In the “Game of Thrones” Season 7 finale, Jon Snow says, “When enough people make false promises, words stop meaning anything.”
HBO is apparently taking that logic and hoping it applies to fake spoilers.
According to a report, which quotes HBO’s president of programming Casey Bloys, “Game of Thrones” producers plan to foil leakers by shooting various false endings, so no one knows what’s real.
“I know in ‘Game of Thrones,’ the ending, they’re going to shoot multiple versions so that nobody really knows what happens,” Bloys said during a speaking engagement at Moravian College, per the Allentown, Pennsylvania, outlet The Morning Call.
He continued, “You have to do that on a long show. Because when you’re shooting something, people know. So they’re going to shoot multiple versions so that there’s no real definitive answer until the end.”
HBO would not confirm Bloys’ comments, but a strategy like this makes sense. Kit Harington already revealed to Jimmy Kimmel that fake “Game of Thrones” scenes were shot for Season 7 in an attempt to avoid spoilers, as well.
Multiple endings are also not unprecedented. “The Sopranos” creator David Chase reportedly shot alternative endings to maintain the mystery surrounding the finale.
Of course, all the fake endings in the world won’t matter if the entire plot for the show leaks online months in advance. “Game of Thrones” dealt with leaks throughout Season 7, as many plot points showed up online and multiple episodes were released before their scheduled air dates.
(The FreeFolk subreddit even had a countdown to one of the finale’s biggest moments. Their upvote symbol is a boat.)
But do the leaks actually matter? In spite of all the spoilers, the “Game of Thrones” Season 7 finale was reportedly the series’ most watched episode ever. It’s also easy to forget that throughout the first five seasons of the show, you could just look at author George R.R. Martin’s books for almost any spoiler you wanted.
Martin’s novel A Storm of Swords, which includes the Red Wedding, was out for more than a decade before the shocking “Rains of Castamere” episode aired.
That didn’t stop people from freaking out:
The show is reportedly beginning production in October and will debut its final season in late 2018 or in 2019.
That means the “Game of Thrones” ending is coming. And so is another one. And another one. And another one.