Winter is Coming

A Game of Thrones producer thinks the show will run seven seasons.

 I agree.



So here's where I think we'll be at the end of the third season.

• Bran and his party have probably made it to the Wall. This gives D&D absurdly little material to work with for the next season. I peg him at Chapter 56.
• Jon has fled the wildlings, but hasn't made it to Castle Black yet. Alternatively, the season could end right before this, and "his harshest test yet" refers to something else. Point is, he's at about Chapter 41.
• Samwell has become Sam the Slayer by this point and has run into Coldhands. He may or may not have made it back to the Wall, but he's around Chapter 56, same as Bran.
• Catelyn is a guest at the Red Wedding. Chapter 51.
• Jaime has done the bear pit scene in Chapter 44, but he has not reached King's Landing (Chapter 62) yet. After getting out of Harrenhal, he's probably got one or two more scenes this season just traveling on with Brienne. ("I only rescue maidens." Please.)
• Arya is still somewhere in the Riverlands. She got hit with an axe at the RW, but she's obviously still alive. So Chapter 65. 
• Sansa is difficult to pin down. She can't be out of King's Landing yet. The problem is, she marries Tyrion in Chapter 28 and then disappears until Chapter 59, which is the first part of Joffrey's wedding, and that certainly isn't this season.
• Tyrion is likewise still in King's Landing, but he at least narrates Chapter 53, which takes place right after the RW and would serve as a sensible "aftermath" scene the way Episode Tens seem to have.
• Davos has been locked up for most of the season, but I have to imagine his plot is going to start moving at least a little bit. If he gets out and if Melisandre gets back, then Chapter 54 is a natural stopping point. (Scratch that - Mels has to do her ritual before the RW, so those ifs aren't ifs.  They'll happen.)
• Daenerys sacks Yunkai, which happens in Chapter 42, which happens to end with the freed slaves calling her "mother" or "mhysa" in their native tongue.

The more I think about it, the more I'm convinced that the final scene of Season 3 will be the Epilogue and the introduction of Stoneheart. When poor old dead Ned lost his poor old dead head, we got "The King in the North" in the following episode to help raise the mood at least a little bit. We need something like that this year, and that's the only thing I can think of that fits the bill (and no, the Purple Wedding cannot be this year for the very simple reason that Oberyn Martell hasn't been introduced yet).

So here's what's left to be covered in ASOS: Dany has to take Meereen (3-4 episodes) and find out Jorah betrayed her. Davos has to do his whole thing with saving Edric Gendry and then send Stannis to the Wall (1 episode each). Jon has to lose Ygritte (sob) and turn down a chance to get legitimized by Stannis, fight a giant battle, and choose between getting legitimized and being made Lord Commander (this could take an entire season - it'd be nice to see it sync up with Jaime's renunciation of his family in favor of his own duty, but we'll see how that works). Down in King's Landing we have to meet the Dornish contingent, have the Purple Wedding, Tyrion's trial, the Viper/Mountain fight, and the final confrontation - that can stretch out over a season.

With the Red Wedding over, and Bran at the Wall, however, we need to step up the pace in the North. Nobody needs to see another season of Theon Torture Porn, so it would not surprise me if Reek's chapters from ADWD started popping up in Season 4. Likewise, we can get through some of Dany's misadventures in Meereen. Brienne's got nothing left to do in ASOS (because in TV canon, Loras doesn't think she murdered Renly), so she can start on her quest to find the Stark girls from AFFC.  We can't really start the Dorne plot, because that doesn't really get underway until Oberyn dies, but we can make some progress with the Iron Islands.

Long story short, Season 4 will fill out the end of the book, plus some of Theon's and Dany's scenes from ADWD.

Season 5 will watch Cersei, Jon and Dany all self-destruct under the burden of leadership. Remember a lot less happens in AFFC and ADWD, and there isn't any big climax like the Battle of the Blackwater or the Red Wedding in either book. The notion that we need more than a season and a half to cover both books is frankly ridiculous.

So, assuming George keeps the books to their projected run of only two more, that does end up being seven seasons.