Few movies or television shows have ever attempted to put dragons onscreen with the level of detail of House of the Dragon, HBO's prequel series to Game of Thrones. While the original series did a great job with Daenerys Targaryen's dragons Drogon, Rhaegal, and Viserion, I think we can all agree that House of the Dragon blows it out of the water. We've met more than a dozen of the fire-breathing lizards on the show, each with their own personality and aesthetic.
The second season of House of the Dragon added even more dragons to the mix, like the massive Vermithor and elegant Silverwing. It also gave extra life to some of the dragons we've already met, like Seasmoke, the former mount of Laenor Velaryon who takes on a new rider, Laenor's bastard brother Addam of Hull (Clinton Liberty).
The dragons on House of the Dragon are spectacular, so it should come as no surprise that the process to create them was equally enthralling. The visual effects work for many of the dragons was done by Wētā FX, one of the best studios in the business at creature effects. Wētā recently shared some videos highlighting their work on House of the Dragon season 2 which give a fascinating behind the scenes glimpse at how the dragons were made.
This first video is all about Seasmoke. "In season 2 of House of the Dragon, the riderless dragon Seasmoke becomes a pivotal character," says the video's narrator. "The dragons of Westeros are all highly individual sentient creatures with different proportions, anatomic details, coloration, and personalities."
According to the video, the artists at Wētā modeled the anatomy of the dragons after fruit bats, "looking at skeletal, muscular, and ligament details to achieve a realistic flying creature physique." It's pretty cool to watch a side-by-side of a fruit bat and a dragon flying to see the similarities. And of course, those fruitbats only have two back legs, and two winged front legs. The Targaryen crest of House of the Dragon may not be anatomically correct with their four legs and separate wings, but the dragons themselves align with George R.R. Martin's vision of realistically proportioned flying creatures.
The video also gets into some of the details about how the team designed Seasmoke's face to be more expressive, since he has some important moments as a character in his own right, like when he finds Addam of Hull and decides to make the young Velaryon bastard his new rider.
The other video is a highlight reel showing a broad overview of many of the scenes Wētã had a hand in crafting. That includes Seasmoke toasting wannabe dragonriders in the Dragonmont, Caraxes flying around Harrenhal and snarling at the leader of House Blackwood, Seasmoke and Syrax's meeting on the beach at the beginning of Episode 6, and Vermithor's rampage where he roasted and ate up a bunch of peasants in the climax of that same episode. This one doesn't go into as much detail, but it gives a pretty good idea of the breadth of the studio's work on House of the Dragon season 2.
Wētā's work on the season was pretty expansive, but they weren't the only visual effects studio involved. Pixomondo, the studio behind a lot of the creature visual effects on the original Game of Thrones, also worked on the dragons. They handled the breathtaking battle at Rook's Rest, where Vhagar, Sunfyre, and Meleys clashed in the sky while armies fought below:
While House of the Dragon struggled a little to stick the landing in its second season, one part of the production that remains beyond reproach, in my opinion, is the dragons. We've never seen their like on TV, and I wonder if we ever will again.
At least until House of the Dragon season 3 rolls along, and raises the bar yet again. The third season is currently filming; we're expecting to see it sometime in 2026.
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