It was beginning to feel like we were a long way off from even one spinoff getting a go-ahead from HBO; the news of four spinoffs is definitely reason to get excited, especially with big names like Dan Weiss, David Benioff, and George R.R. Martin attached.
News of the spinoff development comes on the heels of many months of vaguely encouraging statements from folks at HBO.
Then, in December 2016, HBO CEO Richard Plepler gave a Game of Thrones interview, in which he said that they were in “very embryonic stages of other possibilities.”
Programming president Casey Bloys said last summer that a spinoff is “something I’m not opposed to,” and he followed up in November with the promise that they were in “preliminary ongoing talks,” among other things.