After an historic, 20+ million viewer debut this past Sunday, the highly anticipated ‘Game of Thrones’ prequel, based on George R.R. Martin’s ‘Fire & Blood’ and starring at least 2 dragons with saddles, gets a Season 2 order.
The HBO Original Game of Thrones prequel series, House of the Dragon, based on George R.R. Martin’s “Fire & Blood,” has been renewed for a second season. After the airing of one episode. Because, of course… was a Season 2 ever in doubt, even with the recent programming cuts playing out in grisly, King’s Landing fashion at the network’s streaming partner, HBO Max?
The highly anticipated new drama, set 200 years prior to the events of GoT, debuted last Sunday, August 21, to the largest audience for any new original series in HBO history. According to network, the first episode has now been seen by over 20 million viewers across linear, On Demand and HBO Max platforms in the U.S., based on a combination of Nielsen data and first party data. Curious if there’s data on the percentage of viewers who at least once looked askance at Matt Smith’s glorious wig. Doctor Who?
Francesca Orsi, Executive Vice President, HBO Programming, said, “We are beyond proud of what the entire House of the Dragon team has accomplished with Season 1. Our phenomenal cast and crew undertook a massive challenge and exceeded all expectations, delivering a show that has already established itself as must-see-TV. A huge thank you to George, Ryan, and Miguel for leading us on this journey. We couldn’t be more excited to continue bringing to life the epic saga of House Targaryen with Season 2.”
The Season 1 cast includes Paddy Considine; Matt Smith; Olivia Cooke; Emma D’Arcy; Steve Toussaint; Eve Best; Fabien Frankel; Sonoya Mizuno; and Rhys Ifans. Additional cast includes Milly Alcock; Bethany Antonia; Phoebe Campbell; Emily Carey; Harry Collett; Ryan Corr; Tom Glynn-Carney; Jefferson Hall; David Horovitch; Wil Johnson; John Macmillan; Graham McTavish; Ewan Mitchell; Theo Nate; Matthew Needham; Bill Paterson; Phia Saban; Gavin Spokes; and Savannah Steyn.
The series' visual effects are produced by MPC Episodic, Outpost VFX, and Pixomondo. VFX coverage will undoubtedly hit AWN / VFXWorld just as soon as HBO releases images and OK’s coverage.
Martin and Ryan Condal are co-creators and executive producers; Condal also serves as co-showrunner with writer, executive producer, director, and co-showrunner Miguel Sapochnik. Sara Hess, Jocelyn Diaz, Vince Gerardis, and Ron Schmidt are also executive producers.
Source: HBO
Dan Sarto is Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of Animation World Network.
