George R.R. Martin says he's 'deeply, heavily involved' in the 'Game of Thrones' prequel shows
- "Game of Thrones" author George R.R. Martin shared new updates with fans on his blog.
- He said he's still working on "The Winds of Winter," and also gave new details about prequel shows.
George R.R. Martin infamously stopped working closely with the "Game of Thrones" showrunners after the fourth season, but the author recently said he's been "deeply, heavily involved" with the pre-production process on all the upcoming HBO prequel shows.
In a new blog post shared on Wednesday morning, Martin gave fans updates on his writing progress for "The Winds of Winter," the anticipated sixth novel in his "A Song of Ice and Fire" series — the basis of HBO's "Game of Thrones." The writer said he's made progress on the book in 2020 and 2021, but also said the "successor shows" have been a focus.
"Those have taken a ton of my time and attention this year," Martin wrote. "I have seen some comments out there questioning how much I am involved in these new series. The answer is: a lot. Deeply, heavily involved in every one of the new shows."
He continued: "It's my world, and while I have been working closely with some fantastic writers and showrunners, ultimately it is up to me to try to keep the canon… well, canonical… and to do all I can to help make the new shows great."
Martin so far has maintained that he won't be a credited writer on any new scripts for the prequel shows, but this blog post makes it clear that he's been doing a lot of consulting.
The author, who worked as a screenwriter before writing "A Song of Ice and Fire," penned four total episodes of "Game of Thrones" — one for each of the first four seasons, which ran from 2011 to 2014. But by the fifth season in 2015, Martin said he needed to focus more on "The Winds of Winter" and stepped back from direct involvement with the HBO series.
Coshowrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss continued to spearhead most of the scripts, along with writers Bryan Cogman and Dave Hill.
Now Benioff and Weiss are onto new ventures at Netflix, and the first of HBO's greenlit prequel shows — "House of the Dragon" — will be helmed by former "Game of Thrones" director Miguel Sapochnik and writer Ryan Condal ("Colony").
In his Wednesday blog post, Martin gave updates on a few of the other prequel shows in the works at HBO. They're all still in the development stage and include a mix of live-action shows and animated series. The subjects include Corlys Velaryon, Dunk and Egg, and the legend of Nymeria.
"I will continue to work with the writers and showrunners and directors and producers on all these shows," Martin wrote. "And in addition to all that, let me say [once] again, yes, I am still working on WINDS OF WINTER."
"House of the Dragon" is set to premiere sometime in 2022, though HBO has yet to announce an exact date. Last month Martin said a summer or fall premiere date was possible.
You can read everything we know about "House of the Dragon" here.