For six seasons to-date, fantasy series 'Game of Thrones' - adapting George R R Martin's 'A Song of Ice & Fire' novel series - has entertained audiences on HBO, returning for a seventh penultimate season this July as showrunners begin their preparations to wind up and conclude the story.

George R R Martin will be involved with any 'Game of Thrones' spinoffsGeorge R R Martin will be involved with any 'Game of Thrones' spinoffs

Though this series is one that will reach its end by the end of 2018, viewers will still be able to enjoy the lands of Westeros and beyond, as it's been revealed a total of five different spinoffs are being developed behind-the-scenes at HBO. Of course, that's not to say all five will hit the small screen at some point - rather, a pilot script is being developed for five different ideas - but it's highly likely we'll see at least one or two picked up to order before too long.

Though there have been many theories thrown around as to what the spinoffs may be, Martin has now laid two of them to rest.

"We're not doing Dunk & Egg," he wrote on his Live Journal. "Eventually, sure, I'd love that, and so would many of you. But I've only written and published three novellas to date, and there are at least seven or eight or 10 more I want to write.

"We all know how slow I am, and how fast a television show can move. I don't want to repeat what happened with 'Game of Thrones' itself, where the show gets ahead of the books. When the day comes that I've finished telling all my tales of Dunk & Egg, then we'll do a TV show about them".

He later added: "We're not doing Robert's Rebellion either. I know thousands of you want that, I know there's a petition... But by the time I finish writing 'A Song of Ice & Fire', you will know every important thing that happened in Robert's Rebellion. There would be no surprises or revelations left in such a show, just the acting out of conflicts whose resolutions you already know. That's not a story I want to tell just now; it would feel too much like a twice-told tale."

So what exactly will we see, if anything? That's a question that will only be answered in the coming months or even years, as HBO move closer to ordering a sequel to their hugely-successful 'Game of Thrones'.

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'Game of Thrones' returns to HBO in the US on July 16 and Sky Atlantic in the UK on July 17.