[Buehler445]

Originally Posted by DaneMcCloud

Dude, it had absolutely nothing to do with arrogance and everything to do with spending 10 years of their lives on this series, which had become a never-ending journey, especially given that Martin decided that he needed decades to outline and complete the story.

AT&T's management was and has been compete and utter shit. They pressured those guys constantly because HBO was far, far behind in the Streaming Wars (and years later, still lag far behind Disney, Netflix, Amazon and are virtually tied with Hulu, which has 1/100th the original programming). They wouldn't allow them time off, because HBO had absolutely no other "Anchor" TV series and the grind just wore them down.

Running a show, even a small show, is like being a CEO of a company. There are constant challenges with personnel, salary disputes, delays, and of course, egos. When you're talking about a series with the scope of Game of Thrones, Wiess & Benioff were basically CEO's of a global corporation, with filming locations all over Europe, which comes with its own set of logistics, a team of accountants and finance people, not to mention the fact that they had to pull the story out of their asses because Martin failed to do his part, making it no surprise that the series ended up disappointing a large number of viewers.

The blame lies with AT&T.

Hmm. First I’ve heard of it, other than the Martin stuff. And a lot of it makes sense. But by the same token, by season 5 when they went off book, they should have known what they were in for. And ultimately, they controlled the output so they have to wear a bunch of it.