Game of Thrones Director Mark Mylod Talks Deaths, Mistakes and Stoneheart 

Game of Thrones Director Mark Mylod Talks Deaths, Mistakes and Stoneheart

Nintendo Boss on NX: \'For Us, It\'s Not About Specs\'

We Happy Few Looks Like BioShock, But Is a Different Beast

Daily Deals: PlayStation Best of E3 Sale, Xbox Live, PS Plus, Anker Accessories

Kojima Offers More Cryptic Death Stranding Details

Jared Leto’s Joker Design Inspired By Instagram Drug Lords

The 8 Things We Learned While Playing Horizon: Zero Dawn

Original Skyrim Saves \'Should Transfer\' to Skyrim SE on PC

Steam Summer Sale 2016 Dates Revealed

13 Things You Should Know about Resident Evil 7

Death Stranding: Kojima Reveals New Details - IGN Daily Fix

31 Minutes of Zelda: Breath of the Wild Gameplay - E3 2016

Plus, does anyone know the punchline of Tyrion\'s joke?

Full spoilers for Game of Thrones continue below. There also are discussions about the book character Lady Stoneheart and her potential role in the TV series.

Game of Thrones director Mark Mylod, who directed the show\'s most recent episodes "The Broken Man" and "No One," is the man to ask some of the biggest questions surrounding the series.

The morning after his last episode of Season 6 aired, I got on the phone with British director to talk about the ambiguities in certain storylines, whether he was aware of certain fan theories during production and what his challenges were in these two episodes. Read on for our full interview.

IGN: Of the two episodes you directed this season, which was the most challenging sequence for you to put together?

Mark Mylod: Ooh, difficult... I guess in terms of physical production, I tell you what actually, the scene I was most scared about -- and I was scared about it because I thought the writing was so freaking good that I was scared about fucking it up -- was the scene in episode 8 between Edmure and Jaime, when Jaime goes into his tent and they basically go at each other, where Jaime ultimately threatens to catapult his baby son into the castle unless he does his will. I found the writing of that scene, when I read it, the hairs on the back of my neck were standing up. I thought it was just extraordinary, powerful writing.

Then we got in to finally shoot the scene -- we shot it quite late on -- I realized that I was working with two actors who are so, you know, I know Nikolaj well because we\'d worked together quite a bunch already, but Tobias I hadn\'t worked with previously. And these two actors at the top of their game absolutely going at each other, utterly fearless, and exploring different nuances every single take was really the most exciting days I\'ve had at work in a really long time. And yet, it was just two guys in a small canvas tent. To me, that\'s kind of the beauty of Game of Thrones. One of the things I\'ve loved about it for so long in that it can be the most extraordinary, epic television show probably on the planet, and yet some of the most memorable scenes can be these incredibly intimate scenes.

Richard Dormer as Beric Dondarrion in Game of Thrones

Nikolaj Coster-Waldau as Jaime Lannister and Gwendoline Christie as Brienne of Tarth in Game of Thrones

Essie Davis as Lady Crane and Maisie Williams as Arya Stark in Game of Thrones

Tobias Menzies as Edmure Tully and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau as Jaime Lannister in Game of Thrones

Gwendoline Christie as Brienne of Tarth and Clive Russell as the Blackfish in Game of Thrones

Maisie Williams as Arya Stark in Game of Thrones

Hafþór Júlíus Björnsson as The Mountain and Lena Headey as Cersei Lannister in Game of Thrones

Eugene Simon as Lancel Lannister in Game of Thrones

Gwendoline Christie as Brienne of Tarth in Game of Thrones

Conleth Hill as Varys and Peter Dinklage as Tyrion Lannister in Game of Thrones

Nikolaj Coster-Waldau as Jaime Lannister in Game of Thrones

I think two of my favorite scenes previously way back in Season 1 was a scene between King Robert and Cersei where they talk about the failure of their marriage, and I found it heartbreakingly compelling. Likewise, back in Season 3 was it, there was a bathhouse scene with Brienne and Nikolaj\'s character Jaime where he talks about why he killed the Mad King, and it broke my heart. It was so extraordinary to see vulnerability in this character. I\'d always happily assumed he was such a jerk. Likewise in episode 8, there is to me an extraordinary scene between Brienne and Jaime in his tent, where the subtext is so beautifully eloquent, and yet they say so little of what they actually mean. It\'s just wonderful. I just love that about the writing, and I love that the actors can do that so beautifully and instinctively.

In terms of physical production, I suppose the foot chase between the Waif and Arya that is the climax of episode eight was the most challenging to put together -- again, partly because the writers had put down the most dazzling foot chase ever committed to film. So there was a kind of high bar there. You read that in the script and think, "Thanks very much, now I\'ve got to match that!" No pressure!

] Did you draw any specific inspiration for that chase scene? It\'s sort of like Arya\'s Bourne moment.

Mylod: Yeah, it\'s interesting, I did of course, by YouTube and every other outlet, look for just about every foot chase in history, and quite extraordinarily there was very little that was actually helpful to me in this instance. The particular topography of Girona, [Spain], Oldtown, in terms of the equipment that one can actually get up there and the particular kind of camera grammar that I needed for our particular show was such that there was actually very little to copy from -- and God knows I\'ll steal anything if it\'ll make me look good.

But in this instance, it was really just a question of walking around the streets and actually putting it together like a jigsaw puzzle. You know, "This set of steps is amazing, this narrow street is amazing -- how can we put those building blocks together to make cohesive storytelling?" There were basic ideas that I started putting into place, of starting from this high point in the city and moving down into these darker, shadier areas of the city, getting hopefully more claustrophobic as we went and getting into the darker underside of the city. You know, there was kind of that fulcrum point of the jump and the roll down the steps with the orange market. Those particular streets just jumped out as great filmic places to be. Then it was just a question of actually putting a structure on that.

IGN: The past two episodes have had a certain ambiguity with Arya\'s storyline, both with her being stabbed by the Waif and her leading her to the final fight. Did you make that intentionally ambiguous? What were you trying to convey with those sequences?

Mylod: Yes. In terms of the ambiguity of tone in the chase, yes, that was very deliberate. My dearest wish, I suppose, the endgame there was for the audience to watch the chase for as long as possible thinking, "Oh my God, I\'m watching Arya Stark\'s death," to be carried away on that emotional beat.

] I\'m a big fan too. Well, my favorite characters I wanted to torch myself, honestly. It was more painful for me. [

] And then, as late as possible -- and it\'s impossible to overstate the sophistication of the Game of Thrones audience. They see things coming so quickly, because it\'s a really smart audience, and they\'re so attuned to detail. You know, getting anything past them is nigh impossible, so hence the ambition was to keep that misdirect going as long as possible, ideally up until the last second, in an ideal world up until the swish of that sword to cut that candle. That\'s where I wanted to get it to. You know, our audience, a lot of them will have seen that coming before that. But in my own internal logic, yes, that decision had been made very much earlier to actually lead the Waif to a place, really the only place, where she could have a proper advantage over her to make the kill. So the ambiguity of tone in that chase was very deliberate, yes.

In terms of ambiguity at the end of episode 7, in terms of "Why is Arya stabbed then? How does she allow herself to get stabbed?" -- again, one of the wonderful things about Game of Thrones is that there is so much, because it\'s so tonally complex and myriad that people can make a lot of their own choices. A lot of the time I\'ll make choices in my own head that I don\'t even wish to be pushed out into the world, and people can make their own choices. But for me I played it that the character let her guard down.

Game of Thrones - Was Arya Acting Out of Character? - Dragons on the Wall

I played it that she made a mistake, that having made that choice to get the heck out of Braavos and almost the relief, that the character has a moment of just relaxation -- not quite relaxation, but at least a little kind of existential moment of, "Okay, you know what? This place is cool. I\'m going to miss it. For all that\'s gone on here, it\'s a beautiful city. You know, there\'s that great statue out on the harbor, it\'s a beautiful place. I\'m going to miss it," and that little moment of revery, because, she\'s a warrior, but she\'s still a young woman, and she lets her guard down, and she almost pays with her life. That was my choice in that moment.

IGN: You had two major deaths with the Waif and the Blackfish, both of which happened offscreen. I\'m curious about the decision to do that. You mentioned Game of Thrones having this very sophisticated audience, so -- except with the Waif and her face literally being taken off -- people are skeptical if they don\'t see a death. Was that something that was just in the script?

Mylod: Right. Both were scripted, yep. In terms of the death of the Waif, I think it was a lovely delayed moment. So actually the confirmation of death, as you say, was that little tilt up of the camera to see the face on the wall in the Hall of Faces, and of course the machinations of her death in that the only way to gain advantage for Arya was to become blind. The genius of that moment for me was that was a setup from eight hours of television ago, that was a setup from the first episode of this season, and suddenly it comes to fruition eight episodes later, which is one of the moments of genius from I think the writing. So that was always a conscious choice. And of course, when the character dies in the dark, unless we switch on night-vision goggles, we\'re not going to be able to see that, and we\'re not going to stick around to hear a scream in the dark anyway.

It was actually a conscious choice in the writing and I think, for me, a very elegant storytelling beat as to get that reveal a few seconds later. In terms of the Blackfish\'s death, there was a lot of tonal discussion about this, and I think I can safely speak for the writers that the choice was a conscious one in the writing not to see his actual death, because the emotional focus was really about the final moments between him and Brienne -- two warriors, two samurais, facing each other -- and Brienne\'s acknowledgment that this fellow samurai has chosen his moment, and this is his moment of dignity and choice of his death. So it was really about that moment of choice and the dignity and acceptance between these two great warriors, rather than the actual detail of his actual death. That was actually a tonal choice as to how we saw that character.

Game of Thrones - "The Broken Man" - Dragons on the Wall

IGN: When you\'re cutting together your episodes, how do you determine beyond just what\'s in the writing which sequences you\'re going to spend more time with? 

Mylod: I mean, I\'ve got to say that 90 percent of it is in the script. The scripts, unlike a lot of the television dramas that I\'ve worked on, the final edit of an episode of Game of Thrones in general is uncannily similar to how it\'s written. Honestly, there\'s no way I could possibly overstate the extraordinary vision and overall control that Dave and Dan have over the -- when they write them, they literally see them, because the attention to detail is so extraordinary, even to the point of the timing, and with, as you say, such a massive cast of characters and plot lines. But they just intrinsically understand by the time they actually put those drafts out how much screen time each character needs, what is need to get us to that piece. It\'s mapped out in such extraordinary detail in their heads that very little changes in the edit.

There have been occasions in the past where we\'ve swapped a scene from one episode to another, but very rarely so, and that\'s been for exactly the reasons you already mentioned, where we just start with the balance of "That storyline is a little heavy or a little light," and we need to reinforce that character or that particular story beat. So that has happened but incredibly rarely. And in the case of the two that I\'ve just done, 7 and 8, I think that if you were to do a page-turn with the script, then it\'s pretty much exactly how it was in the script. I would love to take more credit for it, because as a director we\'ll often have a lot more post-production input to move around and shake things, but in this instance it\'s just a case of it\'s not necessary. So, you know, if it ain\'t broke...

IGN: As the show has passed the books and does different things from the books, these two episodes came at a point when there\'s a big book character who could have been introduced. Instead, we got the Brotherhood Without Banners, but I saw this morning that Jóhannes Haukur, who plays Lemoncloak, posted a video of him reading a line from the book that sort of ties back into the Stoneheart of it all. What discussions do you guys have at all about those storylines when you\'re in production and trying to anticipate what fans might be thinking is coming -- or does that really factor at all into the actual shoot?

Game of Thrones - Is THAT Book Character Coming? - Dragons on the Wall

Mylod: You know, it doesn\'t -- certainly not with me. I\'m not in the writers room, and I can honestly say, hand over heart, that I have not had one discussion about Lady Stoneheart. So I have no idea what\'s going on in David and Dan\'s minds. We tend to speak -- there\'s an old adage about "Play the moment, not the future," and because I\'m such a massive fan myself, I\'ll often get carried away talking or discussing future beats for the characters and then have to pull myself back because of course, in terms of actually playing the reality of the moment, these characters cannot see the future. They cannot see their own destiny. You can only play the truth of the moment in front of you.

So as a director, working with those actors, it\'s important for me to stay focused on the present and to find that emotional truth in the moment. And I don\'t mean that as a dodge in this case. I\'ve genuinely had no discussions about Lady Stoneheart, so I genuinely couldn\'t comment about whether that might or might not be in their minds for the future.

IGN: Game of Thrones up until this point has had the 10 episodes each season, and you\'ve been with the show for two seasons, but the next two seasons will likely have shorter episode counts. As a director, how do you imagine that might affect the feel of Game of Thrones going forward as we get closer to the end?

Mylod: All I can do, genuinely, is just keep my finger crossed. [Laughs] I don\'t know. They\'re obviously in discussions with HBO about what the season order will be or Season 7. As to which way it goes, I genuinely don\'t know, but I\'m keeping myself available with my fingers crossed.

IGN: Awesome. Well, you always bring such great humor to the show in your episodes. I hope one day we find out the end of Tyrion\'s joke!

] Me too! We actually had a crew competition. We\'re going to have to run a competition to find out what the hell the punchline is for that joke.

Terri Schwartz is Entertainment Editor at IGN. Talk to her on Twitter at @Terri_Schwartz.

Game of Thrones First Aired Apr. 2011

Season 1, Season 2, Season 3, Season 4, Season 5, Season 6,

Season 6 Differences, Season 5 Differences, Season 4 Differences, Season 3 Differences, Season 2 Differences, Season 1 Differences,

House Stark, House Tully, House Lannister, House Baratheon, House Targaryen, House Greyjoy,