Westeros

HBO has announced three new cast members for House of the Dragon Season 3, each taking on important roles as knights caught up in the brutal Dance of the Dragons. I believe at least one of these has been hinted at previously, when Steve Toussaint posted an image of a script listing a number of characters who were present.

You can see the list of the actors and their characters below, as well as some additional thoughts from us!

Barry Sloane, Tom Cullen, and Joplin Sibtain.

• Barry Sloane will play Ser Adrian Redfort, a knight of the Vale who ends up choosing a side. Sloane is known for his roles in Revenge and as Captain Price in a number of entries in the Call of Duty franchise.
• Tom Cullen has been cast as Ser Luthor Largent, a fearsome officer of the City Watch famed for his immense strength. Cullen is recognized from his performances in Downton Abbey and the film Weekend. This won’t be his first time in history-tinged fare, either, as he played Guy Fawkes in the Kit Harington-starring series Gunpowder and also played a knight in the series Knightfall.
• Joplin Sibtain will portray Ser Jon Roxton, also known as “Bold Jon Roxton,” is aa staunch supporter of King Aegon II and wielder of the Valyrian steel sword Orphan-Maker (more on that soon!). Sibtain recently appeared, memorably, as the Ferrixian wrecker Brasso in Andor and has credits in Doctor Who and Safe.

In a recent podcast Condal teased that three new Valyrian steel weapons were being made for the season, and he thought one in particular might excite fans. We’re quite certain that one of these is Roxton’s sword, Orphan-Maker, which he uses quite judiciously in Fire and Blood. The other, given the casting of James Norton as Lord Ormund Hightower, is almost certainly the Hightower sword named Vigilance.

That does leave the third, though. There’s one other sword explicitly named as part of the Dance, Lamentation, the sword of House Royce, but we don’t think that’s it. Yes, it’d be interesting to see, but I can think of some other possibilities. For example . . . the Celtigars are rumored to have a Valyrian steel axe, which has never been revealed (nor even confirmed whether it’s true or not). I think the hardcore book fans would be excited to finally see it, especially as we basically don’t have examples of Valyrian steel weapons that aren’t swords or daggers. And Ryan does say “weapons”, suggesting that maybe not all the weapons are swords, right? And this could pair with Condal having stated there’s an item from the novels that has never appeared on screen before (though we’re suspicious that actually may be a Valyrian glass candle.)

And another possibility comes to mind—we know they already made Ice for season 2, but what if Roddy the Ruin brings a Mormont with the Winter Wolves? One who’s carrying Longclaw in its original form, before the bear head was replaced with a wolfs head? It’d be a bit of a throwaway, and of course, we do not know of any Mormont castings, so we think that’s less likely.

It’ll be interesting to see once we start getting teasers and trailers and maybe behind-the-scenes footage.