Theories On Why No Game of Thrones Season 6 Casting Announcements at Comic Con
By Ani Bundel
So where was the casting announcement? For the last few years—that would be the 2012 panel post Season 2 and last summer’s panel post Season 4—the show has made a huge splash by debuting a slate of new actors who will be joining the production. (There weren’t a lot of additions for Season 4, so the 2013 panel didn’t have a big list.) These are the moments when Game of Thrones news is made in the off season, and actors like Diana Rigg and Jonathan Pryce have been announced in key roles for the coming season. With so little to go on and so much to wonder about for Season 6, fans were counting on the Game of Thrones panel to deliver the goods—not only the names of cast members, but just as importantly, who they would play, since most of the casting calls haven’t included character names.
And then…nothing. No cast list. No big name British BBC legends added to the already impressive roster. No young nobodies who just scored their big break. Just…Nothing.
Why?
Well, we’ve got a few theories. They range from the practical to the speculative to the outright conspiracy minded. And more importantly—do we think the casting announcement might happen soon? Because fans are dying to know something, anything about Season 6.
Our first theory is the practical one. San Diego Comic Con fell early this year. Earlier, in fact, than it had since the show started. Only the 2012 panel came anywhere close to this early, on July 13th. The others have all been at the end of July: the 19th (2013), the 21st (2011), and the 25th (2014). This matters when you are looking to debut a slew of actors who will be joining the show, especially when casting doesn’t get underway for real until the previous season ends. Actors like Pryce and Rigg might make the casting process sound quick and easy. “They send me a script, I said yes!” But that’s because at their age, that’s all they involve themselves with. That “yes” is then followed by producer’s lawyers drawing up paperwork that is sent to agents, who present it to the actor’s lawyers, who mark it up and send back to the producers, who adjust, negotiate and return, wash rinse repeat.
It’s one thing when casting starts June 15th, and the producers say, “We need these dozen actors signed and ready to announce at 12 PST on the last Friday in July.” It’s quite another to say you want the same in half the time, what with the July 4th holiday in the US as a built in delay,not to mention this year the UK also had the tenth anniversary of 7/7 which brought everything to a halt.
If you believe this scenario, the chances of there being a casting announcement in the next few weeks is only logical. They’ll announce it once everyone’s signed, probably at the end of July. Know hope.
Unfortunately, that’s the only theory that includes such rosy news.
What do we know about Season 6? Anyone? Anyone? Oh yes, the book reader in the back. Yes you! What do you know? Oh, that Arya is blind? Yes, we knew that. Anyone else? Sansa and Theon probably survive the fall? Yes, we assumed that too, despite the physics involved. Anyone else? Jon Snow is alive? I’m sure his hairdresser would like that. Anyone else? Anyone? Anyone?
Right. That’s the truth—we don’t know anything about Season 6. We can speculate—and boy have we—just from the casting announcements that don’t actually list any character names. What’s going to happen once we do have those character names?
It’s one thing for the show to announce a new slate of actors joining the show when book readers already know the new characters that would be introduced next year. When half the viewing audience knows Lady Olenna will arrive in King’s Landing in Season 3 and will ultimately murder Joffrey right under the nose of his own family, trying to keep Diana Rigg from them is pointless. You might as well announce it, get the PR bump, and allow the book readers to smile knowingly while the show-watchers wonder why the grandmother of the girl who used to play Anne Boyelyn is such a big deal.
It’s quite another thing to announce who will be playing whom when none of the viewing audience knows why that character might be important. We can speculate from here to the moon if the overbearing fighter and his wife and kids that are in this casting announcement are Randyll Tarly and the rest of Sam’s relatives. But we don’t know it’s them. We do know Randyll Tarly has a random ride-by with Brienne and Pod, insults the hell out of her, and leaves. But that’s not a major role. If suddenly Sir BigName BritActor CBE is announced in the role of Randyll Tarly, and the role is a clearly a major one, the show has given something away that no one knew. It might even lead to speculation and people putting two and two together before Season 6 or The Winds of Winter comes out. Worse: the longer they have to come up with theories, the chance increases they come up with really amazing plot lines….that don’t actually happen, which risks disappointment and fan backlash. No one wants that.
If that’s the case, the show might hold the casting announcement all the way until March of next year.
Speaking of March of next year, that might be around the time Martin releases The Winds of Winter, which is another reason for the show to hold the casting announcement for the next few months. Martin has said he’s determined to get Book 6 out before Season 6 begins.
Now Benioff, Weiss, and George R.R. Martin have worked hard to separate the show from the books. Though the producers were extremely faithful that first season, with each passing year the show becomes more its own animal—to the point that Martin doesn’t even write episodes for it anymore. That was never more obvious than this last season, as the show started bringing in elements that aren’t in and may never be in the books, like the Massacre at Hardhome. But that doesn’t mean that Benioff and Weiss don’t feel like they owe a debt of service to their creator. The truth is, if they stick to their mantra of “70 episode, no more no less” there’s no way they won’t finish before he does. In fact, the only way Martin could finish before the show is if it stretched 10 seasons, a scenario the showrunners refuse to consider.
But just because the show is going to finish before the books and reveal the ending doesn’t mean that the showrunners don’t want to give Martin one last chance to get a leg up on them while he still can. Martin knows he muffed it—he’s said as much that he should have buckled down and gotten The Winds of Winter done in 2012/2013 so the show couldn’t got ahead of him like this. But even though it’s too late to go back and fix that, it’s not too late for him to at least get one more installment out ahead of the show. And with his suggestion this week that he will be going to WorldCon in November after all, that suggests The Winds of Winter is really close to being finished. The show might be holding their casting announcement to time with the release of the book (or better yet, a week after the book comes out) so that the usual half of the audience is now spoiled and ready, and knows why it is such a big deal that Sir BigName BritActor CBE is playing Randyll Tarly in Season 6.
And then of course there’s the conspiracy theorist’s reason: someone in that casting list might give away if Jon Snow is alive or dead. If that’s true, don’t expect a casting announcement at all.