Kit Harington: I’m “more affected by [the end of Game of Thrones] than I thought I would be”

Game of Thrones is coming to an end. You’re emotional. I’m emotional. My dog is emotional. But whatever we’re feeling is probably dwarfed by the feelings of the people who have labored to create this show for the past eight years (or longer, for select members of the production). Speaking to Deadline, Kit Harington (Jon Snow) seems pretty broken up about it…so far as a Englishman can be, anyway. “I’m understandably more affected by it than I thought I would be,” he said.

"You know I wasn’t quite cynical about things, I’m quite straightforward and English. But, really, eight years of your life is a long time to connect with anything. I didn’t know at the beginning if this would be a show that no one would watch or if it would be a show that a lot of people would watch. And I’ve never been in a situation, a show, that’s lasted this long. In my life it’s pretty significant thing that’s happened to me, and coming to the end of it is understandably quite emotional."

Stop it, Kit, you’re embarrassing yourself.

Just kidding. Anyway, with the show wrapping up in 2019, expectations are high. No one wants the show to trip as it approaches the finish line. Per Harington, that’s resulted in a new kind of pressure on set “I’ve not felt before.”

"Whereas before, every year there’s always been a bit of pressure, this season is one where we could easily let people down. Obviously, we don’t want to do that so we’re very much stepping up everyone’s game which is very apparent, at least to me."

Harington avoided giving specifics on how the story will or won’t live up to fans’ expectations, but did say that filming is “going really well…These days are long and a grind but we’ve got the first section out of the way, and all is well. All is good.”

That’s all we’re likely to get out of him — Harington’s an old pro at not giving things away by this point.

Harington also discussed Gunpowder, a three-part historical drama he appeared in for the BBC — HBO picked it up to distribute stateside. Harington also produced the show, which was a change for him and could herald big things ahead.

"I definitely want to produce again, but I also recently thought of the idea of directing. I think there’s something in that that Game of Thrones has given me, which may be nothing else but great years with so many different directors, and doing such intensive amounts of work with different directors. But I feel like I’ve gotten an understanding of directing and producing from working on Thrones and working on various other projects that makes it appealing to me."

But that’s in the future. After Thrones is over, Harington figures he’ll spend time with fiancé Rose Leslie (Ygritte) and carefully choose his next project. That said, he will appear in How to Train Your Dragon 3 in 2019. He hasn’t escaped the world of dragons and fantasy just yet.

Elsewhere in the Thrones-verse, star Jacob Anderson (Grey Worm) teased Digital Spy about whether he was even going to appear in season 8, despite the fact that he was spotted at the full cast read-through back in October. “Maybe I was just at the read-through for fun,” he said, stirring the pot like a mischievous witch.

"Literally everybody is banished from saying a single thing. We don’t even know if Grey Worm is going to be in it, but I can probably confirm to you that Grey Worm will be in one second of Game of Thrones season eight. I can guarantee that."

We’ll take what we can get, I guess.

Next: The Game of Thrones season 8 director lineup, clarified

To stay up to date on everything Game of Thrones, follow our all-encompassing Facebook page and sign up for our exclusive newsletter.

Watch Game of Thrones for FREE with a no-risk, 7-day free trial of Amazon Channel