Game Of Thrones Fans Wouldn't Have Filmed This Controversial Scene
It has been over two years since HBO's revolutionary fantasy series "Game of Thrones" came to its controversial conclusion, and yet its pop-culture footprint refuses to diminish. Sure, the masses may not be lighting up social media regularly with their two cents or chatting about it at the office watercooler, but "GoT" retains its presence in the public consciousness all the same. After all, if the reaction to the news about its handful of in-production spin-offs is of any indication, there's still a market for more content stemming from Westeros, and fans are willing to eat it up.
Despite television viewers' enduring love for "Game of Thrones," most are willing to admit that it's riddled with noticeable faults. Stunted storylines, odd character decisions, and perplexing deviations from author George R.R. Martin's source material stand out among the most common that folks take issue with. However, something that's rarely brought into this conversation is the gruesome nature of "GoT" — a quality so often described as a strength of the program that it's easy to forget that not every viewer is on-board with strong language, gruesome violence, and explicit sex scenes.
As a matter of fact, there's one moment in particular that, if it were up to the "Game of Thrones" fanbase, it would never have been filmed, let alone shown on-air.
The Mountain's cruelty toward his horse went a step too far
To determine which "Game of Thrones" scene was considered unfilmable by the show's audience, Looper surveyed 615 individuals from the United States for their thoughts on the matter.
Daenerys Targaryen (Emilia Clarke) eating a horse's heart earned the least amount of votes, coming away with 16.59%, narrowly beat out by Jaime Lannister (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) assaulting his sister, Cersei (Lena Headey) in front of their son Joffrey's (Jack Gleeson) corpse at 17.56%. Next up was the infamous Red Wedding or any scene involving Ramsay Bolton (Iwan Rheon) and Theon "Reek" Greyjoy (Alfie Allen) with 19.35%, and Ramsay assaulting Sansa Stark (Sophie Turner) on their wedding night took 21.63%, thus making it the runner-up.
The winner of our poll was Ser Gregor "The Mountain" Clegane's (Conan Stevens) brutal beheading of his horse, securing the remaining 24.88% of the ballots. This scene came in the fifth episode of Season 1, where Clegane took on Ser Loras Tyrell (Finn Jones) in a joust and lost as a result of his horse throwing him off of its back. Frustrated over the defeat, he unsheathed his broadsword and removed the poor animal's head in one swipe before turning his rage on the "Knight of Flowers." Thankfully, King Robert Baratheon (Mark Addy) put an end to the conflict, prompting Clegane to storm off.
"Game of Thrones" was never afraid to push the boundaries when it came to how far its fictional bloodshed could go. At the same time, for many, witnessing the abuse of animals is in a category of mental anguish all its own. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that Gregor Clegane's unleashing of his misplaced anger led a fair number of fans to declare such a scene impossible for them to film had the responsibility fallen on their shoulders.