The author admitted he never imagined the TV series would overtake his books - but that his ending will be different.
Author George R. R. Martin has assured fans of his fantasy franchise that his remaining 'A Song of Ice and Fire' books will take a different route to that of the HBO TV series. Martin made the statement previously, but he's mentioned it again in a more recent interview with PBS in Chicago.
Martin also admitted that when production began on the TV series, he never imagined that it would overtake his books. The author hasn't released a new book entry in the main series since the TV show began. He said: "Looking back, I wish I’d stayed ahead of the books.
"My biggest issue there was when they began the [TV] series, I had four books already in print, and the fifth one came out just as the series was starting in 2011. I had a five-book head-start, and these are gigantic books, as you know; I never thought they would catch up with me, but they did. They caught up with me and passed me.
"That made it a little strange because now the show was ahead of me and the show was going in somewhat different directions. So, I’m still working on the book, but you’ll see my ending when that comes out."
The next entry in Martin's series is 'The Winds of Winter', which still does not yet have a release date. At the beginning of 2021, he said on his blog that the book still needed "hundreds of more pages" to be written - making us wonder if the book will ever see the light of day.
Given how negative the backlash was for the final season of 'Game of Thrones', interest in the fantasy has certainly plummeted. However, that hasn't stopped HBO from developing a vast amount of new content (too many, perhaps?), with a number of prequels, spin-offs, and animation series in the pipeline.
The next entry in the fantasy series will be 'House of the Dragon' starring Matt Smith, Rhys Ifans, and Olivia Cooke. The series will premiere in 2022.
