Here’s the status of every ‘Game of Thrones’ spinoff in the works

Some of the series in development (which Martin prefers to call “successor shows”) are based on existing stories that the fantasy author has written, while others would feature characters and locales he has created in brand new stories.

So here’s everything we know about all the “Game of Thrones”-related projects that are in development, are rumored to be in development, or returning.

Kim Renfro contributed reporting to a previous version of this article.

“A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms: The Hedge Knight”

HBO announced in April 2023 that the tentatively titled “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms: The Hedge Night,” based on Martin’s “Dunk & Egg” stories, was officially moving ahead.

The show — which the author told Entertainment Weekly in 2016 would be the “most natural follow-up” to the much-loved fantasy series — has been given a straight-to-series order. It’ll be written and executive produced by Martin and Ira Parker, with “House of the Dragon” showrunner Ryan Condal, Vince Gerardis, Owen Harris, and Sarah Bradshaw serving as executive producers.

It will take place almost a century before the events of “Game of Thrones” and focuses on the future Lord Commander of the Kingsguard, Ser Duncan the Tall, and his diminutive squire, the future King Aegon V Targaryen. In April, Variety reported that the series had cast its leads: Peter Claffey as Ser Duncan (“Dunk”), and Dexter Sol Ansell as Aegon (“Egg”). 

The pair’s adventures —  which appear across three novellas in the book “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms” — are known fondly by fans as the “Dunk and Egg stories,” but Martin explained in a blog entry why he and HBO had opted for a different title for the adaptation.

“There are millions of people out there who do not know the stories and the title needs to intrigue them too,” he wrote. “If you don’t know the characters, Dunk & Egg sounds like a sitcom. Laverne & Shirley. Abbott & Costello. Beavis & Butthead. So, no. We want ‘knight’ in the title. Knighthood and chivalry are central to the themes of these stories.”

He added that “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms: The Hedge Night” was a working title, and may be changed before the series lands on screens. Martin speculated that the first season of the series will “most likely” consist of six episodes “though that is not set in stone.”

The greenlighting of the series may have come as something of a surprise to fans as Martin shared on his blog in 2017 that despite his initial enthusiasm for a “Dunk and Egg” show, he was putting the idea on a back burner since he was not yet done writing for the characters.

He wrote at the time: “Eventually, sure, I’d love that, and so would many of you. But I’ve only written and published three novellas to date, and there are at least seven or eight or ten more I want to write.”

“We all know how slow I am and how fast a television show can move. I don’t want to repeat what happened with GAME OF THRONES itself, where the show gets ahead of the books,” he continued. “When the day comes that I’ve finished telling all my tales of Dunk & Egg, then we’ll do a TV show about them, but that day is still a long ways off.”

Martin was of course referencing the way that HBO’s “Game of Thrones” wound up overtaking his published books in the “A Song of Ice and Fire” series, resulting in a divisive final season that may significantly deviate from Martin’s planned (and still unwritten) book ending. 

The Jon Snow spinoff, “Snow”

“Snow,” which would have explored what happened to fan favorite Jon Snow (Kit Harington) after the events of “Game of Thrones,” was set to be the only spinoff in development that is not based on pre-existing material by Martin.

However, Harington told Screen Rant in April 2024 that the series was no longer in development.

“Currently, it’s off the table, because we all couldn’t find the right story to tell that we were all excited about enough,” Harington said. “So, we decided to lay down tools with it for the time being. There may be a time in the future where we return to it, but at the moment, no. It’s firmly on the shelf.”

A representative for HBO declined to comment on Harington’s remarks.

Writing on his blog in June 2022, Martin said that he was involved in the series, but revealed that the idea for the show had actually come from Harington himself.

He explained that Harington “brought the idea to us” and had assembled a “terrific” group of writers and showrunners, although he declined to share their names.

As audiences will remember, in the eighth and final season of “Game of Thrones,” Jon discovered that he was not in fact the bastard son of Eddard “Ned” Stark (Sean Bean), but a potential heir to the Iron Throne as the secret child of Ned’s sister Lyanna Stark and Rhaegar Targaryen. 

He also found himself exiled beyond the Wall to live out his days with the Free Folk after committing regicide by killing the crazed Daenerys Targaryen (Emilia Clarke).

According to Entertainment Weekly, speaking during a panel at a “Game of Thrones” convention in 2020, Harington himself said of Jon’s future: “The fact he goes to the Wall is the greatest gift and also the greatest curse.”

He continued: “He’s gotta go back up to the place with all this history and live out his life thinking about how he killed Dany, and live out his life thinking about Ygritte dying in his arms, and live out his life thinking about how he hung Olly, and live out his life thinking about all of this trauma, and that, that’s interesting.” 

“So I think where we leave him at the end of the show, there’s always this feeling of like… I think we wanted some kind of little smile that things are okay. He’s not okay.”

“Nine Voyages” 

Deadline was the first to report in early 2021 that a spinoff series about the adventures of Corlys Velaryon, also known as “The Sea Snake,” was being developed at HBO with a script from “The Mentalist” creator Bruno Heller and support from Martin himself.

Although an older version of the character was introduced in the first season of “House of the Dragon,” (played by Steve Toussaint), it’s expected he will be recast for the stand-alone series, as it follows a much younger version of the character on his sea-faring journeys to Pentos, Dragonstone and around the bottom of Westeros.

However, speaking to Entertainment Weekly in 2022, Toussaint said he would love to be involved, even if it’s just for a brief scene.”

“If I’m lucky, I might say to them, ‘Let me just be at the beginning [of the show] sitting with a book saying, ‘Let me talk about my life,'” he said. “That’ll be me petitioning.”

However, at the end of 2023, Martin announced that “Nine Voyages” would be moving from live-action to animation, and explained why.

In a blog entry on December 31, he wrote: “Budgetary constraints would likely have made a live action version prohibitively expensive, what with half the show taking place at sea, and the necessity of creating a different port every week, from Driftmark to Lys to the Basilisk Isles to Volantis to Qarth to… well, on and on and on.”

“There’s a whole world out there.  And we have a lot better chance of showing it all with animation,” he added.

“Ten Thousand Ships” and “Flea Bottom”

At the same time that Deadline dropped the news about “Nine Voyages,” it was also announced that another spinoff series titled “Ten Thousand Ships” was being considered at HBO too, alongside another project, “Flea Bottom,” which would be set in the poorest slum district in King’s Landing.

While “Flea Bottom” has since been shelved, it appears that “Ten Thousand Ships” is still going ahead. In an August 2022 interview with The New York Times, Martin stated that the series is set “like a thousand years before” the flagship series and described it as “an ‘Odyssey’-like epic.” 

Martin gave a progress update on the series in a June 2024 blog post, announcing that Pulitzer-winning playwright Eboni Booth was writing a new pilot for “Ten Thousand Ships.” Booth isn’t the first writer to reportedly take a stab at the series: Deadline reported in 2021 that Amanda Segel (“Person of Interest”) was attached to the project, and screenwriter Brian Helgeland told Inverse that he had pitched a script but the series wasn’t picked up at the time. 

“We’re all very excited about this one,” Martin wrote in the June blog post. “Though we’re still trying to figure out how we’re going to pay for ten thousand ships, three hundred dragons, and those giant turtles.”

If it goes ahead, the series will tell the story of warrior queen Princess Nymeria (the namesake of Arya Stark’s direwolf) and the surviving Rhoynars who traveled from Essos to Dorne following their defeat by Valyria and their dragons.

“The Golden Empire”

“The Golden Empire” is the working title for the animated series about Yi-Ti, Martin’s own fantasy version of Imperial China, which has only been briefly mentioned in the “A Song of Ice and Fire” books.

Like “Nine Voyages,” the series will be animated, and according to the author, the early concept art and script for the series are shaping up quite nicely — but caveated that it could potentially be shelved.

Writing on his blog in March 2022, Martin stated that they had “a great young writer” working on the show and described the art and animation he had seen as “beautiful.”

In the same 2022 New York Times interview where he spoke about “10,000 Ships,” Martin shared more. “We got a terrific script on that,” he said of “The Golden Empire.”

However, he added: “Obviously, not all these shows we’re developing are going to make it to air, but I hope that several of them do.”

Untitled Aegon’s Conquest series

Almost a year after Variety reported that a show focusing on Aegon Targaryen and his conquest of Westeros was in early development at HBO, The Hollywood Reporter shared some new details about the series which appears to be actively now heating up.

According to the outlet “The Batman II,” screenwriter Mattson Tomlin is working on the treatment for the series, which does not yet have a title. 

Tomlin will adapt the story of Aegon’s bloody and brutal conquest of the Seven Kingdoms, which Martin wrote about in the first half of “Fire & Blood,” the same book that “House of Dragon” is adapted from.

The story is essentially a prequel to the events of “HoD,” as it details how Aegon successfully unified six of the Seven Kingdoms with his sister wives, Rhaenys and Visenya, and their dragons in just two years.

“House of the Dragon” season two

“House of the Dragon” was the first “Game of Thrones” spinoff series to air, after an untitled prequel series starring Naomi Watts, co-written by Jane Goldman and directed by S.J. Clarkson, was dropped in 2019. 

Its first season hit screens in 2022 and was a huge success. Its premiere episode broke viewership records at HBO and it went on to earn eight Emmy nominations.

Unsurprisingly, a second season was quickly confirmed by the network and will be premiering on June 16, 2024.

In a December 2023 blog entry, Martin stated that while visiting the set of “House of the Dragon” season two, he had discussed the third and fourth seasons of the show with showrunner Ryan Condal and the writing staff. So presumably, “House of the Dragon” won’t be ending anytime soon.