The second season of House of the Dragon is right around the corner, but HBO hasn’t yet ordered a third. The writers are working on it anyway:

The second season of House of the Dragon is just around the corner, but what bout beyond that? This Game of Thrones prequel show is based on the book Fire & Blood by George R.R. Martin, and there’s quite a bit more story to tell before we find out who, if anyone, comes out on top in the battle between the Blacks and the Greens for control of the Iron Throne. After season 2 is over, what about season 3?

Well, the bad news is that it doesn’t sound as though HBO has renewed the show yet, for whatever reason; given how long production takes on a show like this, you’d figure they’d want to get a move on. But that doesn’t mean the producers aren’t planning on it. In a new article about season 2, Entertainment Weekly describes showrunner Ryan Condal and his team as “deep into writing” on season 3, so they’ll at least be ready with a plan should HBO come calling, and I certainly hope they do.

Speaking a couple of years ago, Condal opined that House of the Dragon could run three or four seasons, which sounds about right for this particular story. He didn’t give any new numbers to EW, but did outline his thinking on when to end things. “You certainly don’t want to rush to get to an end, but you also don’t want to overstay your welcome,” Condal said. “You want to find this very satisfying place to go out that ties up enough loose ends and leaves others intentionally open because, as we know, this history marches on for another 150 years to Daenerys.”

House of the Dragon showrunner consulting on A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms

When season 3 does happen, Condal hopes it’ll be easier to make, given that much of season 2 was filmed during simultaneous actors and writers strikes last year. His wish for season 3: “That there’s not another once-in-a-generation event looming over the show, and that we can just happily make a season without external influences slowing us down.”

Even without strikes throwing a wrench into things, a third season of House of the Dragon is still unlikely to come out before 2026, not if HBO hasn’t officially ordered it yet. Again, it makes you wonder why HBO isn’t getting a jump on things like other studios do.

That said, HBO does have a plan for a return trip to Westeros while we wait for new seasons of House of the Dragon. Next year, it will premiere A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, a new series set decades after the end of House of the Dragon but decades before the events of Game of Thrones. Based on George R.R. Martin’s Dunk and Egg novellas, the show will follow a knight and his squire as they wander the Seven Kingdoms having adventures. With no dragons or White Walkers anywhere in sight, it’ll be a lower stakes story set in Westeros.

A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms is being written by Martin as well as Ira Parker, who worked on the first season of House of the Dragon. Ryan Condal says that he’s serving as an “Obi-Wan Kenobi” type for Parker, giving advice as needed. “I appear to Ira as a ghost every once in a while and counsel him,” Condal quipped.

There’s also talk about another Game of Thrones prequel series in the works about Aegon’s Conquest, although no one’s pulled the trigger on that yet. “People are picking my brain all the time,” Condal said when asked if he knew anything about that one. “It’s very early days, but we shall see.”

But that’s all in the future. For now, House of the Dragon season 2 premieres on HBO and Max on Sunday, June 16.