Kit Harington Explains Why His Game Of Thrones Jon Snow Spin-Off Never Happened

Kit Harington famously played Jon Snow on HBO’s Game of Thrones, and he was working on an idea for a new TV series that would bring the character back. It never happened, though, and now Harington has discussed part of the reason why.

Speaking to Collider, Harington said the he and his collaborators never found a story that lived up to his standards. “It was just about not finding the right story and not finding something that was worth doing, to bring me back to it and to stay in it. It just made less sense, the longer we went on with it, so we recanted,” he said.

He went on to say that his thought process was, “I don’t want to do this unless it’s the most astounding idea and unless it makes total sense.”

Harington said he was “annoyed” by the fact that his plans for a Jon Snow TV series got reported in the press before he was ready to discuss it. He said he hoped to work on the project quietly in the background so that “if it didn’t work, we could just pretend nothing had happened.”

However, a report in 2022 revealed that Harington and HBO were plotting a potential Jon Snow series. Reflecting on the leak, Harington said in the Collider interview that he wasn’t surprised word got out because that happens all the time for Hollywood projects. But he clarified that the project “never really made it that far.”

“There might be a time in the future, when some years pass, where there is a story that comes up and it feels right. I don’t know. But nothing is being thought through at the moment,” he said.

Just a week after the report came out about the Jon Snow TV show idea, author George R.R. Martin confirmed it and revealed it was Harington’s idea. In April 2024, Harington confirmed the show was not moving ahead.

In other Game of Thrones news, Harington told the Associated Press that he cannot bring himself to watch the spin-off series House of the Dragon. He said, “I can’t watch it. I spent too long there. I don’t think I’ll ever watch that show.” Check out the full interview in the video above.

Harington’s latest project is another HBO show, Industry, which returns for its third season on August 11.