Below is a gallery showing a sample of the MANY photos I took while at the exhibition. Check them out!
I was very excited to be going to my third Game of Thrones exhibit. Once again, it was held downtown Toronto, at the Bell TIFF Lightbox event center. This is where the very first one was held in 2012. It was small but this one has a lot of colorful props and posters, pictures and storyboards for fans to glance at, read about and take pictures. I lost count how many times I saw people’s flashes go off. It was crowded and needless to say, it got hot in the room very fast.
My personal preferences in the exhibit were the “In Memoriam” wall, the story boards, the King’s Landing (especially Margaery Tyrell’s wedding dress) costumes and The Dog and The Wolf (Arya and the Hound) displays. I took over 300 pictures, so you could say that either I got carried away or I like to get as much detailed shots as possible.
Due to the small space, there were a few displays that fans walked around. They had all the displays arranged according to the House. I went in the evening, which was probably not the best time to go but I had little choice in the matter – when I called to get my tickets on April 28, I was on hold for over an hour and all the morning and afternoon slots were already claimed. I was just happy to get tickets at that point. Tickets had sold out in less than 3 hours for the Toronto exhibit.
Fans got to see props from Seasons I to IV. Most notably, the recent props were the costumes from Sansa and Tyrion’s wedding, to Oberyn Martell’s clothing, to Margaery Tyrell’s wedding dress. They improved upon House Targaryen’s display this year, as I recall last year’s was pretty skimpy. They had pictures of the dragons, the eggs and lots of images from Yunkai and Astapor. And while we adoring fans love the actors and actresses who bring these characters to life on screen, we must acknowledge and give thanks and appreciation to all the wonderful and talented people who create the clothing, the banners, forge the weapons, scout the locations, formulate the authentic languages and prepare beautifully crafted sets. It takes a lot of time, talent and team work to make Game of Thrones a success and I am so glad that they have an amazing team of artists who work behind the scenes to capture all the exquisite details!
They had a new feature this exhibit: the Oculus Rift. People lined up for almost an hour to get to experience ascending the Wall with 3-D goggles and earphones. The whole experience is about a minute and a half. I went in line and passed the time by chatting with people in line and discovered that many people had not read the books and that some people had not year watched Season III or IV yet. I told them to be careful because essentially, people all around them would be talking about what was going on, so the night was full of spoilers for them. Other than that, the mood was friendly and boisterous. Once you get to the front of the line, you are escorted into what looks like a large telephone booth, where there are wrought iron bars on the sides for you to hold onto. During my “ascent” I was looking around and experiencing the top of the Wall in 3-D while trying to dodge flame tipped arrows. It was pretty cool, but goes by so quickly.
I loved the banners of various Houses and many of the other props that were featured. I especially enjoyed the weapons display. It bowls me over to think of how much time and craftsmanship goes into the forging of the swords and the shields. I love anything that has to do with medieval history, and Game of Thrones fits right into that time frame. Overall, I was happy to go but I hope that if HBO Canada does another exhibit in 2015, that they choose another venue, a larger one, in order to give fans more room to move around in and to have a lot of space between the various displays. As a devoted fan, I am just happy to partake in the experience. I would just respectfully suggest that a larger venue be selected for 2015. If you ever get a chance to visit one of these exhibitions, take it!
