HBO is hard at work on House of the Dragon, its follow-up to Game of Thrones. The new show is set 200 years before the story we know, and will detail a brutal civil war known as the Dance of the Dragons, where different factions of the Targaryen family fought each other at the height of their power.
The series is based on George R.R. Martinâs book Fire & Blood, and it sounds like HBO has picked the right showrunner in Ryan Condal. Appearing on an episode of Dune Pod, Condal detailed how far along production is on the first season, what he and Martin talk about, and where his show fits into the Game of Thrones cinematic universe, if we wanna tempt fate and call it that.
House of the Dragon filming is in âthe home-ish stretchâ
First up, Condal revealed that he and his team are entering the final stages of filming. âWeâre in the home-ish stretch for production on House of the DragonâŚwhich is very exciting because itâs been a very long production,â he said. âWe started in the middle of April, so itâs been a very long, very complicated production with multiple unitsâŚWe have two full units shooting basically every day nowâŚThereâs so much crew on this show I donât know how anything else is produced in London.â
And what are the names of the two units? âFireâ and âBlood,â obviously.
As the trailer for House of the Dragon shows, the series is going to look opulent right out of the gate, and thatâs before the actual dragons are added in. There will surely be a long post-production period, but as Condal revealed, he and his team also got extra time to write the scripts:
"We had an extended pre-production during COVID. COVID happened during the writing period, which was actually kind of the best time for it to happen, cause it just meant we had that many more months to get the scripts rightâŚSo we got extra time with the scripts which I think was really helpful. We got through that third and fourth iteration of the scriptsâŚWe got a lot of design time, and all the conceptual stuff we got [more time] with."
You can have all the CGI dragons and battles you want, you can hire the best actors, you can give the show tons of promotion, but ultimately, if the script isnât good, the series isnât good, so Iâm glad to hear they got to spend some much time fine-tuning things.
George R.R. Martin and Ryan Condal keep in close contact
Condal also has a secret weapon on his side: access to A Song of Ice and Fire author George R.R. Martin. Condal and Martin are old friends â thatâs part of why Condal got the job â and Condal knows Martinâs work inside and out.
But it still doesnât hurt to check on things with the man who originated this world. âGeorge has been really involved and also very generous with his time,â Condal said. âItâs basically like if you were making Lord of the Rings but Tolkien was aroundâŚWhen you make a choice, youâre like, âWell, I told George and he said that was cool, so come at me, Reddit.'â
Just to clarify, a lot of their communication is through text or, more rarely, phone calls, so itâs not like Martin is actually flying out to set and supervising things. Heâs at home, presumably working on The Winds of Winter. Or at least thatâs what weâre all hoping.
There are âplansâ for a Game of Thrones Cinematic Universe
House of the Dragon is the first Game of Thrones prequel HBO is making, but it isnât necessarily the last. Weâve heard about a whole host of spinoff shows in various stages of development, but thereâs no guarantee that any will actually make it air after HotD.
Still, you have to wonder if this is HBOâs way of aping Marvel and making its own Game of Thrones cinematic universe. Condal says talk that like is mostly above his pay grade:
"Figuring out what the future of the giant Thrones universe still kind of remains to be seen. Certainly there are plansâŚIâm sure all that stuff is going onâŚOur show is really in a way the early Iron Man movie or the early Thor movie, where theyâre still figuring out what this thing is going to look likeâŚRemember that this is really really really early on. But itâs in fantastic hands."
Personally, Iâd hate to see the Thrones universe become as overexposed as Marvel, which seems to have a new movie or show out every month, although of course I get the compulsion for HBO execs to follow Marvelâs lead in the hopes of making aircraft carriers full of money. Still, historically HBO has been a bit less shameless than Disney, so Iâll hope for the best. As Condal says, âThe best creative experience Iâve ever had in my life is with HBO and WarnerMedia.â
We donât have an exact release date for House of the Dragon, but itâs due out sometime in 2022.
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