well I have some thoughts on the blog post that George RR Martin posted today and HBO's response and also the podcast there's a podcast that came out a few hours ago Brian condo who is the showrunner so I have some thoughts and I am a fan of the show I'm I'm very leery of making harsh critical statements about showrunners and writers and decisions that they do and we have Source material that the showrunners uh obviously read and glean from and make their decisions based off of that and their own personal view on what should be shown right and so I will link the blog post and the podcast uh down in the description so that you could check it out yourself and you can let me know what you think of what is being said on in both my here's my take on it I think turning an existing book and adapting it to a TV show is a very very tall task I think it's difficult I don't I my expectation when I go into a show like this is not to not to have every stinking detail that is in the book in the show I think that's that's really unrealistic and can be very expensive and can be uh you know difficult to accomplish uh given the parameters and I've talked about this and I'll link another video that I talked about this about what happens when a studio comes in and cuts budget and basically puts you in a corner as a creative and you have to make really difficult decisions based on the limitations that are placed on you with budget and um everything else that comes with that so I don't know what that feels like as a creator as a writer as a showrunner I don't know what that feels like I know that decisions have to be made to accommodate and to work within the parameters that are given to each show I've seen this happen and this is something that did happen with season two you know we we we went from 10 episodes to eight that is called a budget cut that I don't think that that is necessarily a uh this is just a you know based on you know story this is a story decision you know we can fit all this I it's a budget cut is what that is articles that I've read points to that there was a budget cut and decisions needed to be made okay that being said I'm reading Martin's blog and it sounds like there were a couple things that there were a couple changes that probably ends up in the long term being like initially they could be small changes but in the long term there are very big changes and changes the character there's a lot of things in this that just made me go wow I wish those things didn't change I wish that they would have stayed the same and I'm not sure what people are really thinking it sounds like and I'll I'll just quote I'll just quote the blog here again I'll link the the blog in in the description it says when Ryan first told me what he meant to do ages ago back in 2022 might might be I argued against it for all these reasons so he's referring to um some changes that were made specifically with blood and cheese okay I didn't argue long or with much heat however the change weakened the sequence I felt but only a bit and Ryan had what seemed to be practical reasons for it they did not want to deal with casting another child especially 2-year-old toddler kids that young will inevitably slow down production there would be budget implications budget was already an issue on house the dragon it made sense to save money wherever we could okay so that's that's also this another confirmation that budget has been an issue with House of the dragon and they were tied on it and they needed to save money okay so moreover Ryan assured me that we were not losing Prince maor simply postponing him Queen Helena could still give birth to him in season 3 presumably after getting with child late in season two that made sense to me so I withdrew my objections he says he still loved the episode so that was one instance the thing about this is that if you change something then it changes the sequence of events afterwards right and so that's the part that I'm kind of annoyed by this whole thing because it just without giving away any spoilers it just changes some things I'm not here to spoil any season 3 ideas because there is some of this in this article so just beware when you're reading it uh he does warn um when he's about to step into some Major Spoilers so I I just think I think what I think two things one why not have George be very much involved more involved in the writing and in story decisions than he is I don't understand that I don't know if it's an ego situation like I think it takes a lot of humility to to go I'm a showrunner but I want to I want to bring you in and have your have your thoughts on some of the things that we and I I'm it sounds like Ryan does that to what extent I don't know um but it does sound like he does let George know what's going what's up I'm upset for George George really should just finish his books but this has caused quite to stir online and you know HBO's response is interesting and I'll read that and this is a courtesy of variety so there are few greater fans of George RR Martin and his book Fire and Blood then the creative team on House of the Dragon both in production and at HBO commonly when adopting a book for the screen with its own format and limitations the showrunner ultimately is required to make difficult choices about the character Stories the audience will follow we believe that Ryan and his team have done an extraordinary job and the millions of fans the series has amassed over the first two seasons will continue to enjoy it and I guess my my comment to that is we wouldn't be having this conversation if if HBO didn't come in and cut budgets with a show that's successful and probably would do well with two extra episodes the churn rate on your on your streaming services wouldn't be so high people would stick around a little longer there's so many reasons why I think I think two adding two more episodes to season two would have been just the way to go right but they didn't they cut budget and now now they're in this position now they're having to respond to a statement that George made in his blog and it sucks it sucks it's like this this this doesn't need to happen if certain decisions weren't made this certainly didn't need to happen so I just think he's the author of this stuff I don't know how much weight he has in in decisions so let me know your thoughts uh and we'll talk to you later