'Game of Thrones' prequel 'House Of The Dragon' is 'looking spectacular, ' HBO chief says

The Dance of the Dragons pits Westeros' great houses against each other and resulted in the death of House Targaryen's most powerful dragons. – Photo: Filepic courtesy of HBO

One question follows HBO and HBO Max content chief Casey Bloys gets everywhere he goes: What's up with all those Game of Thrones spinoffs?

Bloys told Variety that he has been surprised by the number of people who believe that there are multiple GOT-related series in active production. For the record, House of the Dragon, a prequel that takes place 300 years before the events depicted in GOT, is the only spinoff that is real so far. GOT author George R.R. Martin is helping to oversee development on at least six other projects, including an animated series.

"House Of The Dragon is the only one shooting," Bloys says. "All the other ones are in various stages of development. People may think we have 10 series shooting at the moment. There's one that will be on the air in 2022. We'll see how the other scripts come along."

Dragon is now filming in England, led by showrunner/executive producer Ryan J. Condal and director/executive producer Migel Sapochnik, a GOT alum. Bloys wasn't giving out any spoilers but he likes what he's seen of the dailies so far. "It looks spectacular," he said. "The cast that (Sapochnik) and Ryan have put together looks good."

Dragon is based on Martin's novel Fire & Blood, a companion to the Song of Ice and Fire novels that were the basis for GOT. The prequel will follow the Dance of the Dragons, the Targaryen civil war between siblings Aegon II and Rhaenyra, who fought for the throne after the death of their father Viserys I. The Dance of the Dragons pits Westeros' great houses – including the Lannisters and Starks – against each other and resulted in the death of House Targaryen's most powerful dragons. Soon after the war, they would go extinct until Daenerys Targaryen would give birth to three dragons three centuries later.

GOT was steered for eight seasons from 2011 to 2019 by showrunners/executive producers David Benioff and D.B. Weiss. The pair were famously protective of the franchise. But they have now handed the keys to the kingdom to the Dragon team after signing a US$200mil production pact with an HBO rival.

Benioff and Weiss "have been entirely hands off" on Dragon, Bloys said. "They're off working at Netflix." – Reuters