The fifth season of Game of Thrones had a star-studded premiere on March 18 at the Tower of London, an atmospheric landmark whose history is not entirely unlike that of the show: tangled, royal and bloody.
The stars of the smash-hit HBO drama walked a red carpet at the 1,000-year-old fortress, a former palace and prison where traitors were once tortured and executed.
“Just think that 200 years ago we’d be coming here to get our heads chopped off ... [not] watch the telly,” said Liam Cunningham, who plays the knight Davos Seaworth.
The cast were sworn to secrecy about the plot of the latest season of the show, a phenomenon that has injected Shakespearean complexity into fantasy television.
But Michael McElhatton, who plays Roose Bolton, promised “shocks” for fans of George R R Martin’s books, on which the series is based, as the story expands southward to the kingdom of Dorne.
“The world has just got bigger and bigger and we are going to move into the world towards Dorne a lot more and introduce a lot of new characters there,” he said. “There’s a lot of shocks particularly for the book readers. There are things that happen now that aren’t in the books.”
Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, who plays Jaime Lannister, added that “there will be major surprises. We enter the endgame now”.
Fan favourite Kit Harrington said big changes were ahead for his character, Jon Snow.
“It’s kind of about him growing up, being a politician, being a commander,” he said. “The scripts are challenging and wonderful and controversial. It’s going to be so good.”
Asked why the show has become so popular – it is HBO’s most-watched series – Harington said: “It’s complex and it doesn’t treat audiences like idiots.”
Alfie Allen – younger brother of British singer Lily Allen – who plays Iron Islands heir Theon Greyjoy, said the new season would bring “shocking scenes without a doubt”.
“I’d like to see how much farther they can push the sort of dark side of it as a show as a whole,” he said, adding that there will be “maybe a little bit of light at the end of the tunnel” for his character, who has spent the past few seasons being tortured and humiliated. “It’s done in a very clever way,” he added.
Season five of Game of Thrones premières on April 12 in the US.
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