Aegon’s Conquest spinoff set to repeat House of the Dragon ‘mistake’
HBO/Bantam BooksAegon’s Conquest is one of the most anticipated Game of Thrones spinoffs, set to chronicle the story of the legendary Targaryen conqueror – but, fans are worried it’ll make the same ‘mistake’ as House of the Dragon.
It’s arguably the most important event in George R.R. Martin’s saga of ice and fire: the formation of the Seven Kingdoms under one Targaryen king, Aegon I, after forcing the realms to bend the knee.
He’s been mentioned in House of the Dragon; specifically, we’ve seen the skull of his dragon, Balerion, the fiercest and largest of its kind in the history of Westeros. Also, the fact that Viserys’ son has the same name caused the confusion that led to the Dance of the Dragons.
Soon (well, in a few years, probably), Aegon’s Conquest will be brought to life in a new TV show. It’s being developed by Mattson Tomlin, who co-wrote The Batman and led Netflix’s Terminator Zero anime series.
After House of the Dragon revealed the true reasoning behind his conquest (he saw a vision of the White Walkers and believed a Targaryen needed to sit on the Iron Throne for the world to survive), it appears the series will follow its example and “interpret” the source material.
Speaking to Tomlin, Westerosies (via Nexus Point News) asked about his approach to the story.
“It starts with what George has done. I’ve now gotten to spend quite a bit of time with him, and there have been a lot of pinch-me moments of just kind of going through fire and blood, highlighting passages, and asking him, ‘What did this mean? What is this? What I think it is,'” he explained.
“You know, sometimes really grilling him, going, ‘I don’t understand what’s happening here.’ And then other times going, ‘I think that it could mean this.’ But it’s really taking that text and treating it like it’s real history. That’s one of the things that my approach to it was, [that] Fire and Blood is written like a real history and these things happened.
“We know the history of Alexander the Great; we know the history of Napoleon. We know what the battles were. We know a lot of the people who died. We know in some cases what was said or what might have been said, but we don’t know everything. We don’t know all of it. We kind of have these flag poles that tell us this is how we marched through history.
“But then also there’s that great quote that somebody much smarter than I said: history is written by the people who won. And so then there’s that as well.”
Remember, Aegon’s Conquest is a small part of Fire and Blood (it’s not even 30 pages). That isn’t enough for a TV show on its own.
“For me, it’s about making sure that I respect George and I respect the text. And then also, it still has to be a dramatic story. Those characters have to go on a journey; they have to change; they have to go from a beginning to a middle to an end,” Tomlin continued.
“Figuring out how to do all of that with the clues that that textbook has left for me and go, okay, I’m going to interpret this very real history and try to make it a really vivid show that hopefully people love and don’t hate, doing the best I can.”
This is reminiscent of Ryan Condal’s approach to House of the Dragon, which attracted (undue) backlash for many of its decisions in Season 2, particularly regarding Alicent’s arc.
“Yeah… we will see. This is basically what the HOTD writers said and look where we’re at,” one user wrote. “Okay, pack it up. Cancel the show. Stop writing. It’s HOTD all over again,” another commented.
“1. This is what the HOTD writers said. 2. This is gonna be garbage 3. They’re gonna have to make up 90% of it,” a third wrote. “If they change anything about Aegon The Conquerer, I swear that I will burn HBO’s building,” a fourth wrote.
Fans may think it’s a mistake to change anything about Martin’s source material. They should remember two things: any TV show exists in a separate continuity, so the book canon remains intact; it’s an adaptation, so it can make as many changes as needed to ensure that it’s entertaining, compelling television.
In the meantime, find out what we know about House of the Dragon Season 3, read our breakdown of Season 2’s ending, and check out our other guides on Tessarion, Daeron Targaryen, and Ulf the White.