Small Council: Is HBO going overboard with Game of Thrones security this year?
By WiC Staff
This year, HBO is going all-out to prevent leaks from the set of Game of Thrones season 8. It’s erected “massive metal walls” around sets, is intent on filming multiple endings, and made it difficult for cast members to read their dialogue — if all the news can be believed, they may even resort to feeding actors lines through earpieces rather than giving them scripts.
Is there a point where all this becomes excessive? Does it really work? Might focusing on security come at the expense of quality? Let’s discuss.
DAN: I feel like we should establish something right off the bat: although Nikolaj Coster-Waldau said that, this year, the cast members won’t get scripts and will instead be fed lines through earpieces on set, he might have been exaggerating…or just wrong…or toying with fans. Even for Game of Thrones, that seems excessive.
And yet, when it comes to this show, it doesn’t seem impossible, which tells you everything you need to know. Game of Thrones takes its spoiler prevention seriously — it’s been known to change character names in scripts just in case they fall into the wrong hands, film fake scenes to throw people off, and more. My question is: Is there a point where putting so much emphasis on keeping the show’s secrets actually harms the show itself?
Assuming there’s any truth to it, the earpiece thing is a perfect example. Obviously, preventing the cast from reading and preparing for their parts beforehand can’t be good for their performances. I want them to have an excellent idea of where the character is at before they say word one, not figure it out on set in the name of keeping plot twists hidden until the last possible moment. It’s not worth it.
Also — and this is the bigger point — does it matter? One thing I’ve learned over the past couple of years is that, like life, fandom find a way. Episodes will leak despite HBO’s security (often by mistake because of an HBO affiliate). Plot details seem to find their way into fans’ hands no matter how badly HBO wants to keep them out. Fans are motivated, resourceful, and tech-saavy. For better or worse, I have yet to see any entertainment company overcome that trifecta. And if the ratings are splendid anyway, why not spend the recourses on making the show better rather than hiding spoilers?
Sure, more spoilers would find their way online. But even in that case, people wouldn’t be able to find them unless they go looking for them, and although it’s easy to forget this when you’re as obsessed as we are, most viewers don’t care enough to do that. (I suppose there could be a drive-by spoiler like the one below, but we can’t live in fear, people.) Personally, I’d prefer HBO scrap all its anti-spoiler measures and spend the extra money on a Ghost scene.
But that’s just me. What do you guys think? Is preventing spoilers a worthwhile goal? If so, is there a point where it stops being worthwhile, and where is it?
MOLLY: I’ve already heard that what Coster-Waldau said wasn’t true, so I don’t know about the quote, exactly. However, I say that if the people at HBO want to make it as hard as possible for the haters to get to everything, good for them.
However, if (and that’s a strong ‘if’) the earpiece thing is true, I don’t understand how that would work. How would any actor be able to work through the scene if they literally don’t know what’s coming next? It seems like it would take them a full year just to film one episode, and then who knows when we’ll get season 8? They’re already making it difficult with the multiple endings — do they really want to put more pressure on the actors?
Anything up to that I say is fair game. It’s amazing that the two episode leaks in season 7 didn’t put any real dent in the show’s performance. On any other show, especially one you have to pay to see, probably would have revenue and ratings. I still have no idea how the leaked episodes pulled in sky-high ratings despite being released early. Maybe it’s magic?
Then there’s the other side: if these hackers get through again, and HBO has hidden everything, imagine what surprises we could get. Might a bit of transparency help? People are still going to be rooting around looking for spoilers — maybe if HBO gave a little, they would stop.
Ultimately, it’s up to the big guys at HBO. I think that, since it’s the last season of the show, it’s fair to try and beef up security as much as possible. I agree with a lot of the reasons why. The only thing I’m personally against is anything that could hinder the acting and make it any less than the amazing show it should be.
RAZOR: Absolutely HBO is going overboard with security, but don’t they have to? For two years in a row, we’ve known how the entire season would play out, thanks to leaks, and I’m sure HBO would like the final six episodes of the series to be massive surprises.
If the actors are fed lines through earpieces — and I don’t really know how that would work on a show like Game of Thrones — then that might be the ultimate in hi-tech security. And if a script is still leaked under these circumstances, then you can narrow it down to someone in production who had access to the scripts being read to the actors.
Just for once, I would love to go into a season with not a single clue as to what’s going to happen. Because I write here, for too long I have known just about everything that has transpired in each episode, and it’s high time I joined the hallowed ranks of the Unsullied.
So do I think HBO is being too strict with security? Yes, but it’s a damned good thing.
COREY: With respect to the honorable NCDub’s, I don’t believe for a second that the actors will be fed their lines through an earpiece. Logistically that would be a nightmare, as half of acting is getting into the head of your character. How can the actors get into the head of the their character when they don’t know which way its going until the moment of? What happens when the line is something completely shocking? You’ll have actors learning of their character’s death or other shocking moments in real time as the cameras are rolling, which hardly sounds ideal.
Even more importantly, unless you are wiping the cast and crews memories afterwards with those little flashy things from Men in Black, what is the point? Whether they learn the lines and plot before or during filming, it can always be leaked afterwards. What’s to stop the guy paid to bring coffee to the director from leaking anything he sees? Coffee guy will still be able to hit Reddit if he sees Daenerys strangle Cersei, whether Emilia Clarke and Lena Headey got their lines that day or months ago.
And finally, many of the spoilers we had from season 7 didn’t come solely from leaked scripts. Outdoor shooting on the beach pegged Jon and Dany’s meeting, Jorah’s greyscale cure, and Gendry’s return among other things. What point is there in feeding actors their lines the day of shooting if someone is sitting a mile away with a camera? All this nonsense about feeding them their lines seems like more trouble than it could possibly be worth.
Now I will say that HBO is on the right track regarding the rumor that multiple endings will be filmed. Even if the scripts are leaked, our filming outdoors gives away big secrets, multiple endings will still have us guessing until the very end. It might be an expensive way to guard against spoilers, but its one of the few options that could actually work.
SARAH: Isn’t Nikolaj known for making things up for fun? I present duck-gate as an example of his penchant for feeding us false clues. I find a lot of his interviews to be inconsistent, due to his aforementioned fondness for messing around with the fans, so I’m taking this revelation with a grain of salt. Having lines fed through an earpiece seems extremely bothersome. An actor’s job is to react to the other actors in the scene, and I imagine that would prove difficult when a member of production is feeding audio into your ear.
That said, if HBO are increasing their security measures to protect our eyes and ears from leaks, I am 100% behind this. I’m a walking contradiction when it comes to Thrones spoilers — I don’t want them to exist, yet when they leak, I can’t help but seek them out. I’d rather not be given the opportunity to spoil myself. A new season of the show is normally like Christmas for me. I watch it with my partner every year, staying up until 2am so we can experience it live and struggling, bleary-eyed but happy, through work the next day. This year, he and I agreed that we couldn’t feel the same enthusiasm for season 7 as we had for previous seasons because we already knew it all, which almost completely removed any element of excitement or anticipation.
Yes, some of this is my fault, because I choose to write for a website where spoilers are almost completely unavoidable — though amazingly, our own Richard Preston managed to steer clear of them — but if there were no leaks, there would be nothing for us to discover.
It’s sad that security needs to be jacked up to such an extent because there are people who — quite ridiculously, I may add — feel the need to take photos, steal scripts and generally make life harder for the production. It’s a searing reflection of a day and age in which people need things now and are unwilling to wait it out for a good thing. It would be a far better thing if paps and opportunistic fans stayed away from leaking content altogether, but as that’s nothing more than an idealistic improbability, I say HBO should go for it with bells on. If they need any help, I’ll be happy to stand guard by the set and pelt lurking photographers with water pistols. Or icy spears.
BROOKE: If what Nikolaj Coster-Waldau says is true, and the actors are going to be fed their lines as they’re filming, I think artistry will suffer for security. Having someone give an actor a line reading in their ear completely negates the actor’s craft. Game of Thrones is not improv. Without the benefit of an advance script, how can an actor understand where the character is going or imbue it with the authenticity forged over the last seven seasons? I think it’s a huge mistake and HBO is going WAY overboard. This is a television show after all—it’s not life or death (even though sometimes it’s felt like that #redwedding)—and it seems like it’s come to the point where the artists who made it the phenomenon it’s become are being shackled by the paranoia of the powers that be. Obviously leaks don’t matter to ratings, as has been pointed out upthread.
100% HBO is going too far with the security.
Actors of this caliber should never be given line-readings.
What do you guys think? Vote in the poll and let us know in the comments!