House of the Dragon just concluded a divisive second season, and before the dust has settled already the news has turned towards the future. And as it turns out, the future for HBO’s Game of Thrones prequel is two more seasons. Dragons can only soar for so long.
According to showrunner and co-creator Ryan Condal, House of the Dragon will run four total seasons. Writing has already begun on season three, with the plan to begin production in “earlyish 2025.” That means we won’t likely see the show return until 2026.
Co-creator and “A Song of Fire & Ice” author George R.R. Martin once predicted it would take four seasons of ten-episodes to tell the complete story, so he wasn’t far off.
It’s unclear if the next season will also be eight episodes. In regards to that, Condal said…
“I haven’t had discussions with HBO about it. I would just anticipate the cadence of the show, from a dramatic storytelling perspective, will continue to be the same from Season 2 on.”
And that means fans may continue to have a polarized reaction to the finales. Continuing a long-standing HBO tradition, House of the Dragon‘s second season was fueled by big character deaths, story twists, and shocking moments, but the battles ended with the penultimate episode. The finale was used to set up the next season and to reflect on prior events. They used to do this with The Sopranos, as well, which led to similar complaints about anticlimactic finales.
Condal went on to discuss the quiet season two finale and the lack of an iconic moment from the books, the Battle of the Gullet, which has been pushed to season three…
“We we were trying to give the Gullet, which is arguably the most anticipated — well, I would say maybe the second-most-anticipated — action event of ‘Fire & Blood,’ trying to give it the time and the space that it deserves,” Condal said. “Obviously, as anybody that’s seen the finale, we’re building to that event. That event will happen very shortly in terms of the storytelling of ‘House of the Dragon.’
Condal continued, “Based on what we know now, it should be the biggest thing to date that we’ve pulled off. And we just wanted to have the time, the space to do that at a level that is going to excite and satisfy the fans and in the way it’s deserved.”
HBO won’t be without Game of Thrones content when House of the Dragon wraps up. Following the episode, a teaser featuring footage from another spinoff, A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, arriving in 2025. [Variety]
