The House That Dragons Built

It was some time,

I think in November, Andrij called me,

and, uh, asked me,

"Do you want to come back and do something spectacular?"

And I was like, "Yes, of course!"

I spent Season Two with Vanja,

and what he does as a cinematographer is amazing.

It was really special to have Vanja back.

This is our finale.

We wanted to go out with a bang.

In many ways, Tumbleton is an indicator

of the things to come in the Dance of the Dragons.

Okay, here we go! Everyone ready?

And, three, two, one. Action!

We can make-- We can make the start line here.

Oh, hello, sir. You jump on the, uh,

on the, uh, stake marked there, please.

Tommy will walk to there with the guys.

Then they'll all-- They all take, like four steps.

Yeah.

I mean, this is the ultimate culmination of Ormund's gambit.

And I think he's-- he's played it to the very end.

Ulf hasn't reported.

And he's not with his dragon.

Now the Rivermen have shown up at their gates

and they're gonna go in.

This is a good, proper, old medieval siege.

The art department

kindly sent me a 1/100 scale model of Tumbleton.

First thing we did,

we bought little, uh, figurines.

And we were like playing like two kids

with this model of Tumbleton.

And we're planning how we want to approach,

uh, each particular scene.

It was months of crafting

storyboards and previs and showing it to me,

and we very much assembled the battle in prep,

and were able to plan and shift things

based on how we were seeing it come together.

Jim Clay and his team

built this incredible set on our backlot.

We had an incredible location,

Hankley Common in Surrey, to marry it to.

Jim's great idea of putting

these farmhouses there

really locked everything into a landscape,

and you had a definitive focus

for playing the scenes around that.

Lord, knights,

savages and cutthroats!

Whether you live or die today

you will be remembered in the histories

as those who began the Hightowers' end!

For Daemon's speech, we really wanted to have

a sort of Braveheart moment

where he rallies and inspires not only the troops,

but the audience.

I don't want the best of you! I want the worst!

It's about the sort of magnitude,

but also about the intimacy.

So, getting those wide shots,

but also being in close enough with the camera

to feel Daemon's emotion.

Go now.

And kill them.

Was that fun, Matt?

It was, mate, yeah.

Paul, what are we doing today, Paul?

We're doing-- We're running up the hill with Hugh,

with Chris on focus.

The action's that way, guys.

Okay, speeding and set. Here we go.

And, three, two, one.

Action!

Go!

The Surrey "Tumbleton" part

was very open and expansive.

And probably one of my favorite days shooting is,

you know, joining a battle on an open field.

Action!

Action!

The costume is stunning.

I have discovered over the years filming,

it is incredibly heavy.

We've done six takes so far.

So...

I expect to do--

We're gonna probably do--

How many?

At least 25 more.

Yeah, it was a few goes at that.

And I seem to remember it was just before lunch.

And everyone was getting really hungry

and it's like, come on, hurry up, so...

...away from the ladder as possible.

And then, literally, Bradley can watch that camera,

and as Tommy's halfway,

start the climbing,

he'll be at the top of the ladder

when Tommy comes up.

- Start there. - Yeah, just give us a--

- Shield back. - Just rile the troops.

Again. Yeah?

Everybody ready?

And, three, two, one.

- Action! -

So, this episode required

a tremendous amount of stunt work.

I think at one point, we had

probably all of London's stunts guys

all working on the same show at the same time.

- Action! -

So, we got the siege of Tumbleton.

Um, we have done sieges before.

Not on this scale, though.

This is big scale.

A lot of the A-side of that was done at Hankley Common.

And then we came back to the studio

where Jim Clay and his team have built

this huge set on the backlot.

So, we travel with the Winter Wolves...

...people are getting hit by rocks.

- - And getting hit by arrows.

Then we're going up a ladder with Roddy the Ruin.

Someone comes past him.

We go up the top, he ends up on the battlements,

and then he looks around to see the, uh, hidden moat

that's been set on fire,

which basically captures all of the Winter Wolves

into a kill zone.

- - Nice.

Aaah! Whew!

Rowley really worked to make it feel

quite authentic and quite brutal.

You'll obviously be

- a little bit slow with that. - Slow, yeah.

Yeah, so, imagine it weighs 15kg and not three.

And just feel...

You know? But push it in.

Thanks, guys. This is gonna be great.

Bastard.

I'm not gonna smile.

Don't worry about me teeth.

"That's Tommy Flanagan! Aah!"

I'll keep me teeth away, I promise.

Aaaah!

- Alright, then! - Beautiful!

- See you later. - Oh!

- He's dead. -

- That was right, yeah? - Moving on.

- Right. Lovely. - Well done.

Dracarys!

When you see Caraxes blasting the gates

of Tumbleton with dragonfire,

that was actually practical.

There's this great moment where we burn the door.

And interestingly enough, I just thought

the door's so huge that it's gonna have to be CG.

Like, you know, we have to burst the door open.

And I thought, oh, we're just not gonna get

all that in camera.

Of course, Mike, our amazing special effects guy

is going, like, "Leave it with me."

Three, two, one!

- Flame! -

And so we had a massive flamethrower

on the other side of the door.

You know, bursting through.

So, we got all that real flames coming through.

And what was great was that we shot that with stunt people.

So, we were able to get the stunts

really close to the flames.

It's a deeply satisfying moment

in House of the Dragon lore.

And I think it is a triumph

of all of the different departments on our show.

You know, we wanted to see Daemon

as the great legendary warrior

once again leading at the head of this battle.

And that begins when he storms the gates.

Ormund Hightower!

Here we go, folks. Everyone set?

We're rolling, standby.

Okay, here we go. Ready?

And, three, two, one. Action!

Ryan and I got together early on

and we're like, "Okay,

"Daemon is gonna be at this fight.

"That means the sword Dark Sister

is gonna be at this fight."