Where my Game of Thrones peeps at? Look, very few TV shows are completely perfect to every fan all the way through, so if we can put aside the highly debated eighth season of GOT, as well as the much-maligned series finale, I think we can all see that the hit fantasy deserved a lot of the love it did get before it wrapped up in 2019. And, show creators Dan Weiss and David Benioff have been able to ride that previous goodwill to a big payday, in the form of their partnership with Netflix. However, it turns out that they turned down a big House of the Dragon perk from their former bosses at HBO.
What Major Perk Did Game Of Thrones Creators Turn Down With House Of The Dragon And Why?
After a stalled first effort to get a spinoff set in the expansive world of Westeros off the ground, work picked up quickly on House of the Dragon, and few can say that it hasn’t paid off. The prequel premiered to record viewing numbers and delivered a number of shocks that kept people tuning in weekly. David Benioff and Dan Weiss spoke with The Hollywood Reporter about their professional ups and downs since their hit show ended, and revealed that as the creators of that Emmy-winning series, they were guaranteed producer credits on all future spinoffs…but they turned it down. As they explained:
David Benioff: HBO was kind of confused. I remember their lawyer saying, ‘But it’s just money, we’re just going to pay you.’
Dan Weiss: I don’t think there is such a thing as free money. For us, if our name is on it, especially that, while being completely detached and uninvolved, it felt like the strain that would come with that hands-off approach — with its success or failure or anything in between — was not worth it.
Along with House of the Dragon Season 2 coming soon-ish, there are six potential spinoffs set in the GOT world currently in the early stages of development. Remember, this pay day as “hands off” producers wouldn't have just been for the first drama in the franchise that successfully made it on air. No, friends. Benioff and Weiss could have gotten paid for all seven of those spinoffs, along with any other prequels or sequels derived from the show they created from the works of George R.R. Martin.
Basically, the duo turned down what any person who’s worked for several years wishes they had access to: money you don’t actually have to work your ass off for. Turning this deal down seems, at first, like a big ol’ dumb idea. That is, until you think about what they’ve already been through with their flagship mega-hit.
Before GOT had even aired its series finale, fans put out a petition to “remake Game of Thrones Season 8 with competent writers.” Ouch, right? Well, as of this writing, that petition (which was, again, started in spring 2019) has been signed by over 1,860,000 people, and 56 of those people signed the thing this week! With the hate that so many fans still have over the last season, and the finale in particular, the creative twosome was probably correct that there would really be no “free money” in their future where the franchise is concerned.
They noted that feedback for Thrones was so intense (whether good or bad) that they had to go “cold turkey” when it came to fan or even critical opinion, which lowered the “ambient stress level in our lives…by about 50 percent overnight.” Remember, Weiss and Benioff were aware of how many fans hated Season 8, so much so that they admitted to plans to hide from the angry GOT fanbase as the series finale aired.
It makes complete sense that they would not believe that any Game of Thrones show with their names on it, even if they weren’t directly involved with said series, wouldn’t put more stink on their names if it progressed in a way that displeased fans. Good riddance to bad free money, I say.
