HBO
If you’re Jon Snow, you ride dragons now, according to the Game of Thrones Season 8 premiere.
If you’re Kit Harington, you hold onto a mechanical buck for dear life while bringing the show to life, thinking the entire time you’re about to die… or lose one very important part of your anatomy.
Spoiler warning: Major spoilers for Game of Thrones: Season 8 below.
In one of the early scenes from the first episode of Game of Thrones’ final season, Harington’s Jon Snow has to hop on one of Daenerys Targaryen’s (Emilia Clarke’s) dragons. Obviously, there are no real-life dragons to film with, so the film crew had to utilize some serious CGI magic to bring the dragons into the real world. While co-star Emilia Clarke has plenty of experience working with a mechanical bull-like machine filming her dragon scenes, Harington did not — which resulted in what could have been a totally disastrous accident for the actor.
“Buck work is not easy,” he said during episode of HBO’s Game of Thrones behind the scenes production Game Revealed. “I think what sums up the buck for me was there was a bit where Jon almost falls off. The dragon swings around really violently, like this, and my right ball got trapped, and I didn’t have time to say ‘Stop!’ And I was being swung around.” Um, ouch.
“In my head, I thought, This is how it ends, on this buck, swinging me around by my testicles, literally. Sorry. Probably too much information.”
Imagine if this is how you met your end — filming a raucous dragon scene because you were almost certain you were going to be swung around by one of your most private pieces of anatomy. Poor Kit! We’re glad everything came out okay, everything is still intact, and that he was able to bring us one of the coolest parts of the show’s final season.
In the meantime, if you’ve had a chance to watch the first episode already, check out some of the funniest memes and reactions that happened on social media over the weekend. If nothing else, it’ll help wipe this traumatic experience for Kit from your mind. We shudder just thinking about it.
TV
Game of Thrones