Game of Thrones (season 7) facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Game of Thrones
Region 1 DVD cover
Starring	See List of Game of Thrones cast
Country of origin	United States
No. of episodes	7
Release
Original network	HBO
Original release	July 16 (2017-07-16) – August 27, 2017 (2017-08-27)
List of Game of Thrones episodes

The seventh and penultimate season of the fantasy drama television series Game of Thrones premiered on HBO on July 16, 2017, and concluded on August 27, 2017. Unlike previous seasons, which consisted of ten episodes each, the seventh season consisted of only seven episodes. Like the previous season, it largely consisted of original content not found in George R. R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series, while also incorporating material that Martin revealed to showrunners about the upcoming novels in the series. The series was adapted for television by David Benioff and D. B. Weiss.

HBO ordered the seventh season on April 21, 2016, three days before the premiere of the show's sixth season and began filming on August 31, 2016. The season was filmed primarily in Northern Ireland, Spain, Croatia and Iceland. Game of Thrones features a large ensemble cast, including Peter Dinklage, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Lena Headey, Emilia Clarke and Kit Harington. The season introduces several new cast members, including Jim Broadbent and Tom Hopper. The series received 22 nominations for the 70th Primetime Emmy Awards and won for Outstanding Drama Series and Dinklage won for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series.

Cast

Main cast

Production

Crew

Series creators and executive producers David Benioff and D. B. Weiss serve as showrunners for the seventh season. The directors for the seventh season are Jeremy Podeswa (episodes 1 and 7), Mark Mylod (episodes 2 and 3), Matt Shakman (episodes 4 and 5) and Alan Taylor (episode 6). This marks Taylor's return to the series after an absence since the second season. Shakman is a first-time Game of Thrones director, with the rest each having directed multiple episodes in previous seasons. Michele Clapton returned to the show as costume designer, after spending some time away from the show in the sixth season. She previously worked on the show for the first five seasons, as well as the end of the sixth season.

Writing

The seventh season contains original material not found in the A Song of Ice and Fire series. Some of the show's sixth season also consists of material revealed to the writers of the television series during discussions with Martin.

Filming

The shores of Gaztelugatxe were used as a location for filming Season 7.

Filming began on August 31, 2016, at Titanic Studios in Belfast, and ended in February 2017. In an interview with the showrunners, it was announced that the filming of the seventh season would be delayed until later in the year due to necessary weather conditions for filming. The showrunners stated "We're starting a bit later because, you know, at the end of this season, winter is here, and that means that sunny weather doesn't really serve our purposes any more. We kind of pushed everything down the line so we could get some grim, gray weather even in the sunnier places that we shoot."

Girona, Spain, did not return as one of the filming locations. Girona stood in for Braavos and parts of King's Landing. It was later announced that the seventh season would film in Northern Ireland, Spain and Iceland, with filming in Northern Ireland beginning in August 2016. The series filmed in the Spanish cities Seville, Cáceres, Almodóvar del Río, Santiponce, Zumaia and Bermeo. Spanish sources announced that the series would be filming the seventh season on Muriola Beach in Barrika, Las Atarazanas, the Royal Dockyards of Seville and at the shores of San Juan de Gaztelugatxe, an islet belonging to the city of Bermeo. The series returned to film at The Dark Hedges in Stranocum, which was previously used as the Kingsroad in the second season. Some scenes were filmed in Iceland. Filming also occurred in Dubrovnik, Croatia, which is used for location of King's Landing. The scene where Arya was reunited with Nymeria was filmed in Alberta, Canada.

Casting

Deadline reported on June 21, 2016, that the five main cast members, Peter Dinklage, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Lena Headey, Emilia Clarke, and Kit Harington had been in contract negotiations for the final two seasons. It was reported that the cast members have increased their salary to $500,000 per episode for the seventh and eighth season. It was later reported that the actors had gone through a renegotiation, for which they had increased their salary to $1.1 million per episode for the last two seasons.

On August 31, 2016, Entertainment Weekly reported that Jim Broadbent had been cast for the seventh season in a "significant" role. It was announced that the role of Dickon Tarly has been recast, with Tom Hopper replacing Freddie Stroma, who had previously played the role in "Blood of My Blood". The seventh season sees the return of Mark Gatiss as Tycho Nestoris, who did not appear in the sixth season, Ben Hawkey as Hot Pie, who last appeared in the fourth season, and Joe Dempsie as Gendry, who last appeared in the third season and maintains his status as starring cast member. Members of the British indie pop band Bastille were reported to have filmed cameo appearances. British singer-songwriter Ed Sheeran also makes a cameo appearance in the season. Frontman of American heavy metal band Mastodon, Brent Hinds, has also revealed he would have a cameo appearance. This is Hinds' second cameo in the series, following his appearance (along with bandmates Brann Dailor and Bill Kelliher) in the fifth season. New York Mets baseball pitcher Noah Syndergaard made a background cameo as a javelin-throwing Lannister soldier in "The Spoils of War."

Episodes

On April 21, 2016, HBO officially ordered the seventh season of Game of Thrones, just three days prior to the premiere of the show's sixth season. In a June 2016 interview with Variety, co-creators David Benioff and D. B. Weiss revealed the seventh season would likely consist of fewer episodes, stating at the time of the interview that they were "down to our final 13 episodes after this season. We're heading into the final lap." Director Jack Bender, who worked on the show's sixth season, said that the seventh season would consist of seven episodes. Benioff and Weiss stated that they were unable to produce 10 episodes in the show's usual 12 to 14 month time frame, as Weiss said "It's crossing out of a television schedule into more of a mid-range movie schedule." HBO confirmed on July 18, 2016, that the seventh season would consist of seven episodes, and would premiere later than usual in mid-2017 because of the later filming schedule. Later it was confirmed that the season would debut on July 16. The seventh season includes an 81-minute finale; this was the series' longest episode until it was surpassed by the Season 8 episode "The Long Night", which is 82 minutes. Season 7's penultimate episode also runs for 71 minutes – around 16 minutes longer than an average Game of Thrones episode. The first five episodes mostly run longer than average (55 minutes), at 59, 59, 63, 50, and 59 minutes respectively. The previous longest episode in the series was the sixth-season finale, "The Winds of Winter", which ran for 69 minutes.

See also

In Spanish: Anexo:Séptima temporada de Game of Thrones para niños