Now that the dust is settling following the backlash over the finale of Game of Thrones, it’s finally safe for George R.R. Martin to start talking about his next project – the prequel.

The good news for fans of the show is that, despite HBO’s refusal to remake season eight, they will be investing in a series set in the Game of Thrones universe thousands of years before everyone started fighting over the Iron Throne.

VICE has more details from Martin that give us some insight into what we can expect going forward.

Martin [below] promises that the show will still feature the White Walkers and everyone’s favorite stoic, bearded Westeros family, the Starks. And that means more direwolves, too.

“The Starks will definitely be there,” Martin said, according to EW. “Obviously the White Walkers are here—or as they’re called in my books, The Others—and that will be an aspect of it,” Martin says. “There are things like direwolves and mammoths.”

There won’t be any Lannisters, though, but Casterly Rock will make an appearance.

The Seven Kingdoms will be a little different, too—namely, there will be a whole lot more than just seven. “We talk about the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros; there were seven kingdoms at the time of Aegon’s Conquest,” Martin said.

“But if you go back further then there are nine kingdoms, and 12 kingdoms, and eventually you get back to where there are a hundred kingdoms—petty kingdoms—and that’s the era we’re talking about here.”

The story will centre around the first war with the White Walkers.

All we ask is that you don’t botch the ending.

To catch up on all of the Game of Thrones action, and brush up on your Westeros terminology before the prequel, stream seasons one to eight on Showmax.

[source:vice]