‘Game of Thrones’ could have shorter season 7, season 8 on way to series finale

The sixth season of “Game of Thrones” is going to be premiering on HBO later this month, and with that, we’re getting closer and closer to the adaptation of the famed George R.R. Martin books coming to an end. While there is no official end date set in stone, it is easy to assume for the most part that one is coming, and this is something that will probably be at the conclusion of an eighth season.

What you may be surprised to know, however, is that the final seasons could be a little shorter. According to Entertainment Weekly, showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss have strongly hinted that they are considering ending the show after 73 episodes, which would mean that season 7 and 8 would both be shorter since they would only need to span 13 episodes of story between them.

Meanwhile, HBO entertainment head Michael Lombardo has made it clear that this episode number is something that has been a key point of discussion for all parties involved for quite some time:

“In every conversation, that’s been [the showrunners’] thinking … It will be interesting to see how strongly they feel about being definitive about that when we are in a position to announce seasons 7 and 8.”

The complicated part of this is that of course from HBO’s perspective, they are going to want to keep the show around as long as they can; however, at the same exact time you don’t want to do anything to run the risk of it getting either stale or having it go longer than it really needs to be.

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