4. Sam Claflin should play Aegon the Conqueror
Next up, we have Daisy Jones and the Six star Sam Claflin. Credit must be given where it’s due: both Taylor-Johnson and Claflin first came to my attention as ideas for Aegon through a fun Reddit thread musing on dreamcast possibilities. And while I had seen Taylor-Johnson in enough movies to immediately picture what he’d be like as a Targaryen, I was far less familiar with Claflin.
It took me watching one scene from Peaky Blinders, where Claflin plays the ruthless politician Oswald Mosley, to understand why he’d totally kill it as Aegon. Claflin’s character in that show is refined yet dangerous, a man who instantly makes the hardened criminals around him blanch. He has an air of command which would perfect for playing Aegon the Conqueror. He’s also the right age and has the right physique. Aegon is a character who needs to appear powerful without necessarily flexing that power at every opportunity, and that seems to be something Claflin is excellent at.
But perhaps the biggest point in Claflin’s favor is his immense range; in recent years, he’s played ’70s rock musician Billy Dunne in Daisy Jones and the Six and suffering aristocrat William Traynor in Me Before You (opposite Emilia Clarke no less)! All of these roles are extremely different, but he pulls them off so believably that it only takes a few minutes of watching his performance to totally lose yourself in it. There’s no question he’d be a boon to the Aegon’s Conquest series.