Killing off Joffrey, Ramsay Bolton felt like balancing scales: ‘Game of Thrones’ co-creator D B Weiss

PTI, Apr 1, 2024, 2:04 PM IST

Los Angeles: Game of Thrones was popular for the sudden deaths of several fan-favourite characters and D B Weiss says he and co-creator David Benioff were thrilled when they got a chance to kill off Joffrey Baratheon and Ramsay Bolton, two of the most hated villains on the series.

During a new episode of the Happy Sad Confused podcast, the showrunners were asked to name their favourite character deaths.

“With ‘Thrones’, there was so much killing of good guys and we finally got to really kill both Joffrey in season four and Ramsay Bolton in season six. It was fun to go back to the old-fashioned joys of just killing off a really bad guy. … It felt like it was balancing the scales a little,” Weiss said.

Joffrey, played by Jack Gleeson, died after drinking poisoned wine, at the hands of Lady Olenna Tyrell and Lord Petyr Baelish. On the other hand, when Jon Snow (Kit Harington) beats him in a one-on-one fight, Ramsay — essayed by Iwan Rheon — is taken prisoner and eaten by his hungry hounds as Sophie Turner’s Sansa watches.

Benioff said he was particularly happy when Turner nailed the shot where she had to react to Ramsay as he was being devoured by the canines.

“For me, at the end of Battle of Bastards, when Sophie sticks the hounds on the Bastard (Ramsay), she doesn’t walk away. You don’t really see the death. You see some of it in the background, but you don’t really see the death. But what you do see is Sophie or Sansa’s smile,” he recalled.

Benioff said it was a one-shot scene and had to film it seven-eight times until Turner did it perfectly.

“It was just that feeling of — that’s so epic. Sophie was so good. When she got that shot, I felt like I can now die happy,” he added.

Weiss and Benioff are currently promoting their new Netflix series, 3 Body Problem, for which they have collaborated with Alexander Woo.