A costume designer on Game of Thrones has revealed that the designs for the White Walkers' armour were too dangerous to use in the show’s action scenes.
Fans of the fantasy series will fondly remember the icy zombies who battled the human characters of Westeros in both George RR Martin’s books and HBO’s hit TV adaptation.
In addition to their distinctive appearance, the White Walkers also wore sets of armour that looked more like scrap metal. The armour wasn’t only hazardous to the characters in the show, but also to the designers who created it.
Talking to The Guardian, costume designer Michele Clapton said that the intention was to make the pieces look like salvaged pieces of metal, but that it was “so, so brutal to make.”
Clapton explains: “The cutting and the bending of the metal was incredibly labour intensive. The armourists just loathed it because they really cut themselves. It’s almost like a huge cheese grater.”
In the end, it was determined that the armour couldn’t be used for any of the action scenes as it was far too dangerous, so a leather substitute had to be created.
Ironically, the actors who portrayed the White Walkers, had to wear hot water bottles beneath the armour to keep themselves warm. “We had hot water bottles we could place inside the costumes. But as there were so many prosthetics, you had to be really careful, because they could easily tear.”
Game of Thrones ran for eight seasons from 2011 until 2019, earning rave reviews, a loyal fanbase and a whopping 59 Primetime Emmy awards.
However, it ended in controversy and disappointment from fans, having aired before Martin had finished the next book in his saga.
Martin is reportedly still working on the novel, titled The Winds of Winter, having begun on the book way back in 2010.
In May, the author acknowledged that fans are likely upset by the continued delay but pushed back against complaints that he doesn’t care about the characters and the story anymore.
“I know, I know. Some of you will just be pissed off by this, as you are by everything I announce here that is not about Westeros or The Winds of Winter. You have given up on me, or on the book,” Martin wrote on his blog.
“I will never finish Winds, if I do, I will never finish A Dream of Spring. If I do, it won’t be any good. I ought to get some other writer to pinch hit for me,” he continued, detailing the typical comments he has received over the years.
“I am going to die soon anyway, because I am so old. I lost all interest in A Song of Ice and Fire decades ago. I don’t give a s*** about writing any longer, I just sit around and spend my money.”
Rebuffing the statement that the books were taking so long because he had stopped caring about them, Martin said: “Thing is, I do care about them. And I care about Westeros and Winds as well. The Starks and Lannisters and Targaryens, Tyrion and Asha, Dany and Daenerys, the dragons and the direwolves, I care about them all. More than you can ever imagine.”
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