Game of Thrones star Sophie Turner slams fans' 'disrespectful' petition to remake season eight

Warning: the story below contains spoilers for Game of Thrones season eight.

Game of Thrones star Sophie Turner has spoken out against a petition launched by fans to remake the show’s eighth and last season.

The actor told The New York Times in an interview published the day after the series finale aired that she finds viewers’ criticism of the show “disrespectful”, especially given the amount of work that went into crafting the fantasy drama’s final episodes.

Game of Thrones‘ eighth season has caught significantly more flack than previous instalments, to the point that more than a million people have now signed a petition to give it a redo.

Asked about the backlash, Turner said: “Honestly, I’m not surprised. People always have an idea in their heads of how they want a show to finish, and so when it doesn’t go to their liking, they start to speak up about it and rebel.”

She added: “All of these petitions and things like that – I think it’s disrespectful to the crew, and the writers, and the filmmakers who have worked tirelessly over 10 years, and for 11 months shooting the last season. Like 50-something night shoots.

“So many people worked so, so hard on it, and for people to just rubbish it because it’s not what they want to see is just disrespectful.”

An online petition posted on Change.org not long after The Last of the Starks (the fourth episode in the eighth season) aired on 5 May had more than 1.2m signatures as of Monday.

The Independent‘s critic called Game of Thrones’ series finale “misjudged and hammy”, and found that it “lacked emotional resolution”.

Game of Thrones is available on NOW TV in the UK, and on HBO in the US.