The first episode of the fifth season of HBO’s hit show Game of Thrones airs this weekend and the Internet is abuzz with discussion about what the future may hold for some of the world’s favorite TV characters. Even though the plot is based on the books of the same name, the TV show’s creators have already been shown to play fast and loose with parts of it. Also, not all of us have read the aforementioned books.
With just a few hours to wait until the first episode airs it seems not everyone is capable of waiting, with the first four episodes having somehow found their way onto a variety of BitTorrent trackers around the globe. Having initially started out on private trackers but now widespread on public ones, the first four episodes of the new Game of Thrones season 5 had already been downloaded more than 800,000 times this morning with the rate of downloads showing no sign of abating.
The cause of the leak is not yet known, but the smart money is on the episodes having been sent to the press for review ahead of their airing. While we wont link to the torrent files for obvious reasons, it is ridiculously easy to find it online.
The currently available torrent only has the standard definition version of the files available too, which is putting quite a few Game of Thrones fans off downloading at all. You’d think that would be pretty far down the pecking order as far as reasons to not steal content go, but there you have it.
Game of Thrones season 5 premieres Sunday night on HBO at 9:00 p.m. EDT, 6:00 p.m. PST, with international audiences having to wait for their local TV companies to catch up. That may or may not be too long to wait for some, but we do know that the UK for example will be showing the new season on Monday nights – so not too long to wait for some of us after all.
iPhone, iPad and Apple TV users can watch it legally using the awesome HBO NOW service. Follow our guide on how to setup your devices to watch Game of Thrones 5 premiere on Sunday:
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