Game of Thrones creators David Benioff and D.B. Weiss say they were prepared for the backlash that greeted Wednesday's announcement of their next TV project, HBO's alternate-timeline drama Confederate, which imagines slavery as a modern-day institution.

A sampling of initial reaction to the project, announced this week, and scheduled to begin production after Thrones wraps its final season next year:

Daily Beastwriter Ira Madison III: "This is white nonsense ... We finally had an Oscars ceremony where a black film won Best Picture (Moonlight) without having slaves or servants in it. But I guess HBO’s eyes are still fixated on 12 Years a Slave."

Roxanne Gay: "It is exhausting to think of how many people at HBO said yes to letting two white men envision modern day slavery. And offensive."

They were far from alone. Twitter posts castigated HBO's decision, resoundingly asking: Why, in such a divided political era (in which the Confederate flag debate still rages on), do we need this show? And why would HBO put such a concept in the hands of two white male show creators who have previously been criticized for a lack of representation of people of color on GoT, and shocking portrayals of rape and violence against women?

But in a joint phone interview with Benioff and their black writing/producing partners, spouses Malcolm and Nichelle Tramble Spellman on Thursday, Weiss told Vulture, "We were very hyper-aware of the difference between a show with a fictional history and a fictional world, and a show that’s an alternate history of this world."

In fact, Malcolm, who previously worked on Fox's Empire, recalled warning the two white men, "You are dealing with weapons-grade material here."

But he didn't see it as a deterrent.

"For me and Nichelle," Spellman said, "it’s deeply personal because we are the offspring of this history. We deal with it directly and have for our entire lives. We deal with it in Hollywood, we deal with it in the real world when we’re dealing with friends and family members. And I think Nichelle and I both felt a sense of urgency in trying to find a way to support a discussion that is percolating but isn’t happening enough. As people of color and minorities in general are starting to get a voice, I think there’s a duty to force this discussion."

Tramble Spellman promised, "There is not going to be, you know, the big Gone With the Wind mansion. This is present day, or close to present day, and how the world would have evolved if the South had been successful seceding from the Union. And what was also exciting to me was the idea that in order to build this, we would have to rebuild world history."

And that rewriting of world history doesn't mean the South won the Civil War, Spellman says, addressing criticism that the show could be viewed as wish-fulfillment for white supremacists.

"I think that [using the word] “winning” creates the wrong image," he says. In the world of Confederate, "it was a standstill. They maintain their position, the North maintains theirs. What people need to recognize is, and it makes me really want to get into the show: The (expletive) is alive and real today. I think people have got to stop pretending that slavery was something that happened and went away. The (expletive) is affecting people in the present day."

Benioff scoffed at the notion that he and Weiss would be calling all the shots and that the Spellmans are there for cover.

"I’d say anyone who thinks that Malcolm and Nichelle are props (has) never met Malcolm and Nichelle. The idea that we would tell them anything — neither one of them is afraid to call us an (expletive). Believe me. That’s happened many times before. [Laughter.] And it’ll happen again. It’s a partnership."

Benioff added that he and Weiss made a conscious decision to use the capital they gained from Game of Thrones to "attempt something difficult, that wouldn’t be easy, that would be challenging, that would cause us all sorts of problems that something easy wouldn’t."

And he admits Confederate's premise, which is akin to Amazon's Man in the High Castle, which reimagines the world if Hitler had won World War II, is a scary undertaking for all of them.

"We knew it would be, and now it’s come true," Benioff said. "It’s obviously creating a lot of controversy before anything’s happened just on the basis of a press release, and that will only continue as we get closer. But even aside from that outside part of it, there’s just the frightening part of — we’re all gonna put a lot of pressure on ourselves to get it right. And that’s scary, but it’s also exciting."