14 DAY TRIAL // Everything Snoop Dogg says is half in jest, whether he’s talking about his future career plans or his personal life, so there’s reason to assume the same applies here, when he’s talking about “Game of Thrones” and how he watches it for “historical reasons.”
In a new interview with the New York Post, the rapper says that the HBO show, heavy on magical elements, dragons, ice zombies and humans who can turn into animals at will, appeals to him because it helps him better understand what happened in the world in bygone times.
Snoop’s favorite history lesson
Snoop has a new album coming out, “Bush,” which marks his return to hip hop after the change in sound that came with his new name, Snoop Lion. He also contributed to the Season 5 “Game of Thrones” mixtape, and the NY Post asked him how that came to be.
GoT counts on millions of fans around the world, being the most popular HBO show so far, so hearing that Snoop is also a fan isn’t what’s surprising. The reason he gave for watching is.
“When they asked me to do the track, I was more than honored because I’m truly a fan of the show,” the rapper explains of the collaboration. “I would have done it for free, but they gave me some money on top of it, so I was like, ‘[expletive] it, let’s do it!’ I watch it for historic reasons, to try to understand what this world was based on before I got here. I like to know how we got from there, to here, and the similarities between then and now.”
This discussion was being had over the phone, and the NY Post reporter notes that he was surprised to hear that. After all, how many people do you know who watch “Game of Thrones” to get their history fix?
So his next question was of the parallels Snoop has drawn between a fictional TV show and the real world, to which the star replied: that “kings still rule” and women remain the cause of all trouble, as they have always been since the beginning of time.
Not everything is fiction
To Snoop’s credit, even though many doubt he actually knew this, George R.R. Martin, who wrote the “Song of Ice and Fire” books on which the HBO show is based, and who is also a producer / writer / consultant on the series, did say that he looked to history for inspiration in the creation of this vast universe.
Specifically, he used the War of the Roses (1455-1487) for inspiration for the conflict between the houses of Lannister, Stark, Targaryen, Martell and Bolton. However, that’s just one of the sources he looked to for inspiration, because others (like “Lord of the Rings”) were also fictional.
So while not everything in “Game of Thrones” is fictional, watching it doesn’t amount to a history lesson. Let’s hope Snoop is joking, because if he’s not, he’s looking in the wrong place for one.