Emilia Clarke fought Game of Thrones showrunners over Daenerys Targaryen's depiction as 'cold, expressionless'

Game of Thrones star Emilia Clarke celebrates her birthday on 23 October. Turns out, the actor, who became a household name for portraying Danaerys Targaryen in HBO’s epic fantasy series for eight seasons actually fought back against the producers of the show when they tried to make her character too cold and expressionless. Clarke, who was nominated for four Emmys for playing Daenerys in Game of Thrones, left fans shocked when in the final episodes of the series, her character descended into madness and turned into the villain of the show. The second to last episode of the show The Bells even saw Dany riding on Rhaegar and burning down King’s Landing. The show, however, left fans undecided with the way showrunners killed off her character. Now, James Hibberd’s behind-the-scenes Game of Thrones book_, Fire Cannot Kill a Dragon: Game of Thrones and the Official Untold Story of the Epic Series_, that includes interviews with the cast and crew, has revealed how Clarke would push back against producers David Benioff and DB Weiss when they attempted to make Daenerys a cold character. According to the website Winter Is Coming, Clarke said that there were a number of times when she rebutted saying, “Don’t tell me what to do with my girl. I know what to do!” The actress revealed she became concerned about the show’s portrayal of Daenerys who became much more emotionless in her descent into madness in the final season. “it’s like Daenerys’s calling card became cold expressionlessness. I always wanted to infuse that with some humanity because no one’s consistently like that,” the actress revealed, adding that she would sometimes fight back a little. She went on to add that she got it that Daenerys’ character had to be unforgiving and a powerful force, but there were moments he felt that the character was also a human being and so would try to incorporate it into the scenes and hope that it made it to the final cut. Meanwhile, actor Paddy Considine has been roped in as the first cast member of the _Game of Thrones_ prequel series House of the Dragon at HBO. House of the Dragon is based on George RR Martin’s House Targaryen chronicle Fire & Blood set 300 years before Game of Thrones. Created by Martin and co-showrunners Ryan Condal (Colony) and Miguel Sapochnik (Game of Thrones) it replaces HBO’s previously announced prequel project starring Naomi Watts, which filmed a pilot and then was scrapped in 2019.