Kit Harington and the return to Westeros: a movie asks viewers to cheer the conquerors

In a living room where the remote is never far from a well-worn box set, kit harington becomes a shorthand between friends for what “Game of Thrones” once felt like: intimate scenes that still carried the weight of armies, borders, and inheritance. Now the conversation has shifted to a different kind of anticipation—Warner Bros. developing a feature film in George R. R. Martin’s fantasy world, set around Aegon I Targaryen’s conquest of Westeros.

What is the new “Game of Thrones” movie about?

The project in development at Warner Bros. is set around Aegon I Targaryen’s conquest of Westeros. The story, as described in Martin’s lore and referenced in his books The World of Ice & Fire and Fire & Blood, centers on Aegon arriving from Dragonstone with three dragons—Balerion, Vhagar, and Meraxes—and demanding that the kings of Westeros submit. When several refuse, he burns castles and armies until they surrender, uniting six of the seven kingdoms.

Warner Bros. is officially developing the film with writer Beau Willimon, credited for work on Andor and House of Cards. In parallel, the same conquest story is also in early development as a series at HBO, setting up two different approaches to the same pivotal moment.

Why is it hard to make Aegon’s Conquest a heroic story?

The obstacle is baked into the premise. In Martin’s established lore, the Targaryens do not win because they are outnumbered rebels or scrappy underdogs; they win because they possess three colossal flying weapons that tilt the geopolitical balance of the continent the moment they arrive. The conquest, in its plainest outline, is a campaign of enforced submission powered by dragonfire.

That creates a narrative problem for a modern blockbuster: audiences often prefer protagonists who struggle upward against a stronger force, not a ruling dynasty that arrives with overwhelming military superiority. Any screenplay adapting Aegon’s Conquest would face a choice—either ask viewers to follow a conqueror as the central figure, or reframe the story so it plays as something other than imperial expansion.

For fans who still measure the franchise by the human stakes they associated with kit harington, the tension is especially sharp. The emotional memory of the series is tied to individuals navigating systems larger than themselves. A story defined by conquest risks flipping that dynamic: the system is the protagonist.

Who is shaping the project, and what else is happening in the franchise?

The film is being developed by Warner Bros. with Beau Willimon attached as writer. Beyond the movie, HBO has multiple projects in motion. Two series connected to the broader world are described as currently on the air: House of the Dragon, which is set to return for season three this summer (ET), and A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, which is working on a second season. An animated take on the Sea Snake character is also mentioned as being in the works at HBO.

Within the internal timeline, Aegon’s Conquest sits far earlier than the other recent stories. It takes place roughly 100 years before the events of House of the Dragon and roughly 300 years before Game of Thrones. The conqueror at the center is Aegon I Targaryen, whose rise is tied to his sisters Visenya and Rhaenys—also described in the lore as his wives—and their dragons: Balerion (ridden by Aegon), Meraxes (ridden by Rhaenys), and Vhagar (ridden by Visenya).

The film’s development also arrives amid uncertainty around the studio itself: Warner Bros. is described as being “up in the air” given an expected sale to Paramount Skydance. David Ellison, described as the Paramount boss, has cited Game of Thrones as his favorite HBO show when asked, a remark read as a positive signal for the franchise’s prospects.

What solutions are available for a story built on “the baddies” winning?

The conquest narrative offers spectacle—dragons, castles, and a continent being reshaped—but spectacle alone does not answer the emotional question: who is the audience meant to stand with? One approach is structural: place the human cost at the center and let power be the pressure rather than the hero. Another approach is tonal: treat “unification” as contested, not automatically virtuous, and allow the drama to arise from what submission requires of both rulers and the ruled.

Institutionally, the franchise already has the machinery to attempt different solutions. A film can compress the story into a single, high-impact arc; a series at HBO can linger on consequences, competing perspectives, and the slow grind of political reality. The fact that rival versions have been considered underscores that the key challenge is not what happens—much of it is established lore—but how a new adaptation chooses to make those events feel.

Back in that living room, the talk circles to what the future of Westeros is supposed to provide: not just bigger dragons, but a reason to care when the fire falls. If the next chapter is to resonate with viewers who still anchor their memories in kit harington, the coming movie will have to do something harder than scale up. It will have to translate conquest into character—without pretending conquest is something it isn’t.

Image caption (alt text): “kit harington fans discuss the new Game of Thrones movie set during Aegon’s Conquest. ”