House of the Dragon: Season 3

The civil war known as the Dance of the Dragons is in full force, with Rhaenyra Targaryen and Aegon II Targaryen pitted against one another with their armies and dragons. Aegon II is reportedly dead, though his body has not been found, and his brother and heir Aemond has gone to ground with his dragon Vhagar, the sole survivor of the three dragons that conquered the Seven Kingdoms. But Rhaenyra faces new challenges as a massive naval battle erupts and a substantial Hightower army advances from the south-west. With more claimants to the throne waiting and new dragon riders emerging, the war is about to get a lot messier.

House of the Dragons, Game of Thrones's spin-off prequel about how the Targaryens lost their dragons, has been a bit of a mixed bag so far. The first season was excellent, with impressive fidelity to the source material and Paddy Considine's phenomenal performance as King Viserys Targaryen anchoring a well-considered project, possibly the finest season in the franchise since Game of Thrones's mid-point. The second season was, in sharp contrast, an odd, dispirited convulsion of television that didn't seem to know what it wanted to do or how to execute it. The phenomenal Battle of Rook's Rest aside, it was a bizarre slide into mediocrity.

Season 3 comfortably splits the difference. More dynamic character arcs and two massive battle sequences (one at sea) give the season more verve and pace than the second season. Season 3 is also enhanced by the presence of James Norton as Ormund Hightower, a deliciously scheming performance that adds a lot of character to a minor role from the books. Freddie Fox was already a bit of a breath of fresh air as Ser Gwayne Hightower in Season 2, but here he is presented as the only sane man in the room as he has to traipse around half the continent with Criston Cole (a satisfyingly, increasingly unhinged performance by Fabien Frankel) proving that some people just succeed in life by failing upwards. These two actors do a lot to keep the story afloat during its more questionable moments, helped by Benjamin Evan Ainsworth giving a game performance as the young but wise-beyond-his-years Daeron Targaryen. Phia Saban, who has always been great as Helaena Targaryen, is particularly outstanding, elevated from a few lines in the source material to the damaged heart and soul of the green faction.

Elsewhere the cast is replete with fine actors given iffy scripts or not much to do. Olivia Cooke and Emma D'Arcy remain superb actors but here the writers seem at pains not to have them actually hate one another, and instead constantly come up with ways of getting them to hang out. At least that makes more sense this year than the previous season's "let's sneak into the enemy stronghold" mechanic. Matt Smith is also excellent as the rogue prince Daemon, an at-heart honourable man desperately trying to be bad but not quite pulling it off. Early Season 3 has him not doing much but later on he is finally given quality scripts to cut loose with, and as usual nails it. Fortunately, he doesn't spend half the season in a bizarre horror side-story in Harrenhal.

Unfortunately, Ewan Mitchell's Aemond does spend half the season in a bizarre horror side-story in Harrenhal that will cause screams of frustration from viewers. Stop benching your best characters in Harrenhal doing nothing! It also massively detracts from Harrenhal's reputation as a bleak and foreboding place. By the end of Season 3 it feels about as scary as the Addams Family mansion. Deep untold horrors from the pit in the kitchen again? Must be Tuesday.

Other storylines are a mixed bag. The newly-promoted "dragonseeds" have a lot of good plot material, but Sonoya Mizuno's Mysaria has nothing to do except give bad advice but inexplicably still be trusted. Replacing Nettles from the books with Rhaena Targaryen is one of those ideas that isn't completely bad (at least in terms of keeping the cast manageable) but in execution is half-hearted, though it does at least remind us that dragons are very dangerous creatures that can't always be controlled. The northern greybeards led by Roderick Dustin (Tommy Flanagan) are entertaining and fortunately are not overused, but characters like Alysanne Blackwood (Annie Shapero) feel like they've had 80% of their scenes cut as the camera dwells on them and you're trying to remember what they've done that warrants the attention.

Still, at least this time around the season storylines build satisfyingly to their climax at the Battle of Tumbleton, rather than being cut short and left to flap in the wind by a last-minute episode count cut as with Season 2. The shorter, eight-episode count for Season 3 helps provide it focus and cuts short some storylines that I suspect would have been interminable at ten episodes (particularly anything to do with Harrenhal, or more Criston Cole stomping around the woods looking vaguely constipated).

Season 3 of House of the Dragon (***½) improves on the second but doesn't rise to the heights of the first. It is certainly an entertaining season of television with lots of vfx eye candy, great performances and several satisfying storylines, but the show seems to still be rolling around with its safety wheels on, not letting things cut loose with how vicious and vengeance-driven the story in the books could be, and tying itself into pretzel-like knots to explain why it's holding back. Hopefully the show can deliver a stronger run of episodes for its fourth and final run.

Thank you for reading The Wertzone. To help me provide better content, please consider contributing to my Patreon page and other funding methods.

A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms: Season 1

It is the year 209 After the Conquest, eighty years after the Dance of Dragons and eighty-nine before the War of the Five Kings. The realm of the Seven Kingdoms is at peace. To celebrate his daughter's nameday, the Lord of Ashford is holding a great tourney, and knights and lords of renown from across the realm are arriving to show their prowess in personal combat and jousting. Amongst them are several princes of House Targaryen, now dragonless but still holding the Iron Throne...and a newly-anointed hedge knight by the name of Ser Duncan the Tall. Dunk sees to acquit himself well in the lists, but his lack of coin makes his prospects precarious. A chance encounter with a young boy named Egg, who volunteers to squire for him, changes his fortunes, and those of the Seven Kingdoms themselves.

For the third time, HBO has decided to visit the lands of Westeros and create a new hit television series. Set in the same world as Game of Thrones (set later) and House of the Dragon (set earlier), A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms adapts the Dunk & Egg series of novellas by George R.R. Martin, with three currently published. This first season of six episodes adapts the first and best (to date) novella in the sequence, The Hedge Knight (1998), and tries once again to right the ship that is Westeros-on-TV after a shaky previous season.

Once again, HBO has defied the odds and delivered a stand-up season of quality television. Here writer and showrunner Ira Parker, working with George R.R. Martin and Ti Mikkel, amongst others, has had to thread a needle of creating something that's identifiably part of the same world as the other shows whilst also ploughing its own path and unique identity. He is helped here by the source material, which is exceptional. The Hedge Knight may be George's strongest piece of writing in the world of Westeros and Essos, and maybe even his finest piece of writing as a whole. It's a story operating on multiple levels as Dunk has to consider the price of honour in a land where violence is still used to solve problems, and fairness and justice are relative concepts. The novella moves its pieces around with precision which click into place at the end in an artistically satisfying way.

At first, the TV take on the same story feels like it's a little stretched. Extensive new flashback sequences explore Dunk's background in Flea Bottom, a rough slum in King's Landing (the previous, or rather future, home of characters like Gendry and Davos), and his period as squire to Ser Arlan of Pennytree. Multiple new subplots have been inserted into the story of the tourney itself, with Dunk refusing an offer for an opponent to throw a match to satisfy the betting crowd and seeking wise advice from the local working girls. More minor characters in the novella like Ser Raymun Fossoway and Lord Lyonel Baratheon, the Laughing Storm, are here fleshed out in greater detail, with distinct character arcs of their own. The show also leans into the lighter and less-ominous tone with more humour, including a lot of toilet humour (quite literally, in some cases)

This expansion of the novella is good, in that minor characters are given more depth and more motivation for helping Dunk, but it does slow down the action. One of the novella's strengths is how it moves with a purpose, says its peace and is done. The TV show slows things down perhaps a tad too much in its opening episodes, with the impact of making the episodes feel both too short (only one exceeds 40 minutes, and several barely crack 30) but also risking feeling like there is too much filler.

This problem quickly evaporates in the third episode, however, as the main plot from the novella kicks into gear and suddenly the season catches fire and does not let up. The infamous tourney battle which is the centrepiece of the novella is rendered here as one of the finest medieval combat sequences ever staged on the screen, with a refreshing use of helmets (often inexplicably absent from Game of Thrones) and intelligent use of weapons. The plotting is impressive, dialogue often poetic and the acting throughout is outstanding, particularly by Peter Claffey as Ser Duncan the Tall and Dexter Sol Ansell as Egg, both outrageously good finds. Bertie Carvel (Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norell) is also outstanding as Prince Baelor "Breakspear" Targaryen, Daniel Ings is a very different Lyonel Baratheon from the book but a compelling performer, and Youssef Kerkour excels in a small role as the blacksmith Steely Pate.

The production values, as you would expect, are excellent. That this is a cheaper show than House of the Dragon and the last couple of seasons of Thrones is to be expected. There are no dragons in the story and the whole show takes place in one castle and the field next door, as well as some miscellaneous Northern Ireland scenery. But it's clearly not cheap. There are vast crowds of spectators, the extras budget alone must have been exceptional, and there's a lot of action sequences involving trained fighters and horses. HBO are their most relatively frugal for this franchise, is still capable of delivering stunning imagery. Dan Romer also delivers a superbly atmospheric soundtrack.

But what makes the show work the best is the relationship between Dunk and Egg. Claffey and Ansell sell the characters' relationship extremely well, with Dunk's pragmatism and idealism (or naivete) counterpointed by his inexperience, whilst Egg's book smarts lacking real-world application is charmingly handled. When the season ends, you immediately want to see more of these characters and their adventures. And there's good news on that, with Season 2, based on The Sworn Sword, already in production for a 2027 release.

The first season of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms (****½) has a slow start but quickly picks up, delivering a relentless battery of well-judged character moments, action, worldbuilding and pathos. It's refreshing to take a visit to a time in Westeros's history when decency and compassion are still respected, and the two leads should be well established for great careers by their performances here. The show is currently streaming around the world and will be released on DVD, Blu-Ray and 4K in the summer.

Thank you for reading The Wertzone. To help me provide better content, please consider contributing to my Patreon page and other funding methods.

Royal Shakespeare Company confirms launch of GAME OF THRONES: THE MAD KING for Summer 2026

The Royal Shakespeare Company has confirmed it will debut its production Game of Thrones: The Mad King, based on George R.R. Martin's Song of Ice and Fire novels and HBO's Game of Thrones TV series, in June 2026. Tickets will go on sale on 14 April this year.

The Mad King is an immediate prequel to both the novels and TV show. Set fifteen years before the events of the books, the play is set during the great tourney at Harrenhal, where a young Robert Baratheon, his best friend Eddard Stark and Eddard's older brother Brandon and younger sister Lyanna rub shoulders with the likes of Jaime Lannister, Ser Arthur Dayne, Prince Rhaegar Targaryen...and King Aerys II Targaryen, the Mad King, whose increasingly erratic rule threatens the peace of the realm.

The full press release follows:

The Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) today announces the world premiere of Game of Thrones: The Mad King, a new play based on the novels by George R. R. Martin, adapted by Duncan Macmillan and directed by Dominic Cooke.

Game of Thrones: The Mad King will have its world premiere at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon in Summer 2026. Priority booking will go on sale from 14 April 2026 with public booking to be announced in April 2026. For early access, visit rsc.org.uk/join to become an RSC member. More information will be announced later in the year. Full details of the upcoming RSC season will be announced on Thursday 26 February 2026.

Enter the world before.

A long winter thaws in Harrenhal, and spring is promised. At a lavish banquet on the eve of a jousting tournament, lovers meet and revellers speculate about who will contend. But in the shadows, amid growing unease at the blood-thirsty actions of the realm’s merciless Mad King, dissenters from his inner circle anxiously advance a treasonous plot. Far away, the drums of battle sound.

Family bonds, ancient prophecies, and the sacred line of succession will be tested in a dangerous campaign for power. Who will survive? Who will rise?

Wars aren’t won by those with most cause, but whose story’s best told.

Game of Thrones: The Mad King is a sweeping new stage epic from the world of George R. R. Martin, written by Duncan Macmillan and directed by Dominic Cooke. Spanning the final years before the events of the novels, this powerful drama reveals a legendary chapter of Westerosi history.

Come face to face with familiar characters from the houses Targaryen, Stark, Lannister, Baratheon and Martell and witness the events that set the stage for the world’s most critically acclaimed series.

Executive Producer and creator George R. R. Martin said: “When I first wrote Game of Thrones, I never imagined that it would be anything other than a book. It was a place for my imagination to exist without limits. To my great surprise, it was adapted for a series and viewers have been able to enter the world of my imagination through the medium of television. For my work to now be adapted for the stage is something I did not expect but welcome with great enthusiasm and excitement. Theatre offers something unique. A place for mine and the audience’s imagination to meet and hopefully create something magical.

“For me, the RSC was the obvious choice when thinking about putting a Game of Thrones story on the stage. Shakespeare is the greatest name in English literature, and his plays have been a constant source of inspiration to me and my writing. Not only that, he faced similar challenges in how to put a battle on stage, so we are in good company. It will be thrilling to watch the events of this new play unfold in a live environment. Duncan’s masterful script honours the world completely, and I am so excited for both fans of the series, and perhaps people who have never picked up one of my books, to experience this new story in a theatre.”

Adaptor Duncan Macmillan and director Dominic Cooke said: “The play is a prequel, taking place over a decade before the events of Game of Thrones. A long winter has started to thaw and, for the first time in years, all the great houses come together for a tournament - destined to be the greatest of the age. It feels like a new dawn, full of hope and opportunity. But tournaments always have a darker purpose.

“George’s storytelling is Shakespearean in its scale and its themes - dynastic struggle, ambition, rebellion, madness, prophecy, ill-fated love. From the beginning, Shakespeare’s histories and tragedies have been our primary reference for the ambition of this production, so the RSC feels like a natural home.

“It will be thrilling for us to share this new play with audiences, both those that know and love George’s books and HBO’s series, but also audiences who know nothing and want to come and experience something both beautifully intimate and truly epic.”

RSC Co-Artistic directors Daniel Evans and Tamara Harvey said: “When we first read Duncan’s script, it was immediately apparent how this epic cycle of warring families sits in a continuum with Shakespeare’s history cycles. So it feels like an exciting and apposite marriage between the RSC and Game of Thrones universe.

“Stories of power, ambition and the complexities of succession are evergreen - and this adaptation explores the true nature of authority through the lens of young people grappling with inherited identities. The story will have all the epic qualities audiences would expect from Game of Thrones, but ultimately, it has a very human heart.”

BALDUR'S GATE TV series in development at HBO from LAST OF US team

HBO is developing a TV series based on the Baldur's Gate video game series, set in the Forgotten Realms fantasy world and Dungeons & Dragons multiverse. The TV show will be set shortly after the events of the video game Baldur's Gate III and will see some returning characters from the game alongside new faces.

If Lump the Enlightened is not in the TV show, we riot.

Craig Mazin, the showrunner of The Last of Us and Chernobyl, is lining this up to be his next project once work on the third and now-confirmed-to-be-final season of that show is completed. Mazin will be the main writer, showrunner and producer, with Chris Perkins from Wizards of the Coast serving as consultant. At this stage, none of the team from Larian Studios, who produced Baldur's Gate III, are involved, and it appears that Forgotten Realms creator Ed Greenwood has also not been consulted on the project so far. However, some of the voice cast from the video game may return, either voicing or playing their characters where that makes sense, or in new roles if not.

Mazin, a noted gamer, has completed Baldur's Gate III more than once, having put over 1,000 hours into the game and completing it on the challenging "honour mode." He is also an avid tabletop gamer, having run ongoing D&D campaigns for over fifteen years straight.

Baldur's Gate is apparently designed to share continuity with The Forgotten Realms, the Shawn Levy-produced show in development over at HBO's now (or soon-to-be) sister streamer, Netflix.

With the final season of Last of Us not likely to land before mid-2027, the Baldur's Gate show may be lucky to hit screens before the end of the decade.

Sales of A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE surpass 100 million

It's been a long time coming, but sales of George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire sequence, perhaps better known by the name of its TV adaptation, HBO's Game of Thrones, have finally and officially passed the 100 million mark.

The Juniper Books rejacketing of the Song of Ice and Fire series.

The news was buried in The Hollywood Reporter's recent article on Martin, although the main focus was elsewhere (yes, The Winds of Winter still isn't out yet, and yes, the fall-out from Martin's public dissatisfaction with House of the Dragon continues to reverberate).

The series started off a little sluggishly, with A Game of Thrones only doing okay on its first publication in August 1996 (the series turns thirty this year) and it taking until the paperback was released before sales picked up, something Martin attributed to the cover quote from fellow fantasy author Robert Jordan, of Wheel of Time fame. Sales and critical acclaim grew with the release of A Clash of Kings in 1998 and A Storm of Swords in 2000. By the time of the release of A Feast for Crows in 2005, sales of the series had approached or exceeded five million. At least twelve million copies had been sold by the time A Dance with Dragons was published and the Game of Thrones TV series launched, both in 2011.

The immense success of Game of Thrones propelled sales of the novels to insane heights. The books reportedly sold a further nine million copies in the first year of the TV show alone (from 2011 to 2012). Sales hit 70 million in 2016 and are believed to have reached 90 million around the time of the pandemic, coinciding with the - contentious in some parts - conclusion of the TV series. With the franchise off the air and no new novel in the mainline series appearing, sales appear to have slowed, although spin-off books The World of Ice and Fire (2014), A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms (2015, collecting three earlier-published novellas) and Fire & Blood (2018) all sold extremely well.

Sales of the series appeared to uptick again after House of the Dragon launched to initial success in 2022, and no doubt there has been another sales boost from the successful launch of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms a few weeks ago.

Crossing the 100 million mark puts Martin in rarefied company. In the secondary world/epic fantasy field, he is just behind Sir Terry Pratchett and Robert Jordan, who have both also crossed the 100 million mark in the last few years, though of course J.R.R. Tolkien continues to rule the roost with at least 300 million sales of his various Middle-earth books (and this figure is highly conservative). Stephen King has over 400 million sales, but only around a tenth of those comes from his epic fantasy or at least epic fantasy-adjacent work, the Dark Tower series and Eyes of the Dragon, meaning that Martin may comfortably be the biggest-selling living epic fantasy author (unless you count Harry Potter as epic fantasy, which most don't seem to).

How long he holds onto that crown will be interesting to see. Brandon Sanderson recently passed 50 million books sold, but Sarah J. Maas recently hit 75 million copies sold and is selling books at a staggering rate.

It should also be noted that book sales are famously sluggish in their reporting, with the reporting sometimes trailing the real figures by many years. Martin's actual sales could be a fair bit higher than this number.

If the books continue to generate hit TV shows, we'll likely see a steady increase in sales. Obviously one thing would blast sales through the stratosphere again, but when those winds will blow remains to be seen.

A Preview of A KNIGHT OF THE SEVEN KINGDOMS

On Friday night, I attended the London premiere of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, the latest foray into the Known World of Westeros and Essos. The six-part show starts airing tonight in the United States and tomorrow in much of the rest of the world.

This six-part series adapts George R.R. Martin's 1998 novella The Hedge Knight. Like the novella it sees the newly-dubbed hedge knight Ser Duncan the Tall seek to make his name and fortune at the great tourney at Ashford Meadow, eighty-nine years before the events of Game of Thrones. Dunk runs into problems proving his identity and legitimacy to take part in the tourney, but taking on an unusually resourceful squire, Egg, soon sees him succeed in his mission. Unfortunately, Dunk earns the ire of a powerful foe and has to fight for his honour and even his life in a brutal melee.

Martin would follow up the novella with The Sworn Sword (2002) and The Mystery Knight (2010) (all three collected in 2015's A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms), eventually mooting anything from nine to twelve stories in total that would follow the life stories of Dunk and Egg across the next fifty-one years, through tumultuous years in the Seven Kingdoms as the authority of the now-dragon-less Targaryens is increasingly tested.

At the premiere we saw the first two episodes of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, and it was interesting to note that the first season of the show is no less than the eleventh season of television set in Westeros. However, the show still manages to feel fresh. The tone is a little lighter than the two preceding series and there is no immediately foreboding feeling of full-scale civil war about to erupt. The entire season takes place in a field and the neighbouring castle (though some flashbacks do take us to King's Landing), and if the show is cheaper than House of the Dragon and the later seasons of Thrones, it's very clearly still not cheap. There are some superbly-staged jousts and melee scenes, crowd scenes with hundreds of people in shot at once, and a lot of spectacular location footage. Some may bemoan a lack of hardcore dragon action, but there's still a lot of visual spectacle.

The casting is exceptional, with Peter Claffey as Ser Duncan the Tall and Dexter Sol Ansell as Egg both being incredible finds. Claffey embodies Dunk's mixture of resolve and naivete to perfection, and Ansell is as impressive a find as Maisie Williams was for Arya fifteen years ago. Bertie Carvel is outstanding as Prince Baelor "Breakspear" Targaryen, Daniel Ings is a very different Lyonel Baratheon from the book but a compelling performer, and Youssef Kerkour excels in a small role as the blacksmith Steely Pate.

One criticism I do have is that the pacing of the show can be best described as "relaxed." After two full episodes we still hadn't reached the event that kicks the plot of the novella properly in motion (Prince Aerion's disagreement with a performer over a story about his family). Some of the new scenes introduced to expand the story are excellent, such as more action for Lyonel Baratheon, but others feel a bit overdone. A new subplot about Dunk seeking advice from some camp followers who feel sorry for him feels weird, at best. Taking a 100-ish page novella and turning it into six episodes of TV (even six episodes that are somewhat shorter than the Game of Thrones or House of the Dragon norm) has required a lot of invention and for some people maybe too much invention; how the remaining four episodes handle this remain to be seen.

The more-humorous tone is also an interesting choice. There are a couple of moments that veer from dark comedy or character humour into outright slapstick, and one scene that makes use of the stirringly epic score of Game of Thrones to comic effect only to undercut it in the basest way possible, is both funny but borders on the too much side of things. Again, seeing how the rest of the season handles this will be interesting.

Ultimately, I think that the first two episodes of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms are a promising start. The production values, acting, sets and action setpieces are outstanding, and after House of the Dragon's increasingly wild swings from the source material, it's a refreshing relief to find a lot of scenes here translated 1:1 from the book to the screen, complete with Martin's laser-sharp characterisation and dialogue. Some of the new scenes to fill out the runtime are well-judged and handled, a few less so, but not disastrously. The more humorous tone starts off promisingly but by the end of the second episode, I was ready for them to reign it in a bit.

Trailer for A KNIGHT OF THE SEVEN KINGDOMS released

HBO has released the first full-length trailer for A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, its TV adaptation of George R.R. Martin's Dunk & Egg series of novellas, set in the same world as Game of Thrones.

Set 89 years before the events of Game of Thrones, A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms tells the story of Ser Duncan the Tall, a penniless "hedge knight" who has to make his way in the world without riches. His fortunes change when he meets Egg, a young boy willing to serve as his squire for the great tourney at Ashford Meadow, where hedge knights mingle with the great and good of the land.

There are three novellas in the series, comprising The Hedge Knight (1998), The Sworn Sword (2002) and The Mystery Knight (2010), all assembled in the collection A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms (2015). Martin has a partially-completed fourth novella in the series, The She-Wolves (working title only) and a planned fifth, The Village Hero, although their current status is unknown. He has mooted writing further novellas in the series, taking the story of Dunk and Egg up through their whole lives.

At the moment HBO are planning to only adapt the existing stories and releasing them between seasons of their other Westeros-set show, House of the Dragon, which is due to air its third season later in 2026.

Season 1 of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms begins airing on 18 January 2026.

House of the Dragon: Season 2

King Viserys Targaryen has died. He left instructions for his oldest child, Princess Rhaenyra, to inherit the Iron Throne. But Ser Criston Cole, the Kingmaker, has instead crowned his son as Aegon II. The realm is divided with almost half declaring for the Queen on Dragonstone and almost half for Aegon. Banners have been summoned and armies are forming. But this war will be bloody, for both sides are armed with dragons. Some are trying to halt the bloodshed with a negotiation, but others are seeking to profit from the chaos as much as possible. The Dance of the Dragons has begun.

Game of Thrones was the biggest TV show of the 2010s and also, easily, the biggest live-action fantasy television series of all time. The show stumbled hard at the end, though, and left behind a bitter taste for viewers. When HBO announced a prequel spin-off, they knew they would have to work hard to win back the fans disappointed by how Game of Thrones ended.

Against the odds, they succeeded. The first season of House of the Dragon was well-characterised with some great dialogue, brief but impressive action sequences, and some outstanding performances, particularly Paddy Considine's epic turn as King Viserys and Matt Smith as his brother, Prince Daeron, as well as Milly Alcock and Emma D'Arcy as Rhaenyra and Emily Carey and Olivia Cooke as her rival, Alicent. This was all great stuff, and established House of the Dragon as the clear fantasy successor to Game of Thrones, succeeding where Wheel of Time, Rings of Power and The Witcher had, to one extent or another, failed.

The reason for the success appears reasonable: whilst Game of Thrones struggled when it outpaced the books and did not have access to George R.R. Martin's source material any more, House of the Dragon had its entire storyline mapped out in Martin's 2018 tome Fire & Blood, with character motivations and arcs clearly established, and major action setpieces established. With a great cast, some strong writers who'd already established themselves in the first season, and some superb vfx designers (the dragons remain unmatched on the small screen), there was no reason to expect Season 2 to be anything other than a smash hit success.

Which is why it's a bit of a mystery why the second season is such a bizarre mess. Season 2 certainly has some great character moments to match anything in Season 1, some superb action scenes, some phenomenal vfx etc, but the pacing of the season has been hugely thrown off. Much of the season feels sluggish, with too many scenes of characters sitting around talking about the plot (again) rather than getting on with business. There's also a bizarre reluctance to embrace the fact that the war has started and cannot be stopped: Season 1 ended in such a way that should have left nobody in doubt that a full-scale conflict could not be avoided. Season 2, however, spends almost its entire length re-litigating about whether the war is inevitable and maybe there's a way to avoid it etc, which beggars all belief. The writers also seem to have realised that, following the book, they'd never have a scene with Emma D'Arcy and Olivia Cooke verbally sparring ever again, so they introduce a surreal device where the two find ways to sneak into one another's strongholds for occasional hearts-to-hearts. It's genuinely bizarre and does not wreck a sense of disbelief as drive a four-ton truck right through the middle of it.

The writers also decided it was a great idea to have Matt Smith spend most of the season wandering around the "haunted" castle of Harrenhal having weird visions and strange exchanges with the locals. One episode of this might have been interesting, even fun, but when this extends into a third episode you might be wondering this was a good use of resources, such as one of your best and most expensive actors. There's also a bemusing obsession with trying to tie the events of House of the Dragon into those of Game of Thrones, through visions, dreams, prophecies, etc that just makes the show feel less confident in standing on its own two feet.

The season finally perks up with the fourth episode, where all hell breaks loose. The Battle of Rook's Rest is excellent, with a well-choreographed ground battle and a furious aerial engagement. Any fears that HBO's vfx department would not be able to deliver on the promise of dragon-on-dragon ultraviolence are laid to rest here. The battle and its plot ramifications are a major highlight of the season.

Any hope of the season turning the corner and becoming more compelling is quickly dispelled: Daemon continues to mess around at Harrenhal interminably, Rhaenyra and Alicent continue to come up with reasons not to, y'know, get on with the actual the war the story is about, and there's a whole lot of not very much going on . The season is not helped by the late HBO decision to reduce the episode count from ten to eight, with the writers' strike just starting. This meant that the production team couldn't do anything to compact the events into fewer episodes (usually ill-advised, but in this case it would have helped the season tremendously with pacing) and just had to cut off the final two scripts from the run and shunt them into Season 3 instead. This robs Season 2 of any kind of climax, it just stumbles to a halt.

There are other strengths to Season 2. Though he debuted at the end of Season 1 and showed some good promise, The Last Kingdom's Ewan Mitchell really nails the role of Prince Aemond and becomes a great addition to the show. Jefferson Hall's Tyland Lannister is also most entertaining and has more to do this season as a politician and diplomat. The acting throughout remains strong, even if the actors sometimes struggle to sell the more nonsensical plot twists.

Season 2 of House of the Dragon (***) is a deeply odd, dispirited convulsion of television. It retains many of the strengths of the first season, including great acting, vfx and casting, but the pacing and writing are all over the place. There's a lack of firm commitment to the fact this is a war, and despite the source material being complete and eminently filmable, there's a strange tendency to drift away from it at times in favour of contrived, less interesting "TV drama" moments. Game of Thrones and House are both at their very best when they resist being "ordinary TV" and it's odd this season makes such strides to try to become that. The battle sequence in the fourth episode is a huge highlight, though, and hopefully now all this additional scene-setting has been done, Season 3 can just cut loose with business and get the story going at last.

The season is available to watch on HBO and Max (and local equivalents) in much of the world, and Sky Atlantic and Now TV in the UK, alongside physical media releases. A third season of House of the Dragon is currently in production for release in late 2026.

Thank you for reading The Wertzone. To help me provide better content, pleae consider contributing to my Patreon page and other funding methods.

15 years ago (somehow) I visited Belfast whilst they were filming the GAME OF THRONES pilot

The Internet informs me that (mostly) celebrated medieval fantasy TV show Game of Thrones entered production just over fifteen years ago, despite it clearly actually being twelve minutes ago. Although I was unable to wrangle a set visit, I did get to meet many of the cast and crew at special events hosted by George R.R. Martin for fans in Belfast that week.

On 3 November 2009, he arranged a book signing in Easons Bookstore in Belfast, Northern Ireland, near the main set at the Paint Hall Studios (aka Titanic Studios). Ostensibly this was for his newly-released fantasy anthology Songs of the Dying Earth, a tribute collection to the classic fantasy author Jack Vance (fellow author Matt Hughes was on hand as well), although obviously most fans turned up with copies of the (then) four Song of Ice and Fire volumes in hand.

George R.R. Martin and Matt Hughes, authors in SONGS OF THE DYING EARTH.

Sophie Turner & Alfie Allen

Kit Harington

Ron Donachie & Richard Madden

Maisie Williams & Sophie Turner

Ron Donachie, Alfie Allen, Kit Harington, Sophie Turner, Maisie Williams, Richard Madden & George R.R. Martin

Multiple Game of Thrones actors stopped by and were happy (if slightly bemused) to sign books: Sophie Turner (Sansa Stark), Maisie Williams (Arya Stark), Richard Madden (Robb Stark), Alfie Allen (Theon Greyjoy), a very tired Kit Harington (Jon Snow) and Ron Donachie (Ser Roderik Cassel). Rory McCann (Sandor Clegane, the Hound) stopped by briefly as well, but alas too quickly for me to snap a picture.

That evening we repaired to McHughes, a bar in the city which had been booked out (for "G.F.F. Martin," apparently). We were joined by Esme Bianco ("Red-Headed Whore," soon to be renamed at George's insistence, "Ros") and several members of the crew, including extras, stunt coordinators and some of the vfx team. One fan even proposed to his girlfriend (she said yes) and George R.R. Martin was proud to announce that Richard Madden had been officially crowned "Best-Dressed Man in Scotland", in absentia because he was obviously filming in Winterfell.

Sophie Turner, Esme Bianco & Maisie Williams

Esme Bianco, Richard Madden & George R.R. Martin

Ron Donachie & George R.R. Martin

George was unusually forthcoming and let us in on some juicy plot info from the upcoming Dance with Dragons, but further revelations were curtailed when Ron Donachie joined us and immediately engaged George in discussion about American football. This was one of GRRM's blog posts come to life.

The main points of discussion were some nervousness, as the pilot was expensive and HBO had not done fantasy before. Everyone agreed the books were great and if they were adapted well, the show could find some success. But I think if you'd told anywhere there that it was going to become The Biggest Show on Television, arguably worldwide, for the next decade, and spawn multiple spin-off projects, I think you'd have been laughed out of the room.

But, of course, that's how it went down, and for the next few years fan gatherings would be held in Belfast to celebrate the show (initially ad hoc but then turning into the more formal TitanCon convention, which ran annually until 2019). The first spin-off show, House of the Dragon, moved production to the Warner Brothers studios at Leavesden, just outside London, but A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms has returned to the original production base in Belfast to resume filming there.

It was a great night and a great set of memories to have.

A KNIGHT OF THE SEVEN KINGDOMS castmembers announced

HBO has unveiled the cast for A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, its forthcoming adaptation of George R.R. Martin's "Dunk & Egg" series of short stories, which act as a prequel to A Song of Ice and Fire and its TV adaptation, Game of Thrones. The show just started shooting in Belfast, Northern Ireland.

Peter Claffey as Ser Duncan the Tall in the first officially-released image from A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms.

The show had already announced Irish actor Peter Claffey as Ser Duncan the Tall and Dexter Soll Ansell as his squire, Egg. Ser Duncan the Tall, popularly called Dunk, is a young hedge knight, a warrior of humble birth with no family name or backing, who has to make his name through his skill at arms alone. Egg is a young boy he meets on the road with a canny intelligence, whom he reluctantly takes on as a squire.

Joining the cast is Finn Bennett (True Detective: Night Country) as Prince Aerion Targaryen. The second son of Prince Maekar Targaryen, himself the fourth son of King Daeron II, the king at the time of the series, Prince Aerion is known his flights of fancy and bullying nature.

Bertie Carvel (The Crown, Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, where he played Jonathan Strange) is playing Prince Baelor Targaryen. Known as Baelor Breakspear, the prince is the oldest son of King Daeron II and his heir, also serving as Hand of the King. He is known for his honour, valour in battle and political savvy. He is honouring the great tourney at Ashford Meadow with his presence.

Tanzyn Crawford (Tiny Beautiful Things) is playing Tanselle. Taneselle is a puppet-maker and player, providing entertainment for the commons.

Daniel Ings (Sex Education) is playing Ser Lyonel Baratheon, popularly called "the Laughing Storm." Lyonel is the heir to Storm's End and is also known for his honour and valour, but he is an outgoing man with a sense of humour. He is a formidable tourney knight.

Sam Spruell (Fargo) is playing Prince Maekar Targaryen. The younger brother of Prince Baelor, Maekar is known for his prickly pride and sternness, but he also has a sense of honour and fairness, if reminded of it. He is driven to distraction by his sons, who seem to delight in frustrating him.

The first season will adapt The Hedge Knight, the first of the three (so far) Dunk & Egg stories, across six episodes. Sarah Adina Smith will direct three episodes, Owen Harris the other three. Ira Parker is serving as showrunner and main writer.

The show is expected to debut on HBO in 2025.

Westeros Timeline

• 1 AC: Conquest of the Seven Kingdoms by Aegon the Conqueror.
• 101 - 131 AC: The events of House of the Dragon take place, ending in the civil war known as the Dance of the Dragons (129 - 131 AC).
• 209 AC: Tourney at Ashford Meadow, the events of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms begin.
• 281 AC*: Robert's Rebellion, deposing of the Mad King.
• 298 AC: The events of Game of Thrones begin.

* In the TV show timeline, in the book timeline the Rebellion takes place in 283 AC.

HBO casts Dunk & Egg for A KNIGHT OF THE SEVEN KINGDOMS: THE HEDGE KNIGHT

HBO has announced that it has found the leads for its upcoming Game of Thrones spin-off series, A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms: The Hedge Knight. The show takes place about seventy years after the events of House of the Dragon and ninety years before Game of Thrones itself, and offers a more ground-level look at the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros during a time of (relative) peace.

Irish actor Peter Claffey will play the role of Ser Duncan the Tall, popularly known as Dunk. Claffey is a relative newcomer, picking up guest spots on Harry Wild and Bad Sisters before winning a lead role as Cormac Kelly on Wreck. He also had roles on Emmerdale and the film The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes. Before that he played professional rugby for Connacht. 

Ser Duncan the Tall is a hedge knight, an honourable and dedicated warrior but who comes from poor beginnings and does not have the wealth, status and privilege that the sons of lords have. Taking up the mantle of a knight after the death of his master, Ser Duncan sets out to win renown at the great tourney of Ashford Meadow, only to inadvertently start mixing with some of the greatest figures in the realm.

At eight years old, Dexter Soll Ansell is even more of a newcomer, having also appeared in The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes alongside The Midwich Cuckoos and Christmas on Mistletoe Farm.

Ansell will play Egg, a young runaway boy that Dunk meets on the road who wants to become a squire. Egg joins Dunk in his misadventures, despite Dunk's misgivings.

George R.R. Martin has written three novellas about Dunk & Egg, namely The Hedge Knight (1998), The Sworn Sword (2002) and The Mystery Knight (2010). He has also partially written a fourth story, The She-Wolves (not the final title), and planned out a fifth, The Village Hero. The three completed stories are available in an omnibus version, A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms.

Unlike the grand epic events of the novel series A Song of Ice and Fire (adapted to television as Game of Thrones), the Dunk & Egg stories are set in a period of (relative) peace in the Seven Kingdoms, with King Daeron II Targaryen, "The Good," repairing the damages caused by the brief civil war known as the Blackfyre Rebellion and the entry of Dorne into the realm through marriage. Dunk & Egg's adventures bring them to the notice of the powerful, who are not above using a mere hedge knight and his squire for their own ends, even in the back roads of the Seven Kingdoms. 

Ira Parker is the head writer and showrunner for the project, which was greenlit last year. George R.R. Martin will act as a producer and consultant, as will House of the Dragon head honcho Ryan Condal. The show is expected to film this summer for a 2025 debut on HBO.

Several additional Game of Thrones-related projects are in development as animated series or further live-action shows, although HBO seems to have taken its foot off the throttle regarding the number of projects in development. House of the Dragon Season 2 is currently due to debut on 16 June this year.

HOUSE OF THE DRAGON Season 2 trailer released

HBO have released the first teaser trailer for the second season of House of the Dragon, it's Game of Thrones spin-off/prequel show.

The second season of the show depicts the beginning of the Dance of the Dragons, the bloody civil war between two branches of House Targaryen after the death of the well-meaning King Viserys II.

The second season of House of the Dragon debuts in the summer of 2024.

The Last of Us: Season 1

A fungal mass infection has overrun much of the world, killing billions and turning others into mindless, ravaging creatures. Smuggler Joel is tasked by a group known as the Fireflies with escorting 14-year-old Ellie across America to safety. The Fireflies believe that Ellie's genes hold the key to a cure for the infection.

The Last of Us was a 2013 video game from Naughty Dog, the creators of the Uncharted franchise. The game was a massive smash hit success, attracting praise for its emotional storytelling, dialogue, combat, characterisation and atmosphere. Its 2020 sequel was somewhat more divisive but still mostly well-received.

Inevitably, moves began to adapt the story as either a film or TV show. After several failed attempts, the project found a home at HBO with Chernobyl writer-producer Craig Mazin at the helm, joined by the game's original creator and writer Neil Druckmann.

The project still faced an uphill battle to succeed. TV has been awash with post-apocalyptic survival stories for well over a decade, with The Walking Dead (2010-22) being the most successful example, spawning multiple spin-offs. Other shows have had less success, with Y: The Last Man (2021) failing to gain much ground and only lasting one season. More notably, video game adaptations still had a long track record of failure in other mediums, Netflix's Arcane being the biggest exception (although that show benefitted from really only using characters and background lore, and crafting a new story).

The Last of Us once again argues that HBO has the Midas touch, emerging as easily the best live action video game adaptation to date. It helps that the series is based on a linear video game with a very linear story, divided itself into sections that can easily be lifted out and converted into episodes. It also helps that the source material itself is so strong.

The biggest success is in casting: Pedro Pascal can play "adopted grumpy gunman protector-daddy" in his sleep at this point, but still brings his A-game. Bella Ramsey doesn't hugely resemble the Ellie from the games, but has the requisite attitude, and Ramsey and Pascal have a great relationship and energy (possibly inspired by both being Game of Thrones casualties). Other actors rotate in and out of the road trip and do a great job, with Nick Offerman delivering the best guest performance of the season as Bill. More under-used is the normally-outstanding Melanie Lynskey, who isn't given much to as Kathleen (and from what we do see, it feels like her Yellowjackets character - also a well-meaning psychopath - has been airdropped in for five minutes). The likes of Merle Dandridge, John Hannah, Anna Torv, Gabriel Luna, Murray Bartlett and Rutina Wesley all provide excellent support.

The structure of the series mirrors that of the games, but also breaks away for format-busting experiments. The third episode, Long, Long Time, might be the season highlight as it follows libertarian prepper Bill's attempts to survive in the aftermath of the outbreak, and it turns from comedy to action to romance with conviction. Left Behind (based on an expansion to the game) is an excellent flashback episode focusing on Ellie's history and what led her to joining forces with the Fireflies.

Where the series falters a little is in some of the "normal" episodes, where the pacing can flag and where the show sometimes hesitates in how it deals with post-apocalyptic/zombie tropes that the likes of The Walking Dead have employed a dozen times over. A loved one is infected and needs to be killed/is allowed to make a noble sacrifice? Yup, several times. Have the tough times have made some people resort to being murders/rapists/cannibals/murderous rapist-cannibals? Oh yeah. At the merest sign of trouble, did about 30% of the population turn into authoritarian lunatics instantly? Of course. To its credit, the show does its best to make these well-trodden plotlines work, sometimes successfully, at other times less so.

This impacts on the pacing, with, once the flashback episodes are removed, seven episodes to tell its story and it still feels a little too long, which is odd given that the show runs to only about half the length of the first game. Still, the game can eat up a lot of its time in combat and stealth sequences which the show can't, at least not so easily.

But if the pacing is sometimes sluggish, there are also excellent moments of character development. It's also refreshing to see an adaptation not afraid to adapt the source material. Entire scenes from the game are faithfully recreated in the show, occasionally dialogue-perfect. Other storylines are changed to accommodate the show's greater sense of realism: fighting off the type of numbers that Ellie and Joel encounter in the game would look silly, or drag out too much. It's a judgement call in each case and, for the most part, the show makes good calls. After a bunch of recent adaptations that seemed to be terrified of their own source material (The Rings of Power comes to mind), it's good to see one more in conversation with it.

The show also makes good calls when it comes to CG. The increasingly all-invasive use of CGI in modern TV and film has become tedious, leading to fake-looking backdrops all over the place. This show certainly uses CG in places, but it is more restrained and, as a result, more convincing. Arguably, the show even fails to use CG in moments when maybe it should have (painting out the massive mountains that have inexplicably appeared around Boston might have been a good idea). The CG-animated cordyceps monsters are extremely well-realised, and used sparingly to good effect.

Excellent performances, good action and strong character arcs make the first season of The Last of Us (****) a winner. Occasionally sluggish pacing and sometimes questionable story turns that seem rooted more in video game logic than actual logic prevent the show from being an unqualified success, but these issues are minor. The Last of Us proves that adult, intelligent and interesting adaptations of video games are possible, and hopefully more will follow.

The TV show is available to watch on HBO or Max in the US and most overseas territories, and on Now TV in the UK.

Thank you for reading The Wertzone. To help me provide better content, please consider contributing to my Patreon page and other funding methods.

HBO greenlights second GAME OF THRONES spin-off show, KNIGHT OF THE SEVEN KINGDOMS

HBO has taken the plunge on a second Game of Thrones spin-off show. Joining House of the Dragon will be A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms: The Hedge Knight.

The new show will be based on George R.R. Martin's Dunk & Egg series of novellas, of which he has so far published three: The Hedge Knight (1998), The Sworn Sword (2002) and The Mystery Knight (2009). Two more novellas are partially written or planned, The Village Hero and The She-Wolves. The first three novellas are available in an omnibus edition called A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, hence the inspiration for the series title.

The novellas begin eighty-nine years before the events of Game of Thrones, during the surprisingly peaceful reign of Good King Daeron the Second. The Targaryen dragons are long gone, but the family's hold on the Iron Throne seems secure. A young, tall but poor hedge knight named Ser Duncan the Tall sets out to make his fortune at the Ashford tourney, where his paths cross with a young boy named "Egg." Duncan takes the young boy under his wing as dramatic events unfold from a very minor incident that will completely change the future history of Westeros.

George R.R. Martin has around twelve Dunk & Egg novellas planned in total, but his plan to release them between novels of the mainline series has suffered from the lengthy delays affecting the main novels. It is unclear if the TV show will adapt all of the planned-but-unwritten novellas as well as the published ones, or - if the title suggests - it will adapt The Hedge Knight by itself and then maybe focus on original adventures in the same time period. Unlike the main books, the Dunk & Egg stories are more standalone and also span a much vaster span of time, with the novellas planned to cover the period 209-259 AC (Game of Thrones begins in 298 AC; House of the Dragon will conclude in 131 AC), with years-long gaps between each one.

A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms will be executive produced by George R.R. Martin and House of the Dragon showrunner Ryan Condal. Ira Parker is expected to be head writer and showrunner, having previously written for The Nevers, House of the Dragon, Better Things, The Last Ship, Four in the Morning, Rogue and The Pinkertons.

HBO is also considering a spin-off movie and accompanying TV series about Aegon the Conqueror, and is working with Kit Harington on a possible Game of Thrones sequel series about Jon Snow.

HBO eyeing a GAME OF THRONES movie and TV series about Aegon the Conqueror

HBO are reportedly, strongly considering greenlighting another Game of Thrones spin-off/prequel show. This time around they are looking at the possibility of combining a feature film with a TV show about Aegon the Conqueror, the first Targaryen king who united the Seven Kingdoms and forged the Iron Throne.

Aegon the Conqueror and his sister-wives Rhaenys and Visenya. Art by Roman "Amoka" Papsuev.

HBO's attitude to the Game of Thrones franchise has been a bit variable in recent years, with immense satisfaction of the massive commercial success of the final two seasons being undercut by a risible critical reception and heavy criticism of the series finale. The successful launch of the first successor show, House of the Dragon, last year seemed to restore some good cheer, but we then recently heard of the show's second season having its episode count slashed. Meanwhile, talk of further spin-off shows had become muted, amidst rumours that the ongoing complexities of the Warner Brothers/Discovery merger (which had resulted in companion streamer service HBO Max being gutted of almost all its drama material) had even spilled over to impact HBO's biggest success story.

This news seems to suggest that HBO is tilting back to reinforcing its investment in George R.R. Martin's vision. The story of the Conquest is more focused and concentrated than that of the Dance of Dragons, the civil war that unfolds during the events of House of the Dragon, and is more linear, with less preamble. It is a shorter linear story that might appeal to HBO, aware that some viewers had problems following the constantly-skipping timeline of the first season of that show. It could also be told faster, likely to be a relief to fans facing the dispiriting possibility that House of the Dragon might take eight years to produce just four seasons, three of them only consisting of eight episodes apiece.

The show would be based on the same book as House of the Dragon, 2018's Fire and Blood, although notably the Conquest gets far less coverage than the Dance of Dragons, so it would have to be expanded considerably to fuel a two-hour movie and several seasons of television.

Season 2 of House of the Dragon is now in production to air in 2024. HBO is pushing this new project into a fast turnaround but has not yet attached any writers or showrunners.