Five years after Game of Thrones premiered its eighth and final season, Kit Harington has opened up about what many thought was a “rushed” ending to the long-running fantasy drama.
Harington, who played Jon Snow, reflected on the season finale, along with the recent shelving of a GoT spinoff, in a new interview with GQ.
“I think if there was any fault with the end of Thrones, is that we were all so fucking tired, we couldn’t have gone on longer. And so I understand some people thought it was rushed and I might agree with them. But I’m not sure there was any alternative,” Harington said about Game of Thrones’ finale. “I look at pictures of me in that final season and I look exhausted. I look spent. I didn’t have another season in me.”
“Everyone is entitled to their opinion. I think there were mistakes made, story-wise, towards the end maybe,” he added. “I think there were some interesting choices that didn’t quite work.”
Earlier this year, it was revealed that Snow, a spinoff that would see Harington reprise his role, had been scrapped. The actor told GQ that although the show had been in development for years, it never really gained traction.
“What I can tell you is it was HBO that came to me and said, ‘Would you consider this?’ My first reaction was no,” he shared. “And then I thought there could be an interesting and important story about the soldier after the war. I felt that there might be something left to say and a story left to tell in a pretty limited way. We spent a couple of years back and forth developing it. And it just didn’t… nothing got us excited enough.”
Harrington wound up backing out of Snow, telling HBO that “if we push this any further and keep developing it we could end up with something that’s not good. And that’s the last thing we all want.’”
Harington recently made his debut in another HBO series, Industry, playing the CEO of a green tech company.
