‘House of the Dragon’ Starts To Lose Its Fire

The new season of “House of the Dragon” is in full swing on TV screens and streaming platforms. On the surface it is very much business as usual. The third season implicitly addresses criticisms that the first two instalments of the “Game of Thrones” spin-off were a bit boring – a lot of talk, not enough fighting or dragons, which is ironic given the title.Now, finally, there is a great deal of CGI-enhanced action. The show kicked off with the suitably grandiose Battle of the Gullet, in which various cast members competed with one another to see who can be the hardest-bitten in the face of vast computer-animated dragons, while the appearance of the estimable James Norton as the absurdly named Ormund Hightower seems set to continue Norton’s entirely commendable run of being the best thing about dodgy shows, as previously evidenced in “House of Guinness,” and “The Trial of Christine Keeler.” James Norton in ‘House of the Dragon.’ Ollie Upton/ HBOThe makers of “House of the Dragon” are at this point aiming not at converts but at the faithful. If lots of portentous talk of fate and destiny and occasionally spectacular moments of bloodshed are your bag, then there will be an awful lot for you to enjoy. It is nice to see what looks like half the British acting profession getting their well-paid moment in the sun. Matt Smith glowers and pouts as Daemon Targaryen, whose blond fright wig is probably the most terrifying thing on screen. There is a supporting cast of thespians who seem to have been plucked from the stages of the National Theater and the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) and given a hefty paycheck to spout dialogue, courtesy of showrunner Ryan Condal, that alternates between the amusingly ridiculous and the straightforwardly ridiculous.This is what lovers of George R.R. Martin’s writing have signed up for, and they are unlikely to be disappointed. In fact, the person who seems most displeased with “House of the Dragon” is Mr. Martin himself, who openly criticized the second season of the show on his website. Referring to various plot points that Condal had changed, he wrote “it’s simplest, yes, and may make sense in terms of budgets and shooting schedules. But simpler is not better.” Mr. Martin also commented that “There are larger and more toxic butterflies to come, if “House of the Dragon” goes ahead with some of the changes being contemplated for seasons three and four.” The implication — that his imprimatur will be removed — was clear.HBO, the company behind the show, have found themselves in the difficult position of trying to keep everyone happy at the same time. They issued a pained statement stating: “Commonly, when adapting a book for the screen, with its own format and limitations, the showrunner ultimately is required to make difficult choices about the characters and stories the audience will follow.” They then added: “We believe that Ryan Condal and his team have done an extraordinary job and the millions of fans the series has amassed over the first two seasons will continue to enjoy it.” In other words, they are backing “Team Condal,” with the potential of displeasing the 800-pound gorilla who created the whole Westeros universe, and whose favor is eagerly sought by showrunners and production companies alike. Away from the screen, Mr. Martin continues to get flak from some readers for not having finished “The Winds of Winter,” the still-unpublished sixth novel in the author’s “A Song of Ice and Fire” series.According to recent reports, Mr. Martin has written more than 1,000 pages, still not enough for many devotees of the saga who demand their literary hero write at a faster pace. He told the New Yorker: “The more readers you have, the harder it is to keep up, and then you can’t get any writing done,” adding that given the close attention, if he didn’t get the rest of his series just right, readers would “come after me with pitchforks and torches.”Testifying to the enduring popularity of the saga, presently everyone from the UK’s RSC to the high-class publishing outfit the Folio Society is getting in on the George RR Martin action. The first play to be based on Mr. Martin’s books, “The Mad King,” is premiering in Stratford-upon-Avon in July. Hopes are high that it will follow the RSC’s “Matilda” — to say nothing of the massively popular “Harry Potter and the Cursed Child” — and eventually make a triumphant trip across the Atlantic, hopefully to thrill Broadway audiences in all perpetuity.If you’ve got a spare $2200 lying around, then you can buy the Folio Society’s 30th anniversary limited edition of “Game of Thrones,” signed by Mr. Martin himself, and, according to the breathless publicity blurb, “from the dragon leather binding to the clamshell box and a limitation label blocked in real gold, every detail has been carefully considered.”Despite this apparent sustained appeal, the question is whether, after the truly disastrous eighth and final “Game of Thrones” season, which aired in spring 2019, as many people still care as they once did. There are various well-sourced explanations for why D.B. Weiss and David Benioff’s once-excellent adaptation of the books went so spectacularly off the rails, after its triumphant debut in 2011. A combination of badly thought-out screenplays, idiotic fan service — let the Mountain fight the Hound? — and, it must be said, the realization that some major members of the cast were simply not up to the dramatic challenges faced by their characters meant that audiences spectacularly turned against both the season and the show.Emilia Clarke in season eight of ‘Game of Thrones.’ Helen Sloan/ HBOThere will, of course, be those who will watch anything that has Mr. Martin’s name attached to it, but many others turned off and have not switched on again. This is reflected in the slight, but consistent, decrease in viewership: 21.5 million global viewer watched the season 3 premiere, down eight percent from the season two premiere. The show lost viewers between its first and second seasons. While this decline might be a shame — there is hokey fun to be had out of the third series of “House of the Dragon.” this year’s rather lighter and less grandiose, if equally violent, “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms” indicated what might be done with a different kind of source material.But it can now be seen that “Game of Thrones” destroyed the show for casual fans, meaning that HBO are now going out of their way to cater to the proper obsessive; those who will be shelling out $2200 for their dragon leather-bound copies of the books signed by their hero and paying these steep prices with apparent good grace.Such people, and their deep pockets, ought to be celebrated. But the rest of us, who aren’t so committed can enjoy James Norton’s scenery-chewing and wonder precisely whatever incestuous or violent twist the show is going to come up with next, while still quietly reflecting that things have gone a bit too far. Ultimately time will tell if Mr. Martin ever finishes his book series, or whether interest in “Game of Thrones” continues to slowly drain away.

‘House of the Dragon’ Starts To Lose Its Fire

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