HBO hasn't given up on a controversial slavery-themed show from Game of Thrones writers David Benioff and D. B. Weiss, in spite of a huge backlash on social media.
Many criticised the network when it was announced last year that Benioff and Weiss would follow up Thrones with Confederate, an alternate history series in which the South had successfully seceded from the union and slavery remained in existence.
There were calls for a boycott and a #NoConfederate movement was launched online, with HBO and Benioff and Weiss responding that it was "premature" to draw conclusions about the show's content.
That all took place last summer, and nary an update about Confederate has been announced since then, so it'd be logical to assume that HBO quietly dropped the project without actually saying so.
Apparently, that's not the case. HBO programming president Casey Bloys told TVLine at the TCA press tour this week that Confederate is still in the pipeline once Benioff and Weiss finish the final season of Game of Thrones and get a handle on their upcoming Star Wars movies.
"There's no change," Bloys maintained. "They haven't written anything. They still have to finish digital effects work on [the final season]… and they obviously now have the Star Wars movie. But at a certain point they'll tell us when they are ready [for Confederate]."
The writing duo said earlier this year that they'll get started on Star Wars "as soon as the final season of Game of Thrones is complete", so any development on Confederate would likely be far in the future.
Benioff and Weiss are not involved in the Game of Thrones prequel spin-off, which is expected to begin filming next year.
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