And so it begins.

Filming of Game of Thrones got underway this morning at Doune Castle in Scotland, which is being used for the exterior and some interior scenes in Winterfell. Several of the actors, including Peter Dinklage as Tyrion Lannister, were apprently filming today and at least one of the wolf pups - a white-haired one, almost certainly Ghost, Jon Snow's direwolf - was around as well, suggesting the first scenes being shot will include the Tyrion/Jon Snow/Ghost scene in the courtyard. It sounds like establishing shots may have also been shot earlier in the week, whilst Sean Bean and other castmembers are not expected until later in the week, possibly for the scenes where the king's party arrives at Winterfell and maybe the grand feast as well.


Filming will also be carried out at the Paint Hall studios in Belfast in around a week and a half's time, and will move on to studios and locations in Morocco for the Daenerys scenes later in the month. Filming is expected to take place for another four to five weeks or so.

It may have felt like a long road to get here, but actually it was only two years ago that HBO optioned the series. It is much more normal for a potential TV or movie series to stay in development hell for a much longer period of time or have far more hiccups on its way to production. The Wheel of Time series, for example, seems to be on its second option in eight years and this one doesn't look like progressing very far in the near future either. A Game of Thrones, on the other hand, seems to have had an easier time of it. Of course, so far only the pilot remains in production. We likely won't know if HBO is ordering a full season for another 2-4 months or so, but even if the project does not proceed any further, watching the process of a book getting on screen in unusually close detail has nevertheless been fascinating.

Good luck to everyone involved in the project. I'll be in Belfast on 3 November for GRRM's book signing and, will report back with any choice information or photos I pick up ;-)

More GAME OF THRONES news

From Winter is Coming: the sets are going up, apparently consisting of 'awesome' castle interiors on a wrap-around greenscreen (to be used for special effects shots and backplates). Rumours that the direwolves have been cast with four Norwegian wolves, although they could be for another production altogether so I'd take that one with a pinch of salt for now.

Of greater interest, George RR Martin will be in Belfast for a book signing on 3 November and is hoping some of the cast and crew from the TV series may also be able to attend. He will also be doing another signing two days later in Dublin.

Currently reading: Lavondyss by Robert Holdstock
Currently watching: Merlin Season 2, True Blood Season 1

The Cimmerian on A Dance with Dragons

The award-nominated scholarly website 'The Cimmerian' has run an article on A Song of Ice and Fire and in particular analysed the current long wait for the fifth volume, A Dance with Dragons, here. The article is reasonably interesting, touching on the current flamewars sweeping various websites over the delays to the book and the shockwaves of fear sent through some of the more ill-informed corners of fandom by the death of Robert Jordan in late 2007. I was rather amused to seem them picking up on an Amazon post I made some considerable time ago about how J.R.R. Tolkien would have fared whilst working on Lord of the Rings in the Internet age. Others later pointed out many flaws in my comparison (not least that some of the target audience for the book would have been more worried about, for example, storming Monte Cassino than waiting for a sequel to a book they read as a kid ten years earlier) which led me to believe I should have cited The Silmarillion instead, but there you go. Anyway, I may have to start introducing myself as "A. Whitehead of the storied legionary city Colchester," were it not for reasons of brevity.


On a somewhat related note, the Winter is Coming blog has issued a general update on the status of production on the Game of Thrones TV series. Unfortunately, we are now in the doldrums of news with pre-production under way but no solid progress to report, since we are still many months from shooting and likely several months from casting even beginning. However, we can hopefully expect confirmation of a shooting and production location in the coming days or weeks.