On Wednesday, HBO announced its plans to develop a new series from Game of Thrones creators David Benioff and D.B. Weiss. The show, titled Confederate, will be an alternate history, sci-fi-tinged series based on the idea that the South won the American Civil War—and slavery is still legal in the Confederate states.

The news, naturally, sparked outrage online—and, to be honest, that outrage is pretty reasonable. Writer Roxane Gay tweeted, "It is exhausting to think of how many people at HBO said yes to letting two white men envision modern day slavery. And offensive." MSNBC host Joy Reid had a similar response, writing, "It plays to a rather concrete American fantasy: slavery that never ends, becoming a permanent state for black people. Repugnant."

In an interview with Vulture, Benioff and Weiss—as well as their partners, husband and wife producing and writing team Malcolm Spellman and Nichelle Tramble Spellman—admit that they expected the backlash to come swiftly as soon as HBO dropped the announcement:

David Benioff: Oh, yeah. We all knew it was coming in one form or another. I remember the very first time we talked about this, one of the first things that came up was …

D.B. Weiss: Malcolm said, what was it?

Malcolm Spellman: "You're dealing with weapons-grade material here."

The original HBO announcement did mention the Spellmans' involvement, although they were eclipsed a bit by the two white, male showrunners whose current HBO hit served as the peg for most headlines about Confederate's development. The Spellmans, who are black, have expressed their intent to avoid the typical slave narrative and imagery, focusing on the fact that this show is rooted in science fiction, taking place in an alternate present rather than the past.

"I think what was interesting to all of us was that we were going to handle this show, and handle the content of the show, without using typical antebellum imagery," Tramble Spellman says. "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."

Malcolm Spellman reiterated that point—as well as the fact that they plan to take great care in depicting the show's controversial subject matter:

[W]hat people have to understand is, and what we are obligated to repeat in every interview is: We've got black aunties. We've got black nephews, uncles. Black parents and black grandparents. We deal with them every single day. We deal with the struggle every single day. And people don't have to get onboard with what we're doing based on a press release. But when they're writing about us, and commenting about us, they should be mindful of the fact that there are no sellouts involved in this show. Me and Nichelle are not props being used to protect someone else. We are people who feel a need to address issues the same way they do, and they should at least humanize the other end of those tweets and articles. You know what I'm saying?

Ultimately, the creative team hopes viewers will give them a shot once the show begins (they haven't written a pilot yet, and there is no date set for its premiere). As Tamble Spellman says, "I wish [critics'] concern had been reserved to the night of the premiere, on HBO, on a Sunday night, when they watched and then they made a decision after they watched an hour of television as to whether or not we succeeded in what we set out to do."

From: Esquire US