The fifth season of Game Of Thrones is still nearly a year away, leaving fans with some free time to speculate over who George R. R. Martin will kill next and make some Hodor memes. But details are slowly coming together as the show gears up for production in the fall, and Entertainment Weekly’s little birds have uncovered a good one: the lineup of directors for next season.
The list is mostly notable for its absences. Showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss won’t direct any episodes next season, and neither will Alex Graves, who directed four episodes last season—including the one that got people really upset. Also absent are fan favorites Michelle MacLaren (she’s directing an episode of Better Call Saul instead) and Neil Marshall, who was just nominated for an Emmy for his work on “The Watchers On the Wall.” Instead, epic battle duties have been assigned to David Nutter, the lone returning director, who will be handling the climactic ninth episode as well as the season finale. The rest of the directors are all new to Game Of Thrones, if not to television. Here’s the complete list:
Episodes 501 and 502: Michael Slovis, cinematographer and occasional TV director who served as DP on Breaking Bad and directed four episodes of the show, including season five opener “Live Free Or Die” and season five’s “Confessions.”
Episodes 503 and 504: Mark Mylod, who directed the Anna Faris comedy What’s Your Number? and Ali G Indahouse as well as episodes of Shameless and Entourage, presumably here on boob duty.
Episodes 505 and 506: Jeremy Podeswa, who has been working with HBO since the Carnivale and Six Feet Under days. Podeswa earned his palace intrigue chops working on The Tudors, and recently directed episodes of Boardwalk Empire, American Horror Story: Coven, and The Walking Dead.
Episodes 507 and 508: Miguel Sapochnik, who directed the dystopian Jude Law/ Forest Whitaker sci-fi movie Repo Men in 2010. He’s been working mostly in network TV since, including episodes of House M.D., Fringe, Revolution and Under The Dome.
Episodes 509 and 510: David Nutter, whose previous credits include four episodes of Game Of Thrones: “The Old Gods And The New”, “A Man Without Honor”, “The Rains of Castamere”, and “Mhysa.”