The actor who played Barristan Selmy, Ian McElhinney, said recently that from what he heard GRRM actually finished both books, but promised D&D he won't reveal it until the show is over.

There is no chance GRRM would wait with his ending, but assuming that someone isn't simply lying, only doesn't have a full information, maybe he really did finish the sixth book? Surprisingly enough, a month ago he did say that his writing goes quite well at the moment.

EDIT:
I somehow missed that GRRM has already disproved it all. Well, maybe next time.

The actor who played Barristan Selmy, Ian McElhinney, said recently that from what he heard GRRM actually finished both books, but promised D&D he won't reveal it until the show is over.

There is no chance GRRM would wait with his ending, but assuming that someone isn't simply lying, only doesn't have a full information, maybe he really did finish the sixth book? Surprisingly enough, a month ago he did say that his writing goes quite well at the moment.

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I mean, it's entirely plausible that the show producers paid Martin a big fat stack of cash so that they could be the ones to "properly" finish the series. There's more than enough money involved for that to be a believable, if unlikely, scenario, and it wouldn't surprise me much if it did actually happen. If it did, I'm willing to bet Martin's regretting it right now, given the mess the show's made of the last season, but it's very, very possible.

Give how monstrously huge Martin's books are, I could certainly believe that there's a rough draft of Winds of Winter done. I can also believe that properly editing and cleaning up what he's said will probably be a 1500 page manuscript is going to be a pretty massive task. At last in my experience, going from the rough draft to the print version can often take up as much time and effort as pounding out the rough draft did.

I continue to theorize it as a possibility. I can't imagine Martin would say anything about the books being finished if they were, then he wouldn't sleep until D&D had them. I think they know damn well their show has gone downhill ever since it went off the rails of the source material, and any nugget of that sweet, sweet, well-thought out plot would be a fantastically lucrative addition to their show. Martin, however, knows it's beyond saving. It's been a great money-making venture for him, but ultimately the demand market and the writers have turned it into a ship that needs to run itself into the ground, the harder the better. I have very little evidence in favor of this, but this author is someone who likes a long con; he's been pulling a few of them for longer than I've been alive, though the fan theorists have probably disentangled most of them. I only state this in advance because it will amuse me if I turn out to be right, since we'll really never know until such a time the show actually ends.

Well, they certainly butchered Jaime's arc. He was my favorite character by last season, hell I would have picked Jaime if I was participating in that whole "who's gonna sit on the throne at the end?" thing (he did sit on that throne before, didn't he?); and I couldn't give less of a shit about anything he's done this season.

Other than that, though? Again, I really enjoyed it. Honestly, if you think Daenerys doing what she did is a contrivance or character assassination; replace Jon, who has a better claim but doesn't want the throne with (f!)Aegon, whose claim supersedes both and who does want the throne, but would offer queenship to Dany as a consolation prize; and replace Cersei, who seized the throne first and has the Golden Company backing her, with Aegon again; and I think it's pretty obvious this is how things are going to play out in the books. Sure, they could have led up to it much better, but it does make more sense than pretty much any plot point they've come up with independently (probably because they didn't come up with it). I mean, I can see the poor sods who named their children Daenerys getting outraged over this, but it's not contrived so much as badly adapted because D&D decided to drop a character 3 seasons ago and are reaping the repercussions, as they've done a million times in this series.

Maybe it's because I like the Mad Queen theory (and I like it because it would make for a good tragedy, since some people seem to immediately link that to misogyny), with the two caveats being that the timeline doesn't make sense for it and it would rob Daenerys of her agency, which is not what I want. This though? This isn't her going mad. This is her deciding to do this, sanely. All of her story so far was terrible hardship -> overcoming that to wide acclaim. She was married off to a barbarian rapist, she found her own voice and became powerful in her own right. Drogo died, she hatched three dragons. She was left with nothing in the desert, she looted two cities and acquired 8000 unsullied. She gets kidnapped by Dothraki, and she took them over. Blah blah blah, you get the idea. She's used to overcoming adversity and being loved by the oppressed she rescues for it, whereas Westeros only took from her. She contributed nothing to the fight against the Night King that she did not herself cause, the whole thing would play out the same way if you take all the dragons and Dany out of the picture, but it cost her Jorah and Viseryon, and then Cersei took Rhaegal and Missandei, and all she has to show for it is people trying to assassinate her so the most boring character on the show can take the throne. Jon would be the Aragorn in that one critique of Tolkien GRRM made (look up "what was Aragorn's tax policy?" and don't take it too seriously), but a bit slower. Take that, add loneliness and grief and a little battle madness, and I can see her trying and failing to satiate her desire for revenge for Missandei in that moment. Less inherited madness, more snapping. And that's assuming she didn't conclude that the bells ringing -> Tyrion was trying to work around her this whole time, but even I'm not willing to patch things up for D&D to that level.

In other words, it looked nice, it was better written than most things D&D wrote since Season 4 ended, and I'm sure the book version will be great (yes, I still have hope). Even with the stupid Night King shit they pulled, this has been a better season than the last one.

I continue to theorize it as a possibility. I can't imagine Martin would say anything about the books being finished if they were, then he wouldn't sleep until D&D had them. I think they know damn well their show has gone downhill ever since it went off the rails of the source material, and any nugget of that sweet, sweet, well-thought out plot would be a fantastically lucrative addition to their show. Martin, however, knows it's beyond saving. It's been a great money-making venture for him, but ultimately the demand market and the writers have turned it into a ship that needs to run itself into the ground, the harder the better. I have very little evidence in favor of this, but this author is someone who likes a long con; he's been pulling a few of them for longer than I've been alive, though the fan theorists have probably disentangled most of them. I only state this in advance because it will amuse me if I turn out to be right, since we'll really never know until such a time the show actually ends.

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You mean the guy who when this seasons started was sad that they didn't produce even more season of it and which has several other TV projects in the works? That guy is supposed to be some mastermind plotting against the TV show?

And I am amused by how desperate you guys are to believe that the books will solve the mess that is the end of ASOIAF so much better than the TV-show seems to do, provided of course that GRMM will ever actually write them which I personally wouldn't be that optimistic about (and by god I pity any author who gets the job of ending the series if Martin croaks it). If Martin had puzzled out how to satisfactorily end (t)his series I am pretty confident that he would have shared most of the rough outlines with the TV show.

GRRM explicitly said he doesn't want anyone continuing the books if he were to die.

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That has always interested me. As someone who has dabbled in publishing contracts, I'm wondering if he, or his estate, has a choice.

The publisher would have paid him a substantial amount at this point, based on the promise of two more books for ASOIAF. If he doesn't deliver those books, the publisher may have a case to recoup their costs... Now, his estate (given the TV show) may be able to pay that promise back without two more books.

But if he dies with it left unfinished, the estate may have no option but to bring in a ringer (like Sanderson for Wheel of Time, though I think that was more about finishing the story than meeting financial obligations) to keep the promise.

GRRM took their money in advance of providing two more volumes. The publisher has a right to recoup their costs should he fail to deliver. Whether that's in good taste or not, based on his wishes, is another question entirely. He may be too big to push around, even dead.

Personally, I hope he crosses the finish line on his story. Either way, it's going to be a sinful precedent, I think.

-​

Becoming a writer is a polite way of saying you've chosen alcoholism as a career.

It's a strange thing for sure. One the one hand almost all the criticism of the episode is valid. On the other hand, however, this was the first episode of the eigth season that actually kept me immersed for more than ten minutes at a time. Maybe it was the stellar visuals and great score, but the episode actually hit some emotional points while I was watching.

Lots of things to complain about (glowing, peaceful horse/suddenly nerfed scorpions/etc.) but somehow the episode doesn't leave me as empty as the Winterfell battle vs the Night King.

Kasper hummed. He took a cloth, drenched it in a bucket of water, and began rubbing down his horse the way the soldiers from the convoy had showed him. The horse stared back with dark, simple, equine eyes, but it seemed to enjoy itself for its cock grew noticeably.

You mean the guy who when this seasons started was sad that they didn't produce even more season of it and which has several other TV projects in the works?

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Okay, so what I said was there was a possibility this guy was lying about not having finished the books, or at least made some significant progress without telling anyone. Is it possible he was also lying about being sad the TV show would not continue?
Detective: Okay, so you said you didn't kill this dude. Did he sleep with your wife? We're pretty sure he did.
Suspect: Nope.
Detective: Well, I almost thought I had motive there. Good thing you couldn't be lying about two things at once.

Again, I merely think it's possible, and as stated, my motivation here is amusement if I turn out to be right. You're more than welcome to remind me of this if I turn out to be wrong.