Game of Thrones was a show so full to bursting with characters that some of the most important only showed up in brief flashbacks. Lyanna Stark was one such character. Decades before the events of the main show kicked off, she and Rhaegar Targaryen were married in secret, a forbidden romance that divided the Seven Kingdoms and plunged them into war. At the end of what became Robert's Rebellion, Rhaegar had died on the battlefield, Lyanna had died in childbirth, and their son was taken by Lyanna's brother Ned Stark to be raised as a bastard named Jon Snow.
Robert's Rebellion would definitely make for an exciting TV or movie series. If such a thing ever comes to pass, actor Aisling Franciosi — who played Lyanna — would be willing to reprise her role. "Absolutely. Yeah, I would if it came up," she told Screenrant. "It was fun to be a part of something [so big], even if I was a tiny part. It was fun to be a part of something so massive; really good fun."
One assumes that, if HBO or whoever did adapt Robert's Rebellion for the screen, Lyanna would have more than "a tiny part." The war doesn't happen without her.
Will HBO ever make a Game of Thrones prequel about Robert's Rebellion?
That said, there's no guarantee we'll ever get a Robert's Rebellion. Writing on his Not a Blog in 2017, back when HBO was just getting the ball rolling on making Game of Thrones spinoffs, author George R.R. Martin came out against it. "We're not doing Robert's Rebellion either," he wrote. "I know thousands of you want that, I know there's a petition... but by the time I finish writing A SONG OF ICE & FIRE, you will know every important thing that happened in Robert's Rebellion. There would be no surprises or revelations left in such a show, just the acting out of conflicts whose resolutions you already know. That's not a story I want to tell just now; it would feel too much like a twice-told tale."
Of course, HBO has final say on what Game of Thrones spinoffs do or do not happen; in that same blog post, Martin said that he didn't want HBO to make a TV show based on his Tales of Dunk and Egg novellas, since he hadn't completed enough of them. And yet we're getting a new show based on those stories called A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms later this year. Also, Martin has publicly criticized the team behind Game of Thrones prequel show House of the Dragon for how they've been adapting his book Fire & Blood, so it's pretty clear that the network doesn't put a ton of stock into what Martin wants or doesn't want.
Right now, HBO has one Game of Thrones prequel series on the air in House of the Dragon. Another, A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, will premiere this year. So far, that's everything they've greenlit, although we've heard they're developing other ideas in the background. Time will tell if any of them ever make it to the screen, and if one of them is a Robert's Rebellion show. I think much depends on how House of the Dragon and A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms perform.
To stay up to date on everything fantasy, science fiction, and WiC, follow our all-encompassing Facebook page and Twitter account, sign up for our exclusive newsletter and check out our YouTube channel.