Pedro Pascal on the similarities between Star Wars and Game of Thrones

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Pedro Pascal is fast becoming a superstar of nerdy culture. Having brought the devilish rogue Oberyn “The Red Viper” Martell to life during the memorable fourth season of Game of Thrones, the actor is now preparing to star in The Mandalorian — the upcoming Disney+ show set in the aftermath of Return of the Jedi. That calls for reflection on two of the biggest pop culture franchises of all time.

Both Star Wars and Game of Thrones have been dominating our screens (big and small) in the past few years, but according to Pascal, the similarities go deeper than that — all the way back to their beginnings.

“I see enormous parallels between the world of Star Wars and the world of Game of Thrones,” Pascal recently told EW. “Game of Thrones might not exist if not for Star Wars, in the way that this world-building genre [took] science fiction to a new level in the way that Game of Thrones takes fantasy to a new level. And the way that it represents such concrete realities that we live in, although the irony being that it’s science fiction and fantasy.”

Such parallels might not extend to Pascal’s roles in each of the stories, however. While Oberyn was a flamboyant rapscallion, Pascal has compared the protagonist of The Mandalorian to a Clint Eastwood character who talks little.

We’ll have to judge the similarities for ourselves when The Mandalorian premieres on Disney+. Watch the video above for more from Pascal.

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