Novelist George R.R. Martin has yet to finish the next novel in his A Song of Ice & Fire series colloquially called Game of Thrones. However, he did announce on New Year’s Eve that he’s working with HBO on a number of animated projects set in the world or his novels.
Game of Thrones #20 (2013), Dynamite
In a blog post on his website, Martin detailed, “HBO and I have our own animated projects, set in the world of A SONG OF ICE & FIRE. None of them have been greenlit yet, but I think we are getting close to taking the next step with a couple of them.”
He added, “When this last round of development started a few years back, we had four ideas for animated shows, with some great talents attached. Writers rooms and summits, outline and scripts followed in due course… but, alas, two of the original projects were subsequently shelved.”
Martin did note that while those two projects have been shelved he hopes to share them “in another form, perhaps as graphic novels.”
The Hedge Knight: The Graphic Novel (2013), Jet City Comics
Not only did he note he had two original animated series in development, but he also revealed that a series titled Nine Voyages “about the legendary voyages of the Sea Snake” is now being animated rather than live action.
Martin explained why the decision to animate over live action was made, “Budgetary constraints would likely have made a live action version prohibitively expensive, what with half the show taking place at sea, and the necessity of creating a different port every week, from Driftmark to Lys to the Basilisk Isles to Volantis to Qarth to… well, on and on and on.”
He added, “There’s a whole world out there. And we have a lot better chance of showing it all with animation. So we now have three animated projects underway.”
Game of Thrones #3 (2013), Dynamite
Martin previously promised he would have Winds of Winter completed by the World Science Fiction Convention in the summer of 2020.
He wrote at the time, “But I tell you this — if I don’t have THE WINDS OF WINTER in hand when I arrive in New Zealand for worldcon, you have here my formal written permission to imprison me in a small cabin on White Island, overlooking that lake of sulfuric acid, until I’m done. Just so long as the acrid fumes do not screw up my old DOS word processor, I’ll be fine.”
Game of Thrones #10 (2012), Dynamite
In July 2020, he stated, “This writing stuff is hard. Even so, it has been going well of late. Three more chapters completed this past week. And good progress on several more.”
He then added, “Still a long long way to go, though. Do not get too excited.”
Game of Thrones #15 (2013), Dynamite
In a subsequent update in November 2020, he said, “So let me assure you that, when not sweating out election returns or brooding over other real world problems, I have continued to work on THE WINDS OF WINTER.
He added, “No, sorry, still not done, but I do inch closer. It is a big big book. I try not to dwell on that too much. I write a chapter at a time, a page at a time, a sentence at a time, a word at a time. It is the only way. And sometimes I rewrite.”
Game of Thrones #2 Cover by Mike Miller (2011), Dynamite
What do you make of Martin continuing to develop animated series set in the world of Game of Thrones, but he hasn’t finished Winds of Winter yet?
NEXT: Cobra Kai and House of the Dragon Show What Popular Really Looks Like
