On April 17, 2011, a new HBO drama about warring families, icy zombies, and CGI dragons premiered, and whether you loved it or hated it, there's simply no denying the kind of impact Game of Thrones had not just on television, not just on pop culture, but on the world in general. Its epic journey was a wild, weird, and fascinating adventure, and to mark the occasion Collider presents "What Is Ten May Never Die," a ten-week tribute to the show's legacy — what we remember fondly, what we wish we could forget, and everything in between.
When the very first episode of Game of Thrones aired on April 17, 2011, I watched it live on HBO because, well, HBO made good shows and this kind of sprawling fantasy series sounded interesting. But as the credits rolled after the first hour, I was pretty underwhelmed. The pilot was compelling in parts – those ice zombies sure seemed interesting, and Peter Dinklage was fun – but there were so many different characters and places and loyalties and enemies, I mostly just came away confused. Friends of mine who’d read George R.R. Martin’s book series A Song of Ice and Fire told me to stick with it, and answered the litany of questions I had (“Wait so the blonde guy and blonde girl are siblings?”), and as the season progressed I got more and more invested, and by the time Ned Stark’s head got chopped off, I was obsessed.
10 years after that first episode aired, my feelings on Game of Thrones are no less complicated, but one thing is abundantly clear: the pilot plays so much better after you’ve watched the whole series. I went back and rewatched the first seven seasons in anticipation of the final season back in 2019, and even then I was surprised at how much more I enjoyed the pilot. Rewatching it now, and knowing how the entire story wrapped up, is even more rewarding.
It’s no secret that showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss had trouble putting this pilot together. In fact, there’s an unaired version directed by Oscar-winning Spotlight filmmaker Tom McCarthy that was so disastrous HBO let them go back and reshoot almost all of it, recasting major roles like Daenerys Targaryen and Catelyn Stark. The reshoots were likely an improvement, but the episode remains confounding for those unfamiliar with the books. Even the wigs on the characters are pretty dreadful, but as I mentioned the show improves greatly as Season 1 goes on. It’s just, as far as introductions go, “Winter Is Coming” is middling at best.
But as a prequel of sorts? Or a flashback episode? It’s fantastic. There are so many moments that echo events that play out down the road, to the point that just watching Robb (Richard Madden), Bran (Isaac Hempstead Wright), Theon (Alfie Allen), and Jon (Kit Harington) rescue a pack of direwolves is wildly emotional. Only two of those characters survive to the end of the series, and the “runt of the litter” mentality with which the others view the “bastard” Jon Snow really reminds you of Snow’s mindset throughout the series. He may eventually become the King of the North, but he lived most of his life feeling pretty worthless.
Other moments are downright chilling, like watching Sansa (Sophie Turner) fawn over young Joffrey (Jack Gleeson) as she asks her mother when they’re going to get married. Knowing the torture that Joffrey puts her through, and the abuse that Sansa endures throughout the series, makes this all the more heartbreaking. And the episode’s final moment, in which Jamie Lannister (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) pushes young Bran out the window when he discovers Jamie and his sister Cersei (Lena Heady) doing the horizontal tango in the tower, rings a bit differently. When I first watched the episode, I saw a monster pushing a child out a window. But watching it again, knowing how the Cersei-Jamie dynamic later plays out, it’s clear Cersei is the one who gives him the order to push Bran. “He saw us!” she exclaims, only to then repeat herself when Jamie seems to ignore her – “He saw us!” meaning “DO something about it!” Unnerving, and more than a little sad.
And outside Winterfell and King’s Landing, Dany’s (Emilia Clarke) story gets off to a traumatizing start. She’s literally introduced as naked and afraid, a pawn in her brother’s game to win back the Iron Throne for the Targaryens. It’s still uncomfortable to watch, especially given Clarke’s candor in recent years about how some of the producers approached female nudity on the series, but it’s also fascinating to see Dany and Jon begin the series at such low points. As the show progresses, Dany and Jon become the leads, and although Dany’s endgame in the final season is, uh, let’s say not great, she and Jon Snow ultimately become tremendously powerful in the world of Game of Thrones. It’s a long way to the top, indeed.
Of course Benioff and Weiss had the advantage of pulling from Martin’s book series (which, just as a lil’ update, is still not finished), and so much of this foreshadowing is no accident. At the time that the Game of Thrones pilot aired, the fifth book – A Dance with Dragons – was about to be released, so the showrunners had a hefty amount of foreknowledge at their disposal with regards to the paths these characters would eventually take. And Martin eventually told them his planned endgame, once it became clear the series would end before he finished his books.
But that doesn’t make the rewatching experience of the pilot any less rewarding. Even the extended prologue that introduces the White Walkers is compelling, especially knowing that the mystery of their origin and motive remains murky for seasons to come. And, as with most things Game of Thrones, we also know this particular story point has a less than satisfactory conclusion.
But the beginning! Oh the beginning, how naïve and trusting we were. Pilots are tricky to get right, and more often than not it takes a few episodes for the writers and producers and actors to really discover what their show is. I still contend if you know nothing about Game of Thrones, “Winter Is Coming” is a pretty underwhelming affair. But as we’ve now hit the 10-year anniversary of its first airing, if you kept watching the series and haven’t gone back to check out the first episode in a while, I recommend it. Be forewarned, however: you may just find yourself sucked into a full-on series rewatch – and you know how that ends.