02x07 - The Red Sowing

[bunniefuu]

The scale is unlike anything
I've ever seen before.

♪♪

But that set's a beautiful set.

Come on.

We set fire
to a lot of people.

Everybody loves
to fire a scorpion.
'Cause why?

You can k*ll dragons!

Emma never complained.
I was freezing.

Spoiler alert...
I ride a dragon.

[epic music playing]

[music fades out]

[tense music playing]

[dragons roaring]

Episode 207
begins on a beach,
a desolate beach,

and Rhaenyra meets
Addam of Hull

who, somehow, has claimed
the dragon Seasmoke

that belonged
to Rhaenyra's husband, Laenor.

How did this happen?
Who is Addam of Hull?

♪♪

[dragons screeching]

The opening of 207,

we had always
set on the beach.

We really wanted that
kind of vast landscape

that you have at Driftmark.

I swore after season one
that we were never

going back
to a coastline again.

And we found ourselves
there for that scene,

thankfully,
for just a brief day.

Toby Ford:
Beautiful beach
when the sun's out,

and we were filming
right on the tideline.

The problem there, of course,
is the continuity of the tide.

It doesn't sit
and wait for you,

so you're chasing
down the beach

and back up the beach.

Loni Peristere:
So when you're scheduling
a scene like that,

you have to work out
exactly what direction
works for what time.

So, you schedule
based on

how the tide comes in
and tide goes out.

Now what
we didn't anticipate

is that we were gonna be
in the worst of Welsh weather.

[wind gusting]

The rain was falling,
the wind was howling,

the sand was blowing,
the waves were crashing.

And the tide was comin' in
quicker and harder than
we could've ever thought.

crewmember:
Let's go again!

The tide's coming closer!

-[thundering]
-[waves crashing]

[shouting]
You stand before the Queen
of the Seven Kingdoms

with a dragon
of House Targaryen!

I'd actually hoped for a storm

because you can just
sort of see it, can't you?

This sort of face-off.

I honestly loved it.

And it was the first time
me and Clinton got
to sh**t together.

Emma never complained.
I was freezing.

I filmed with Seasmoke
the day before
I filmed with Emma,

so it was
really sunny, beautiful.

I was running
all day with Seasmoke
and it was beautiful.

And then...

the tide and the storm came in
for the scene with Emma,

which really
influenced the scene.

[shouting]
You kneel quickly...

for a man
so suddenly elevated.

This dragon came to me.

Thomas Horton:
It's a beautiful dragon line

to open that episode,

you know,
in terms of wonderful,

you know, opportunities
for our dragons to kinda
step forward

and kinda be part
of that drama.

Dadi Einarsson:
It's pretty big
and it's pretty vast.

You know, Loni put a lot
of kinda passion

and prep into just,
uh, establishing

an epic scale and look.

And then we had
our dragon performers.

We had our guys in blue suits
with a dragon head.

Ford: For all of
the weather issues
that we had,

it really did look epic.

And, I think,
when you've got two big
dragons in there as well,

I think it's gonna be
a fantastic opening
to the episode.

Do you think you can
get him to Dragonstone?

I can try.

♪♪

Peristere:
One of the things
I loved in 207

is that we had a lot of
different vignettes

that took place
in a lot of cool places

and one of those cool places
is the godswood,

which is at the foot
of Harrenhal.

That particular
godswood is unique

because just across
the God's Eye,

there's the Isle of Faces.

Like so
if you know mythology,

you know that
this island is important.

This is the godswood
that's fallen into disuse.

Um, you know, we know
that Harrenhal was built

on a felled orchard
of weirwood trees,

and then the weirwoods
were chopped up

and used as lumber
to build the castle,

which possibly led to, uh,
some of the experiences
that people have there.

♪♪

The Harrenhal godswood
went through various processes

of what it should be,
what scale it should be.

And so, ultimately,
it came back to the backlot,

and it became
part of the ruined garden

with the weirwood tree
standing on a, a rockscape

at the end of the garden.

This is a much darker,
sort of more mysterious,

kind of almost,
almost nightmarish

sort of version
of the godswoods.

To evoke the Harrenhal
sort of vibe of,

"This, this is
a ruined castle."

Ryan Condal:
Unlike the Red Keep godswood,

which was, generally,
well-tended and kept,

this one
has fallen into total,
you know, disarray.

I mean, the first time
Daemon walks in there,

there's a bunch of broken carts
all scattered around.

I mean, it seems like
a, a back garden storage

for the people at Harrenhal.

♪♪

It was a great
dramatic concept.

Lake behind,
rocks with the walls
coming up to it,

and then these
enormous great roots
from this giant tree

just breaking it
all to pieces.

That was weeks
and weeks and weeks
working with Conrad.

From a maquette
to the real thing,

as it was polysculpted.

There's a, a metal
armature in there.

Conrad Lindley-Thompson:
A lot of metalwork inside it

to keep those branches
from falling.

We had quite a lot of real
branches in amongst there.

Roger Holden:
And then it's all taken apart

and it was
transported down here

and then put back
together again.

There's also all
the, the leaves.

They have to be painted
first into that color,

then attached
to those branches,

so lots and lots of work.

Horton:
But that set's
a beautiful set.

Uh, our big visual effects
challenge is the godswood tree.

So, they've built
the base of the tree

and then we're extending it.

And again,
what's lovely about the show

is everything's
so character-based

that even the tree
is a character.

Condal: And, uh, yes,
I think there is a face

that people may
or may not recognize,

uh, but I'm going to require
you to go to the videotape

and figure it out for yourself.

There's a new face in there.

I don't know
if I'm allowed to-to talk
about who the face is.

Yeah, we've got quite
a famous face in there

that might be recognizable.

-The face
on the weirwood tree is...
-George R. R. Martin.

Yes, George.

Is it?
I didn't know that.

Oh, that's good.
I like that.

Uh, which Ryan wanted
to do as a bit of a tribute,

and the idea was
that it gradually
started to disappear

back into the bark
of the tree.

The brief was to make it
feel enough like him,

but you're never really sure.

The idea is that
you don't look at it

straight away and say,
"That's George R. R. Martin."

You do a second take and say,
"Ooh, is-is that?"

This is really cool, guys.
Thank you.

♪♪

Kieran Bew:
The dragonseeds come
into the Dragonmont,

which is this huge cavern

with, I guess,
what could be described

as a mounting block,

The scale is unlike anything
I've ever seen before.

You go into these
huge sound stages

and they've built a gantry,

a perfect, huge gantry.

And at the end of that,
there's a dragon.

It's not actually
a dragon there.

That-- They do that
post-production.

♪♪

Peristere: In 207,
we're working with dragons,

so a lot of the preparation
that we did was looking into

how do we burn people,
and how do we eat people?

And that was a collaboration
that began in visual effects.

It was the, uh,
"Why did I ever take this job"

[laughs] moment.

"What was I thinking?"

Massive cavern,
dragon the size of a jumbo jet

so no hiding here.

And then,
45 dragonseeds on a platform

that was off the ground by
at least a story and a half.

Well, we wanted it to start
in a similar way to 206,

so you know that
you're coming to a place
you've been to before.

Then, when, uh,
all hell breaks loose,

and the dragon starts
burning everybody
and eating everybody,

then we wanted to feel
completely different

and switch
to something very dynamic.

Most of that scene
was shot handheld.

Einarsson:
It's a massive scene,

and it was just
hugely enjoyable

to plan that with Loni.

Vanja Cernjul: We had
a very detailed storyboard

and very detailed previs

to know where the dragon is
and what the dragon is doing.

Ide O'Rourke:
You can previsualize
with your lenses,

your camera, your blocking,

and then, when you
arrive on set,

everyone knows
what they're doing.

Adam Lawrence:
We had a big, blue proxy,
uh, nose made

for Rhaenyra to interact with.

Not only we just
build this head,

we also had puppeteer
animating it,

looking exactly
what's motion dragon,

what's the motions gonna be,

so the actor can
actually interact with it.

They're a character themselves.

And Loni
got them performing,

bending down, subjugating.

Peristere: It was
extraordinary to see

Emma D'Arcy put their hand
on the blue screen buck,

knowing that when you see it
in all of fandom,

you will be like,
"That is one of the scariest,

coolest moments
I've ever seen."

Because you know what
Emma D'Arcy felt?

You know what Rhaenyra felt?

They felt power.

What this is gonna be
is when Rhaenyra turns around
and looks at the seeds,

it will evoke that exact
poster frame of Rhaenyra

in front of the dragon.

[dragon growling]

Who among you would be first?

Someone's gonna die today.

Someone's gettin' set on fire,

and I'm so excited.

-crewmember: It might be you.
-It's not me.

Spoiler alert...
[laughs] I ride a dragon.

♪♪

Peristere: Historically,
in "Game of Thrones,"

what makes the dragons real
is that our fire is real.

[flames whooshing]

We continue that legacy,
so when you see this episode,

it is not CGI fire
that you are seeing.

It is real fire
with our real actors

in front of the real fire.

And that was done through
very meticulous planning

with the stunt team,
with the special effects team,

hair and makeup,
and wardrobe

to figure out how are we going

to burn this many people?

[quietly] Basically,
all of the smartest
people in the room

are deciding how
to sh**t people on fire.

And we're just muckin' about.

crewmember [shouts]:
Three, two, one, action!

[dragonseeds screaming]

It's a big, big fire event,
and there's a lot happening.

There's the full burn mask,
which is a pretty

spooky-looking thing
when you see it.

That's not really camera-ready.

So those ones,
we definitely have to do
a face replacement.

A kind of half-burned mask.

They're actually, like--
They look fantastic,

so we're having to do
very little to those.

Waldo Mason:
When we're doin'
the partial burns

and people aren't
being engulfed,

we'll just apply sort of
s-silicone bald caps

with pre-painted on
and pre-sculpted burns
that cover their ears.

And then we've got a piece
that covers their neck,

and we have some pieces
to cover their faces,

so we're keeping
all this clear,

which should not be
in the fire anyway.

So you get to see
the fire just lickin' up
around their ears,

around the backs
of their heads.

And it looks like,
"How are they tolerating it?"

But it does the job,
at least for the 15 seconds
they're on fire,

and then, obviously,

the guys with
the fire extinguishers
come in.

Peristere:
In 207, we burned 45 seeds
in various different ways.

The biggest of the burns,

we had a 16-man burn
that happened all at once.

And in that burn,
we see Vermithor,

essentially,
unleash his biggest blast.

[screaming]

Condal:
But that particular set
is five meters in the air.

Uh, and there was a danger
in having people who were,

first of all, on fire,
and second of all, blinded,

because you have to be
to protect your eyes.

So for all of those
very good reasons,

we did it outside
on an eight-inch-high

approximation
of the platform.

Peristere:
And we've created
a safe environment

where we could use
Tamar ignition devices

to put these people on fire.

crewmember [shouts]: Ready!
And three, two, one, action!

Okay, you just witnessed
a major burn on the set.

Open air this time,
which is, which is
a lot easier for us.

We put charges into the ground
to ignite the stuntmen

who were drenched
in a fire gel.

On cue, we sequenced it
so it looked like

a, um, a dragon run,

and it took them all up
nicely, I thought.

It looked very good, very hot.

And it worked amazing.

I got, uh, got my hand
shook by the producer,
so I'm good, I'm happy.

I'm gonna go home
and go to bed now.
See you later.

crewmember [shouting]:
Ten, 11, 12, out, out, out!

♪♪

Peristere: In 207,
we claim two dragons.

Hugh claims Vermithor.

Ulf claims Silverwing.

These two claiming moments
are very, very different.

Hugh takes us on a journey
from the top of the gantry

down into the bowels
of the Dragonmont.

And what we wanted to do
is we wanted to sort of

distinguish Hugh's journey

from the mass amount of chaos
that happened up on the plinth.

We decided to do that
by taking away cuts.

I always love
the subjectivity of a great,

well-staged Steadicam shot

that takes a single character
through an abyss of action.

We looked at the best
of the best of the long takes

that happened in action scenes,

and what made
those scenes great

is that there's always
something happening in layers.

One of the challenges
was that Hugh is running
in the scene,

so just being able
to run with him

and still see
what's going on

because of the choice
of handheld camera means

that, also, you're going
to have a very shaky image.

We still wanted to see
what's going on.

Horton:
There were so many
moving elements

in terms of the size
of the dragon

and the scale of the dragon

that we had--
everyone had to hit
their marks precisely.

And we couldn't
cheat the framing.

Cernjul:
And also coordinating that
with all the stuntwork.

We literally had stuntpeople

falling from the,
from the ceiling, on fire,

which added the,
as you can imagine,

another layer of complexity.

Condal:
It's a tremendous
amount of work,

and then, lots
and lots of layering

and visual effects
to get it to come together.

It is very complicated scene
because it's all one shot.

So, in order to achieve it,

we had to split it
to pieces and do invisible,
uh, transition.

Einarsson:
Hugh runs along, he looks up,

the camera looks up
to see what he's looking at.

Vermithor's blasting someone.

We come back
and that's then another take,

comes around to the rock,
we look over the rock,

as we look at
what he's looking at,

and then come back down,
that's another take.

So we've designed all these
stitch points into the shot.

Peristere: So it is a oner
that you'll see no cuts in

that was made out
of seven or eight pieces

that includes
dragons, burns, feedings,

and, eventually, a bonding
all in one moment

where Vermithor takes a knee
with a small man, Hugh,

who puffs his chest
and says--

[yelling]
Come on!

David Hancock:
Vermithor is called
the Bronze Fury

because he's bronze
and he's furious.

He's nearly the size of Vhagar,
and he is, famously,

one of the most vicious
dragons in the kingdom.

♪♪

Peristere: My background,
I come from visual effects
and animation,

so any time I get
on a blue screen with actors
with fake things,

I'm like,
"Oh, this is like home."

And I got to basically
play dragonriding

with Tom and with Ewan

in the kind of
penultimate sequence,

which features Vhagar chasing
Silverwing to Dragonstone.

[roars]

The main challenge
for the buck work
this season was

we wanted to really add
element of handheld
to the buck work,

so that you feel like
you're sitting on the dragon
with the rider.

So, we had to come up
with a way

of sh**ting something
that feels handheld,

uh, but it's actually
remotely operated.

Michael Carstensen:
I'm working with
the ball tech's arm

that's sort of rigged
on top of a container,

and then,
we're working with the buck,

and it almost feels like
the camera's attached
to the dragon itself.

Ford:
The buck is moving
to a set computer program,

and the camera is
doing that as well,

as it has already been
designed in the previs.

♪♪

♪♪

The putting the pieces
together was quite easy.

The fun part was actually
working with Tom and Ewan

to actually see the dragon.

We tried to create a sense
of a lack of anticipation,

so when the dragon turns right,
it's like a trust fall.

They have to not anticipate
anyone being there,

and then they have
to kind of counter that fall

with a drastic movement.

So, when you see them,
what makes it real

is this sense of,
like, unpredictability,

despite the fact that
we're working in a very
predicted manner.

You're effectively
suspended on-- in the air

on this mechanical
bucking bronco.

You've got wind,
you've got atmos.

And you're in a backbend,
and you're 43,

and there's blokes sh**ting,
uh, leaf blowers at you.

-crewmember:
Fantastic hairdo now.
-Thank you so much.

-[laughter]
-And your, your work
will only make this better.

crewmember:
It's because you're worth it.

-[laughs] I am.
-[laughter]

[roaring]

Condal: You get that
beautiful tableau of Rhaenyra

and her dragon army,

and, literally,
the dragon queen

coming out of the Dragonmont

and we see that it worked.

Uh, whatever
challenges were, were,

uh, were put to her
and, uh, whatever questions
she was faced with,

she was right in the end,
and was able to assemble
this army of dragons.

[roaring]