Liam Cunningham (Davos Seaworth) defends Game of Thrones season 8

Love it or hate it, the Game of Thrones series finale brought an end to an epic tale that spanned eight seasons and helped usher in a new Golden Age of Television. Although that the show has been over for nearly five months now, fans continue to argue about the controversial way it ended.

Naturally, cast members are being peppered with questions. Recently, Isaac Hempstead Wright (Bran Stark) and Liam Cunningham (Davos Seaworth) answered questions from Los Siete Reinos during a Q&A panel at the Game of Thrones exhibition in Madrid, Spain. (I’m using Google translate when transcribing their comments, so please forgive anything lost in translation.)

Image: Game of Thrones/HBO

Wright was asked how long ahead of time he know that Bran would end up as king. “Long time, a year and a half!” he said. “It was not easy. I told my mother, just her, on the phone. I remember she was driving and almost had an accident…I thought I was going to die, probably. I didn’t see any of that coming.”

But being king isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Wright lamented that he doesn’t have an Iron Throne to sit on, and that he was only king for “15 minutes of the whole damn series.” He also reiterated that George R.R. Martin had told showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss that Bran would become king in the Song of Ice and Fire books, as well. Of course, it may come about a little differently.

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As far as who Wright and Cunningham thought would be king before season 8, they both had different answers.

"Wright: “To be honest, for some time I thought I was going to be the King of the Night, that I was going to win, then I thought that Sansa…”Cunningham: “I thought it was going to be Tyrion. I would have been glad it was Tyrion. Especially after what he suffered with the distrust of Daenerys, with what happened with Varys, I thought he might be about to fall and then resurface.”"

“The good thing is that we talked about these issues while recording the scenes,” Cunningham continued. “We did not know. And people didn’t know it either, they debated it, they didn’t guess it…that’s a compliment, and they theorized, and they said, it can’t be!”

The conversation then turned to fans sad over the show being over. “The series ended when I had to finish,” Cunningham said. “People were sad, but it always happens in any series when it ends. And it is because people love history, love characters. I met some Americans in Belfast who met six years ago watching Game of Thrones and were there now making their honeymoon.”

"When it has become part of their lives, people see it at parties, having a common experience, like in the theater … It’s great to give that pleasure to people, make people laugh and get angry … it ‘s a precious experience. If people have enjoyed the series, a series that can be seen alone but even better in company … the fact that they have seen it with other people is fantastic."

Was Cunningham satisfied by the way the show ended? “There are people who did not like it, but also many people did not like the end of The Sopranos. “If you take something from people that they like very much, no matter what it is, they won’t like it. And you ask them, how could they have done that end better? And nobody knows.”

"You have to remember that the books are beautiful and you can never live up to each other’s imagination. And the showrunners David [Benioff] and Dan [Weiss] have dedicated 15 years of their life, and love the books very much, but know they have to have to do a television series that reaches many people."

NEW YORK, NEW YORK – APRIL 03: George R. R. Martin attends the “Game Of Thrones” Season 8 Premiere on April 03, 2019 in New York City. (Photo by Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images)

When it comes to comparing George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire books to Game of Thrones, Cunningham was full of opinions. “One of the best things the series has done is to make people read the books,” he said. “[A]nd George R.R. Martin has a large audience, not only for the quality of his writing but for the television series. He writes beautifully. And comparing it is ridiculous, they are different media, one is television and the other literary.”

"And about the end…there was nothing we could do to make everyone like the end . And if we did, people would complain, “This is a series for adults, we are not children!”"

Cunningham believes Game of Thrones “had the happiest ending that was possible.” He mentioned how House Stark was “in good shape,” and House Lannister had “disappeared.” House Targaryen — Daenerys specifically — was “finished,” and the Small Council is staffed with good people. “It’s a pretty happy ending to something that had a genocide right before.”

“I think it was a good ending,” Cunningham continued. “People say ‘it was short.’ The series was originally going to have 70 chapters, and thanks to David and Dan they added three more, which is six more months of work than they had under the HBO contract. They went one step further.”

"And people say ‘it was accelerated.’ Well, everything is accelerated. Davos has seven children in the novels. Bran, as you said, is more magical. Lady Stark is resurrected, Lady Stoneheart. There are thousands of things that appear in books …"

As you can tell, Cunningham get pretty fired up, saying that it was “impossible” to include all of that in the show. “We would all die of old age. And the shootings are getting longer. Watch the last season, a year for six chapters. Isaac would be 75 years old if we adapted everything from the books. It would be impossible.”

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As much as I lament the absence of Lady Stoneheart, Cunningham is absolutely correct. There was never a way to include the entirety of Martin’s fantasy world given the realities of television production.

What do you all make of Cunningham’s impassioned defense?

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