'House of the Dragon' star Emily Carey says she deleted Twitter account after fan backlash

Melbourne: "House of the Dragon" star Emily Carey has revealed that she quit Twitter after receiving a barrage of abusive tweets post her appearance at the 2022 San Diego Comic Con (SDCC).

The British actor, who plays the young Alicent Hightower in HBO's prequel series to "Game of Thrones", said she was trolled for her comments at the show's panel at the annual event where she had discussed how she built a backstory for her character.

"I love social media. I’m 19, so I’m all on social media, and I’ve been on social media since I was a kid because I’ve worked since I was a kid so I’m very conscious of things … Any hate that comes in, it’s just … It’s a person behind a screen. You just have to move on from it,” Carey told Australian website news.com.au.

"But I will say I did delete Twitter (after SDCC) because it’s just so loud. Even when it’s good, there’s so many and it’s so loud. I love the buzz, don’t get me wrong, but sometimes it can be overwhelming, and that’s me being completely transparent," the 19-year-old actor added.

"House of the Dragon", which started streaming on HBO from Sunday, follows the history of House Targaryen set 172 years before the birth of Daenerys Targaryen (Emilia Clarke) and the events narrated in "Game of Thrones", the epic fantasy drama which ended its eight-season run in 2019.

In July, Carey had said at the SDCC that she chose to humanise her character Alicent, which sparked outrage among the die-hard fans of George R R Martin's books on which the two shows are based.

"There were some gaps that we had to fill, so to figure it all out I sort of started journaling, and... managed to come up with some form of backstory, and it proved to be very useful. I’ve never had the freedom to create a whole human being like this before. So it was so much fun being able to go so in-depth with her.

"There are so many layers to her. I think lots of people are already expecting her to be the villain of the show, but I think bringing her in younger, there was a lot more to explore," she had said.

Her comments were reportedly met with a backlash on the microblogging site as the users argued that her character was a villain.

At the time, Carey had reiterated her stance about her character.

"I stand by what I said in the panel. Alicent is not the villain, folks. When we meet her she’s a child, a product of the patriarchy. Just you wait and see. Maybe you’ll sympathise," she had said in a tweet, which she later deleted.