7 Years On, WB Just Got Us Closer Than Ever to Game of Thrones’ Original Ending Plan

The Game of Thrones franchise is now closer to realizing one part of the original ending plan for the main series. Game of Thrones‘ series finale was extremely controversial, with fans unhappy at plot developments such as Bran Stark becoming king, Jon Snow killing Daenerys Targaryen, and how rushed the final season was. And yet, that hasn’t stopped HBO from being able to successfully expand it into a true franchise: spinoffs like House of the Dragon and, most recently, A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms have proved there’s still plenty of love for Westeros.

That isn’t slowing down anytime soon. There are multiple prequels and even some sequels in various stages of development, from an animated show about Corlys Velaryon to, perhaps, a series about Arya Stark finding what’s West of Westeros. Biggest of all, though, is a Game of Thrones movie, which is reportedly being written by Beau Willimon (House of Cards, Andor), and will focus on Aegon’s Conquest. In a way, this brings things full circle from Thrones’ ending: showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss originally pitched ending the TV show with three feature length movies that would be put in theaters, but HBO shot the idea down because they were in the business of making TV, not theatrical movies.

Game Of Thrones’ New Movie Makes More Sense Than The Ending Plan

It’s not difficult to see why the idea of ending Thrones with a movie would’ve would tempting. The show had already started blurring the lines between movies and TV, delivering the kind of epic spectacle that had once been solely reserved for the big screen. To be able to go all out with that probably would’ve been visually spectacular, and the kind of event the show was worthy of.

At the same time, it would’ve been unfair to the audience who’d watched along on Sunday nights on HBO. And, more importantly, it would’ve only made the problems worse: Seasons 7 and 8 were truncated enough as-is, and trying to condense things into three movies wouldn’t have helped matters. At most that would’ve been around nine hours, and realistically not even that, which wouldn’t have been anywhere near enough time.

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Still, it’s no surprise that the franchise may now finally be headed for the big screen. Although Paramount’s impending takeover of Warner Bros. does create some uncertainty, it also further intensifies the need for recognizable IP to put into movie theaters between the two studios. Thrones is one of the biggest that comes under the WB umbrella, so it only makes sense they’d finally look to it into a theatrical hit.

Likewise, again, the sheer scale of some of these stories also makes it feel like it was always destined for movie theaters, even if it’s taken a long time to get there. With the story expected to be Aegon’s Conquest, which includes three large dragons, then it should at least be a visual feast befitting of being a movie, even if I personally think the stakes of the conquest are rather lacking as a story (because it’s mostly just him being an unstoppable force).

The potential downside to this is that the true greatness of Thrones is not in its dragon spectacle, but in its human drama. At its best, there’s so much richness to be had from its quieter scenes, character development, and letting things breathe and build so that those epic moments are well-earned payoffs. Hopefully, given Willimon’s great background, the movie can still achieve those things, if and when it happens.

All eight seasons of Game of Thrones are available to stream on HBO Max.

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