Kit Harington: Don’t look for closure in Game of Thrones season 7
By Dan Selcke
Kit Harington is out on the press trail to promote Game of Thrones season 7. Last night, he showed off his skill with impressions on Jimmy Kimmel Live! And today, Extra TV uploaded a new interview where he had some interesting comments about what’s to come. Have a watch.
Besides the story about getting approached by Game of Thrones fan and Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers one time, Harington gives the usual line about season 7 being “extraordinary.” More interesting is his response to Mario Lopez’s question about whether season 7 will offer closure on any plotlines.
"I don’t think you should look too much for closure at this stage in the game, but you definitely do see some meetings that you’ve been waiting for for a very long time. This season moves at an incredible pace, and one that we’re used to from Thrones. A lot happens in a very short space of time, and for that reason, it’s completely different from other season there’s been."
Because seasons 7 and 8 were planned together, it makes sense that we wouldn’t get too much closure in season 7. Given how many comments cast members have made about the accelerated pace, we at least know that whatever doesn’t get resolved won’t get resolved in record time.
Moving on, Harington gave a lengthy interview to Rich Eisen of The Rich Eisen Show, where he refused to tease season 7 (“No one dies this year. Not a single person.”), refused to reveal his idea for how the show ends (“I’m pretty certain I know who sits on the Iron Throne.”), and talked about football.
This interview was pretty light, but here are some highlights:
- Harington is among the few cast members who have read the Song of Ice and Fire books, which he burned through when he got the gig. (It’s possible he hasn’t read A Dance with Dragons yet, since that came out after he’d filmed the first season.)
- Harington had “a two-week period” after he read the script for “Mother’s Mercy” when he didn’t know if Jon was coming back, and he convinced himself it was over. But it wasn’t, and he was relieved. “I didn’t know how I was coming back to life. I just knew that they said, ‘Don’t cut your hair.'”
- He didn’t reveal specifics about season 7, but did say that it will be “a different type of epic. We did seven episodes instead of 10, so we could put so much more resources into those seven episodes.”
- Will he appear in any of the forthcoming Game of Thrones spinoffs? “I’m not sure you could do a Jon Snow spinoff. It might just be too morbid.”
- The worst Game of Thrones fan theory Harington ever heard involved the whole show taking place in Ghost’s dream. “Please never become a screenwriter,” he told the guy who suggested it to him.
But Harington’s not the only cast members aboard the hype train. Liam Cunningham and Carice van Houten talked to Stuff about where Davos and Melisandre are headed this year. Cunninham, being his colorful self, argued that the White Walkers could be a metaphor for climate change.
"Don’t forget in Westeros, we’ve been denying them, nobody believes them, it’s myth, it’s legend and this that and the other, it can’t happen. We obviously know on the show they’re on their way and no army, no one army, no Daenerys army, no Cersei army, no Jon Snow army is going to be able to defeat [them]. They’re very difficult to kill and I just kinda said at the time maybe it’s a little like climate change."
And in a case of life imitating art, Van Houten disagreed with him. “To me I see the White Walkers as a metaphor for death coming for all of us and whether you’re a king or a peasant, man, woman, strong or weak or whatever, you can’t escape.”
Van Houten also addressed questions about nudity on the show, something that she, as Melisandre, is familiar with. “When I say I am comfortable being naked, that’s not entirely true,” she said.
"I just feel like it’s part of our job. If it’s just about nakedness and tits, I agree, I don’t like that either. I wouldn’t agree on doing that but if it serves the purpose, and if it’s part of a character, and in my case or in my character’s case, it’s a weapon that’s when it’s a little different.”"
“A f…ing dangerous weapon,” Cunningham chipped in. Oh, those two.
Game of Thrones season 7 debuts on July 16.
