--- title: Games of Thrones, Breaking Bad IMDb Ratings Rivalry description: G.o.T.'s "Battle of the Bastards" may have broken an Emmy record, but its episode rating is lower than Breaking Bad's "Ozymandias." canonical: https://time.com/4501830/game-of-thrones-breaking-bad-imdb-ratings-rivalry/ author: Megan McCluskey article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-09-20T20:49:42.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:36:46.593Z og:title: The Game of Thrones-Breaking Bad Rivalry You Never Knew Existed og:description: Breaking Bad is still on top og:url: https://time.com/4501830/game-of-thrones-breaking-bad-imdb-ratings-rivalry/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: The Game of Thrones-Breaking Bad Rivalry You Never Knew Existed twitter:description: Breaking Bad is still on top twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # The _Game of Thrones_\-_Breaking Bad_ Rivalry You Never Knew Existed > Sponsored content. 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Every edition is assembled by TIME editors rather than generated automatically. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-brief-2026q3/newsletters?i=78eaa061-bee8-4fb6-9268-26d1d9601daf&cr=time-nl-brief-2026q3-v1)  by [Megan McCluskey](https://time.com/author/megan-mccluskey/)  ## Megan McCluskey Staff Writer Sep 20, 2016 8:49 PM UTC  by [Megan McCluskey](https://time.com/author/megan-mccluskey/)  ## Megan McCluskey Staff Writer Sep 20, 2016 8:49 PM UTC “[Battle of the Bastards](time.com battle of the bastards)” — the penultimate installment of [_Game of Thrones_](http://time.com/4429346/game-of-thrones-season-7-cast-news/)‘ sixth season — won awards for Best Writing and Best Directing at Sunday night’s [Emmys](http://time.com/4499327/game-of-thrones-cast-2016-emmys/), bringing its total to a record-breaking seven. But in the eyes of showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss, it seems the true honor for the episode would have been a perfect IMDb rating. During an interview with IMDb Live following the awards show, Benioff and Weiss revealed that their biggest concern following the “Battle of the Bastards” premiere was whether it would earn the elusive 10/10 score that “Ozymandias,” the eighth episode of _Breaking Bad_‘s fifth season, possesses. “After that episode aired, we were talking to \[director\] Miguel Sapochnik every hour, and all we kept doing ― we didn’t look at the ratings, we didn’t look at any of that stuff ― we were checking the IMDb episode rating,” Benioff said. “Cause our friend Rian Johnson directed the [‘Ozymandias’](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2301451/) episode of _Breaking Bad_, which was the 10.0, and we were like, ‘We gotta get f—king Rian.'” However, while “[Battle of the Bastards](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt4283088/)” originally scored a 10, it has since been demoted to a 9.9\. “Somebody screwed us,” added Weiss jokingly. “I think Rian opened 25,000 IMDb accounts and just voted us down.” Watch the full clip below. \[h/t [_The Huffington Post_](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/the-secret-rivalry-between-game-of-thrones-and-breaking-bad-directors%5Fus%5F57e03eb1e4b08cb140974d70?section=&)\] ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4501830/game-of-thrones-breaking-bad-imdb-ratings-rivalry/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4501830/game-of-thrones-breaking-bad-imdb-ratings-rivalry/"},"headline":"The Game of Thrones-Breaking Bad Rivalry You Never Knew Existed","datePublished":"2016-09-20T20:49:42.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:36:46.593Z","description":"Breaking Bad is still on top","url":"https://time.com/4501830/game-of-thrones-breaking-bad-imdb-ratings-rivalry/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Television","game of thrones","breaking bad","TV"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Megan McCluskey","jobTitle":"Staff Writer","url":"https://time.com/author/megan-mccluskey/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4501830/game-of-thrones-breaking-bad-imdb-ratings-rivalry/","name":"The Game of Thrones-Breaking Bad Rivalry You Never Knew Existed"}}]}] ```