Game of Thrones: Aegon's Conquest in Early Development, GRRM Involved

Summary:

• Aegon’s Conquest is one of potential Game of Thrones prequels that haven’t been greenlit by HBO yet.
• Screenwriter Mattson Tomlin revealed that he’s currently working on the show’s script with George Martin ’s help.
• According to Tomlin, the biggest difficulty with Aegon’s Conquest is that it’s pure history with known facts but unknown context.

Set in George Martin’s massive World of Ice and Fire, Game of Thrones has a vast and yet untapped spin-off potential. Apart from House of the Dragon, there have been countless ideas and projects in discussion over at HBO in the past few years, and one of the most prominent ones — Aegon’s Conquest — is already in early development, with George Martin being actively involved in it.

Aegon’s Conquest’s Writer Gives Update on the Project

Screenwriter Mattson Tomlin isn’t a stranger in the industry by any means. The Terminator franchise, Keanu Reeves ’ BRZRKR, Robert Pattinson ’s The Batman: Part Two — he’s working with many prosperous titles. But the one that specifically tickles Game of Thrones fans’ nerves is Aegon’s Conquest, the potentially upcoming prequel about the greatest Targaryen conqueror who created the Seven Kingdoms.

“[Aegon’s Conquest] is [in its] very early days where I’m currently writing the script, currently doing a lot of great back and forth with George,” the screenwriter told EW, confirming that the show is in active pre-production. It’s still not greenlit, however, as Tomlin is yet to convince HBO of the prequel’s potential: such a huge project would be very costly, so the company’s filtering out most spin-off ideas to minimize risks.

Aegon’s Conquest Must Be Treated Like History

One of the biggest caveats of this spin-off is that it doesn’t have solid source material. There is some information about Aegon’s Conquest in Fire & Blood, sure — but apart from that and George Martin’s personal insights, Mattson Tomlin has next to nothing to go off. But that’s why GRRM gave him rather unique advice.

“In speaking to George, it became really clear, ‘This is history, treat this like it is what happened.’ <...> It kind of turns into doing Napoleon or doing Alexander the Great or doing some great historical figure where we know a lot about the guy, <...> [but] we don’t have the context. We don’t know what anybody said,” Tomlin explained.

This means that there’s much more creative work involved with Aegon’s Conquest than with other Game of Thrones spin-offs, and a lot is left to the writer’s imagination. But hey, we’re always down for some half-fictional historical epics — even more so, when the historical figure is a one-man army with giant dragons by his side.

Source: EW