In a series like Game of Thrones and the upcoming prequel series House of Dragons, there’s an epic amount of mythos and lore to be covered. With House of Dragons taking place 200 years before the original series, nods and references to things to come are of course going to be sprinkled in. One of those appeared to be the catspaw dagger that Arya Stark had when she killed the Night King. Except that wasn’t the dagger that Olivia Cooke, who plays Alicent Hightower on the Game of Thrones prequel, is holding in the trailer.
On a set visit back in December, Entertainment Weekly was told by set designers and other individuals that this sort of thing is going to happen. Showrunner Ryan Condal, who co-created House of the Dragon with A Song of Fire and Ice creator George R.R. Martin, expanded on that with EW. “There’s a ton of shared history here,” Condal explained. “There’s gonna be a lot of linkage in terms of places you go and buildings you see,” he continued. “That’s 200 years before the original show. So there’s gonna be a ton of shared imagery.”
The dagger was first shown in Season 1 of Games of Thrones during an assassination attempt on Bran Stark. The attempt is thwarted by Bran’s mother Catelyn, and his direwolf, Summer. Following this incident, Catelyn shows the dagger to a small group of allies. It is made with a dragonbone hilt and a Valyrian steel blade, which is significant as whoever had ordered the attack must be someone of wealth.
Condal also acknowledges the rarity of Valyrian steel, even in the time that House of Dragon takes place. “It’s a technology that doesn’t exist anymore. Their blades are not made anew,” he says. “So all the Valyrian steel is a fixed number of assets in the world. Even in a time when Targaryens are in power, they themselves as Targaryens are not able to make Valyrian steel.”
He continues with how it is believable that something that did exist in the original show would’ve existed here, but “perhaps in a slightly different packaging.”
House of the Dragon premieres exclusively on HBO on August 21.
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