When HBO announced the inevitable—that it would be exploring several potential Game of Thrones spin-offs in an already-successful attempt to never allow us to forget the original series—there were two stories in Westerosi history that fans were most excited about seeing: Robert’s Rebellion and the Dance of the Dragons.
If you paid any attention to the program throughout its run, both moments should ring a bell (but not the kind that would incite you to burn down an entire city). Robert’s Rebellion was a popular possibility for a prequel, because it involves about 80 percent of the characters from Game of Thrones who were around for the war against the Mad King Aerys. It would basically be the Ned Stark and Robert Baratheon show, which is something the people want and deserve. Unfortunately, George R. R. Martin and HBO confirmed that there would pretty much never be a Robert’s Rebellion spin-off. But the story of the Dance of the Dragons, which had been mentioned in passing throughout the series by characters including Joffrey and Shireen, still remained a possibility.
In late October, HBO announced that it ordered a prequel straight to series called House of the Dragon, based on Fire & Blood, a two-part historical text documenting the Targaryen dynasty 300 years before the events on Game of Thrones. The show might not air until 2022, but it isn't too early to catch up on your Targaryen history.
The story begins with Aegon I, who conquered Westeros and forged the Iron Throne. The first volume of Fire & Blood was released in November 2018, and the second part, which is expected to focus more on the Dance of the Dragons, is due at some point. (Or is it? This is George R. R. Martin, so who’s to say.)
House of the Dragon, which has already been picked up for a full first season—unlike the untitled Naomi Watts–led project that was canceled—will follow the Targaryen dynasty in the years leading up to and during the Dance of the Dragons, a devastating civil war between the Targaryen family. Because obviously, the one thing people looooooved the most about GoT were the dragons and the Targaryen plot (the Qarth storyline in Season 2 was never a drag, Daenerys’s ending made so much sense, etc.)
The Dance of the Dragons is, quite unfortunately, not exactly what it sounds like, which would be something like Step Up but with dragons. Fair warning before we dive in further: Spoilers lie ahead. The events all started over a hundred years before the War of the Five Kings on GoT, with King Viserys I, who was in an unprecedented situation for the Targaryen dynasty. He had several children but only one, Rhaenyra, who he shared with his first wife, Queen Aemma Arryn, survived into adulthood. Although a female monarch wasn’t traditional, Rhaenyra was his only living child, so King Viserys trained her to rule Westeros and established allies who would support her claim to the throne.
When Queen Aemma died, King Viserys remarried and had four more children. Despite having sons, including Aegon II, with his new wife, King Viserys remained adamant that Rhaenyra succeed him. Years later, when King Viserys died, Aegon II’s followers staged a coup, making Aegon II the crowned King of Westeros. Meanwhile, Rhaenyra was on Dragonstone, the ancestral seat of House Targaryen, which is situated in Blackwater Bay, opposite of King's Landing. When she found out what happened, she crowned herself the Queen of Westeros and declared Aegon II a traitor. Sound familiar? There’s a pattern in ole Westeros, isn’t there?
Bantam Fire & Blood: 300 Years Before A Game of Thrones (A Targaryen History)
But unlike the War of the Five Kings depicted in Game of Thrones, this intense civil war—the most devastating one in the country’s history—involved dragons, which were very much alive and well at the time. The war continued for two years. Dragons devastated many parts of the country, Targaryens betrayed Targaryens, and many dragons (along with innocent people) died in the process. Eventually, Aegon II had his dragon devour Rhaenyra while her son, Aegon III, watched. Not long after, Aegon II died of wounds, and Aegon III became king. The Targaryens used their dragons so relentlessly during the Dance of the Dragons that it led to their extinction a few years after the war ended.
A show centered on this Targaryen drama can provide a lot of things that Game of Thrones fans loved: betrayal, political intrigue, dragons, incest, sons watching their mothers get killed by dragons. In all seriousness, it was a wise decision to base a show on this storyline; it has everything that made Game of Thrones so popular in the first place, but it (hopefully) won’t be more of the same. In fact, it can possibly do the series’s terrible ending justice by providing more insight into the mind of Targaryen characters like Daenerys’s ancestors.
