Past seasons of HBO's hit show have generally debuted sometime in early April; Season 3 hit the earliest, on March 31, while season 1 hit the latest, on April 17. So fans -- with appetites for new material whetted by the many spoilers that have leaked out of the show's set -- have been hoping that Season 6 would follow a similar timeframe. Or even earlier!

　　But it looks like that's not happening. Today, HBO announced that Martin Scorsese's much-hyped rock drama "Vinyl" will start on Feb. 14, while comedies "Girls" and "Togetherness" are returning on Feb. 21. All three shows will run for 10 episodes -- which implies that "Vinyl" won't end until April 17, while the other two won't end until April 24.

　　"Vinyl" will occupy the time slot -- Sunday at 9 p.m. -- that "Game of Thrones" normally does. So unless HBO decided to make the virtually unprecedented step of switching its biggest show to another night, the earliest it could possibly return is April 24, before the season finales of "Girls" and "Togetherness."

　　Last season of "Game of Thrones," though, was paired with "Silicon Valley" and "Veep," not "Girls" and "Togetherness" -- which would imply that "Game of Thrones" won't premiere before May 1.

　　Yet even this seems like a dicey proposition: HBO generally leaves a week between its quirky "seasons." If the network does so in this case, "Game of Thrones" might not start until May 8. Or even later!

　　HBO, for its part, told HuffPost that it has not yet set a premiere date for the show, and would not comment on how the air dates of "Vinyl," "Girls" and "Togetherness" might affect "Game of Thrones," with a representative nothing they "can't confirm any dates at all."

　　This is, needless to say, a major bummer.

　　There is one ray of light here though. Albeit a dim one. Season 6 will be the first season of "Game of Thrones" to cover material that hasn't yet been covered in George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire books. And no one knows when the next book in the series, The Winds of Winter, will be released. But many fans believe -- based on a few scraps of news -- that Martin is racing to finish this book in time to release it before the next season, in order to keep the show from spoiling the book.

　　This may be a stretch, but it's not inconceivable that Martin and his publishers told HBO that they would be releasing The Winds of Winter on, say, April 30 -- and HBO scheduled the show accordingly. That sounds a little convoluted, admittedly, but we are talking about the people behind Littlefinger and Varys. Convoluted secret plots are their lives.

　　《权力的游戏》(Game of Thrones)剧粉翘首以待的第六季凛冬也许会比预期来得更晚，而书迷却迎来好消息，乔治·马丁(George R.R. Martin)新书有望在新季开播之前出版。

　　10月29日星期四，HBO证实新剧《黑胶时代》(Vinyl)将于明年2月14日首播，《都市女孩》(Girls)第五季与《患难与共》(Togetherness)第二季将于2月21日开播，三部剧集都是10集，预计要播到4月中下旬，如此一来，《权力的游戏》新季很可能由惯常的3月底4月初推迟到4月底甚至5月初开播，饱受煎熬的剧粉至少又要多捱一个月。

　　不过《冰与火之歌》(A Song of Ice and Fire)原著党却欢欣鼓舞，从2011年的《魔龙狂舞》(A Dance with Dragons)之后，他们就苦苦等待系列小说的第六部《凛冬的寒风》(The Winds of Winter)的面世。时至今日电视剧《权力的游戏》不能说穷尽前五部小说的故事，至少也用去了大部分素材，所以充满未知的第六季对纯剧迷和纯书迷来说才那么重要。马丁一直都期望第六部书作能抢在第六季开播前出版，不惜推掉多项公开活动潜心赶稿，随着电视剧可能的延迟，他和书迷的愿望很可能实现。