Game of Thrones Season 7 Production Delayed

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During a recent appearance on a UFC podcast (of all places!), Thrones bosses David Benioff and D.B. Weiss revealed that production on Season 7 is going to be pushed back to accommodate the arrival of winter in Westeros.

“We don’t have an air date yet,” the showrunners acknowledged when pressed for one. “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.”

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In previous years, Thrones has returned as early as March 31 and as late as April 24, so it was already anyone’s guess when Season 7 — which will kick off the series’ final run of 13 episodes — would premiere. Now, we’re not even sure if Bran Stark, in all his tree-whispering wisdom, could give us the answer. (In lieu of magical, info-bearing trees, TVLine has reached out to HBO for comment.)

our thoughts on Thrones‘ delay? General hopes for Season 7? Drop ’em in a comment below.

Launch Gallery: Game of Thrones Season 7 Death Pool

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