

Game of Thrones has been the biggest show on TV since it debuted on HBO back in 2011. Millions of fans are eagerly waiting to discover out the fate of their favorite heroes, and villains, in the final season that begins in 2019. We all want to know the fate of Jon Snow, Daenerys Targaryen, and Queen Cersei but for now, we’ll have to wait. To give us a little taster of Game of Thrones, we’ve taken a behind-the-scenes look at some of the most famous shots from the series. Unfortunately dragons aren’t real, and castles are no longer around so much, which gave the showrunners a problem. How were they going to make their viewers feel as though this fantasy world was really alive? That’s where CGI comes in and transforms some dull-looking sets into the amazing scenes we see in the show. This is what Game of Thrones looks like without the special effects. Playing with fire When Emilia Clarke learned she was going to be starring alongside dragons, her heart must have skipped a beat. Then they bring these green sticks onto the set an ask her to pretend they are fire-breathing beasts. While it must have been hard to imagine a real living dragon sitting on her lap, when the show aired it was basically impossible to tell it wasn’t actually there. Who knew that long green sticks would make such authentic looking dragons? This was when Daenerys’ dragons were babies though, so we’ll check in with the Breaker of Chains later when they grow up.

Arya’s boat Fans followed Arya’s adventures as she left Westeros to explore the world. That’s where she trained with the Faceless Men and became an assassin. Before she got to Braavos, she had first to flee her home or face being captured by King Joffrey after her father was beheaded for treason. This CGI boat proves that Maisie Williams didn’t have much interaction with her ship as she hot-footed it out of town. In fact, it looks as though she didn’t get on a boat at all and the special effects team did the fleeing for her. Thankfully she successfully made it across the ocean once again and is back in Westeros to keep crossing people off her list.

Ramsey’s army While Ramsey Bolton talks strategy with his father, the giant army they’re talking about are nowhere to be seen. Only thanks to some computer magic does Ramsey have such a large army at his disposal. We can’t help but think if his enemies knew most of his army were just smoke and mirrors, Ramsey wouldn’t have been half as scary. http://2.media.dorkly.cvcdn.com/46/13/562dcb8731a0b4dd02f4cc25a0627896_13.mp4 He was still one of the most memorable villains the series has had, and Theon Greyjoy, or Reek if you prefer, certainly won’t forget Ramsey in a hurry. It took heroics from Jon Snow and the cavalry to arrive, thanks to Littlefinger, for Ramsey to meet his demise after he was fed to his own dogs.

Bringing the Night King to life The scariest thing about the Night King as a villain is that he has so far not even uttered one word. For seven seasons he has quietly stalked his way to beyond The Wall and now he has a dragon under his spell he seems unbeatable. The living are having to forge alliances to take him out, but you can see he looks far less intimidating without the CGI enhancements to his face. Some fans have been speculating that the Night King isn’t the enemy at all and the fact he’s trying to take out the living is a good thing. Whatever his reasons, we’re sure to find out why he’s marching south in season eight.

Scaling The Wall Before the Night King came along and smashed The Wall, wildings had to risk their lives to get over it. The Wall stands at over 100 ft high, and it takes a huge effort to get over it, especially when you consider it’s made out of ice. These brave wildlings risked everything to get to the top, but as you can see, the actors were not asked to learn ice climbing. Instead, they were pretty safe, and they weren’t even hanging at all, they were horizontal the whole time. If only the Night King knew that’s really how easy it was to climb it, he’d have south of The Wall years ago!

The Red Keep While the Game of Thrones showrunners have done an amazing job finding their filming locations, some things, unfortunately, do not exist. When The Mountain fought The Viper, this is the spot they used for the bloody battle, but there was one thing missing, the Red Keep. http://0.media.dorkly.cvcdn.com/54/38/a11fe33833fa690a733fc461534483d9_13.mp4 It didn’t matter, and they found a way to get the intimidating stronghold into the shot. While the building sadly doesn’t exist in real life, we bet you didn’t notice when watching the show for the first time.

Growing dragons We mentioned the dragons were just babies when we first met them, but they grew up pretty fast. This is how Emilia Clarke had to pretend her dragon was just as affectionate as before. Now she has a much larger stick to play with, but once again it was barely noticeable that the dragon had been added in by the special effects guy later. At some stage, she was going to have to ride one, and we’ve got the secret behind that coming up too.

King’s Landing King’s Landing is the city where most of the backstabbing goes down. It was where Ned lost his head for honor, where Joffrey choked to the delight of Sansa, and where Tywin took a crossbow shot in the gut. The real-life location of King’s Landing is Dubrovnik in Croatia but as beautiful as it is, it had to be enhanced using special effects. The Red Keep by the sea was added as well as many of the buildings along the cityscape.

The knights of the Vale The Vale is considered to be one of the strongest castles in Westeros because it is perched on the edge of a cliff. The only way up is through this gate, but only thanks to special effects. http://0.media.dorkly.cvcdn.com/62/98/f36b51432a87bb70b79e7a31b7395467_13.mp4 If you came to this location when Game of Thrones isn’t in town you’d find nothing blocking your path and you could walk right through. You can see here just how many layers of effects it took to make the scene look convincing.

Staring out to space This is Arya finally returning home to Westeros, and her first step was to visit The Twins and say hello to Walder Frey. This was where her family became the victims of The Red Wedding, and Arya was out for revenge. She calmly served Frey a pie filled with his own children before doing what assassins do best and riding off into the sunset. The Twins are the two strongholds either side of this bridge and the Game of Thrones special effects team had to add it all in using CGI.

How to train a dragon So how did Daenerys finally manage to ride her dragon now that it was large enough to support her weight? As you can see, there isn’t a green stick in sight, but there is what kind of looks like the Batmobile attached to a bunch of steel poles. No longer do we need green sticks, the dragons are too large, and instead the special effects budget grew with Daenerys’ babies. The Mother of Dragons became the first person to ride one in hundreds of years thanks to these effects.

Creating the Unsullied The Unsullied are the army that Daenerys has come to rely upon, and the people she hoped would help her recapture the Seven Kingdoms for her family. She commands a large army, but they aren’t as large as the Game of Thrones showrunners would have you believe. Here you can see where the troops have been bolstered thanks to the use of a big green screen. People would not fear Daenerys if she turned up with just a few actors, so it was essential her numbers were boosted digitally.

Soldiers are easy to find It seems as though if you’re looking to add numbers to an expansive scene, it doesn’t take much. This shot is taken from the famous Hardhome episode, where we first learn just how powerful the Night King is. It isn’t just people who were added to this scene though, and the landscape completely changes once the special effects crew got their hands on it. If they had forgotten to remove the vehicles and tents, it might have been a bit confusing for viewers as those things hadn’t been invented yet.

Going beyond The Wall You might have thought they went to some wintery location to get this shot, but all they had to do was find a quarry that wasn’t being used. Clever computer trickery has made us believe these Night’s Watch guards were heading north of the Wall. http://0.media.dorkly.cvcdn.com/11/92/ffbd9f6d858dd42f9d05ab04adaf84a6_13.mp4 All they were really doing was riding a few horses around in a big hole filled with dirt. Who said being an actor is all about heading to glamorous locations? This is as far from glamorous as it gets.

Who needs a real castle? There’s no need to actually find a castle anymore as you can always get the CGI department to add one in post-production. This castle looks far less impressive when you see it without the special effects in the background. Plus, no one is going to be trying to invade this stronghold when it doesn’t look like it could hold up in a string breeze, let alone survive an army. We much prefer the finished version, and when they’re done with Game of Thrones, these experts should take up architecture.

No actors harmed Some of the battle sequences look so convincing, but when you know the effects used, they no longer seem so realistic. This battle scene featured a bunch of animals and actors who were never actually there to begin with. That didn’t stop it from becoming one of the most talked about episodes in the show’s history. Entire armies have been added, along with the arrows they fired toward their enemies. It goes to show the only real limit to making TV and film is the imagination of the creators.

Dragon simulating This is the complete evolution of Daenerys’ dragons. Instead of sticks, or roller coasters, they just used a man dressed as a dragon to give Tyrion Lannister, aka Peter Dinklage, an idea of what was behind him. http://2.media.dorkly.cvcdn.com/23/15/1f71aef306356a3cfbfe97998583f83b_13.mp4 Although it would be less terrifying, we wish they had used this guy in just one scene instead of the CGI beasts they did opt for. Sure it would ruin the look of the show, but it would be hilarious.

Breathing fire We’ve already seen how the dragons are added in post-production, but what about the fire that they breathe? This scene, in which Drogon the dragon comes to the rescue in the fighting pits, looked a whole lot different while they were shooting it. Instead of a fire-breathing dragon, there is a flame thrower on tracks, so it can move as if it were a dragon. You can also see that all of the production team and the dolly tracks were removed after the fact.

Endless columns Building an entire set for the entrance to the House of Black and white is simply not practical. Instead, for the scene when Arya walks through the grand entryway, they only built the first four columns, and only completed the bottom part. The green screen in the background makes it easier for them to add depth in addition to the rest of the columns. The special effects also give the scene the dark, foggy feeling that it needs.

They’re on a boat With such incredible special effects at their disposal, Game of Thrones could film nearly any difficult scene in the studio. Here, they only constructed the deck of the ship on which Arya sails to Braavos, and put it in front of a green screen. It allowed them to edit in the vast expanse of sea and sky without ever needing to take a long and costly trip to sea. They needed to get the perspective and lighting just right, but the final result sure looks convincing.

Ygritte falling off the wall Actors often need to pretend to be in situations that are simply impossible to actually film. Take Ygritte climbing the huge ice wall in the north, for example. Actress Rose Leslie couldn’t actually climb and fall off of a huge wall of ice during a snowstorm, so they had to use a green screen and special effects to make it look real. They captured this shot from above, with the huge drop and snow added in post production. Ygritte’s look of terror is certainly real enough, though.

The giant The wildlings’ giant is an important part of the story, but of course, giants don’t actually exist. In order to make it look like there was really a larger than life creature with the wildlings in the scene, the production used a lot of effects. Here, you can see that the giant was filmed separately, with a green screen behind him. Then the rest of the scene was added in and scaled so it looks just right.

Cersei’s walk of shame In season five, Cersei is forced to march through the crowded streets in a walk of shame. It certainly looked real enough, but there was no way the production could actually gather enough extras to fill the scene. Instead, they again used a green screen and added the people in later on. In addition, actress Lena Headey opted to use a body double to avoid having to strip down for the scene. Putting it all together took some additional editing.

Wildfire In the fictional world of Game of Thrones, wildfire is an extremely flammable liquid that burns hot and green. It doesn’t exist in real life, of course, so the production had to figure out a way to make it look authentic. Here, they used green lighting to simulate the glow cast by the green flames and added the fire itself in post production. It’s much safer than trying to work with real fire, that’s for sure. Much of the background in this scene was added afterwards as well.

White walkers in real life As Game of Thrones progresses, we start to see more and more white walkers, the undead creatures that exist in the north beyond the wall. In order to make them come to life in a believable way, they used stunt doubles dressed in bright green body suits and some items of clothing that the white walkers wear. Then, the flesh was removed from the scene so the character looked like a walking pile of bones. It’s pretty impressive what they can do with modern technology!

What the Night King looks like This is what every day before wearing the Night King’s mask looked like for Vladimír Furdík as he sits in the makeup chair getting transformed. As you can see it’s quite the transformation Furdík has to go through to become the most fearsome threat Westeros has ever seen. No human looks scary enough to represent the Night King as they are, so this terrifying costume had to be created to bring the monster to life. We’ve definitely got nightmares looking at this change.

Calling for reinforcements Game of Thrones has become known for its epic battle scenes as the action began picking up the pace in the late seasons. This is Jon Snow’s famous battle against Ramsey Bolton when the Starks would fight to take back their family home from the tyrants who stole it. There weren’t as many people on the battlefield as you might have thought that day and many of the extras were added in digitally. Every addition helped create one of the most suffocating battles ever made for our viewing pleasure.

Scaling up the dragon We don’t know if it’s a good thing or not that dragons don’t exist. It would be amazing to see these magnificent beasts with our own eyes, but we can’t help but feel as though we’d be toast if they were real. The scene where the Night King reanimates this dragon is an ominous sign of things to come for the living, and you can see how many visual effects were used. Not only was the entire dragon head created using CGI, but the Night King got some upgrade too.

Making the Night King terrifying As if the CGI and makeup didn’t make the Night King terrifying enough, we can’t forget the huge army of reanimated bodies he has. In this scene, we get thousands more wights added to the shot plus the chilly mountainscape. The Night King ruled beyond the wall and created one of the biggest armies ever seen on television, mostly thanks to some clever use of green screen. You’d think no one would mess with him after seeing this, but that didn’t stop Jon and the gang from fighting him in season 8.