HBO sorry for George Bush beheading in 'GOT'

HBO

HBO vows to delete images of George W. Bush's likeness from future "Game of Thrones" DVDs.

By Ree Hines

"Game of Thrones" fans weren't the only ones surprised to learn that one of the staked heads featured in the show's first season was actually a likeness of former President George W. Bush. As it turns out, even the network behind the critically praised fantasy series was shocked -- and none too happy -- about the reveal.

Show co-creators David Benioff and D.B. Weiss first tipped off viewers about the blink-and-you'd-miss-it inclusion during commentary recorded for the season-one DVD set. Now HBO has issued an apology over for the fictional beheading and has vowed to delete the image from future DVDs.

?We were deeply dismayed to see this and find it unacceptable, disrespectful and in very bad taste," the network said in a statement. "We made this clear to the executive producers of the series who apologized immediately for this inadvertent careless mistake. We are sorry this happened and will have it removed from any future DVD production.?

As for Benioff and Weiss, they explained themselves in a joint statement.

"What happened was this: we use a lot of prosthetic body parts on the show: heads, arms, etc. We can't afford to have these all made from scratch, especially in scenes where we need a lot of them, so we rent them in bulk. After the scene was already shot, someone pointed out that one of the heads looked like George W. Bush.

"In the DVD commentary, we mentioned this, though we should not have. We meant no disrespect to the former President and apologize if anything we said or did suggested otherwise."

Do you think deleting the controversial images from future DVDs is a good call, or should fans have the chance to see the scenes as they originally aired? Share your thoughts on our Facebook page.

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