George R.R. Martin Signs Massive Five-Year Overall Deal With HBO (Exclusive)
The 'Game of Thrones' author strikes a long-term deal with HBO worth mid-eight figures.
www.hollywoodreporter.com
I listed the supposedly planned shows below, by order of my own interest level, because I'm the OP and can do that:) And I mention also the diversity potential in the casts because let's face it; this matters for these shows to reach a broader audience which I think they should.
Dunk & Egg
Set around 90 years before AGoT.
Hopefully going from the very start all the way to "The Tragedy Summerhall". I think this story is all about how much Duncan sacrificed to live his "dream" of being a knight, sacrificing too much in the process out of loyalty to Egg/Aegon. It starts off with Egg and Duncan traveling around on adventures, but eventually Aegon becomes king so it starts to settle down into King's Landing politics.
It would feature Aemon (the old maester at the Wall for those who don't know the books, much younger of course), Bloodraven (The Three Eyed Raven in the show, before he became the Three Eyed Raven), possibly a young Old Nan (the old woman who tells Bran a scary story in AGoT), and Duncan is rumored as being an ancestor of Brienne, let's just say the big guy was quite popular with the ladies. Jenny of Oldstones would likely also be covered as it ties directly into the Tragedy of Summerhall (for those who only watched the show, she is the Jenny of Jenny's Song which Podrank sang at the end). It would also likely feature the Ghost of High Heart as part of Jenny's story, who wasn't in the show but is in the books. Oh and also a 16 years old Barristan Selmy (old knight that joined Daenerys).
This is definitely what could be the most AGoT-like show. In the published books, it's currently very much a two-characters-traveling-around story, but they are expected to go to Winterfell in "The She-Wolves of Winterfell", which is supposedly about a time when no male heirs exist for the Stark line and a few women are vying for heirdom but being set aside. Likely ties into the whole Bael the Bard story and all that. Later on, it would be heavily King's Landing-focused, with Aegon as king, familiar house names returning, etc. I think this show has the best potential of all with a bit of clever rewriting for the early bits.
One pitfall is that there isn't much potential diversity-wise other than on the gender front.
The 9 Sea Voyages
Corlys Valerion traveling around the world, set around 250 years before AGoT.
I have to imagine this would feel a bit like Black Flag. Would cover Corlys sailing to various locations around the world. Unclear what the story would be about exactly.
Could be fun. Could be costly to make, lots of different locations to film in but they could stick to fewer per season if they spread out the voyages across many seasons. Supposedly headed by Bruno Heller of HBO's Rome. Since they have cast Steve Toussaint to play Corlys in House of Dragon, this show would have him as the lead character. Difficult to come up with an interesting premise for a wide audience if he is always on the move, as it would lead to too many characters and lack focus, but I don't care personally, I am really interested either way. I think The Mandalorian's serial-like approach would probably be a good fit in this context, where you do have one big overarching plot but made up of smaller self-contained stories, but again the popularity of a show like AGoT stood on recurring characters and locations, keeping things fairly simple.
Probably the show with the highest diversity potential, so the less favorable points would be offset somewhat by that, we could even have travels to Yi Ti (sort of Asia-like). Another potential pitfall is Orientalism, as Essos is plagued with it in the books (think the diner scene with the monkey brains in Temple of Doom), but nothing the writers can't course-correct, as George hasn't actually published this story, so they have a lot of leeway either way.
House of the Dragon
Presumably starting a few decades after Aegon's conquest of Westeros, so 250 years before AGoT, like the 9 Voyages, and would feature Corlys as a main character too.
Pretty much Dysnasty + Game of Thrones, or so I expect it to be; lots of family drama, lots of war. Full grown dragons involved. Could cover many decades if not all the way into Dunk & Egg. It would certainly make sense to do D&E after this show.
It would cover some Targaryen family drama and the Dance of Dragons, which was a war of succession. One potential issue I have with this story is that they'll throw under the rug the racist slant of the Targaryens (they are literally "Aryans" with the whole blood purity thing, sort of George's comment on Tolkien's Elves being secret-racists), but considering they have cast Steve Toussaint as Corlys Velaryon maybe they actually plan to bring that up instead of ignoring it, as that means we would have a black man married into the Targaryen line. I really don't like the idea of ignoring that aspect of the Targs when the whole notion of "Othering" is at the core of what will likely make people prefer Cersei over Daenerys and her "foreigners" no matter how evil Cersei is in the books: the real "others" to the average Westerosi is not the White Walkers (boogey men no one will ever see or even believe to exist), it's the scary dragon queen and her army of brown people who they see as barbarians and slaves because they have the wrong perspective, so having the Targs be racist would be an interesting highlight of how Daenerys was different.
Low diversity potential on the surface, but not if they actually go with what I said regarding Corlys, and they can add a lot more characters from Essos and Dorne as travelers/merchants/etc. even if they might be secondary, there's plenty of potential to bring diversity, it would just suck if they pretended Westerosis aren't racists because, bullshit, don't side-step the issue. We'll see!
Nymeria
This would be set way back before Aegon's conquest, around 700 years, so almost 1000 years before AGoT.
This would be about Nymeria's conquest of Dorne (in the show, that was the bit with Doran and the Sandsnakes). To make a brief a summary: she leads her people out of Essos and into Westeros on thousands of ships to escape doom, so they sail around from here to there and finally settle in Dorne which they conquer, leading to the establishment of House Martell, the one you saw in the show ruling Dorne. Something like that, basically read her wiki if you want more info https://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/Nymeria I would see it as maybe more sword & sandals in feel, akin to Rome.
Probably the second show with the most diversity potential after 9 Voyages. You have Dorne which is Mediterranean-North-African-like, you have potentially the Summer Islands which are from my understanding Caribbean-like, the Basilisk Isles are basically West Africa from what I understood.
Flea Bottom
The rundown part of King's Landing. No idea when it would be set or what it would be about. Probably Breaking Bad or Peaky Blinders meets AGoT.
Good diversity potential as King's Landing is the capital of Westeros, you can have people from anywhere really.
Some animated shows
No details yet. I could see them reviving the abandoned Blood Moon project that dealt with the Others (White Walkers)' origin, thousands of years ago. Anything goes with anime, no limits.
But what about the books???
So George by now has a team working for him to handle a lot of "stuff", and I believe he will travel much less than he has in the past. It may be that some existing projects of his are coming to an end (not the books) and his team has grown, he delegates more, and as a result of the pandemic he feels he can do more while staying home. I wouldn't panic.
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