‘House of the Dragon’ Chronicles the Beginning of the Targaryens Downfall
House of the Dragon chronicles a time before Game of Thrones. The series centers on Viserys I Targaryen (Paddy Considine), a peacetime king who has named his only living child, Princess Rhaenyra (Milly Alcock as a teen, Emma D’Arcy as an adult), as heir.
Though Rhaenyra is a woman, Viserys’ young brother, Prince Daemon Targaryen (Matt Smith), is unfit for the Iron Throne. The series is a story of succession and sexism and marks the beginning and end of the Targaryens.
‘House of the Dragon’ begins some 200 years before ‘Game of Thrones’
House of the Dragon will certainly look familiar to GoT fans, but it actually acts as a prequel story. The series opens 172 years before Daenerys Targaryen’s birth and the death of the Mad King, which marks the official end of the Targaryen reign.
‘House of the Dragon’ chronicles the beginning of the Targaryens’ downfall
As we saw from the House of the Dragon pilot, the Targaryens have always been patriarchal. In fact, Viserys is chosen over his older cousin, Rhaenys Targaryen (Eve Best), to sit on the Iron Throne, though she is the more direct blood heir. When it comes time for Viserys to choose his own successor, naming his daughter Princess Rhaenyra (Milly Alcock as a teen, Emma D’Arcy as an adult) doesn’t sit well with the council or the Seven Kingdoms.
“Here’s the story you’ve always heard about,” Condal told Shadow and Act. “The Targaryens, at the height of their power with 17 dragons and great wealth and power and influence. They’re unchallengeable. This is that time. So I think it’s a fascinating place to drop in because they’ve just started to turn and decline, but they don’t realize that until it’s too late.”
George R.R. Martin has always wanted to tell this story
When HBO put out the call for a Game of Thrones spinoff, Martin through his hat in the ring with Ryan J. Condal. He’d already written Fire & Blood, an account of the Targaryen kings, and though his point in Westeros history that was the beginning of the end for this once glorious house was an important story to showcase.
“George [R.R. Martin] sees this particular story as the most important event in the Targaryen history, outside of the conquest,” Condal told Shadow and Act. “The conquest wins them the power that then this story precipitates them beginning to lose. Before even Fire & Blood [George] had written quite a bit about this period. The Princess and the Queen was about Rhaenyra and Alicent (Emily Carey and Olivia Cooke, at different points in time) as adults. The Rogue Prince is about Daemon when Rhaenyra was more of a child that adapted into this book’s chapters. But this has always been on his mind as having the most thematic and spiritual resonance with the original series. So when I sat down with him, the very first meeting we ever had, this was the chapter that he slid across the table to me and said, ‘This is the one I want to tell.’”
