Who was the promised prince in Game of Thrones? !
The prophecy of the promised Prince of House of the Dragon was retconned in Game of Thrones, but did the legendary hero appear, and if so, who was he?
Game of Thrones Jon Snow Princess Rhaenyra House of the Dragon
In House of the Dragon, the “Prince Who Was Promised” prophecy gets a lot more attention, but did Game of Thrones really fulfill it? The Prince Who Was Promised is the story of Azor Ahai, the champion of the Lord of Light, who will be reborn to fight a great darkness, as told in the books A Song of Ice and Fire by George RR Martin. The Prince That Was Promised was just a small part of Game of Thrones. That was never the main focus of the story, but fans of the book have been looking for signs that Azor Ahai might be one of the main characters in the war against the Night King.
In the first episode of House of the Dragon, King Viserys I Targaryen (Paddy Considine) confided to his daughter and heiress, Princess Rhaenyra (Milly Alcock), the great secret of the Targaryen kings: Aegon the Conqueror dreamed of La Longue Night and the end of the world caused by great darkness coming from the North. Aegon didn’t take over the Seven Kingdoms just to bring honor to House Targaryen. He did this because he believed the Seven Kingdoms could only be led against the Night King by the Targaryens and their dragons. For this reason, the Targaryens thought it was very important that their family still be in charge of Westeros. Rhaenyra thinks she should sit on the Iron Throne because, among other things, she knows about Aegon’s dream.
House of the Dragon Episode 4 tied Aegon’s dream even more closely to the prophecy about the Prince That Was Promised. Viserys showed Rhaenyra Aegon’s dagger, whose blade of Valyrian steel bore the prophecy written upon it: “From my blood shall come the promised prince, and his will shall be the song of ice and fire.” This proves Aegon’s belief that the prince who was promised, the reincarnation of Azor Ahai, will come from the line of Aegon Targaryen. The Long Night happened 200 years later in Game of Thrones, and in the end, the Night King was defeated by all the forces of Westeros. But did the prince who was promised turn out to be one of the heroes of Game of Thrones?
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Was Jon Snow or Daenerys Targaryen the promised prince?
Jon Snow and Daenerys North in Game of Thrones season 8
Jon Snow (Kit Harington) and Daenerys Targaryen are the most likely candidates for The Prince Who Was Promised in Game of Thrones (Emilia Clarke). Both are related to Aegon Targaryen by their blood. Daenerys is a full-blooded Targaryen as her father, Mad King Aerys II Targaryen, is her grandfather. Jon Snow was raised in the Cold North as a bastard of Stark, but he eventually found out that he was Daenerys’ nephew and his real name is Aegon Targaryen, the son of Daenerys’ older brother Rhaegar Targaryen and of his secret wife, Lyanna Stark. This means Jon is half Targaryen, but he’s still tied to Aegon the Conqueror through his father.
The Prince Who Was Promised is good news for Jon Snow. Jon is a male Targaryen, and he earned his reputation as one of the best warriors in the Seven Kingdoms by fighting in bloody battles for many years. Jon and the Night King also had a unique dislike for each other after several face-to-face fights. But Jon isn’t the one who ultimately killed the Night King. The White Walkers couldn’t have been stopped without Daenerys’ dragons. Jon killed Daenerys because he was afraid she would turn into Mad Queen. Yet when Jon and Dany are together, it seems like they’re the song of ice and fire, but Game of Thrones doesn’t specify whether one or both are meant to be the prince that was promised.
On Game of Thrones, the Night King holds Arya by the throat as she tries to stab him.
At the end of The Long Night, it was Arya Stark, played by Maisie Williams, who killed the Night King. The Faceless Men taught Arya how to be an assassin, and she used Aegon’s Valyrian steel dagger to kill the Night King. The cat-legged dagger has a dark connection to Arya’s family as it was once meant to kill her brother, Bran Stark (Isaac Hempstead-Wright).
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Why Game of Thrones Didn’t Resolve The Prince That Was Promised Prophecy
The fact that Arya killed the Night King could mean that she is the prince who was promised. There are signs that this is true, especially after Melisandre (Carice van Houten) told Arya about her vision to kill brown-eyed, green-eyed, and blue-eyed people. But Arya has nothing to do with Aegon Targaryen’s lineage, which seems to rule him out as the prince who was promised, as Aegon predicted.
In George RR Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire books, the prophecy about The Prince Who Was Promised and Azor Ahai is much more prominent. However, Game of Thrones left out much of the book’s convoluted plot and many of its characters. As the TV show moved past Martin’s finished books, showrunners Dan Weiss and David Benioff set the characters on their own paths, which may or may not fit Martin’s plans for the end of his saga. In the end, Game of Thrones officials weren’t interested in this obscure part of Martin’s mythology. Instead, they chose to focus on telling the story of the TV show as they did.
The Prince Who Was Promised was more of a subject that book readers knew about. They thought Game of Thrones would eventually cover it, but when it didn’t, they were disappointed. But parts of The Prince Who Was Promised couldn’t have been left out of Game of Thrones, even though the prophecy was never central to the story. Which is why it was so surprising when House of the Dragon not only included The Prince Who Was Promised in the prequel story, but also made him a key part of the Targaryen story of how Rhaenyra became queen. But that’s also to be expected, since George RR Martin has more creative control over House of the Dragon than Game of Thrones.
Will the GRRM books prove who the promised prince is?
Fire and Blood: The House of the Dragon George Martin Fire and Blood: The House of the Dragon Martin George
The big question is whether George RR Martin will ever say who the prince who was promised is in A Song of Ice and Fire. It’s likely Martin knows the answer, as he knew the prophecy was actually Aegon the Conqueror’s dream, which he kept to himself until he told the creators of House of the Dragon when they were doing the show. (And no one knows if Martin ever told Benioff and Weiss about it.)
Martin’s latest book in the Game of Thrones series, A Dance with Dragons, has been out for over 11 years now. Martin’s sixth book, The Winds of Winter, is not yet finished, so there is no set date for its release. If George RR Martin doesn’t finish A Song of Ice and Fire, maybe HBO’s House of the Dragon or one of the other Game of Thrones spin-offs they’re doing will show who the prince who was supposed to be promised.
House of the Dragon airs on HBO Max Sundays at 9 p.m. ET.
