The ambitious plan to produce the next season of "Game of Thrones" is revealed in "House of the Dragon."

War is inevitable, or at least that is what Daemon Targaryen is counting on.

A meeting to discuss tactics is being held within the torchlit gloom of Dragonstone castle, and the cunningly arrogant prince is leading it.

The menacing Daemon, who was dressed in all black and had long hair that was silver-blonde in color, announced, "I want patrols along the island's perimeter." "Involve the dragon riders in the conflict; they're skilled warriors... besides them, we also have Syrax, Caraxes, and Tyraxes, and..."

A pause is taken by Matt Smith. Remember the name of the fourth dragon, if you please.

"Oh, for the eff's sake!" Smith screams at us. "No motherfucking way! I demand... well, screw it!

Actress Emma D'Arcy, who plays the headstrong princess Rhaenyra Targaryen, is sympathetic. "All the dragons have weird names with Xes in them!" she exclaims.

Smith freely admits that there were times when he seriously considered that he was in charge of naming Santa's reindeer.

The names of the characters in House of the Dragon, which unquestionably includes the dragons themselves as playable characters, have been the subject of debate. Fire & Blood is a 700-page book written by George R.R. Martin that chronicles the history of House Targaryen and its dragon-riding royal family. 

This book serves as the basis for the highly anticipated prequel series to Game of Thrones that will air on HBO. The author strives for authenticity, and real-life dynasties have a tendency to have a lot of names and suffixes that are very similar to one another (England had 11 kings named Edward, after all). So early on in the writing process, Dragon showrunner Miguel Sapochnik pointed out to his fellow showrunner Ryan Condal that unless they started making changes to Martin's mythology, they were going to have, for example, a Princess Rhaenyra and a Princess Rhaenys.

Sapochnik said to Condal, "You know we have to change some names," and Condal nodded.

And in response, Condal said, "We can't."

Which conclusively demonstrated that the production would adhere closely to Martin's original vision when adapting to his complicated world.

Condal explains, "For the past two decades, I've been an avid reader of these books." "I was a fan of Game of Thrones; I watched the pilot episode the same night it aired on HBO, as well as every episode that followed. You won't be able to follow Game of Thrones because it's about The Beatles.

 As a fan, I've set out to create the thing that I want to see, and I'm pleased with what we've been able to accomplish so far. You always heard about this time when they were powerful and numerous and always wanted to see it, and that's how you feel about the Targaryens. They're similar to the Jedi in Star Wars. And now it's your turn to,"

To make the first sequel to what was arguably the most successful show of the 21st century required an epic battle that was almost as high-stakes and dramatic as the show itself. It took years of painstaking effort and a large number of talented writers and executives just to figure out which story to tell from the numerous books that Martin has written about Westeros and Essos. There was an expenditure of hundreds of millions of dollars, but only a few heads were placed on spikes.

And everything kicked off the second Game of Thrones started winding down.

The conflict between the five different pitches

July 2016: HBO had just made the announcement that Game of Thrones would end with an eighth and final season, which was in agreement with the creative plan developed by showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss. The discussion about the network's strategy, which was being led by the company's chief content officer, Casey Bloys, immediately shifted to the topic of which project they could make next that was based on Martin's work.

The objective was not obscure. The atmosphere was one of worry.

HBO might make an effort to establish Game of Thrones as a franchise, similar to what Disney did with Marvel and Star Wars. However, HBO had never produced even a single spinoff series in its then four-decade history, much less a sprawling creative universe, and some employees within the company were concerned that Game of Thrones might only be a one-time phenomenon. 

The show debuted in 2011 as an underdog, but it has since experienced a meteoric rise to become ratings and pop culture phenomenon, as well as the drama with the most Emmy awards won throughout the history of television. A failure to follow Thrones with another successful show would be extremely embarrassing and costly. However, the benefits... well, the benefits had the potential to be absolutely staggering: a content stream of titles that could last for decades and bring in billions of dollars. 

It's kind of like that hypothetical investment question: If you could either win a guaranteed million dollars or a billion dollars by flipping a coin, which would you choose? The decision was made by HBO to begin tossing coins.

An insider recalls that during the early stages of development, "they were understandably very nervous about failing and not living up to the original series." "I don't think there was much confidence internally [that Game of Thrones was a franchise] because the show was so big and so seminal," said one of the show's producers. For another reference visit here cincinnatiwire.com

 Francesca Orsi, executive vice president of drama for HBO, reflects, "We saw it as an opportunity to keep telling great stories, but not necessarily to try and replace Game of Thrones as the most epic show in the history of television."

The company's headquarters are in Santa Fe. Martin took a flight to Los Angeles in order to meet with executives from HBO. Initially, he presented two different concepts. The first of these was a series based on his relatively humorous Dunk and Egg novellas, which tell the story of a knight and his young squire as they travel throughout Westeros. 

The second book in the series was titled "The Dance of the Dragons," and it told the story of the legendary civil war that took place among Daenerys Targaryen's ancestors. This conflict tore Westeros apart approximately 180 years before the events of "Game of Thrones." According to Martin, "Dance had all the intrigue, competition for the Iron Throne, murders, duels, big battles, and 20 dragons — all of that stuff."

AMANDA EDWARDS/GETTY IMAGES

Dunk and Egg was not picked up by HBO (initially, at least). The executives enjoyed Dance, but they didn't want to put all of their eggs in one basket by betting the future of a potential franchise on a single concept. According to Bloys, "I wanted to give ourselves every chance there was to be successful." You don't want to say things like, 'We're going to replace the most successful show of all time, and it's all going to rest on one script.'"

Following an investigation into Martin's body of work, the network came up with approximately 15 different ideas for potential prequels. HBO held meetings with a wide variety of writers in order to fill the void left by the fact that the showrunners for Game of Thrones, Benioff and Weiss, had refused to participate in any spinoffs. Bloys claims, "We tried everything there is to try." "There was not a single idea that was too out there."

Well, there is one possibility: a series concept that has the feel of a superhero team-up and is based on the idea that the fabled Seven Gods of Westeros are real people. The premise involved following various characters, such as a Father, Smith, Warrior, etc., as they went on adventures and eventually became deities worshipped by the people. A knowledgeable source sarcastically comments, "That didn't get very far."

After much deliberation, a final decision was made to develop five of the concepts. All of them took place in the time before the events of Thrones. This novel approach to a bake-off would become jokingly known on the internet as "The War of the Five Pitches."

One of these attempts was a screenplay written by Max Borenstein (Kong: Skull Island) about the fall of the ancient Targaryen empire of Valyria; another was a take on the Dornish warrior queen Nymeria written by Oscar winner Brian Helgeland (L.A. Confidential); and yet another — much of which has never before been reported — was about Aegon's conquest of Westeros and was written by Rand Ravich and Far Shar In that script, the character that was inspired by William the Conqueror was written as a drunken lout.

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Carly Wray, a writer with experience scripting dark fantasy dramas such as Westworld and Watchmen, was the first person that HBO approached for the Dance project. However, Wray and Martin were unable to come to an agreement on when in the complex and drawn-out timeline of Targaryen history the story should start.

 In Martin's book, it states that "Wars Often Begin in Times of Peace," and demonstrating that transition was very important to Martin as he wrote the book. But this course of action would result in a series that spanned multiple generations; and exactly how would that be accomplished?

Next up was Bryan Cogman, a co-executive producer on Game of Thrones. Cogman had written a number of critically acclaimed episodes for the first series and knew as much about the franchise as anyone. Insiders say that his interpretation of Dance was solid, but HBO decided not to use it.

HBO's initial reaction was, "How can we subvert [Thrones]?" Sapochnik reflects on the past. "The Dance of Dragons seemed like a natural progression all the way down to the prequel level. I believe that they took it less seriously because they were thinking something along the lines of, "Well, who wants to see more Game of Thrones?" And the irony, of course, is that there are a lot of people."

"The desire at HBO was to not just offer up a sequel that's about the war for the throne," says Condal, who is in agreement with this statement. They wanted to do something that was so radically different from everything else that it would astound everyone. I believe that is the reason why they decided to go with "The Long Night" instead.