Skip to footer

'Game of Thrones': Will the show officially go beyond the books?

'I kind of wish that there were some things we didn’t have to spoil, but we’re kind of stuck between a rock and a hard place,' co-showrunner David Benioff said in a recent interview. 'The show must go on… and that’s what we’re going to do.'

|
Helen Sloan/HBO/AP
'Game of Thrones' stars Sophie Turner (l.) and Aiden Gillen (r.).
  • By Molly Driscoll Staff Writer

For big “Game of Thrones” moments like the Red Wedding, some book fans have waited gleefully for those watching the TV show to be surprised by the events. But now the books' readers may be learning of plotlines from the TV show before they ever have the chance to see them in print.

Fans of the books have long wondered whether the HBO show based on George R.R. Martin’s “A Song of Ice and Fire” series would eventually go beyond the stories that the books have covered. Martin is reportedly currently working on the next book in the series, “The Winds of Winter,” but neither that book nor the next in the series has a release date.

The TV show “Game of Thrones” keeps making new seasons, however, and as we previously reported, one character, that of Bran Stark, has already been taken out of the upcoming episodes. "The fact is, even though we’re making changes to the books and adapting as necessary, we’re trying to keep the various storylines the same as the books and trying to keep them roughly [chronologically] parallel," co-showrunner David Benioff told Entertainment Weekly. "And last year we caught up to the end of Bran’s storyline [in George R.R. Martin’s most recent A Song of Ice and Fire novel, 'A Dance with Dragons']. So if we pushed him forward this season, then he’s way ahead of where the other characters are."

Now the “Thrones” showrunners have spoken a bit more on the matter.

“Luckily, we’ve been talking about this with George for a long time, ever since we saw this could happen, and we know where things are heading,” co-showrunner David Benioff said in response to a question about the show going beyond the books, according to Vanity Fair. “And so we’ll eventually, basically, meet up at pretty much the same place where George is going; there might be a few deviations along the route, but we’re heading towards the same destination. I kind of wish that there were some things we didn’t have to spoil, but we’re kind of stuck between a rock and a hard place. The show must go on… and that’s what we’re going to do.”

This of course may change – Martin recently wrote online that he will not be attending upcoming events such as this year’s Comic-Con in order to devote more time to working on “The Winds of Winter.” So perhaps we’ll see “Winds” sooner than we thought.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to 'Game of Thrones': Will the show officially go beyond the books?
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/Books/chapter-and-verse/2015/0323/Game-of-Thrones-Will-the-show-officially-go-beyond-the-books
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe