The director of the latest “Game of Thrones” just tossed some subtle shade at those complaining about the timeline
The following post contains spoilers for the most recent episode of Game of Thrones. If you haven’t seen “Beyond the Wall” just yet, bounce on over to HBO.
Gone are the days where characters spent half a season traveling from one city to another across Westeros. In the most recent episode of Game of Thrones, Jon and his band of misfits found themselves beyond the Wall on a mission to capture a wight. Realizing this was a *terrible* idea, as they were ridiculously outnumbered by the army of the dead, Jon sent Gendry back to Eastwatch to get a raven to Daenerys, who proceeded to travel from Dragonstone to beyond the wall to execute a rescue mission.
This all happened in the span of about…20 minutes on the show. So how much time actually passed in Westeros??
The quickened pacing of Season 7 has seen the plot accelerate, and we’re not spending as much time watching our favorite characters get from point A to point B. Naturally, this has become a point of contention with fans, many of whom have grown worried that the show’s timeline has gotten a little *too* implausible.
The director of “Beyond The Wall,” Alan Taylor, explained to Variety that the timeline has gotten a little “hazy,” but pushed back a bit against those, as the Hound might say, “whinging.”
“We were aware that timing was getting a little hazy, Taylor told Variety. “We’ve got Gendry running back, ravens flying a certain distance, dragons having to fly back a certain distance…In terms of the emotional experience, [Jon and company] sort of spent one dark night on the island in terms of storytelling moments. We tried to hedge it a little bit with the eternal twilight up there north of The Wall. I think there was some effort to fudge the timeline a little bit by not declaring exactly how long we were there. I think that worked for some people, for other people it didn’t. They seemed to be very concerned about how fast a raven can fly but there’s a thing called plausible impossibilities, which is what you try to achieve, rather than impossible plausibilities. So I think we were straining plausibility a little bit, but I hope the story’s momentum carries over some of that stuff.
But Taylor isn’t worried about the timeline complaints. Game of Thrones‘ viewership has been at an all-time high and continues, for the most part, to be on top of its game.
The director then added, “It’s cool that the show is so important to so many people that it’s being scrutinized so thoroughly. If the show was struggling, I’d be worried about those concerns, but the show seems to be doing pretty well so it’s OK to have people with those concerns.”
While thecurrent pacing of GoT *does* make us chuckle at how much time we spent wandering Westeros with our favorite characters in previous seasons. But seeing how we’re down to our last seven episodes of Game of Thrones EVER, we’ll take dope storytelling over a hazy timeline any day.
