Have any of these 15 shows become “the next Game of Thrones”?
By WiC Staff
9. The Expanse
Stepping deeper into sci-fi, we come to The Expanse. For a long time, whenever anyone asked me what show they should be watching after Game of Thrones, this was my go-to answer. Despite the fact that it is a sci-fi story complete with interplanetary warfare and alien civilizations, The Expanse has a lot of things in common with Thrones. There’s political intrigue between various factions of Earth, Mars, and the people of the asteroid belt (Belters). There’s a huge cast of characters, incredible worldbuilding and no shortage of shocking and memorable deaths.
Like Outlander, The Expanse started airing while Game of Thrones was still in its prime. Its first season debuted on the Syfy Channel in 2015, but after three seasons it was cancelled. After a passionate fan campaign, Amazon Studios picked up the series and continued it for three more seasons.
The influences of Game of Thrones and George R.R. Martin run a little deeper on this one. Did The Expanse try to copy Game of Thrones? No. Not at all, actually. But the two authors who wrote the books, Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck, have close personal ties to Martin and have worked with him in various capacities for years.
The Expanse is one of the few book series out there that, tonally and stylistically, feels like a very natural complement to Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire. That means that all The Expanse had to do to scratch that itch was be faithful to the novels, which it has been, even when things were changed. – Daniel
10. Halo
Halo is one of the newer contenders for the crown, but it is very clear that Paramount+ is doing everything in its power to turn the show into a phenomenon. Based on the long-running Halo video game franchise, the show follows Master Chief John-117, a genetically modified human super soldier known as a SPARTAN. The games had a decent story themselves, but really what they’re known for is their multiplayer mode where players can slaughter each other in their quest for glory. And by glory, I mean laughing into a microphone and squatting repeatedly over their opponents’ corpses. I don’t make the rules.
A TV show based on a game like Halo sounds risky on paper, but the show has managed to tell a fairly compelling story so far. Yes, there’s an interstellar conflict, but Halo is honing in on specific characters in ways reminiscent of the quiet hallway scenes from Game of Thrones, where power players debated the grander implications of their actions. It’s shooting for a broader fanbase than Thrones, so while it has plenty of blistering sci-fi violence, don’t expect much nudity or cursing.
The biggest way that Halo is following in Game of Thrones’ footsteps is simply by getting made in the first place. The project was originally announced in 2013 before spending almost a decade in development hell, leading many to believe we’d never see it. Only after Game of Thrones came along and convinced studios that it was possible for an expensive genre show to succeed did Halo finally come to fruition. It’s trying very hard to carve out its own niche, but only time will tell whether it will succeed. – Daniel
11. Foundation
A recent addition to the list of contenders from Apple TV+, Foundation is an adaptation of Isaac Asimov’s classic novel series about a mathematician who accurately predicts the coming fall of a galactic empire, and the galaxy-wide dark age that follows…
Or at least that things start. The Foundation story is told over generations, with new characters taking over as leads as the old ones die off. That’s tricky to do on a TV show, where we want familiar faces to get attached to. We’re only one season into the Foundation TV show, but Apple TV+ has already changed things considerably by combining characters, altering the timeline, and adding in more action than Asimov had in his original books.
You can feel the influence of Game of Thrones in some of these choices — the rulers of the Galactic Empire, who have a much-expanded role on the TV series, do a lot of GoT-esque politicking, for instance. But at least in this first season, this approach seems somewhat at odds with the idea-driven source material. Foundation is an ambitious project, but it may be too divided within itself to really capture the zeitgeist like Game of Thrones did. We’ll see what future seasons bring. – Dan