After much anticipation, House of the Dragon delivered its first episode and it’s safe to say people tuned in to see if it was worth all the hype. Although the show’s quality is subjective - for what it’s worth, the consensus is House of the Dragon is off to an excellent start - the numbers don’t lie. HBO claims that the Game of Thrones spinoff posted historic numbers as nearly 10 million viewers (9.986 million, to be exact) watching House of the Dragon on both the cable networks and HBO Max in the United States. In addition to this, HBO revealed that the premiere of House of the Dragon brought renewed interest in the original series as the streaming numbers of Game of Thrones spiked during the months of July and August. Audiences still haven’t forgiven David Benioff and D. B. Weiss for what they did to the last two to three seasons of Game of Thrones. To make matters worse, George R.R. Martin went out and admitted that he had little to nothing to do with Game of Thrones anymore except for creating the source material. But, the good news is that Martin is more heavily involved this time around. House of the Dragon credits Martin as one of its executive producers and creators, implying that everything we’re about to see in House of the Dragon, as well as its still-unconfirmed second season, will have the blessing of the author. Regardless of how things will turn out, one thing is for sure - Christmas has come early for all the fantasy fans out there.
