Game of Thrones creators David Benioff and Dan Weiss announce Confederate, their new HBO series

We’re currently in the thick of Game of Thrones season 7, but with the end of the show in sight, it’s time to start planning for what comes after. That’s exactly what creators and showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss are doing. Today, HBO announced that it’s working with the pair to create Confederate, a show about an alternate reality where the Confederacy won the American Civil War and seceded from the Union, creating a new nation where slavery remained legal and “has evolved into a modern institution.” The story will will chronicle “the events leading to the Third American Civil War,” which sounds dire. It will follow “freedom fighters, slave hunters, politicians, abolitionists, journalists, the executives of a slave-holding conglomerate and the families of people in their thrall.” It sounds more than a little like Game of Thrones in terms of breadth of experience.

“As the brilliant ‘Game of Thrones’ winds down to its final season, we are thrilled to be able to continue our relationship with Dan and David, knowing that any subject they take on will result in a unique and ambitious series,” said HBO programming president Casey Bloys. “Their intelligent, wry and visually stunning approach to storytelling has a way of engaging an audience and taking them on an unforgettable journey. CONFEDERATE promises to be no exception, and we are honored to be adding the talented team of Nichelle and Malcolm Spellman to the mix.”

Benioff and Weiss, speaking as a single organism, also weighed in:

"We have discussed CONFEDERATE for years, originally as a concept for a feature film. But our experience on ‘Thrones’ has convinced us that no one provides a bigger, better storytelling canvas than HBO. There won’t be dragons or White Walkers in this series, but we are creating a world, and we couldn’t imagine better partners in world-building than Nichelle and Malcolm, who have impressed us for a long time with their wit, their imagination and their Scrabble-playing skills."

Carolyn Strauss and Bernadette Caulfield, each of whom work as producers on Game of Thrones, will join Confederate as executive producers, so an important chunk of the creative team behind Thrones will carry over. Benioff and Weiss will again serve as showrunners, proving that they have no hesitation about managing another huge show. They think big, these guys.

Next: HBO releases official images from 'Stormborn,' the second episode of Game of Thrones season 7

Before you start getting worried, HBO’s press release is very clear that production on Confederate will begin AFTER the final season of Game of Thrones, which could air in 2018 or 2019 — HBO isn’t sure yet. And although Benioff and Weiss will be working on something new, HBO fully intends to keep the world of Game of Thrones alive on the small screen — it’s currently developing multiple spinoffs.