Let’s dreamcast “10,000 Ships,” HBO’s new Game of Thrones prequel series

Barkhad Abdi, Hiroyuki Sanada, and Tadhg Murphy as the Three Corsair Kings

Thus begins the long voyage of Nymeria and her people in search of a new home. While the warrior princess does her best to keep the enormous fleet of ten thousand ships together (that number may be inflated by the passage of time), they are quickly beset by storms and other problems which plague them for basically their entire journey. One of the first and most notable is their confrontation with the three corsair kings of the Basilisk Isles.

Shortly after escaping the Rhoyne, Nymeria’s fleet stops at the Basilisk Isles to gather fresh water and prepare for the journey ahead. But the Basilisk Isles have a strong pirate presence, and the Rhoynar do not go unnoticed.

According to The World of Ice and Fire, the three corsair kings of Ax Isle, Talon, and the Howling Mountain had a long history of warring with one another…but in light of the opportunity for plunder that Nymeria’s people represented, they set aside their differences. They attacked the Rhoynar, enslaving hundreds and burning dozens of ships.

The end result of all this carnage and mayhem is that the corsair kings offer to let Nymeria and her people settle on the Basilisk Isles, so long as they surrendered their ships and offered each king “thirty virgin girls and pretty boys each year in tribute.” Instead, Nymeria loads her people back onto the ships and set back out to sea, leaving the Basilisk Isles behind.

We don’t know a ton about the corsair kings, which leaves room for interpretation when it comes to casting. This could be a great opportunity for the 10,000 Ships team to explore what different kinds of pirates might have looked like on the seas of Essos.

Barkhad Abdi knocked it out of the park as the Somali pirate Abduwali Muse in Captain Phillips, and since he’s gone on to do some genre work since then in movies in Bladerunner 2049, we’re betting he’d have the chops to make the jump to the world of ice and fire. The same goes for Tadhg Murphy, whose stint as the pirate Ned Lowe on Black Sails was one of the most terrifying performances on the entire show. Hiroyuki Sanada needs no introduction. Seen most recently in Mortal Kombat as Scorpion, the man can basically play any role at any level. He would be a great foil to Abdi and Murphy, acting as the “reasonable” pirate.

But really, none of these pirates are reasonable, and Nymeria’s journey is far from at an end.