The End of An Era: GOT to Premiere Sunday

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Maddy Javier, Staff Writer

On Sunday fans of the hit television HBO series Game of Thrones will be jittering in front of their TVs in anticipation of the season premiere of the show’s eighth and final season.

As the main title plays, fans will watch the oh-so-familiar introduction that flies over the map of Westeros and beyond the Wall for one of the last times.

The television series, which was first brought to the screen in 2011 as an adaptation of the best-selling book series, “Fire and Ice” by George R. R. Martin, is an American fantasy drama series, encompassing several plots that revolve around three main stories set in the fictional land of the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros and Essos.

The show has been credited for its beautiful film locations that attribute to the medieval-esk setting, including places such as Croatia, Iceland, Spain, Malta, Northern Ireland, and Scotland. However, the show has also been criticized for its grotesque violence and use of nudity in earlier seasons.

Over the past eight years, the show has released 67 episodes (at about one hour each). Season eight will span over six episodes, with the final episode to air on Sunday, May 19th. The episodes are estimated to range from 54 minutes to one hour and 20 minutes.

The big question that everyone is asking about the final season, however, is:

Who will win the “game of thrones?”

All bets are on the table as fans prepare for the final battle that will end with one shining victor.

Will it be the fan favorite, Jon Snow, played by Kit Harington? What about the fearless “Queen of Dragons,” Daenerys, played by Emilia Clarke? How about Tyrion Lannister, the witty, yet clever, exiled son, played by Peter Dinklage?

When asked about the ending to the show, Dinklage told Entertainment Tonight, “There are no better writers in television than [showrunners] Dan Weiss and David Benioff. They ended it brilliantly. Better than I could have imagined, and you people are in for it. It ends beautifully for my character, whether it be tragic or not.”

Actress Sophie Turner, who plays Sansa Stark, shared her own thoughts about how fans will react to the conclusion of the last season.

“A lot of fans will be disappointed and a lot of fans will be over the moon,” Turner told IGN. “It will be really interesting to see people’s reactions, but for me it was just heartbreaking to read at the very final page of the script: ‘End of Game of Thrones’. That was really emotional.”

The odds are up for debate as fans begin to share their theories about how the final season of Game of Thrones will end.

Be sure to tune in to HBO on Sunday night at 8pm CT for the first last episode of GOT!

If you haven’t watched the show before, the previous seven seasons are available to stream on HBO or Hulu. You could also head to the Lake Bluff or Lake Forest Public Library and check out the DVDs for each season.