HBO Max developing animated Game of Thrones drama

First, Game of Thrones ended. Then, HBO made a pilot for a prequel show called Blood Moon that didn’t end up going to series. Then they announced they were making House of the Dragon, a show all about a Targaryen civil war that tore Westeros apart over 100 years before the original series. Then, just the other week, we learned that the network was considering making a show based on George R.R. Martin’s Tales of Dunk and Egg novellas and another on Robert’s Rebellion, the war that put Robert Baratheon on the Iron Throne.

And now, sources at The Hollywood Reporter that the network is looking into making an animated drama that would be “similar in tone” to the original show. What’s more, sources say that executives at HBO are working directly with A Song of Ice and Fire author George R.R. Martin to fill out the televised world of Game of Thrones, with the intent being to use this new network of shows to draw subscribers to the HBO Max streaming service.

Have the floodgates opened on Game of Thrones spinoff news lately or what? Although we’ll note here that all of these shows save House of the Dragon are in their early phases; there’s no one officially attached, and it’s possible they might not even happen.

Nonetheless, THR’s sources have it that plans to expand the Game of Thrones universe were in place before Disney announced approximately 300 new Star Wars shows at its Investors’ Day conference in December, which makes sense. At the moment, all the biggest content producers are trying to get people to subscribe to their streaming services, and that means stacking them with high-quality content. Game of Thrones was the biggest TV show of the past, so WarnerMedia is leveraging it. As one veteran agent put it:

"In the face of massively expanding verticals, people have to make choices about what services they want based on what they can provide them. [HBO Max] is going to look in their library and they’re going to exploit everything they can."

What would a Game of Thrones animated drama be like?

HBO already has plans to adapt several time periods from Martin’s invented history. Robert’s Rebellion happens just years before the original show, Dunk and Egg 90 years, and House of the Dragon over a hundred. There are plenty more eras to cover. The show could go back to 300 years before the show and show us Aegon Targaryen’s conquest of Westeros, or it could go further back and show us the fall of Valyria, or even further back and show us the war between the First Men and the Children of the Forest, or the battle against the White Walkers that followed. The possibilities are many.

In fact, HBO has already animated some of these adventures for its Game of Thrones DVD extras. Their film about the Dance of the Dragons could provide a direction for a series to go in:

Of course, exploring a period of Game of Thrones history isn’t the only route a show can take. Maybe it could be set during Game of Thrones, showing us the events from the perspective of minor characters, an idea that Martin himself is fond of. Maybe it could go beyond the end of the show and give us a sequel, or something else entirely. What do you think?

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