AAA<\/p>\n
Kevin de la Noy knows a thing or two about sinking ships. \u201cI\u2019ve got a bit of a cheat on this one,\u201d he says: \u201cI did Titanic.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the late 1990s, de La Noy worked with James Cameron on the ultimate ocean-going catastrophe, overseeing the building of the giant water tank and then the construction (and post-iceberg deconstruction) of Leo and Kate\u2019s doomed liner. But the great battle set-piece that opens the new series of House of the Dragon, he says, is even bigger.<\/p>\n
What does bigger than Titanic look like? On the set of season three of House of the Dragon on the Warner Bros. lot in Leavesden, England, last year, I was granted hallowed access (it\u2019s next to the Harry Potter set, after all) to watch filming of the famed Battle of the Gullet, which will open up the new season. Throne-iacs and readers of George R.R. Martin\u2019s Fire and Blood bestseller will know that the Battle of the Gullet, a remorselessly brutal naval tear-up, is the defining point in the Targaryen civil war between the Greens (who support the claim of Tom Glynn-Carney\u2019s Aegon II Targaryen to the throne) and the Blacks (who support Emma D\u2019Arcy\u2019s Rhaenyra Targaryen).<\/p>\n
Related Article But you don\u2019t have to know anything about House of the Dragon, Game of Thrones or indeed Martin\u2019s entire Westeros medieval fantasy world to see that this sea battle is one big deal. To the untrained eye, the Battle of the Gullet set looks most like a theme park ride.<\/p>\n In a deep water tank 40 metres across, five hydraulic gimbals are pitching and yawing dismembered ships from below, Captain Hook-a-likes are jumping from poop deck to rigging, broadswords are swinging, everything is on fire and no one can see a thing. Film crew waft smoke and spray water guns. Steam rises and blood boils. A tide of silicon corpses floats among the boats. It looks like one heck of a ride.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s controlled chaos,\u201d said Abubakar Salim, who plays Alyn of Hull, a sailor in the Velaryon fleet. \u201cIt\u2019s literally a ship that is breaking apart and moving. You have to really remind yourself that you are in a bloody battle \u2026 because all I\u2019m thinking about is Pirates of the Caribbean.\u201d<\/p>\n Naturally, creating chaos requires total precision. The ships\u2019 movements, as powered by the pumps and gimbals, are all computer-controlled.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have a black box and we sent that out to sea on a sailboat,\u201d says SFX supervisor (and Oscar nominee) Michael Dawson. \u201cIt measures all the degrees of movement so we can then we can come back and put it into our computer system. That will extrapolate those movements and put it into the hydraulics so that what the ship did on that day we can match here.\u201d<\/p>\n Related Article A moving stage, minimal visibility and people running every direction presents obvious challenges for the actors. In rehearsal, Steve Toussaint, as Lord Corlys Velaryon and the commander of the Black fleet, jumps on a moving floor, turns to confront an assailant \u2026 and just falls over.<\/p>\n \u201cWe learnt all the choreography months ago but today was the first time we did it all in front of the cameras,\u201d Toussaint says afterwards. \u201cAnd so yes, I fell. I mean I went down in stages.\u201d<\/p>\n Toussaint pauses to take a drink \u2013 it\u2019s a hot day, despite all the water everywhere. He looks back at the enormous floating balance board that is his office for the day. \u201cIt is about the spectacle: we want people to sit back and go, \u2018Oh my goodness, look at that, how did they do that?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n HOTD\u2019s forebear, Game of Thrones, made its name with a series of increasingly bravura set pieces such as the Battle of the Bastards, and Hardhome, episode-long assaults that redefined what was possible on television. As executive producer, de La Noy understands the Battle of the Gullet will be compared to what has gone before.<\/p>\n \u201cYou have to do better,\u201d he says. \u201cThat\u2019s a minimum requirement, to do better than what\u2019s gone before. We\u2019re well aware of what happened in the Battle of the Bastards but, you know, that\u2019s 10 to 15 years ago, so we have to keep improving.\u201d<\/p>\n Related Article It helps, de la Noy says, that the technology has improved too. \u201cDigital water has come on hugely, so you can add water in there. And also, you\u2019ve got to remember, when we shot Titanic, we were shooting on film. Now we\u2019re shooting on digital. We had 71 stuntmen sliding down that tilting poop deck on Titanic; we don\u2019t need that number now, we can motion capture them, put them in and you will believe it because the level of visual effects has developed so rapidly.\u201d<\/p>\n Though the spectacle is indeed spectacular, it\u2019s still the case that dramas such as House of the Dragon only work over time if they\u2019re founded in character and story. Otherwise, it\u2019s just a video game. Toussaint\u2019s Lord Corlys is, the actor says, precisely the kind of multi-faceted role that keeps viewers interested \u2013 a man and a leader who longs for peace but is bound to war.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen we meet him he is very much trying to fulfil what his wife would have wanted him to do,\u201d Toussaint says. \u201cBecause if you recall in the previous seasons, it is she that has said to him, \u2018No, no, Rhaenyra\u2019s claim is good, we need to help that girl\u2019. Whereas at the end of season one he felt, \u2018Let\u2019s just forget this, let\u2019s just go home and enjoy our riches\u2019. So that\u2019s what he\u2019s got ringing in his ears.\u201d<\/p>\n Unfortunately, happy times, forged alliances and dragons don\u2019t go. Abigail Thorn plays Sharako, commander of the opposing Triarchy fleet who has a vendetta against Lord Corlys.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve talked a lot about the things that she\u2019s seen that have led her to this moment,\u201d Thorn says. \u201cTo the point where she\u2019s risking dragon fire to kill this one guy. And no one\u2019s ever taken a dragon out before until she\u2019s like, \u2018You know what? I can do it\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n Related Article Did someone say dragons? There has been fevered speculation that Syrax, Vhagar and Caraxes may have some new spiny bedfellows.<\/p>\n \u201cThere are new dragons coming in,\u201d de La Noy offeres, before refusing to say any more. \u201cThere\u2019s got to be a cliffhanger somewhere in here!\u201d<\/p>\n There have also got to be bigger themes at play for House of the Dragon to maintain interest. The show has been commissioned for two more seasons, but after that HBO Max has confirmed it will finish.<\/p>\n \u201cWe want to continue exploring the large themes of the show,\u201d says showrunner Ryan Condal. \u201cWhich is the cost and consequence of power and how a person can lead in this world.\u201d House of the Dragon, Condal stresses, is not just about burning boats and slashing swords.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s about women in power, particularly in a feudal society that values women largely as a childbearing vehicle,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd then the bigger concepts that are unique to the show, which, I think, is waging war in an era of nuclear power \u2014 the allegory here being the dragons. Unlike in Game of Thrones here, if somebody makes the wrong move or pushes things too far, civilisation could actually come to an end.\u201d<\/p>\n The stakes couldn\u2019t be higher. Now let battle commence.<\/p>\n House of the Dragon (season three) premieres on Monday, June 22, on HBO Max, with episodes dropping weekly. <\/p>\n Want more TV? We\u2019ve got you.Newsletter: Find out the next TV, streaming series and movies to add to your must-sees. Get The Watchlist delivered every Thursday<\/a>.Best TV of the year (so far): From The Pitt to Widow\u2019s Bay, and ABC comedy Dog Park, these are the shows that have caught our critics\u2019 attention<\/a>.Adults only: Sex work is all over TV right now<\/a>. Which shows are telling the real story?Nick Mohammed: The British comedian has been drafted by SBS for the World Cup. But all we want to know is whether he\u2019ll be back in Ted Lasso<\/a>.Ground Up review: This new ABC comedy about forming an AFL team in Tasmania misses the mark<\/a>.Video: Deputy TV editor Meg Watson on the TV shows she recommends watching right now (below).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Save You have reached your maximum number of saved items. Remove items from your saved list to add…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":743286,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[64,63,134,427],"class_list":["post-743285","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-entertainment","tag-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/743285","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=743285"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/743285\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/743286"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=743285"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=743285"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=743285"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Mabel](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/0823b9d7c8214aced502e7a1966ee6c5003a9606.jpeg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n![\"Salim\u2019s](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/9381ada448961146db0e422a884846c6fe62ef79.jpeg\")
Salim\u2019s Alyn of Hull surveys the carnage in the Battle of the Gullet in\u00a0House of the Dragon.<\/p>\n![\"Starring](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/98bc9ea8accbad06287df2c559608be9a47ae0b0.jpeg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n![\"Abubakar](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/f825e7e9e2417b84d1b7b6ab1919289d27cde254.jpeg\")
Abubakar Salim (left) as Alyn of Hull and Steve Toussaint as Lord Corlys Velaryon in season three of House of the Dragon. <\/p>\n![\"Josh](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/1781739437_953_3c38f6948cc8934e8b74c3a22fa18efa62b58cd2.jpeg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n![\"Yes,](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/2cab9d3d9872c090fa34bbb90758a00a37d808fd.jpeg\")
Yes, there will be dragons in season three of House of the Dragon.<\/p>\n![\"What](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/25850b7f6ae8a5291f2778f54fadbc5f5c346010e9083bf26febf8c8322fa238.jpeg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n