Following last week’s epic Great War against the Night King — the longest battle scene shot in TV history — “Game of Thrones” fans spotted an odd prop in Sunday night’s follow-up episode.
About 17 minutes into “The Last of the Starks,” Winterfell is alive in celebration of its victory at the hands of Arya Stark. Brienne, Tyrion and Jaime were playing an oddly flirtatious drinking game, Arya was nowhere in sight, Tormund was raising a glass (or two) to Jon Snow and Daenerys was pondering her future near a hot cup of coffee.
“My favorite show in the entire world forgot a STARBUCKS COFFEE CUP ON THE TABLE WHILE FILMING,” YouTube personality Zane Hijazi tweeted along with an eight-second clip from the episode.
The cup, clearly not of Westerosi nature, was spotted to the right of the Mother of Dragons as Tormund raves of his loyalty to Jon Snow.
“He’s little, but he’s strong. Strong enough to befriend an enemy and get murdered for it,” Tormund said before the camera panned out to include Daenerys’ glare … and the apparent Starbucks cup.
Referring to said cup as from on-set craft services, HBO, in a statement, copped to the error – with a bit of non-Westerosi cheekiness. “The latte that appeared in the episode was a mistake. Daenerys had ordered an herbal tea.” The cup was removed by HBO in all on-demand viewing formats Tuesday. It will not appear in future broadcasts, HBO said.
The tweet calling out the error was shared more than 140,000 times and liked by 494,000 people. It inspired memes and fan reactions — several about Westerosi Starbucks baristas struggling to spell Daenerys’ name — prompting “Starbucks coffee cup” to become a trending Twitter moment.
Starbucks even got into the action tweeting, "TBH we’re surprised she didn’t order a Dragon Drink."
“Barista: Name? Dany: Daenerys Stormborn of House Targaryen, First of Her Name, Protector of the Seven Kingdoms, Mother of Dragons, Khaleesi of the Great Grass Sea, the Unburnt, Breaker of Chains. Barista: How do you spell that,” one Twitter user wrote.
“The Starbucks coffee cup has more screen-time than Ghost,” another fan wrote, in disappointment of Jon Snow’s decision to send his dire wolf Ghost with Tormund.
Fans who are less than pleased with the turn of events in the HBO epic’s eighth and final season were more critical of the set mishap, calling the episode “rushed” and the editing “lazy.”
This season is “so stitched together, they forgot to remove a Starbucks coffee cup,” one fan wrote.
