Game of Thrones Season 8 is going to extreme lengths to prevent leaks from happening ahead of the show's release in 2019. Showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss are keeping the casts in the dark about their characters' fate and have ordered them to stay away from social media.
Emilia Clarke, who plays Daenerys Targaryen, revealed in a recent interview that the showrunners are taking extra precautions this time. They do not want a repeat of the Season 7 leaks from happening with the final season of Game of Thrones. This is why, Benioff and Weiss have instructed the casts to back off from social media for the meantime, while they are busy filming Season 8.
"We have a very strict social media ban this year because people need to stop spoiling it for everyone. It's really frustrating," Clarke told the Telegraph.
This decision apparently does not sit well with the actress especially since she is an avid social media user. However, there is a very good reason for the showrunners to implement this rule. After all, Clarke did somehow spoil Season 7 through her Instagram.
Fans may remember a previous post in August when she shared her photo with Kit Harington, who plays Jon Snow. She captioned the image with a cryptic nod at her character's story in Season 7.
A post shared by @ emilia_clarke on Aug 6, 2017 at 10:12am PDT
Avid fans instantly associated her caption with Daenerys' encounter with Jon Snow, which did happen in the third episode of Game of Thrones Season 7. The new king of the North visited Daenerys in Dragonstone to ask for her help in defeating the Night King and his army of White Walkers.
To top off the social media ban, the casts do not know how their character's story ends in Game of Thrones Season 8. Clarke said that they are left in the dark about what happens at the end of the series. She warned fans not to believe the spoilers they read online, because chances are that they are probably fake.
"They've written a number of different endings. So none of the cast know what the actual ending is. If there's ever a leak of any kind, don't believe it because it's probably not true," Clarke added in her interview.
Clarke's interview comes after HBO president Casey Bloys said in a previous interview that Game of Thrones Season 8 is going to film multiple endings to avoid spoilers. However, a few still remain doubtful about this plan, since it takes money to film even a single episode. Likewise, fans believe that the casts are merely pretending, again, not to know how the series ends, just like how they dodged questions about Jon Snow's death and resurrection in Season 6.
