The Zombie Show You Forgot George R.R. Martin Worked On Teased a Book Very Different From The Winds of Winter
Back in 2015, George R.R. Martin joined the undead, cameoing in Syfy’s Z Nation Season 2 as a zombified version of himself—held captive by a deranged collector and doomed to sign stacks of his own books in one of TV’s strangest meta gags.
George R.R. Martin once played a zombie version of himself on TV, and the gag was so on-the-nose about his writing timeline that I still can’t believe he said yes to it.
Yes, GRRM did Z Nation — as a zombie, signing books
Back in 2015, Syfy’s post-apocalyptic series Z Nation brought Martin in for a Season 2 cameo as, basically, Undead George. The setup: a creep nicknamed The Collector runs a museum of famous zombies, and he’s nabbed Martin. The author sits at a table glumly facing piles of his own novels, robotically signing copy after copy like muscle memory never dies.
The book on display? 'A Promise of Spring' — a knowingly fake entry in the A Song of Ice and Fire saga that twists the real final-book title, 'A Dream of Spring.' The whole thing plays like a wry wink to fans, and honestly, it’s still one of the funniest TV cameos he’s done.
The punchline: a jab at 'The Winds of Winter'
The scene doesn’t stop at the sight gag. The Collector asks Murphy (the guy with mind-control-lite powers) if he can nudge Zombie Martin into, you know, finishing his long-awaited manuscript. Murphy flips through it and clocks that it’s already 800 pages deep. The Collector floats a solution that every deadline-blown writer has heard in a nightmare:
'Just type "The End".'
He adds that he doesn’t care what happens, as long as the thing goes to print — or better yet, wipes out everybody in the next book. Dark, but on brand for a show that turned GRRM into a guest ghoul.
Where the joke hit real life
For context: by the time this episode was filmed in September 2015 (Martin logged it on his Not a Blog), HBO’s Game of Thrones was about to outpace the books, and he was in a very public sprint on 'The Winds of Winter.' He’d even set himself a Halloween deadline, missed it, asked for a year-end extension, and missed that too. Cut to now, and the wait for Winds is closing in on 15 years. The scene landed because it echoed exactly what fans were already feeling.
The ongoing bit about Martin doing everything but finishing
Fans love to point out that Martin keeps busy with pretty much everything else: developing multiple live-action shows, backing non-Westeros projects, supporting dire wolf-related science efforts, getting involved in the fight over AI and authors’ rights, and making the convention rounds. Whether that’s fair or not, the Z Nation cameo basically turned that whole perception into a self-own — and Martin looked like he was having a blast doing it.
Quick hit info
- Show: Z Nation (Season 2 cameo in 2015)
- Creators: Karl Schaefer and Craig Engler
- Rotten Tomatoes: 67%
- Where to watch: Streaming on Peacock
Be honest: should he just lean in and rename the final ASOIAF book 'A Promise of Spring'? Drop your take below.