After House of the Dragon, HBO’s projects include new live action series, but also cartoons. At least three are in the works, including one that will recount the legendary voyages of the Sea Snake, Corlys Velaryon.
We do not know today what will be the next series taking place in the universe of Game Of Thronesand which will therefore succeed House of the Dragon — of which season 2 arrives in the summer of 2024. On the other hand, we now know that HBO is increasingly looking towards animation to tell new stories taking place in Westeros, rather than live action.
This is George RR Martin, the writer behind the romantic saga of Iron Throne, which lifted a very small part of the veil covering the American channel’s reflections on “the after”. In a blog post published on December 31, 2023 on his personal website, the American author counted three animation projects. However, nothing says that they will all complete their development.
The rumors in the corridor have so far evoked only one cartoon, as well as four other live action series (these are not guaranteed to succeed either). It is HBO that will ultimately determine which script has the best chance of achieving critical and audience success, taking into account in particular the cost necessary to bring the story to the screen.
Less expensive projects to finance
The choice of animation can be a convenient solution to continue to benefit from the public’s attraction to the universe of GoTbut at a lower cost.
The production budget for the first season of House of the Dragon amounted to nearly $200 million, or an average of just under $20 million per episode, Variety reported in 2022. In comparison, the amounts for an animated series generally range from 6 to 12 million euros, according to Le Figaro in 2021.
These sums give an order of magnitude, but exceptions exist: for the series Arcana for example, it was reported by the French newspaper an estimated expenditure of between 60 and 80 million euros for six hours of content (there are, in total, nine episodes). This, without including the entire budget for marketing, which also applies to live action series.
It is impossible to know today what resources HBO would put into one of these cartoons, nor what graphic style would be chosen. We can assume that there would be at least partial use of 3D, a process that is found more and more commonly in modern animated series. To return to the case ofArcanathere was a 2D/3D mix.
The story of Sea Snake becomes a cartoon
Among the three projects mentioned by Martin, there is one whose outlines have been roughly mentioned: it is Nine Journeys (Nine Journeys). Behind this working title, there is the project to tell the marine adventures of Sea Snake, the nickname of Corlys Velaryon, the lord of House Velaryon of Lamarck.
Initially, it was planned to carry Nine Journeys in a live action series — a choice all the more justified since the character of Corlys Velaryon already exists in flesh and blood in House of the Dragon. The actor who plays him is Steve Toussaint. Corlys Velaryon is arguably one of the most famous sailors, and his fleet was the largest in his time.
This switch from live action to animation is validated by Martin and above all justified for budgetary reasons. “ Budgetary constraints would probably have made a live-action version prohibitive, as half the series takes place at sea and a different port must be created each week, from Lamarck to Lys via the Basilisk Islands, Volantis , Qarth and… well, again and again and again. There’s a whole world there », he explains.
As for the other two series, the work “ however continues at a sustained pace », assures the writer, without saying more.
The choice of animation to develop stories without blowing the budget (even if it can also cost a lot of money to produce) is a path taken by other major pop culture licenses. This is the case of Star Wars (The Bad Batch Or Tales of the Jedi among the latest projects), from Marvel (What If) or The Lord of the Rings (War of the Rohirrim).
It is also a way of occupying other segments, by developing the universe of Iron Throne the license beyond novels and series, to also try to reach another audience, in addition to fans. Game of Thrones already existed in comics, derivative stories, role-playing games, card games and other derivative products. A cartoon will be a first.
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