Game of Thrones cast and crew members are descending on the São Paulo Expo in Brazil for the Comic Con Experience (CCXP). To kick things off, Maisie Williams (Arya Stark) and John Bradley (Samwell Tarly) sat down for an interview streamed on Facebook Live. Watch below!
The interviewer actually didn’t ask many questions specifically about the coming final season of Game of Thrones, but Williams was there to pick up the slack. “Some of the most exciting parts of this show are coming in the new series,” she said when asked for show highlights, “so I can’t talk much about them.” And then there’s the one part where the interviewer actually does ask about season 8, asking Williams if we’re going to see more “epic” scenes from Arya next season:
We really, really are. There’s some exciting things coming in the new series, and you’re all gonna…
And then the Facebook feed just skips forward. What happened? Of all the times for technical difficulties, that is definitely the worst, assuming it wasn’t some HBO censor skipping over a spoiler. Debate amongst yourselves.
Williams also let us in on what it was like filming her final scene as Arya:
Doing my last scene was really emotional, but at the beginning of this final season, I said to myself, I’m really just gonna make the most of every last second, and I really feel like I did, and although it’s heartbreaking to say goodbye to Arya, it’s so much better…than to do something to death and do it until we’re all sick of it. All good things must come to an end, and it just felt like the right time…It’s really sad saying goodbye to Arya. She means so much to all of us, but it’s worth it, I think.
Bradley sounded a little more mixed about it. “I feel like I’m abandoning [Sam], kind of, because I’m never gonna see how he is again,” he said. “Funnily enough, they become real people and you just hope that they’re happy. But to know you’re never gonna touch base with them again…it’s kind of hard. It’s a real emotional separation, I think.”
Sam’s had an interesting journey on the show, evolving from a background player in Jon Snow’s story to leading his own. He finds it “flattering” to be a lead, but at the same time, he will sometimes “miss the old gang,” particularly when they get to participate in stuff like the Battle of the Bastards and he doesn’t. “You feel like a face at the window, and you feel on the outside of that, and that can be a bit difficult at times.”
Still, he wouldn’t trade the experience of playing Sam for anything:
You’re never treading water with these characters. Every single scene inspires a change in them you never could have anticipated. So to plot these characters’ narrative progression over the course of this whole series is a really exhausting job because they’re never the same…from one episode to the next. They’re learning, they’re growing, they’re experiencing things and they’re developing all the time, and that’s the privilege of playing these parts.
Showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss are also at CCXP. They’ll be on a panel soon. Might we even get a trailer…?
Here’s hoping. In the meantime, enjoy these photos of the Game of Thrones Experience HBO has set up on the con floor:
Looks like fun! We’re looking forward to seeing what else comes out of this con.
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