♪ (INTENSE MUSIC PLAYS) ♪
RHAENYRA TARGARYEN: Everyone says Targaryens are closer to gods than to men.
But they say that because of our dragons.
Without them, we're just like everyone else.
What we really tried to do was create a world where dragons existed.
At this point in the history,
there have never been as many dragons in the world
since the time of Old Valyria,
when there were a thousand dragons alive.
That's quite a lot of dragons.
But, you know, dragons are born, dragons die, dragons hatch.
MIGUEL SAPOCHNIK: George really wanted the dragons to be colorful.
I thought it was great, the idea that dragons are reptiles.
And if you look at reptiles,
they traditionally have very, very colorful coats.
RYAN J. CONDAL: In the original series,
dragons hadn't lived, at that point, for 150 years.
And when they're born, it's this miracle.
Blood of my blood.
CONDAL: Whereas in our world,
not everybody has seen a dragon, but they are around.
And they certainly, if you live in King's Landing,
you've seen many of them fly overhead.
The core of any Targaryen is a dragon.
PADDY CONSIDINE: They're extremely powerful, and without them,
we would not be the house that we are.
DAVID HANCOCK: They are treated with fear and reverence and awe.
But they're also used as threats.
There's a kind of détente that exists when
a force has such an overwhelmingly dominating power, like dragons.
SAPOCHNIK: They are weapons of mass destruction.
The reason that the Targaryens are considered as being closer to gods
is because of their dragons.
GEORGE R. R. MARTIN: You've got the dragons.
Are you going to use the dragons?
Are you going to burn entire cities and armies, or try to?
Dragon!
That's a big step for any king or lord or claimant to try to take.
Woo!
We also want to have the dragons be their own characters.
CONDAL: The first dragon you meet is Syrax,
which is Rhaenyra's dragon,
who at this point is a young adult.
Syrax was hatched to Rhaenyra when she was a child.
I think the dragons that are born to their riders
have a shared, deeper bond than any of the other dragons.
-(SYRAX ROARS) -(YELLING)
CONDAL: We kind of approached her like a bird of prey.
So she's an eagle, she's build for speed,
she's very proud and honorable.
(SYRAX ROARS)
MARTIN: Caraxes, the Blood Wyrm, Daemon's dragon,
is quite another thing.
Vicious, some would say.
Short tempered.
Maybe the dragon and the rider have a little in common there.
Save me! (PAINED GROAN)
MARTIN: Caraxes has burned a lot of people and seen a lot of battles,
and has earned that name of the Blood Wyrm.
MARTIN: Another major dragon, I think,
that you would have to say is, of course, Vhagar.
CONDAL: Vhagar is the oldest, largest dragon in the world.
Certainly the largest dragon you've ever seen on Game of Thrones.
MARTIN: Queen Alicent's second son, Aemond, claims Vhagar.
And act that actually enflames the dislike
between the two branches of the family even more.
Vhagar is kind of old and falling apart a bit.
(VHAGAR GRUMBLES)
CONDAL: The way we've approached dragons in this story
is to say that dragons never stop growing.
They essentially grow until they die.
And part of their death cycle is getting too large, too big for the world.
And Vhagar is so large that she doesn't really fit anywhere anymore.
In our story, she doesn't even fit in the Dragonpit anymore
because she's grown so large.
And that's created a bit of a loner personality to her.
And she's very grumpy, she sleeps a lot.
You know, she's like an old cat.
(SYRAX ROARS)
Dohaeras, Syrax.
What we did a lot of word on was creating dragon infrastructure.
The Dragonpit was meant to be, basically, a stable for dragons.
But dragons being big, it's an enormous structure.
CONDAL: There are dragon keepers to look after and tend to the dragons.
They have their whole, own culture and mythos to them.
There's dragon saddlery.
So saddles are built to hold the dragons.
Dragon eggs are the gateway to power.
New offspring in the Targaryen line receive a dragon egg in the cot.
Hopefully that hatches,
and then they will be sort of joined for the rest of their life.
SAPOCHNIK: I think it's quite interesting,
the way that the dragon eggs are describes as
only being partially successful in hatching.
That is, half of them don't ever actually hatch.
You've come for the egg. Here it is.
MARTIN: The story of House of the Dragon
is a character-driven story with a lot of dragons.
Everybody knew that if you messed with the Targaryens, you would get the dragon.
So nobody dared to overthrow them.
And at this time, the only thing that could tear down
the House of the Dragon was itself.
Fire is such strange power.
Everything that House Targaryen possesses is owed to it.
Yet, it has cost us both what we love.
Dracarys.
♪ (MUSIC CLIMAXES) ♪