Showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss confirm what fans dreaded: Game of Thrones Season 8 will only feature 6 episodes!
In news that is unlikely to surprise any of the Westerosi faithful, it is still with a grim nod that we now know Game of Thrones will meet the Many-Faced God of TV Death in 2018 when its final season airs... and it will only enjoy six episodes at that.
Casey Bloys, HBO president of programming, confirmed to EW in July 2016 that 2018's season 8 will be the final year, as showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss had long stated was their intention. But now Benioff and Weiss have confirmed this past weekend to the fan themselves that Game ofThrones season 8 will continue to the letter of that original plan and end the series with six final weekly installments.
Benioff and Weiss revealed as much while hosting a panel at Austin's South by Southwest Festival.
“It’s only going to be six episodes for the final season,” Benioff said during a featured speaker panel. “From the beginning we’ve wanted to tell a 70-hour movie. It will turn out to be a 73-hour movie, but it’s stayed relatively the same of having the beginning, middle and now we’re coming to the end. It would have been really tough if we lost any core cast members along the way, I’m very happy we’ve kept everyone and we get to finish it the way we want to.”
Granted, we are still hopeful that their emphasis on six episodes does not mean they are confined strictly to each being an hour. The Game of Thrones season 6 finale memorably went over the one-hour mark by about 15 minutes, and the Westworld season 1 finale was literally feature movie length at 90 minutes. Perhaps more than a few of these six episodes will find an excuse to also stretch their legs? 75 hours, after all, just sounds like a rounder number at least...
Still, this news is not necessarily shocking since Benioff and Weiss have repeatedly made it clear that they are planning to do only 13 more episodes after season 6: seven episodes in summer 2017 and another six for season 8 in 2018.
On the upside, we were at the San Diego Comic-Con panel last year where Miguel Sapochnik hinted he’d be back for season 8, and Dan Weiss nodded his head in approval. We wouldn’t be shocked if he directs an unusually high number of the episodes for that season after filming the double whammy of "The Battle of the Bastards" and "The Winds of Winter" in season 6's final two episodes.
Meanwhile, we have everything we do know about Game of Thrones season 7 right here. And if you are really curious, here are our theories about how the final two seasons will play out.