Game of Thrones begins....

[viper37]

I wonder in the real Middle Ages, was "Blow up the Pope" really a viable option.

They had no wildfire cache under the Vatican.

They usually preferred getting the Pope on their side or naming their own Pope, or later becoming a sort of Pope.
Besides, the Pope was popular elsewhere too, not just in Rome.

[Hamilcar]

If that scene is from GRRM, then it's undoubtedly inspired by the Gunpowder Plot.

[viper37]

Remember, remember the 5th of November.

Outside of the middle ages, though, so not an option for Raz's question.

[grumbler]

The Europeans had gunpowder by the end of the 13th Century, which is still the Middle Ages.

[Josephus]

Looks like we'll have to wait a long longer for next season...and it's gonna be shorter.

http://www.ew.com/article/2016/07/18/game-thrones-season-7

[Grey Fox]

It's ok, these things are like babies, they come when they come.

[Hamilcar]

I'll go off on a limb here that the delay is due to GRRM promising to get TWOW in before the agreed date. I'll also predict that he won't meet this new deadline.

[Josephus]

It's ok, these things are like babies, they come when they come.

You would know

[viper37]

I'll go off on a limb here that the delay is due to GRRM promising to get TWOW in before the agreed date. I'll also predict that he won't meet this new deadline.

Winter is here.  They need to shoot in winter, so they can't start now.

[Hamilcar]

I'll go off on a limb here that the delay is due to GRRM promising to get TWOW in before the agreed date. I'll also predict that he won't meet this new deadline.

Winter is here.  They need to shoot in winter, so they can't start now.

They don't shoot in actual winter.  Shooting in real snow and ice is *very* challenging.

[Razgovory]

Yeah, the Soviets found that out.

[Valmy]

I'll go off on a limb here that the delay is due to GRRM promising to get TWOW in before the agreed date. I'll also predict that he won't meet this new deadline.

I seriously doubt that. The first part anyway.

[viper37]

They don't shoot in actual winter.  Shooting in real snow and ice is *very* challenging.

"Now that winter has arrived on Game of Thrones, executive producers David Benioff and D.B. Weiss felt that the storylines of the next season would be better served by starting production a little later than usual, when the weather is changing," Carter Bloys, president of HBO programming, said in a statement. "Instead of the show's traditional spring debut, we're moving the debut to summer to accommodate the shooting schedule."`

Some of the scenes beyond the Wall were shot outside, IIRC, in late Fall/Winter.

I know it is very expensive, and that's likely why this will be a 7 episode season instead of 10, for the same costs.

[grumbler]

The explanation I read was that the delay and fewer episodes was because of the skyrocketing time needed for post-production of these much-more-CGI episodes in the last two seasons.  HBO would have paid the additional costs, but there was no way to get around the production time issue.

[Phillip V]

Maybe each episode will have a longer runtime.