George R. R. Martin’s legions of fans should be happy to know that the pilot episode to A Game of Thrones, a television series based on book one in his epic fantasy series, A Song of Ice and Fire, is set to begin filming this October for HBO. You can rest assured that this isn’t some nasty rumor: George has announced it himself over on his blog. Filming will take place in Northern Ireland. He also provides links to the original article that broke the news and where filming will take place. Of course this is just the pilot episode, so cross your fingers that it comes out well so the brass at HBO are happy enough to make this a full-fledged series, thus allowing us to geek out to thirteen episodes a year for seven years (the plan being one season devoted to each book in the series). Like all of George’s fans I’m anxious for a release date to A Dance with Dragons, the next book in his series, but this is one hell of an appetizer.
Except that Season 3 will have to be increased to 26 episodes, and in Congress will be forced to split 2012 into 2012A and 2012B for Season 4.
Your forgetting he refuses to release book 5. So I guess the series will end after season 4. grrr
Y’know, UncrownedKing, if I had as many entitlement-syndrome-infested “fans” bitching about my inability to deliver a complicated creative work to an external timetable as Martin appears to be plagued with, I might well “refuse” to release it or anything else, ever. Fortunately, Martin appears to be less pissy than I would be in a similar situation (or possibly just under contract), and will therefore release the book just as soon as he finishes writing the damned thing.
I, for one, am glad to see the ball rolling. My boyfriend and I have been checking the project profile on IMDB forever, hoping to see some definite change in status…
Dear Ceara,
My comment above was, I admit, harsh and wrong of me. It came as an initial reaction to the announcement and may have been a little rash. Let me say the following:
I love the series, but I am just frustrated. He writes political driven fantasy that is as good or better then Jordan’s. It certainly is more complicated. I have zero to complain about the books. They are great.
However, I am in the “Come on dude! I’ve been waiting for 4 years” club. I’m not ashamed of that. He told us initially that he had over half of it done when Feast for Crows came out.
Now I do not know anything that has happened/happening in GrrM’s personal life so I shouldn’t judge. That is why I don’t yell and scream about it. He’s a phenominal artist and is in my top 5 writers ever.
So I apologize for my comment. And I think that HBO can/will do a good job with this series.
Uncrowned King:
I suspect I am a bit hypersensitive on this topic because it has recently been An Issue discussed on, among other places, GRRM’s blog itself, and he is more than a little testy about it. He promises he’s working on it just as fast as he can, and really, what more can one ask for?
(And hell, it’s not like I wouldn’t dearly love to learn tomorrow that the manuscript is in the publisher’s hands and a release date is forthcoming soon, but I appear to have achieved a rather Zen state about the whole thing. It’ll come when it comes, and not before.)
While I’m a pretty big fan of Ice and Fire and will definitely watch any video version that comes out, I’ve gotta say that if it’s his work on the Wild Cards series that is slowing him down, then he can just go right ahead and take as long as he needs.
this is good news. I too have been among the bitter people waiting for the new book. I want it to be good, but this waiting is torture. It isn’t helped by the fact that release dates have twice been postponed.
I trust HBO to do a quality project, and will look forward to it.