Considering “Game of Thrones” was nominated for about 3,254 awards at last night’s Emmys, it was clear that the cast and crew of the HBO series would be in attendance, and would likely be hit with some uncomfortable questions. Namely, the people involved in the series would have to finally give their opinions about how fans seemingly disliked Season 8 and were disappointed that the epic series went out with a whimper, instead of the bang that was expected.
Speaking to Variety, Emilia Clarke, who played the fan-favorite Daenerys Targaryen, was asked about her thoughts to the fan response. The actress, whose character seems to be at the center of much of the debate of the final season’s quality, was surprisingly upbeat about it all, finding the silver lining to the whole situation.
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“You know what?” Clarke said. “It was profoundly flattering is what it was because when someone cares that much that they’re ready to make such a noise about how they believe the characters should’ve been finished and how the story should’ve gone. That’s just enormously flattering. That just shows how much everybody loved it.”
She added, “We’ve had enough space now since filming, since it coming out, since the premiere, and all of that stuff. It’s been all of these different stages. Now, here we are and it feels like everyone’s had some time to cool down a little bit.”
The actress isn’t the only person that was asked about the controversial ending while attending the Emmys. As you might expect, her co-star Kit Harington was asked about what he thought. And considering his passionate defense of the series from earlier in the year, he decided to focus on the good times and claim ignorance about the quality of the final season.
“I haven’t seen the final season,” he said. “But I know what it took to shoot it. It was hard and everyone put all of their love and effort into it. We knew what we were doing was right, story-wise. We knew that it was right for the characters because we’d lived with them for 10 years. Controversy for us didn’t really affect us.”
As for the men at the center of the debate, ‘Thrones’ creators David Benioff and D.B. Weiss, the controversy about the final season, which included over 1 million digital signatures on a petition to have them re-do the entire batch of episodes, hasn’t really affected them, as they look to the future and hope that over time, emotions will calm.
“It’s not really up for us to decide what people feel about it,” said Weiss. “We hope that they watch it and like it in the future. There’s no way to tell. The landscape of television changes so quickly; it’s changing right now as we’re standing here. It’s so gratifying to have reached this many people. We hope the people who are a little bit too young will grow up to watch it as well.”
No matter what the public’s opinion on the final season is, “Game of Thrones” still won a dozen trophies at this year’s Emmys, including Best Drama. So, it would appear that plenty of people loved what Benioff and Weiss presented. And as the latter suggests, it’ll be interesting to see how the season holds up in the years to come, as fans settle into their thoughts and new fans emerge. Perhaps in 10 years time, we’ll all look back and be astonished that there was any controversy whatsoever.