House of the Dragon is HBO Max’s prequel to the phenomenally popular Game of Thrones series. With Game of Thrones(GoT) remaining the #1 most viewed HBO title of all time, promoting a prequel at first glance may seem like an easy task.
But GoT’s cultural ubiquity was a double-edged sword. While the series has a lot of fans, and is known all over the world, we needed to combat franchise fatigue.
Further complicating matters: House of the Dragon was HBO Max’s first tentpole post the WB-Discovery merger. New CEO David Zaslav needed a calculated programming win to establish confidence in his leadership. In short, HOTD needed to be a hit on par with its predecessor. Our top priority therefore was to make HOTD the #1 subscription driver for HBO Max, motivating enduring popularity for potential audience expansion and achieve new viewing records – the must-see show of 2022.
