By Since Game of Thrones had a wet fart of an ending back in May of last year, showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss have kind of fallen off the public radar. For as much well deserved ire fans of GoT may have towards the two, it’s not hard to forget that for the longest time, these two could do no wrong on the show. You could argue that it may be only because they were working off of pre-established material, but their adaptation of GoT turned the fantasy series into a pop culture phenomenon and arguably one of the most important shows of the past decade.
As for what they’ve been up to since that series finale is a bit of a confusing tale. They were attached to direct a new Star Wars trilogy, only for those plans to fall through in favor of striking up a lucrative deal with Netflix, but they left one unresolved point in the entire equation; what about Confederate?
For those unaware, Confederate was going to be Benioff and Weiss’ follow-up to Game of Thrones for HBO. The series would follow a modern day Confederacy after successfully seceding from the Union with slavery continuing to the present day. With such a premise like that, it’s no surprise to hear that the series was immediately under fire for its controversial setting. Since the announcement, HBO remained silent about the future of the show, with HBO confirming today that yes indeed, the series is cancelled.
While a part of me is curious to see exactly how a premise like that could be executed, I honestly don’t think we need a series like Confederate. In case you forgot, HBO just recently finished a series that heavily examined modern race relations in America to overwhelming critical praise in the form of Watchmen. Confederate seemed like a redundant concept in the wake of Watchmen’s success, so seeing it fade away into the unknown is probably for the best.
