HBO has five Game of Thrones prequel series in development with the plan to move forward with whichever one they feel the most confident in.
That decision remains some time off as the network is pre-occupied with production on the eighth and final season of the series over much of the next year. Those episodes are expected to air in early 2019.
HBO’s CEO Richard Plepler appeared at the MIPCOM trade show in Cannes this week and was asked by Variety if there were any updates he could give on how the prequels were developing. He responded:
“No. Other than to say it’s a fantastic group of writers and talent, most of whom have lived inside the Thrones eco-system so are very, very familiar with its intricacies. I think we will find with this embarrassment of [writing] riches an exciting property for us to moves forward with. We are looking some things, I have read a couple of early bibles and I’m excited about what I’ve seen.”
Bryan Cogman, Max Borenstein, Jane Goldman, Brian Helgeland and Carly Wray are all working with Martin to different extents to develop their pitches. Whichever gets chosen, it looks as though we won’t be seeing a ‘Thrones’ spin-off on screens until 2020 at the earliest.
The new comes as Watchers on the Wall reports that Marc Rissmann (Into the Badlands) has been cast in the final episodes of the main series as Harry Strickland, the leader of the Golden Company.
