Why I'm watching House of Dragons

[CharlesPhipps]

youtu.be/7_4Bn4fioXA

To quote another story about a dysfunctional family of great influence, "Just when I think I'm out, they pull me back in!" I watched the extended Comic Con trailer for House of the Dragon, and it was like all the old feelings I'd suppressed from my days as a Game of Thrones superfan came running back.

We'd broken up for good reasons. Season Eight was a dark period in our relationship but let's be honest, it hadn't been good between us in a while. Things had been treading water for a while with massive changes from the books like the excision of Young Griff, Sansa being given Jeyne Poole's role as Ramsey's torture victim, and the Martells going from my favorite characters in the novels to people I just wanted annihilated. The Sparrow Plot was a meditation on the power of the people, and it was turned into another attack on religion. Tyrion lost his dark turn after murdering his father. We could be here all day.

There's also the fact I wasn't exactly in a great place with George R.R. Martin himself. I love the song "George R.R. Martin is not your bitch." I'm a writer myself. Sometimes the creative juices don't flow or flow in different directions. I even told myself that I didn't care if he finishes the books because what he'd given us in unfinished form was worth it for the experience. I told myself this, but I was lying. I gave my wife copies of the first four books when we were dating, and we've celebrated our twelfth wedding anniversary.

But I'm sold. The sight of the trailer combined with all the little tidbits and characters I recognized from Fire and Blood transported me back to the time when I was ready to join Daenerys in her purge of slavers as well as when the Others still had menace. However, you may want to know the reason for my insanity, so I thought I'd share.

1:] Nobody does it better

Game of Thrones has had many imitators since it went off the air. However, none of them have managed to capture my interest the way HBO's adaptation of the books has. I was one of the people who liked the Wheel of Time by Amazon but even I wasn't blind to the flaws. The Witcher comes closest but they're fundamentally different kind of stories. No, HBO and Martin developed a ten-year relationship that was like nothing on television and still remains unique. The politics, magic, intrigue, characterization, and, yes, sexiness was all a delightful cocktail that you can only get one place.

2:] Weiss and Benioff aren't involved

It probably seems ungrateful to those two to specifically cite their lack of involvement as a reason for why I'm willing to give another chance, but a lot of behind-the-scenes material has made me think the show's biggest flaws were their architecture. The pair sprung the idea that Game of Thrones should be five seasons and theatrically released movies (which HBO, a cable company, wasn't keen on) on their producers right as they were finishing season four. They were eager to move on and unwilling to have other people carry the show beyond them. Apparently, also immune to any form of criticism and prone to doubling down. There's a deleted scene, for example, where Arya watches a play where they simulate Sansa’s assault by Ramsay Bolton. One of the audience complains and another tells them not to watch if they're so annoyed by it.

3:] It's complete

Fire and Blood will not be for everyone because it is a work of cryptohistory rather than novels, but George R.R. Martin has it all plotted out for us. The cast of vivid characters, sex, violence, blackmail, bastards, and dragons is all there. While I hate to say I'm utterly spoiled, I kind of am and know how this tragedy is going to play out the same way I would if I went to see Hamlet or Revenge of the Sith again. For better or worse, I know how the story is going to go and will be giggling like the Red Wedding when my wife speculates on the civil war she's predicting between Daemon and his niece Rhaenyra.

4:] The cast looks incredible

It's not Doctor Who that I'm looking to for Matt Smith's performance but his role as Prince Phillip in The Crown, but I think he'll bring a massive amount of talent to the role. The fact we're going to be seeing young actors in the role of Rhaenyra and Alicent before skipping ahead a couple of decades also tells me that they're going to get all the nuances of this. Emma D'arcy is bringing a lot of chops and I'm even happy to see Olivia Cooke escape from Ready Player One. But when I say looks incredible, I mean the LOOK is incredible. Everything I've seen of their characters is fantastic and we're a long way from the t-shirts of Shanarra.

5:] Dragons

I'm a simple man. I see a dragon, I smile. I hear the show is going to have sixteen characterized dragons and dragon fights, I am sold. Will I ever see a live action Dragonlance in my lifetime? Probably not. Will I take this instead? Yes.

Would I watch anything BUT this? None of the other spin offs appeal to me because they're not pure Martin. Snow? I'll watch it but not with the same enthusiasm? Dunk and Egg? OH, HELL YES. But this? This will be my jam, I'm sure.

[McAvoy]

I may respond with a longer post at a later time.

I will watch it. The my reasoning is simple, just like before Season 1 of Game of Thrones I am curious on how they will handle it. I was one of those who truly wondered if they had the balls to kill off Sean Bean's character. Got to remember there was a lot of speculation about that. In that why would you bring in such a big name actor for a character to die in the very first season.

So they they kill him off. The first season is a near perfect line for line reproduction of the first book in TV form. They kill off a major actor who was in all of the major publicity photos and videos.

Like you said the Terrible B's are not involved. Someone here once called Martin a hack. No those two are hacks. So for me there is a hope that with a new crew that they might formulate a competent series that sticks the landing.

I honestly think Season 8 is the worse final season of any series. It reminds me of the reaction of How I Met Your Mother. All that build up for the final satisfaction only to be so let down that the whole series feels like a waste. Like the rewatch value plummeted down to the ground, dug deep and planted the flag of being unwatchable.

Whereas other series with terrible final seasons like That 70's Show, Roseanne, Scrubs, and so forth that if you took out the final season, the rest was still watchable. Assuming you like them.

At least with this series, it doesn't have to deal with the aftermath of Season 8. It starts new and there is a clear path to follow. They probably won't follow it 100% of course. But is there. There is a beginning and an end.

Those of you not familiar, it's in Blood and Fire book that came out a few years ago. Reads a bit like a history book.

[stryke]

I'm just here for some Nettles and she's probably not turning up for a couple of seasons anyway.

[CharlesPhipps]

I honestly think Season 8 is the worse final season of any series. It reminds me of the reaction of How I Met Your Mother. All that build up for the final satisfaction only to be so let down that the whole series feels like a waste. Like the rewatch value plummeted down to the ground, dug deep and planted the flag of being unwatchable.

Whereas other series with terrible final seasons like That 70's Show, Roseanne, Scrubs, and so forth that if you took out the final season, the rest was still watchable. Assuming you like them.

At least with this series, it doesn't have to deal with the aftermath of Season 8. It starts new and there is a clear path to follow. They probably won't follow it 100% of course. But is there. There is a beginning and an end.

Honestly, people are already wondering if Snow is going to be set Beyond the Wall and somehow it being a lot more interesting than implied or if it's going to somehow become a defacto Season 8. Which would depend greatly on how many actors they could get to come back for it.

[clearspira]

GOT is soooooo last decade. The time for a prequel was when the world was hyped for more of it. Sadly for them of course they didn't predict season 8 to be such an unparalleled shizzle show.

As an aside, I genuinely do not think that I have ever seen a show fall so dramatically out of the public consciousness so quickly. I mean it was EVERYWHERE in its prime. For some newspapers it was page 1 content. Not helped by Martin being so distant either.

If this prequel is a success I will be greatly surprised.

[CharlesPhipps]

If this prequel is a success I will be greatly surprised.

As with Mass Effect, I hope it can rise from its shitty ending where everyone was pissed at Daenerys' and Shepard's fate.

[stryke]

Huh, well now there's an unexpected self realisation. I was so pissed off and upset with Mass Effect going off in the rails in 2 and then the several trains jumping off the same rails, then doing some loop the loops, before landing on the increasingly broken wreckage that was 3 that I'm never going to buy another Mass Effect game. No matter what, the series is just too burnt for me to be able to engage with it like I did before.

And yet I've never thought that about a TV or film series that was liable to get a continuation in another form, and that's someone who while I thought GoT was alright to the end, I was seriously grumpy about the end of the Moffat era of Who. Seriously fuck that bloody stupid moon-egg. Not once did I think 'well I'll never watch Who again over this'.

I'm getting seriously burnt out on MCU and yet there's some stuff that might well tempt me to give it a watch like Agatha. I hated everything I saw of Discovery, and then ended up loving both Lower Decks and Strange New Worlds. Sure there's some creators who have behaved badly enough that I don't want to support them ever again, but I'm talking strictly matters of what I thought of a work's quality here which is a different matter.

Going back to gaming sure Mass Effect is the biggest deal as that first game is still top 3 best games of all time for me. There are others though like I had no interest in anything to do with Dragon Age after 2 for one example.

Is it the time commitment? Sure there's a lot of time spent in a long running series, but that's still not going to be as much as a long rpg. Is it just the different level of polish? Can't think of a tv series or film that showed a scene out of order breaking a character's story like what happened to me at a critical point in Dragon Age 2. Is it the extra level of investment? That might be it as I feel like I have my Shepards (I played that first game alot) and that's not something you're going to get in a tv series where your input is limited to watching then discussing it at most.

Something for me to mull over I think.

[hammerofglass]

I didn't realize that was coming so soon. Better hurry up and read Fire and Blood, I guess.

[stryke]

There's also The Princess and the Queen available in the Dangerous Women anthology which just covers the same period. No idea what the difference is between that and the Fire and Blood version though. Also comes with a not particuarly good Dresden Files short story which is why I brought that book in the first place.

[CharlesPhipps]

I didn't realize that was coming so soon. Better hurry up and read Fire and Blood, I guess.

You might want to hold off given it spoils the entire period.