House of the Dragon is off to a strong start. The Game of Thrones prequel series debuted last night, Aug. 21, and currently holds an 88% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes. House of the Dragon stars Paddy Considine, Emma D’Arcy, Matt Smith, Steve Toussaint, and Olivia Cooke. The series focuses on House Targaryen 200 years before the events of Game of Thrones, showing the family at the height of their power just before civil war and chaos ensues.

We called the series a ‘bloody promising start’ that ‘roars out of the gate with sex, violence, and political intrigue galore.’ House of the Dragon was reminiscent of Game of Thrones while maintaining a level of separation from its initial series that justified its existence. The show is based on the 2018 historical book by George R. R. Martin, Fire & Blood.

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HBO recognizes the success of House of the Dragon and the eagerness of fans to jump back into the Thrones universe. This should open the door for future spinoffs to receive the greenlight, something Martin is quite enthusiastic about. The author tells the New York Times he knows not all the upcoming spinoffs will make it to air, but ‘I hope several of them do.’

Martin Compares the Thrones Universe to The Mary Tyler Moore Show

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No, the plots of The Mary Tyler Moore Show and Game of Thrones aren’t similar. However, that doesn’t stop George R.R. Martin from comparing the two projects, saying he wants to flesh out his world similarly. He tells the New York Times he would ’like to see a range in our shows.’

“Well, we are developing a number of other spinoffs. There’s the Jon Snow sequel show, and the rest are all prequels. There’s ‘Ten Thousand Ships’ about Nymeria — that’s like a thousand years before and about how the Rhoynar came to Dorne. That’s an ‘Odyssey’-like epic. There’s the nine voyages of Corlys Velaryon, the Sea Snake. That would take us to places in the world that we’ve never seen. We have some animated shows going, one of which was set in Yi Ti, which is basically the fantasy version of Imperial China or the Far East. We got a terrific script on that. Obviously, not all these shows we’re developing are going to make it to air, but I hope that several of them do.”

HBO has already seen one failed spinoff in the Thrones universe with the Long Night prequel starring Naomi Watts, which never saw the light of day. However, with the success of House of the Dragon, the future may be bright in Westeros and the lands beyond the Narrow Sea.

“I do like what Marvel is doing because I like the variety of the shows. Another model that I think was interesting was the old ‘Mary Tyler Moore Show.’ That show generated a number of spinoffs: There was ‘Rhoda,’ about her friend. Phyllis got her own show. And the one that really excited me was ‘Lou Grant.’ They took this character from a sitcom and they made him the hero of a serious journalism show. That’s pretty amazing to take a character who is a comic foil and make him the center of a serious show. I’d like to see a range in our shows.”