Put Matt Smith in a Romantasy Adaptation Right Now
The third season of HBO's House of the Dragon has ended, leaving many of us with no small number of complaints and questions about what, precisely, is going on with this series. "The Treasons at Tumbleton" is, as such things go, a barnburner of a finale, complete with sweeping battle sequences, major character deaths, and a queen in crisis. And yet, it's also a deeply frustrating conclusion that makes several major (generally inexplicable) changes to the source material and suffers from the fact that several of those major deaths have little emotional impact. (House of the Dragon, for better or worse, has long struggled to give its audience a reason to truly care about most of its sprawling cast of characters.)
But there's one thing I think we can all agree on about the show's third outing: This season belongs to Daemon Targaryen and Matt Smith. Yes, Emma D'Arcy truly does deserve an Emmy nomination for her layered, often devastating work as Rhaenyra, but nobody on this show's canvas — save perhaps for Tommy Flanagan's Roddy the Ruin — is having a better time this season than Smith and his character. From leading armies and intimidating his enemies (with a little help from Caraxes) to reclaiming the Red Keep alongside his wife, Season 3 sees Daemon at the height of his power and living his best life.
Your mileage may vary about whether the show's third season wraps up in a way that feels satisfactory, but if nothing else, House of the Dragon has proven that Smith is a bona fide star. (Those of us who've been with him since his Doctor Who days could have told y'all that.) And his performance as Daemon is a sign that if some studio or network is smart, they're busy trying to cast him in a big-budget romantasy adaptation immediately.
Even if you don't read much romantasy — the publishing genre that blends the epic worldbuilding of fantasy with the emotional stakes and steamy sex of romance — you've probably heard of several of the popular bestsellers that have hit shelves over the past few years. Titles like Sarah J. Maas's sprawling fae-based A Court of Thorns and Roses series and Rebecca Yarros's dragon college-set Fourth Wing may be the most recognizable names in the space, but they're hardly alone in terms of massive fan bases. (See also: Carissa Broadbent, Jennifer L. Armentrout, Sarah A. Parker, Rebecca Ross, and dozens more.)
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Romantasy is so popular right now that it's kicked off a flurry of new development deals in the entertainment world, as networks and streamers scramble to grab their own piece of this latest Big Thing. While it's likely many of them won't ever see the light of day — I'm still mourning the Hulu adaptation of A Court of Thorns and Roses that got shelved —there are some intriguing possibilities on the table.
Prime Video has greenlit a Fourth Wing TV series, and projects based on titles ranging from Callie Hart's Quicksilver and Lauren Roberts's Powerless to Lauren Palphreyman's The Wolf King and SenLinYu's Alchemised are reportedly in the works. And if the executives behind these projects are smart, someone is considering how best to throw money at Smith, whose performance as Daemon has more than proven that he is a perfect choice for a leading role in this genre. He's basically already playing one.
House of the Dragon isn't what anyone would call a romance, but one of its primary emotional drivers is the relationship between Daemon and Rhaenyra. Yes, their marriage is incestuous, often difficult, and sometimes downright combative, but it's also deeply romantic. Their love story is often as problematic as it is compelling, featuring two people who are selfish, morally complicated, and not always particularly likeable. But it makes for great TV.
Smith's Daemon is, in a lot of ways, a romantasy hero come to life. It's true, the House of the Dragon version of the character represents a fairly significant departure from George R.R. Martin's original. But in the series, Westeros's Rogue Prince's swaggering pride, overweening ambition, and ruthless violence are softened by his obvious devotion to his wife, whom he never asks to become anything less than the fierce ruler she is.
Yes, his love language is violence, but watching Daemon casually cut down a squadron of knights to clear a path to the throne for Rhaenyra is pretty much the pinnacle of Targaryen romance. (The couple that slays together stays together, I guess??)
Smith's already got the intensity, the brooding, the physical fighting ability, the generally menacing vibes, the prickly attitude, and the single-minded dedication to a particular woman and her cause down pat. And his charisma is off the charts. All traits that...just so happen to be the major characteristics of romantasy's favorite book boyfriends.
From Quicksilver's Kingfisher, The Serpent and the Wings of Night's Raihn, and even Fourth Wing's Xavier Riordan (though Smith doesn't fit the age range of that particular role), these are characters whose vulnerability is masked by a tough and often threatening exterior, a balance that the man who plays Daemon Targaryen had to master from House of the Dragon's earliest episodes.
Someone should let him do it again immediately.
House of the Dragon Seasons 1-3 are available on HBO Max.
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