HBO’s penny pinching is part of House of the Dragon’s disappointing second season

Key Takeaways

• Season 2 lacks action, leaving key characters stuck in repetitive dialogue for many episodes.
• The season 2 finale received the second lowest rating in the show’s history, in part due to budget constraints.
• HBO is investing heavily in “House of the Dragon,” making it one of the most expensive TV shows, but budget decisions may affect the quality of the show.

The disappointing second season of House of the Dragon has begun.

The game had only one battle all season and had no other game. Meanwhile, the show’s main characters were left treading water for much of the season. Daemon spent the season manipulating the ghosts in Harrenhal, and Rhaenyra spent most of the second season repeating the same dialogues, trying to find any way to avoid the war. It was a far cry from what we expected at the end of the first season, when we thought that the Dark Ones would get their revenge after Lucery was eaten by Vhagar.

It all culminated in the second lowest rated finale of all seasons of House of the Dragonagain Game of Thrones, with House of the Dragon’s second season finale currently sitting at 50% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, narrowly edging out Game of Thrones’ infamous eighth season finale at 47%. So what went wrong with one of HBO’s best shows? Series producer Ryan Condal offered his own reason for the disappointing season: lack of budget.

Something was missing from the ending

Hour-long trailer for season three

After the conclusion of the second season, the producer of the House of the Dragon show, Ryan Condal, held a virtual press conference with several journalists. He addressed some of the major criticisms the show’s latest season has received. He even admitted that the end of the second season seemed to have a bad weather, revealing that they made the difficult decision to push the naval battle, known as the Battle of the Gullet in the books, to the beginning of the third season rather than filming it in the second season. . He then explained the reason why that decision was driven by budget decisions, saying, “One of the challenges of doing television on any scale. [is] no one has infinite time and resources. When you’re a gamer, you’re always in a situation where you have to balance the story with the resources you have to tell that story.”

So Condal says that the lack of budget is the reason why the second season ended quietly. Is that a valid argument though? The second season of House of the Dragon was rumored to cost HBO upwards of $20 million per episode. That’s after the first season cost the network $16 million per episode. In terms of pure cost, that compares to other major chains. The fifth season of Yellowstone cost $12 million per episode and the latest Walking Dead spin-off, The Ones Who Live, cost $13 million per episode. There’s also Netflix’s Stranger Things, which cost $30 million per episode in its fourth season, and Amazon’s Rings of Power series, which reportedly cost $58 million per episode. Comparing how much it costs to make these shows doesn’t tell the whole story though.

HBO is paying big for House of the Dragon

House of the Dragon is a more expensive project than other shows

Game of Thrones helped make television stand out. It’s the kind of content that was almost exclusively reserved for movies. That’s why its development process shares more similarities with blockbuster movies than other TV shows. Fight scenes with hundreds of extras and expensive CGI creatures, such as dragons and werewolves, were not uncommon to watch on Sunday nights at 9pm before Game of Thrones. Even a series like The Walking Dead, which can require huge sets, extreme makeup and costumes, and the usual CGI scene, does not compare to the scope that HBO tried to pull off with Game of Thrones, by filming in real castles around. the world. Stranger Things and Rings of Power can both cost more, but they have built-in costs that House of the Dragon doesn’t have to account for. Stranger Things is paying just $78 million to keep the original cast together for another season, while Rings of Power reportedly had to pay $250 million just to get the rights to make Lord of the Rings out of Tolkien’s realm.

If you subtract those exorbitant costs from Rings of Power and Stranger Things, House of the Dragon may actually be the most expensive TV show currently airing. Still, HBO is clearly cutting corners in hopes of cutting costs at the expense of the story Ryan Condal and the rest of the House of the Dragon crew are trying to tell. This is not unusual, as Game of Thrones showrunners Dan Benioff and David Weiss have often revealed that keeping budget costs low was a factor in the show’s decisions. Jon Snow’s direwolf Ghost was often left on the chopping block to avoid HBO paying to render the big wolf. There are also battles that were kept off-screen in the first series, such as Tyrion leading the mountain families to fight in the first season or Robb Stark’s take on Jaime Lannister. We didn’t see any of those events in the first series, but it didn’t feel like we were missing out by not seeing them, which is a real problem.

House of the Dragon is not a game of thrones

The prequel has yet to reach the heights of the original

While budget concerns may have played a role in House of the Dragon’s second season being a disappointment, it’s hard to say that HBO isn’t giving Condal and his team the money they need to succeed. Although the budget played a role in not getting a second season finale, we couldn’t fix what went wrong this season. Fans have reason to say the season didn’t work, but that hasn’t been a problem for Game of Thrones. The original could go on for weeks without a sword being drawn, but every interaction between the characters will leave you on the edge of your seat. This is where House of the Dragon has reached its peak. While there weren’t a ton of action scenes, they were almost as good as any we’ve seen on Game of Thrones, but when House of the Dragon tries to rely on story instead of action, it becomes a show with interesting characters who do nothing. interest.

HBO is increasingly relying on Game of Thrones content. They exist right now seven spin-offs in some way to promote the channel, including A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, a new series hitting HBO in Summer 2025. We may return to Westeros every summer to check out new series in the coming years, but how long will the audience stick around if the shows are mediocre? Already, there is a large section of Game of Thrones fans who have been disaffected due to the disappointing end of the original series. If House of the Dragon continues the downward trend that began in season two, or if A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms disappoints, it’s easy to imagine HBO pulling the plug on more expensive spin-offs.