Westeros

The newly released teaser has enough interesting images in it of characters, scenes, and costumes and props that we thought we should comment on a selection of them. Images, and our thoughts, follow!

HBO Max has given fans a pleasant surprise with a first look at House of the Dragon, in the form of a Matt Smith-narrated teaser showing a number of scenes and characters from the show, as well as confirming several significant new cast members. See the video below, and the press release about new cast following that.

Blackfyre looks great, we have to say. So, too, does Daemon Targaryen’s tournament armor with the dragon wings on the helm (an idea we used on our game, Blood of Dragons, for Aemon the Dragonknight, grandson of Prince Daemon). And, perhaps the biggest surprise at all, a revised vision of the Iron Throne and its dais to try and bring it more in line with George R.R. Martin’s actual vision of as a monstrous, twisted construction. There’s even a tourney scene featuring Criston Cole (distinguishable by his coat of arms, ten black pellets on red, on his shield) and a knight of House Tarly (possibly the future Lord Alan Tarly, who sides with the blacks?), though the array of banners there are rather curious: Lannister and what looks like Lefford, perhaps Corbray… but also Bolton, Stark, and what might be a take on Manderly (the latter at a southron tourney seems okay to us… but the Boltons and Starks would be incredibly unlikely to appear at a tourney in what appears to be the Reach.)

We plan to screen cap and go in more detail at some of the images and scenes later this evening, for those curious.

The press release follows:

HBO has confirmed a number of previously-unannounced cast members, confirming at least one casting that was already figured out by fans (the popular Graham McTavish of Outlander, The Hobbit, and Men in Kilts) and a number of other significant characters who play pivotal roles in the events covered by House of the Dragon, which is based on George R.R. Martin’s Fire and Blood.

Top L-R: Ryan Corr, Jefferson Hall, David Horovitch, Graham McTavish. Bottom L-R: Matthew Needham, Bill Paterson and Gavin Spokes

Ryan Condal’s and David Mandel’s The Stuff Dreams Are Made Of podcast about movie and television prop collecting has returned after a mid-season hiatus, and it starts with a bang as Condal recruits none other than George R. R. Martin to discuss his own history as a collector, as well as just a wee bit of discussion of House of the Dragons at the end. Fans should find this one pretty interesting, in particular George’s feelings regarding the ideal adapters of his work going forward.

Discussion of Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon related matter begins around the 1 hour, 18 minute mark.

Today marks the 73rd birthday of one George Raymond Richard Martin, known and beloved as George R. R. Martin, or GRRM for short. George has posted a brief remark on this happy occasion at “Not a Blog”, quoting from T. S. Eliot’s “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”.

Creation Entertainment and Warner Bros. Themed Entertainment have announced an official Game of Thrones fan convention to be held in Las Vegas, Nevada at the Rio Hotel & Suites Convention Center on February 18-20, 2022. This is the first ever official convention for the show, and promises to have many guests, panels, and events, as well as merchandise for sale.

We’ve placed the full press release below:

A spate of reports concerning the FromSoftware’s forthcoming RPG Elden Ring, as the developers have provided game journalists access to previews of the game and interviews with the developers. The game, from a developer already extremely famous for its Dark Souls series, added George R. R. Martin to its creative team when the game first entered development. Now, in an interview transcribed at The Verge, Yasuhiro Kitao from FromSoft reveals that GRRM’s participation was very early on and quite particular.

A newly-released screenshot from Elden Ring.

The 2022 A Song of Ice and Fire Calendar [Affiliate link] is now available, as George R.R. Martin has noted on Twitter with a post featuring a fantastic preview of one of the pieces by Spanish artist Arantza Sestayo.

The image depicts the ravens being sent out from Dragonstone, with one of the best depictions we’ve seen of the citadel’s many terrifying gargolyes and the stone shaped by Valyrian magic.

James Hibberd has another scoop, reporting that HBO Max has ended development of the previously reported series focused on Flea Bottom. But it also is developing two new animated projects to join a previusly announced animated show, and one of them is based on Yi Ti, an ancient and high civilization far to the east of the Seven Kingdoms that is inspired by Chinese history and culture. The World of Ice and Fire is the source of much of what we know of Yi Ti, including its people and their descent from the Great Empire of the Dawn who may have had a role in the Long Night.

Artist’s conception of the imperial capital, Yin.

Back in February, we connected some dots following our stumbling across Vince Gerardis’s Startling Inc. site listing a number of titles that he had in production and development. Among the items there was a note: “Dark Winds at AMC”. We speculated that this was based on Tony Hillerman’s crime novels and that GRRM was involved due to a post he made back in June 2018.

This is now all confirmed thanks to James Hibberd at The Hollywood Reporter:

There’s also a statement from GRRM that Hibberd reports, indicating that Chris Eyre (who directed the accoladed film Smoke Signals) and Robert Redford(!) reached out to ask him to become involved and help bring Hillerman’s Leaphorn & Chee series to television.

Zach McClarnon as Hanzee Dent in the 2nd season of Fargo

Last month, we shared that Ryan J. Condal’s and David H. Mandel’s podcast focused on film and television props, The Stuff Dreams Are Made Of, would have an episode featuring a head of department from House of the Dragon. That episode has now aired, and reveals (among other things) that the show’s master armourer and head of the armoury department (which provides all the weapons for the show) is Tim Lewis, a leading armourer in the film industry with credits such as The Outlaw King, The Old Guard, and Ridley Scott’s upcoming The Last Duel.

Lewis’s website includes an extensive gallery of some of his work across a number of films. In the course of the podcast, Condal and Lewis of course discussed a bit of what’s going on on House of the Dragon. More details below:

Swords made for The Outlaw King and Macbeth, designed by Tim Lewis.

HBO has confirmed two new names of actresses cast in the in-production House of the Dragon, and these are particularly interesting as they reveal that flashbacks will be used to convey part of the background to the events of the Dance of the Dragons. Per Hollywood Reporter, Milly Alcock and Emily Carey are part of the cast of the production. Alcock will be playing a young Rhaenyra Targaryen while Carey will play a young Alicent Hightower.

Milly Alcock, hailing from Australia, has appeared in a number of Australian television dramas and mini-series. Emily Carey, from the UK, has also done some television work, but has also been seen in film—notably, playing the young Diana of Themyscira in the first Wonder Woman and the young Lara Croft in the Tomb Raider reboot starring Alicia Vikander.

The artists behind 2019’s very successful Unseen Westeros art exhibition—a collection of artworks from some 40 artists inspired by The World of Ice and Fire—have gathered together to launch a second exhibition of artwork, this time dubbed Unknown Worlds. Taking place at Frankenstein Castle overlooking the city of Darmstadt in Germany, the art exhibition will take place from July 15th through July 18th. Entry is entirely free.

Full details below!

Things have been quiet on the House of the Dragon front since their filming in Cornwall led to fans getting their first glimpses of some of the lead actors in costume. Now, thanks to Spanish newspaper Hoy, we learn (thanks to our friends at Los Siete Reinos) that House of the Dragon is set to film for three weeks in October in the Extremaduran city of Cáceres and the town of Trujillo. Both of these were used during filming of Game of Thrones, with the town of Trujillo providing the walls of King’s Landing and Cáceres as the location for a procession scene in King’s Landing featuring Euron Greyjoy as well as scenes set in Oldtown.

Per Los Siete Reinos, the three weeks would include pre-production time, so actual filming there will be shorter.

Update June 30th: A second article from Hoy concerning the filming in Cáceres also reveals that the show will be filming in the Portuguese village of Monsanto.

Elden Ring, a game from Dark Souls-developer FromSoftware whose world and story was created in collaboration with George R. R. Martin, now has a release date: January 21st, 2022.  A trailer was also revealed showing some of the gameplay and the amazing environment and character design that FromSoftware is famous for:

The game was first announced this month two years ago, and Hidetaka Miyazaki sat for an interview that discussed just how and why GRRM got involved (TL;DR: he’s a fan of his work from well before A Song of Ice and Fire).