Cancel all of your plans for 2019.
Why? Because that's when the eighth and final season of Game of Thrones is likely to air. Yep, that means we have over a year-long wait for new episodes.
The Hollywood Reporter reports that production on the new season is set to begin in October and could likely run as late as August 2018. So that means the shortened six-episode season would likely return in 2019. (HBO had no official comment on the air-date for the final season.)
GAHHH. Want something to blame? How about those pesky (but totally incredible) special effects.
"Our production people are trying to figure out a timeline for the shoot and how much time the special effects take," HBO programming president Casey Bloys told THR. "The shooting is complicated—different continents, with all the technical aspects—and the special effects are a whole other production period that we're trying to figure out. That is a big factor in all of this."
The takeaway here: Mo' dragons, mo' delays, people.
Fans are used to waiting for their fix, however, as season seven was also delayed, with the push being partially caused by weather conditions.
"Now that winter has arrived on Game of Thrones, executive producers David Benioff and D.B. Weiss felt that the storylines of the next season would be better served by starting production a little later than usual, when the weather is changing," Bloys, said in a statement at the time. "Instead of the show's traditional spring debut, we're moving the debut to summer to accommodate the shooting schedule."
Last night's season seven finale delivered the series' highest same-day ratings ever (despite that pesky hack and some episodes being leaked). "The Dragon and the Wolf" attracted 12.1 million live-plus-same-day viewers, and when you add in the first repeat and immediate streaming numbers, the viewership climbs to 16.5 million viewers.