Welcome to the House of the Dragon.

A tweet from the official Game of Thrones Twitter account announced the start of production on the show’s new prequel series, House of the Dragon. A photo showed the cast assembled for a socially distanced table read:

If you followed that tweet’s instructions over to the show’s official Twitter account, @HouseofDragon, you could see individual photos of the key cast: Rhys Ifans as Otto Hightower, Olivia Cooke as Alicent Hightower, Matt Smith as Prince Daemon Targaryen, Paddy Considine as King Viserys Targaryen, Steve Toussaint as The Sea Snake, and Emma D’Arcy as Princess Rhaenyra Targaryen.

House of the Dragon is a prequel to Game of Thrones set roughly 300 years prior to the start of the main series and, as the name suggests, it focuses primarily on the Targaryen family of that era. It’s not related to the earlier Game of Thrones prequel starring Naomi Watts that would have been set in Westeros 10,000 years before the original series. (HBO commissioned a pilot that was shot in 2019, but ultimately decided not to greenlight a full season of episodes.) According to reports, there are at least three other GoT spinoffs currently in development, including a series for Steve Toussaint’s Sea Snake character), one titled 10,000 Ships about a warrior queen, a series set in King's Landing slum of Flea Bottom. And if that’s not enough Game of Thrones related stuff for you, a Broadway production is in the works as well.

House of the Dragon is expected to premiere on HBO and HBO Max in 2022.

Gallery — The Best-Dressed Characters in the History of Game of Thrones:

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