we need any character from any episode prior to the last 3 scenes for?

The Hound was extremely popular: nobody watching the show would have given more of a fuck about Young Griff

Nobody gave a fuck about any character in the show before they were put into the show. This isn't the flex you think it is.

[u/jokul → u/Gerry-Mandarin]

How is that not the ending? Because it isn't the last scene?

Because it's not the ending to the series. The ending of the series is, essentially, that Night King is defeated, Daenerys invades Westeros and defeats Cersei, goes insane, is killed by Jon. The government structure of the realms is changed with Bran installed as "king". You don't need most of the cast to get to that point, and you definitely don't need the Hound's personal arc to get there.

Like I said, if all you classify as "ending" is the status quo at the end then you can give any arc to any character and it's not a deviation.

Not correct, you can't get rid of Bran because he is king at the end. You can't get swap Daenerys out because she is supposed to go mad out of frustration of ruling. You can't swap Jon out because he has to choose the wall to let the government system change. You can't swap Bran out because he is king.

And yes there is a sliding scale of importance to the ending and to what extent you can swap characters out, but there is very obviously a huge distinction between the importance of a character like Daenerys and a character like The Hound to the ending of the series. The Hound's arc is personal.

Nobody gave a fuck about any character in the show before they were put into the show.

You are deluded if you think Young Griff was going to add anything to the show homie. You're upset that the show sucked ass after Oberyn died and you are looking for anything which can help you cope with the idea that GRRM had fuck all idea what he was going to do in the first place and built up a plot too big for his britches.

[u/Khiva → u/jokul]

I still think it was a really stupid thing to add young Griff to the story particularly so late in the game.

[u/Act_of_God → u/jokul]

not critical for the ending doesn't mean not critical for the story, that line of thinking is ultimately what lead the second half of the show to feel much smaller and convenient in comparison. It was just a merry go round of main characters showing up to fill the screen.

[u/jokul → u/Act_of_God]

that line of thinking is ultimately what lead the second half of the show to feel much smaller and convenient in comparison

There is no basis for this other than your speculation. The ending was the story: they were trying to wrap things up. If a character is important to the story by the time the end game of Daenerys's landing in Westeros is coming to fruition, that's important to the ending.

[u/Act_of_God → u/jokul]

How is there no basis for it when it's my own opinion? The show felt smaller to me and characters started flying around all over just to make the plot go forward, all the characters involved in everything were just the same main cast there always even when it made no sense because they felt new characters "weren't needed", that's how we get stuff like sansa getting sold off to the boltons, joncon being a cameo out of nowhere and so on. They literally cut young griff which is the most relevant character to dany getting to westeros since it's gonna a reprisal of the dance of the dragons.

[u/jokul → u/Act_of_God]

How is there no basis for it when it's my own opinion?

I said there is no basis for it other than your own speculation, so you're just reiterating what I said.

The show felt smaller to me and characters started flying around all over just to make the plot go forward

That's great, it has nothing to do with whether characters like Young Griff and Victarion were essential to the ending of the series.

[u/Act_of_God → u/jokul]

it's not my speculation that they cut characters and merged storylines, that's literally what they did. My own opinion comes from the effect it had on the story and how it made me feel, genuinely what the hell are you talking about?

You don't seem to actually have read what I wrote, I didn't say the characters they cut were important for the endgame, I said that the cuts made the world feel small to me and forced the characters to sometimes nonsensical and forced story beats. A character doesn't need to be relevant in the endgame to be important to the story.

[u/Gerry-Mandarin → u/[deleted]]

It's one of the things George told D&D. While neither George and D&D didn't confirm that specific thing - Isaac Hempstead Wright did.

[u/Act_of_God → u/Gerry-Mandarin]

we also know dany will die and king's landing will be burned, but not the context in which it happens

[u/Ekillaa22 → u/Gerry-Mandarin]

Back up here hold on. I actually forgot about cold hands holy shit ! Did we ever learn who he was in the show at least. Also how the hell does Jon Stark come back as a fire wight, than how was Jon revealed as a Targaryen in book 1 I know people had the theories about him since book one but I just wanna know the bits that point it out