Entertainment Weekly is continuing its insider preview coverage of Game of Thrones as the season 7 premiere date draws closer. Today, EW’s Westeros correspondent James Hibberd has some sobering news: despite hopes to the contrary, the remaining 13 episodes of the show (seven in season 7 and six in season 8) will not be longer than usual.





Fans have been hoping the episodes might be longer ever since hearing we’d be getting less of them. Hibberd, who has direct access to the folks on the Game of Thrones production, explains why that’s not in the cards:

If the producers needed significantly more time to tell their story, they would simply have made another episode — not lobby HBO for fewer episodes to close out the show and then make them all extra long. (Also, most people in television are generally paid per episode, so going around making super long episodes when a network is willing to give you more episodes wouldn’t make much sense either).

This tracks with the news that the season 7 premiere will be 59 minutes long, which is roughly consistent with the lengths of other premieres. However, Hibberd did say that the season 7 finale will clock in “at well over an hour.” So look out for some big revelations in that one.

For reference’s sake, here are the lengths of the season finales to date:

Season 1 finale (“Fire and Blood”): 53 minutes

Season 2 finale (“Valar Morghulis”): 64 minutes

Season 3 finale (“Mhysa”): 63 minutes

Season 4 finale (“The Children”): 66 minutes

Season 5 finale (“Mother’s Mercy”): 61 minutes

Season 6 finale (“The Winds of Winter”): 68 minutes

Season 7 finale: Four hours long?

Keep in mind that just because the episodes won’t be longer doesn’t mean they won’t be excellent. Cast and crew members have said that season 7 has a faster pace than usual, and Iain Glen (Jorah Mormont) said that the episodes we’re about to see are “the best seven episodes [showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss have] ever written.”

Game of Thrones season 7 premieres on July 16.