Game of Thrones cancelled spinoff: Bloodmoon pilot resurfaces as future of House of the Dragon confirmed

Following the success of Game of Thrones, and the first spinoff series House of the Dragon, several other Westeros-set shows were planned, and Bloodmoon saw a pilot made, but was eventually cancelled by HBO.

Bloodmoon was to be set during the Age of Heroes 8,000 years before the events of Game of Thrones, and tell the story of the dawn of the White Walkers and the first Long Night, when winter lasted for an entire generation and White Walkers threatened to destroy all life on the continent.

These events occur before The Wall was constructed and the Night’s Watch founded - both of these were a response to the repelled White Walker threat. Parts of the period are glimpsed very briefly in Game of Thrones, and many fans were excited to see the period developed in a full spinoff. In the end the show was scrapped, but recently images from the pilot have resurfaced online, reminding fans of what they could have had.

Why was Bloodmoon cancelled?

Game of Thrones author George RR Martin, who is still yet to complete his penultimate A Song of Ice and Fire novel, The Winds of Winter, was concerned about the lack of source material for the concept.

Despite these concerns the project went ahead into pre-production in 2018 and a pilot was even shot with Naomi Watts, John Simm, Georgie Henley, Jamie Campbell Bower, and Miranda Richardson in the cast. 

However, in the end HBO decided that, despite the strong cast and compelling premise, the series didn’t have the right feel, and the prequel was cancelled in 2019. Instead, work on House of the Dragon, based on Martin's history of the Targaryen’s, Fire and Blood, got into gear.

Is House of the Dragon season 2 still happening?

Yes, HBO may have ummed and ahhed over the first planned Thrones spinoff, but once House of the Dragon got going, the network decided that it had another hit on its hands.

House of the Dragon is based on a couple of chapters of Martin’s Fire and Blood which cover the Targaryen ivil war for control of the Seven Kingdoms known as the Dance of the Dragons. The events depicted in the show take place around 150 years before Game of Thrones, making the series much closer to the original series than Bloodmoon would have been.

Not only is House of the Dragon season two happening, it has already been filmed and is expected to be released in August 2024. Additionally, Martin, the show’s creator and writer, confirmed that a third and fourth season of the show are in the works.

It is expected that House of the Dragon will run for a total of four seasons, each ten episodes long and will culminate with the end of the Targaryen civil war.