Dragon House
Why is HOTD’s Ryan Condal still adapting to the nature of the job? HBO is indeed returning to Game of Thrones with House of the Dragon, a prequel series set roughly 200 years before Daenerys Targaryen was born, in hopes that a large audience would follow.
In just a few hours, House of the Dragon will be released, exposing the truth behind the bloody civil war depicted in George RR Martin’s Fire and Blood. House Targaryen starts off strong in the first season, but King Viserys’ choice of his eldest daughter Rhaenyra as his successor is quickly called into question.
Ryan J. Condal and Miguel Sapochnik crafted HBO’s fantasy action series House of the Dragon. When asked when they started House of the Dragon and how things are going so far, Screening recently interviewed showrunners Condal and Sapotchnik.
In the interview, HOTD’s Ryan Condal said the series didn’t include the novel-style writing he was hoping for. Sapochnik and he tried to find the “objective truth of this real story”:
As fun as this Rashomon style of storytelling is, we left that up to the book and decided to try instead to define what we thought was the objective truth of this actual story, as we saw it. Some historians are right and some historians are wrong; sometimes they’re all right, sometimes they’re all wrong. I think that was the fun of the adaptation; get to really interact with the book as a companion piece.
The showrunner hopes book fans will be as enthralled by the series as they are by the original literature. He further shares his thoughts on how what historians have established may or may not be the same as what the author of the book may have written:
I think people who have read the book and watched the series will hopefully be enthralled. “It’s interesting how they shot this event”, or “George wrote this seemingly disposable little line, but there’s this big thing that happened, because historians didn’t see it or didn’t know what really happened.”
RC also hopes that if fans watch the series, like it, and read the book, it could “deepen and enrich” an “understanding of Targaryen’s history” that the creators had in mind.
Then I think if you watch the series and hopefully like it, if you go back and read the book, I think it will deepen and enrich your understanding of the Targaryen story we’re telling . And I think people are going to be like, “What happened to that thing?” Did it happen like this or not? I think real historians go through this process all the time in their own study.
The verdict of the fans will be published soon
The crown indeed weighs down the wearer’s head. Will the series satisfy readers’ cravings for George RR Martin’s pseudo-medieval costume? Maybe. It’s also a challenge that House of the Dragon faces, as it follows one of the most successful and beloved television series of all time.
If the House of the Dragon will succeed in scaling this wall, only time and the seasons that follow will tell. House of the Dragon might not be a sure thing, but after the first six episodes, it’s obvious it has a fighting chance. This fantasy drama doesn’t need you to be a Game of Thrones fan to enjoy it, but if you are, you’ll probably still love it.
