‘Game of Thrones’: What Peter Dinklage Thinks About Season 8’s Haters

Peter Dinklage has weighed in on Game of Thrones haters who continue to criticize Season 8, saying he wishes they would “move on.” In December, Dinklage — who played Tyrion Lannister on GoT — spoke with the New York Times and was asked about the criticism that the show suffered from some fans after the series finale. “They wanted the pretty white people to ride off into the sunset together,” he replied. He then jokingly added, “By the way, it’s fiction. There’s dragons in it. Move on.”

Dinklage went on to day, “No, but the show subverts what you think, and that’s what I love about it. Yeah, it was called , but at the end, the whole dialogue when people would approach me on the street was, ‘Who’s going to be on the throne?’ I don’t know why that was their takeaway because the show really was more than that.” The actor continued, “One of my favorite moments was when the dragon burned the throne because it sort of just killed that whole conversation, which is really irreverent and kind of brilliant on behalf of the show’s creators: ‘Shut up, it’s not about that.’”

He added, “They constantly did that, where you thought one thing and they delivered another. Everybody had their own stories going on while watching that show, but nobody’s was as good as what the show delivered, I think.” Going on to share his take on why some fans didn’t enjoy the show’s finale, Dinklage offered, “I think the reason there was some backlash about the ending is because they were angry at us for breaking up with them.”

“We were going off the air and they didn’t know what to do with their Sunday nights anymore,” he continued. “They wanted more, so they backlashed about that. We had to end when we did, because what the show was really good at was breaking preconceived notions: Villains became heroes, and heroes became villains.”

Dinklage went on to say, “If you know your history, when you track the progress of tyrants, they don’t start off as tyrants. I’m talking about, spoiler alert, what happened at the end of Game of Thrones with that character change,” he said. “It’s gradual, and I loved how power corrupted these people. What happens to your moral compass when you get a taste of power? Human beings are complicated characters, you know?” Fans can still relive all eight seasons of Game of Thrones on HBO Max.