By Jared Gomberg

Season 5 of HBO’s popular fantasy drama Game of Thrones is scheduled to premiere on TV April 5, 2015. The season will contain material from the two most recent books of the series A Song of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin.

The producers of the show have made statements about the upcoming season and what it will include. It will include flashbacks from the past, though nobody has said how far back the flashbacks will go. Many are hoping that Robert Baratheon’s rebellion will be featured, wherein Ned Stark and Robert Baratheon take the Iron Throne of the Seven Kingdoms from Aerys Targaryen, the Mad King. Viewers may also see the childhood of Viserys and Daenerys Targaryen, being forced from King’s Landing to Dragonstone, then Dragonstone to the Free Cities across the Narrow Sea.

Missandei and Daario Naharis, two minor characters from the show, are to become series regulars. Bran Stark and Hodor will not be included in this season due to their story lines actually being way ahead of the rest of the characters’ in the show.  In fact, Bran and Hogar’s story takes them through the conclusion of A Dance with Dragons, the most recent book in the series.

Filming of the fifth season began in July 2014 in Belfast and ended in December 2014. Locations in Northern Ireland included the edge of Binevenagh Mountain. Some of the scenes that take place in the principality of Dorne were filmed in Spain.