As filming continues on Game of Thrones season 8, many of the show’s leading players must feel like they’re walking on eggshells in order to combat spoilers and untimely leaks.
Take Maisie Williams, as an example. The New Mutants actress recently appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live (h/t Cinema Blend) where she was badgered about all things Game of Thrones and its impending series finale. April 2019 has been earmarked as a tentative launch window for season 8, which tells us that production should be all wrapped up before the year’s end.
But for Williams, it seems she’s already laid eyes on the final script, thereby joining an exclusive club that so far includes Kit Harington (Jon Snow/Aegon Targaryen), Peter Dinklage (Tyron Lannister), Sophie Turner (Sansa Stark) and many of the other key chess pieces that make up the Westerosi ensemble.
It’s seemingly an “incredibly moving” finale, while Maisie Williams told Jimmy Kimmel that it was quite surreal to read the closing moments of a TV series that has been on the airwaves for almost a decade, and therefore all of Williams’ adult life. But rest assured, fans can look forward to a fitting finale:
I do, I know the end of Game of Thrones. . . . I was just in my bed, I think, just like reading. It’s just surreal, being on this show for so long, and then it also having the following that it does, it’s just…everyone’s waiting for this moment, and then you read it, and it’s incredible.
The actress also addressed those rumors that HBO was filming fake scenes in order to throw people off the scent. And, well, it looks like those rumors were just that…rumors:
Well I heard this, and I immediately thought, ‘I don’t think we’ve got the budget to shoot lots of different endings’… But as we know, sometimes presidents don’t always tell the truth.
Comprised of only six episodes in total – down from the usual lot of 10 – Game of Thrones season 8 is expected to take flight next April. Elsewhere on the HBO lineup, the network has received no less than five pitches for a possible Thrones successor series, and though there’s been no announcement just yet, we know George R.R. Martin is actively involved in building a future for Westeros beyond 2019.