the short night

HBO scraps planned Game of Thrones spinoff

One of HBO's Game of Thrones prequels isn't coming after all.

The planned Thrones spinoff series starring Naomi Watts isn't moving forward, Deadline reported Tuesday. A pilot for the show was already shot over the summer after HBO ordered it in June 2018, but the network never picked up the full series, and now, it has reportedly decided not to do so.

The untitled prequel would have taken place thousands of years before the events of Thrones and followed "the world's descent from the golden Age of Heroes into its darkest hour," exploring everything from "the horrifying secrets of Westeros' history to the true origin of the White Walkers" and "the mysteries of the East to the Starks of legend," HBO previously said.

Why HBO decided to suddenly scrap the project is unclear, but Deadline reports its demise comes "after a lengthy post-production and rumors about issues during filming in Northern Ireland." Considering original series creators David Benioff and D.B. Weiss just coincidentally left a planned series of Star Wars films, it certainly hasn't been a great 24 hours for Thrones-adjacent projects.

That's not to say HBO is getting out of the Thrones spinoff game entirely, though. Just last month, news hit that another prequel series, with this one revolving around House Targaryen, was moving forward. In fact, at one point, not one but five spinoffs were in the works, and George R.R. Martin in May said three of them were "moving forward nicely." But as we just learned, when you play the game of pilots, you make it to air, or your show dies. There is no middle ground.