Diehard Game of Thrones fans will cheer watching The Mad King play – it’s a spectacle

Game of Thrones fans know how this story ends – it’s about the journey (Picture: Johan Persson)

It’s epic. Of course it’s epic. It has to be epic. It’s Game of Thrones – an ever-expanding fantasy franchise not known for its lightness of touch, which now tumbles off the page and screen, onto the stage of the Royal Shakespeare Company.

But this is no straightforward stage adaptation of author George RR Martin’s iconic fantasy adventure. This is a different beast.

So while there are plenty of familiar names bandied about – from Ned Stark, Robert Baratheon and the manipulative Lord ‘Spider’ Varys, to various Westeros locations – there’s also a new story, one that sits within the pre-existing narrative, and is now firmly touted as canon.