how many seasons will GoT go on for?

[Stannis the Wight]

The magic number is 9.

As the show goes on and as it catches up to the books I think that the season's relationship to the book it is depicting will become less distinct. For example in season 4 I believe we will start to see some stuff from AFFC so that season 5 can focus more on the ADWD storylines and the main characters (Tyrion and Dany specifically) don't need as much screen time as chapters in that book. This will leave enough room for some of the new characters to be established. Many intersecting stories from ADWD can be condensed too.

[PatrickStormborn]

Why so many people seem to want the worst two books in the series to cover two whole seasons (or more) is beyond me.

[Lannister Hamster]

Why so many people seem to want the worst two books in the series to cover two whole seasons (or more) is beyond me.

Speaking for myself I don't think that they can squish all the source material into 1 season.

Rereading book 5 though there is no reason why they would need to take more than 2 seasons to translate 2 books. There is a lot of filler.

[PatrickStormborn]

Speaking for myself I don't think that they can squish all the source material into 1 season.

Rereading book 5 though there is no reason why they would need to take more than 2 seasons to translate 2 books. There is a lot of filler.

They need to make a coherent season of television for season five. The best way to do this is, imo, to streamline as much of AFfC and ADwD as possible. There are a lot of great aspects in each book - the problem is that they suffer from massive pacing problems and are full of filler. The biggest flaws of the books are their midsections; the beginning and endings (excluding the parts without conclusions) are generally great material, but the middle parts need to be condensed and rearranged.

The most relevant parts of the books (the chapters of Cersei, Jaime, Jon, Tyrion, Dany, Arya, Bran and Sansa, and the story of Stannis re-taking the North) could all fit in a single season. If there's a lot of spare time left - great! They can add more. If not, they will have to cut the most irrelevant parts out.

[Lannister Hamster]

They need to make a coherent season of television for season five. The best way to do this is, imo, to streamline as much of AFfC and ADwD as possible. There are a lot of great aspects in each book - the problem is that they suffer from massive pacing problems and are full of filler. The biggest flaws of the books are their midsections; the beginning and endings (excluding the parts without conclusions) are generally great material, but the middle parts need to be condensed and rearranged.

The most relevant parts of the books (the chapters of Cersei, Jaime, Jon, Tyrion, Dany, Arya, Bran and Sansa, and the story of Stannis re-taking the North) could all fit in a single season. If there's a lot of spare time left - great! They can add more. If not, they will have to cut the most irrelevant parts out.

The problem is that at the beginning of season 5 you have to restart the story in a way as the war between the starks and lannisters are over. The new reality has to put across and new characters main (Aegon) and supporting (Jon's traitorous Steward and Tanda (both whose names are escaping me now)) need to be introduced. This will take at least 2 episodes and then you are really packing stuff in.

I think you could combine the books into one series (it would be possible) but HBO wouldn't want to do it because they lose a potential series of tv of their best ever drama and I'd imagine D&D would want to have as much time to tell their story as possible. I think nearly every main character arc in books 4 and 5 have a good midway point that can serve as a season ender and if not then its up to D&D to manufacture one from the source text.

[irith]

Unfortunately, a lot of people's predictions are very much wishful thinking. Premium cable shows just don't have 10 seasons in them. Costs tend to go up as time goes on - actors demand more money on renegotiations, etc. Everyone involved starts to want to move on. TV productions take a lot of people, and it is difficult to keep dozens of creative people 100% invested in one project for what would end up taking a decade of their lives. Never forget these are real people that have real lives and careers.

Looking at previous HBO shows, 7 seasons is the maximum I could see this show running - and that's assuming ratings stay way up. 8 seasons is somewhat conceivable, but a big stretch. Even The Sopranos didn't last that long. Here's how I would like to see it shake down:

2011 - Game

2012 - Clash

2013 - First 1/2 - 2/3 of Storm

2014 - Remainder of Storm, part of Feast/Dance. They would ideally cherrypick to make sure all storylines ended reasonably for a season ending. More than likely there would be a bigger share of Feast's material than Storm's. This is obviously where it begins to become tricky.

2015 - Remainder of Feast/Dance, POSSIBLY the very beginning of Winds to better resolve things, though this would require that Winds be released early 2014 or GRRM provide relevant details ahead of time (less than likely).

2016 - Year off. This is not unheard of in the big name TV shows. It would allow for actors/writers/etc. to "recharge" so to speak, and more importantly gives GRRM some breathing room to write Dream. This could possibly be placed after S6 instead, it just depends on how Winds concludes compared to Feast/Dance.

2017 - Season 6, Winds. Dream MUST be released by the time S6 is airing unless they want to wait another year, which would likely be a bad idea.

2018 - Dream. If GRRM takes 3 more books instead of 2, I can almost guarantee you the show will not make it that far. There is simply not enough time. It would only work if Winds/Dream/8th book take no more than 2 years each which is probably unrealistic by now.

And this is all dependent on the show keeping its viewership. As the series goes on, it becomes increasingly less TV-friendly. S2's main problem was more the number of characters/POV's than anything else, INCLUDING the (admittedly disappointing) original material. The increasing distance and limited interactions between the main characters really starts being a hindrance in the TV format. Honestly, I'm questioning D&D's decision to split Storm. It's a good idea to do justice to Storm, but it starts to make things more offset as time goes on. 1.5 seasons for Feast/Dance seems most reasonable, but there are limited ways to end S4 in any kind of sensible fashion in that case. Those two books have little enough resolution as a whole, and even less stopping at some indeterminate point in the middle. There's definitely not enough material in Storm for two full seasons, so they have to either pad S4 with original material (not great luck with that so far) or pull in stuff from Feast and/or Dance.

Also, Robert's Rebellion or D&E are not going to happen as interim seasons. Period. The network isn't going to spend the cash on that when they could just as easily have a 1-year delay. Those would not work very well from a TV standpoint anyway - almost completely new cast, limited relevance to the main arc. It's obviously some nice backstory, but it still just delays the main plot rather than advancing it in any way. That is simply not an option in TV storytelling.

[Shadow on the Wall]

And this is all dependent on the show keeping its viewership. As the series goes on, it becomes increasingly less TV-friendly. S2's main problem was more the number of characters/POV's than anything else, INCLUDING the (admittedly disappointing) original material. The increasing distance and limited interactions between the main characters really starts being a hindrance in the TV format. Honestly, I'm questioning D&D's decision to split Storm. It's a good idea to do justice to Storm, but it starts to make things more offset as time goes on. 1.5 seasons for Feast/Dance seems most reasonable, but there are limited ways to end S4 in any kind of sensible fashion in that case. Those two books have little enough resolution as a whole, and even less stopping at some indeterminate point in the middle. There's definitely not enough material in Storm for two full seasons, so they have to either pad S4 with original material (not great luck with that so far) or pull in stuff from Feast and/or Dance.

You make good points, but the impression that I get is that D & D will go through aSoS more slowly than we think. I initially thought the PW would be in, but it seems very unlikely that it will be now. And if that's the case, that leaves plenty of story for Tyrion's arc. Which means that he can actually finish Season 4 dramatically, perhaps compensating for the other character's lack of resolution.

Jon Snow could very easily get a thrilling arc in Season 4, just using aSoS material, especially if Season 3 does not contain the battles at Castle Black. Daenerys could possibly have the taking of Meereen in Season 4 and then go into AffC/AdWD, like most of the other characters.

But if that season has a couple of dramatic conclusions to it, the loose threads will probably be tolerable.

[ctbj]

7 seasons will be plenty, not enough bones in ADWD too many plot lines in motion would be really hard to keep viewers satified and Curious George will find the time to finish up the books, he already knows whats going to happen he just has to get it on paper LOL, my guess is this season is very importaint in the future of this series the ratings have to be huge for this series to hit 5 seasons

[ghost23]

7 seasons will be plenty, not enough bones in ADWD too many plot lines in motion would be really hard to keep viewers satified and Curious George will find the time to finish up the books, he already knows whats going to happen he just has to get it on paper LOL, my guess is this season is very importaint in the future of this series the ratings have to be huge for this series to hit 5 seasons

I think this season will definitely be the biggest in terms of ratings. Just look at the 15 second teaser which already has 1.5 million views on Youtube. The same teaser for season 2 released a year ago only has 500,000 views in comparison. The show's popularity has grown immensely over this time so I have no doubt season 3 will be the biggest.

[Lord of Lannisport]

Probably 8 seasons (assuming 7 books)

S1 - aGoT

S2 - aCoK

S3 - 2/3 aSoS

S4 - 1/3 aSoS, parts of aFfC and aDwD

S5 - most of aFfC, aDwD

S6 - parts of aFfC, aDwD, some of tWoW (Siege of Winterfell, Battle of Slavers bay, other relevent parts)

S7 - Remainder of tWoW, some of aDoS

S8 - Remander of aDoS

If the ratings start to drop after S4 they can probably condense it into 7 seasons, but they way they film S5 will commit them to the number of seasons they're trying for.

[Peasant Rebel Leader]

That sounds reasonable, and I agree that Season 5 will be the deciding one. Though I would advise against assigning books to seasons. Your list already shows why that's not a good idea. The producers have stated that they intend to go forward chronologically and in a way that makes sense for the storylines and for the television medium.

That means for example that much of the Kingsmoot story is moved forward, to season 4, but actually they can condense that to one or two episodes or leave it away as a whole if they want. This also changes everything around regarding AFFC and ADWD: Janos Slynt is killed right at the start of season 5 (early ADWD), while we will not see the prologue of AFFC until the start of Sams Oldtown story (so, season 6 or equivalently early TWOW!!), they'd also will bring in things from earlier books, I can see many iconic talks about Rhaegar being moved to later Daenerys scenes, they can even redo some of the HotU for Dany later on, and of course the whole story of the Reeds has been pushed back to season 3.

So, instead of doing charts with books, I'd just list the real core of characters (=influence other characters) and where they stand: Jon, Dany, Tyrion, Cersei, Sansa. Maybe add Arya and Brienne to cover the rest of the areas.

But yes, 8 seasons sounds good, though I'd shift S6,7 and 8 contentwise ;)

[Javi Marcos]

The Sopranos begun in 99, finished in 2007. 8 years, 6/7 seasons (if you consider the last one as 2 seasons).

So, for GoT I'm sure the series won't be airing in 2020.

2011 GoT

2012 ACOK

2013 2/3 ASOS

2014 1/3 ASOS + part of AFFC/ADWD. I'm pretty sure what parts are going to be there

-Kingsmoot

-Arianne (they won't make her move when with Oberyn's demise but with Joffrey's, because in that moment by Dorne laws Myrcella is the rightful queen)

- Brienne (she leaves King's Landing for example in chapter 5, faces Lady Stoneheart in Episode 10)

- First Reek chapters, until Boltons conquer Moat Cailin

2015 Here comes my doubts

Scenario 1:

2015 The rest of AFFC (Cersei, Sansa, Arya, Jaime) + full ADWD. Main problem: we won't see here the battles of Mereen and Winterfell

2016

1/2 half or 2/3 of TWOW. Of course we'll see here the battles of Mereen and Winterfell, but in the first 3-5 episodes.

2017

The end of TWOW

TWOW will be a huge book and with all the characters there, like ASOS

Scenario 2

2015 The rest of AFFC, first half of ADWD Main problem: pretty bad season, nothing really great happens there, only plot development. Not battles, no Dany riding dragons, no Jon's fall, no Cersei's WoS. The only gamechanger is Aegon.

2016 Second half of ADWD + Full battles of Mereen and Winterfell

2017 TWOW (the rest)

And finally

2018

ADOS Part 1

2019

ADOS Part2

We'll have 9 seasons, but all of them of 10 episodes. The Sopranos IIRC had 86 episodes.

Yeah, it woud be easier(specially for 2015 and 2018) maybe to make less seasons, but with more episodes, but D&D already said they won't make more than 10 episodes per season.

[The Dragon has three heads]

I've posted in this thread on and off an it's pretty circular.

What you'll be looking at after season 3 will be a chronological and story only blending of the books, they'll pretty much cease to matter, the iron born stuff must be brought up so their actors are not cooling their heals for two seasons.

The tyrion Oberyn, PW, arc will be played out over season 4 so realistically that doesn't put one of the major characters on essos until the beginning of 5 and Then Danny flying away at the end with the death of jon is going to drive the tv fan base off the deep end.

That Puts us at season 5 being aired in 2015. And if by some miracle they can stretch it out perhaps season 6 will end with the above, but I don't see it.

[HexenII]

HBO is pretty predictable, but also very cold. They're not afraid of shivving die-hard fans between the ribs and leaving us for dead. They did it to me on Rome and Deadwood, I wouldn't be surprised if they did it again. As long as Game of Thrones is making money and keeping people interested, it'll likely go on... Probably. Rome was still doing well and they just panicked because of how expensive it was to produce. Game of Thrones doesn't look too cheap, either, which worries me. I know True Blood is just garbage and on season six, but True Blood looks a lot less expensive. Modern settings, modern clothes, bit of CGI... nothing like the world-building undertaking of Game of Thrones. Entourage went long, too, but again, modern and hyper popular. Game of Thrones is closer to Rome... so it worries me.

Totally agree with you, some panic times are spreeding.

[CoolOff]

But was Rome ever close to the phenomenon that GoT has become?

[Khal-a-bunga]

Rome was significantly more expensive to make than Game of Thrones is, and was co-financed by the BBC during the first season (which is why the show was cancelled during production of the second season). Management at HBO have admitted that canceling both Rome and Deadwood was a mistake, as they hadn't taken the profits from DVD/Blu-Ray sales into consideration. I wouldn't use the cancellation of these two shows as a basis for how HBO will handle the shows they're currently airing/working on, as the management has since changed and Eric Kessler (company president) seems to understand that viewer (customer) loyalty is integral to their success going forward.

[King Tommen]

One thing that Game of Thrones has going for it that these other HBO series did not is that it is a serialized saga that has source material with a definitive endpoint (we would hope). If you cancel the show before they reach the end of the books, then you render the entire endeavor almost pointless because you have no way of completing the story that these characters have started on. Any of those other HBO shows could end at any time and you could easily say "I would have liked to have seen them depict more of this story but this is where they chose to end it I guess". If you end Game of Thrones before the end of Martin's books, you have no way to feasibly "wrap up" the series with any coherence. You've spent hundreds of millions of dollars and you will end up with an unfinished product.

This would have been very clear when embarking on this project that you were going to be all-in and HBO's business model is actually set up to handle something of this magnitude. As long as the show maintains its status of a buzz-worthy and quality anchor of the network, then they'll be able to continue with it. The audience numbers don't matter as much on HBO as they do on broadcast networks and as long as the subscriber base is in good shape and the ancillary market for the show is strong (BluRay's etc), then it will make sense to continue with it. I would suspect that the audience will stay with a show like Game of Thrones the same way the readership has because they will have spent enough time getting the audience engaged in the character's plights so that they want to see where they will end up and how the series will resolve itself.

[McCloskey]

Not sure if its already been mentioned but one thing going for GOT is that actor salaries. They won't be as big a problem as other shows as we move into future seasons, ie 6, 7, 8, etc. Two and Half Men gets 10 million viewers a week but CBS might cancel it since after all these years the actors are making millions (combined) an episode. For GOT, few of the actors will make it from season 1 forward, and of those who do many are supporting characters who won't appear in the full 10 episodes of the season.

[Werthead]

Actor salaries is something of an issue. Not for a lot of the characters who show up and die a few episodes, or maybe a couple of seasons, later, and not for actors who can fit their filming into a short period (like Charles Dance, who filmed his whole S2 appearance in two weeks, apparently). But by the end of Season 6, Peter Dinklage, Emilia Clarke and Kit Harington may have become major stars and are fending off movie offers to continue working on GoT. Certainly actors like that might find it tempting to leave, thus requiring huge salary hikes to return for the final 2 seasons. Those three characters having to be written out earlier than in the books could prove disastrous for the series.

[Myrddin]

But by the end of Season 6, Peter Dinklage, Emilia Clarke and Kit Harington may have become major stars and are fending off movie offers to continue working on GoT. Certainly actors like that might find it tempting to leave, thus requiring huge salary hikes to return for the final 2 seasons. Those three characters having to be written out earlier than in the books could prove disastrous for the series.

It's a good thing Martin has opened up a way for at least one of them not to return.

If Jon does come back from the dead reborn or whatever, just have a new actor step up.