Daenerys Targaryen is no stranger to dramatic, fiery exits on Game of Thrones, but one in particular stands out as the show’s craziest stunt. On Thursday, stunt coordinator Rowley Irlam revealed that Season 5’s Daznak’s Pit scene involved setting twenty extras on fire with 45-foot flames.
In the scene, which is from Season 5’s penultimate episode, “The Dance of Dragons,” shit hits the fan in the political situation in Meereen. Members of Sons of the Harpy, the rebel group resisting Dany’s rule, attack and surround Daenerys and her entourage of Missandei, Tyrion, Daario, and Jorah. Their small group seems outnumbered, until Daenerys’s wayward dragon Drogon swoops in to save the day. Drogon breathes flames onto the attackers, and Daenerys jumps on his back, spiriting away.
Speaking to Express UK, Irlam said, “We set fire to 20 guys in one day and used a 45 feet [14 meter] flame thrower on a motion control crane so we could control the dragon. That was a new record I think. It was the most amount of people that had been set on fire in one day.”
The Battle of the Bastards might have been grander in its scope, and the flames of Cersei’s wildfire were taller, but the Dance of the Dragons had the most fiery impact.
Game of Thrones returns for its seventh season on July 16.
