With Game of Thrones now in the rearview mirror, it seems that everyone is wanting to give their hindsight opinion. Most prominently, the show’s creators recently spoke about the franchise at an event in Austin, providing some very controversial remarks. The rest of the cast has gotten in on the action as well, with everyone from Emilia Clarke to Kit Harrington giving some kind of statement. And given how underwhelming the series’ final season proved to be for audiences and critics alike, that’s not a surprising development.
Now, however, Khal Drogo himself, Jason Momoa is weighing in on the show. During a recent interview to promote his new project with Apple, Frontier, the erstwhile lord of the Dothraki was asked about his time with GoT, and he commented that he was somewhat disappointed with how things ended up for his character.
I’ve always wanted to do this. I’ve always felt like I’ve been cheated in a lot of the things I’ve done. You try to show a little bit of color in there, you know, with [Conan the Barbarian], but no one wants to see Conan crying and with Drogo, he died before any of that stuff could happen. In Frontier, all his family were killed, and it was about the revenge of it all. In this, it’s just beautiful because you see the whole arc of it all.
This is certainly a fair point of view. Momoa’s Khal Drogo was heavily featured in the first season, even epically taking out “The Last Dragon” Viserys Targaryen by pouring a pot of molten gold over his head, but that was basically it. There wasn’t a lot of character development. In many ways, Khal was simply a plot device that was needed to get Daenerys Targaryen with the Dothraki and to move her story forward.
By the end of season 1, the character had already been unceremoniously killed and written out of the show. It’s important to note that his death wasn’t in vain and is a large part of what fueled Dany throughout Game of Thrones. However, it will likely always be a little bittersweet that Momoa didn’t have more to do in the realms of Westeros. Still, it’s a demonstration of the actor’s ability that he was able to make such a grand impact with such a minor part.