Westeros

Today sounds like an exciting day for eager House of the Dragon followers, as the Warner Bros. Shop names today, June 22nd, the “Day of the Dragon” and has dropped a large collection of House of the Dragon merchandise on the new shop, including a limited edition bomber jacket that looks very smart, as well as a few bits-and-bobs from Game of Thrones (including Sansa’s crown!)

Below you’ll see the limited edition bomber jacket, and click through to the full article for the press release from Warner Bros. as well as a slideshow gallery featuring a number of the new items that can be ordered or pre-ordered!

Via James Hibberd at The Hollywood Reporter, we’ve learned that Kit Harington is attached to star in Jon Snow spin-off series set after the end of Game of Thrones. Suffice it to say, the new has sent shockwaves through fandom, casual and hardcore alike. For our part, it doesn’t seem all that surprising, for the reasons laid out in Deadline‘s confirmation.

Jalic Blades, who among other things produce the Valyrian Steel line of A Song of Ice and Fire and Game of Thrones replicas, has just announced that tomorrow they will launch preorders for a replica of Blackfyre, the sword of Aegon the Conqueror and many of his heirs. It is a limited edition stainless steel sword, and that some time after they will also produce an even more limited Damascus steel version of the sword.

UPDATE: The even-more-limited Damascus edition is now available for pre-order as well.

Occasionally, we like to recommend works of fantasy to our fellow fans of A Song of Ice and Fire, and the upcoming release of All the Seas of the World by Guy Gavriel Kay (hits shelves on May 17th) is something we’d like to bring to our readers’ attention. Thanks to Kay and his publisher, Linda and I had the chance to read the novel early. Below, you’ll find Linda’s review of the novel (consider it co-signed by me!), but in brief: a compelling, beautifully poignant work from one of the finest authors working in the genre (and one of our very favorites in any genre!)

The official House of the Dragon twitter account woke up today with a few tweets and new character posters (more on those below)... but all that led up to the release of an official teaser trailer:

It’s a pretty epic trailer (if, concerningly, rather dark and desaturated) featuring all the chief characters, a Red Keep in the midst of renovation or expansion, Kingsguard, gold cloaks, violence, the Great Council at Harrenhal… and of course, dragons. Besides the new trailer, HBO also released a number of brand new character posters featuring key characters, which you can find below.

A new report from Variety shares a piece of information from an anonymous “production insider”: the 10 episode first season of House of the Dragon managed an average per episode budget somewhat under $20 million. This is cited as a great achievement given rising production costs and the greater number of dragons that will need to be CGed in the series. Variety reports:

[T]he production insider says HBO is now so adept at these world-building series through years of not just GoT, but also producing Westworld”and His Dark Materials, that the team can make a high-quality series as efficiently and effectively as possible.

By way of comparison, the final season of Game of Thrones cost somewhere in the vicinity of $15 million an episode.

A dragon egg on the verge of hatching accompanies the announcement from HBO that House of the Dragon will premiere on August 21st of this year. Along with the poster, HBO has also sent out eight new images featuring a variety of characters from the series, that you can see below.

With a ten episode run, that means it’ll end on October 23rd… just two days prior to the release of The Rise of the Dragon. Interesting timing, that… For more on this informational art book that very much ties in to the events covered by House of the Dragon, see here.

Yesterday, we said that we wanted to make sure we could get the name of all the contributing artists out there, and the team over at Ten Speed Press put that together quickly for us. In total, there are 38 artists who’ve contributed to The Rise of the Dragon, and below you’ll find the full list as well as links to their websites or online portfolios. We’re very proud to have worked closely with all the artists on this one, providing notes, references, etc., and they’ve delivered art that we think will please fans.

The Rise of the Dragon hits shelves in October 2022!

Balerion, the Black Dread, from the cover of The Rise of the Dragon. By Ertaç Altınöz, for Random House

As promised, we can now discuss in more detail our forthcoming book, The Rise of the Dragon, as it has not been posted about at Not a Blog. The book will hit shelves in October, both in the US and in the UK as HarperVoyager announced they’ve picked up the rights (and shown off their own cover).

US Cover of The Rise of the Dragon, by Ertaç Altınöz

Over at Not a Blog, George R.R. Martin has provided fans a lengthy update on The Winds of Winter, HBO’s successor shows, and more… and in the process lets the cat out of the bag regarding one project we here at Westeros.org have been working on for the last couple of years.

We’ll provide a quick summary below:

The Three Chroniclers, by Chase Stone.

A brand new calendar has been announced for 2023: the World of Fire and Blood 2023 Calendar, a departure as it focuses on characters and events first described in The World of Ice and Fire and expanded on in Fire and Blood. Another departure: where previous calendars were single-artist affairs, this one will feature multiple artists, including prior calendar artists Marc Simonetti and Magali Villeneuve, as well as artists new to the calendars such as Chase Stone and René Aigner

Aegon the Conqueror and Balerion destroy Harrenhal, by Marc Simonetti. (This post contains affiliate links to Amazon.)

Random House has revealed their publishing plans for the summer, and fans have noticed that July seems particularly stacked with House of the Dragon tie-ins using Fire and Blood as the focal material.

First, Random House revealed that on July 12th they will publish tie-in editions of Fire and Blood that will feature a cover using photography from House of the Dragon. Second, Random House announced that the 2023 A Song of Ice and Fire Calendar, to release on July 19, will be based entirely on Fire and Blood. And, in a departure from the previous calendars, this will feature an array of artists rather than just one. No word yet as to who has contributed.

Fans may notice these July dates, and speculation has run that the dating relates to the as-yet-unannounced premiere of House of the Dragon.

[Affiliate links to Amazon.com can be found in this post)]

An interesting piece of news via The Hollywood Reporter, as it reveals that Marvel is adapting the first volume of Wild Cards, with the writing work being handled by Wild Cards veteran Paul Cornell and the art by Mike Hawthorne. Titled Wild Cards: The Drawing of the Cards, the first issue will be released in June.

Of course, this is not the first time Marvel has dabbled with Wild Cards...

A sit-down with various media outlets has provided some fresh information from Casey Bloys, HBO’s and HBO Max’s chief content officer, regarding the future of the Game of Thrones franchise, from the release date of House of the Dragon to the status of a number of projects in development. While there’s nothing really concrete, the one thing Bloys committed to is that House of the Dragon is definitely airing this year, but that the conversation has only just now started thanks to the show officially wrapping.

We’ll provide a brief bullet point of the main information that came out of the interview with Bloys:

First announced in 2019, the Game of Thrones Studio Tour in Banbridge, Northern Ireland has now officially opened its doors. The opening ceremony was attended by a number of actors from the series, including Kristian Nairn (Hodor), Natalie Emmanuel (Missandei), and Isaac Hampstead Wright (Bran Stark).

See below for the press release and additional images!

Kristian Nairn (“Hodor”), Nathalie Emmanuel (“Missandei”) and Isaac Hempstead Wright (“Bran Stark”) help to ‘Break the Chains’ for the brand-new Game of Thrones Studio Tour located in Northern Ireland.

Photo courtesy of Game of Thrones Studio Tour