5 Fantasy Shows That Rival 'House of the Dragon'

Image via HBO Published Aug 1, 2026, 6:04 PM EDT Sign in to your Collider account House of the Dragon is a prequel series to the massive cultural phenomenon Game of Thrones, both of which are based on high fantasy books by George R. R. Martin. House of the Dragon is set 300 years prior to Thrones, and covers the rise of the House of Targaryen, who united the Seven Kingdoms and built a centuries-old empire that ruled with an iron fist. Though they did not do this unopposed. House of the Dragon involves epic battles and feuds with other noble houses who oppose the Targaryens' rule. Like Game of Thrones, the series is full of familial drama, epic battles, gory action sequences, and noble politics. The HBO hit is kind of a behemoth on streaming right now, though there are a couple of shows like House of the Dragon out there that have honestly come close to the same level of quality. 5 'Outlander' (2014–2026) Image via Starz Outlander opens up with a British nurse named Claire (Caitríona Balfe), who previously tended to wounded soldiers during World War II. By some inexplicable fluke, she ends up getting magically transported through time back to the year 1743. While there, she meets a Scottish Highland warrior named Jamie (Sam Heughan), and immediately falls in love with him. Subsequent seasons see the couple traveling through other places and points in time, including the American Revolutionary War and the Regulator Insurrection. The show is based on the series of romantasy novels by Diana Gabaldon, with the tenth and final book on its way. The show was brought to an end in 2026, having exhausted the source material and reached a fitting conclusion. There's also a prequel series, exploring the lives of Jamie and Claire's parents, who meet in the early 18th Century and World War I, respectively. The reason this show easily rivals House of the Dragon is that it has many of the same themes, despite being a low fantasy rather than a high fantasy. It contains gruesome violence, romantic relationships, and political narratives that fans of George R. R. Martin's work love so much. It's no wonder this bit of historical fantasy was so successful, and why it lasted 12 whole years. 4 'Shadow and Bone' (2021–2023) Image via Netflix Shadow and Bone is a Netflix series based on the novels by Leigh Bardugo. This show is set in a high fantasy world with a lot of industry, more reminiscent of Victorian England than Medieval Europe, so it's kind of a breath of fresh air in the fantasy genre. The novels and the show itself are for a decidedly younger audience—it's more of a teen or a YA show, somewhere in between an adult series and a kids' series. Adults are still able to enjoy it, however. Unfortunately, Netflix deemed it wasn't turning a profit, so they gave it the axe, in spite of critical acclaim. This show dives deep into an elaborate magic system involving Grishas, who are divided into specific classes based on what magical abilities they have. The show does a pretty good job of world-building, really making you feel like a part of this vast and wonderful world. Like House of the Dragon, the show does actually deal a lot with politics and with cultural divides between families or classes. It's a wonderful show that deserves attention, one that easily rivals House of the Dragon in terms of quality, if not in viewership. Collider Exclusive · Game of Thrones Personality Quiz Which Game of Thrones House Do You Belong To? Stark · Lannister · Targaryen · Baratheon · Tyrell Five great houses. Five completely different answers to the same question: how do you hold power in a world that will take it from you the moment you stop paying attention? Eight questions will determine where your loyalties — and your nature — truly lie. 🐺Stark 🦁Lannister 🐉Targaryen 🦌Baratheon 🌹Tyrell FIND YOUR HOUSE → 01 Someone powerful is acting dishonourably and everyone knows it. What do you do? In Westeros, the answer to this question has ended more than one great house. ACall it out, openly and on the record. If honour means anything, it has to mean something when it's costly. BUse it. Information about someone else's dishonour is leverage — and leverage is power. CAct decisively to correct it — with or without the approval of those around me. DChallenge them directly. Strength settles disputes more honestly than courtroom manoeuvring. ENavigate carefully — build alliances, apply quiet pressure, and create a situation where the right outcome becomes inevitable. NEXT QUESTION → 02 What is the source of your power? Every house endures because of something. What is it for yours? AThe loyalty of people who trust me — earned over generations, not bought with gold. BWealth, intelligence, and the willingness to use both without sentiment. CA legacy so fearsome and a vision so total that opposition becomes unthinkable. DPhysical strength, military force, and the respect that comes from being the kind of person nobody wants to fight. ECharm, connection, and the ability to make powerful people feel that my success is also theirs. NEXT QUESTION → 03 Who do you truly fight for? Strip away the banners and the words. The honest answer tells you everything. AMy family and my people — those who depend on me and have kept faith with me through everything. BMy family — the ones who share my blood, even when they exhaust me, even when they disappoint me. CMy cause — a vision larger than any single person, including me. DMyself, and those few who've proven themselves worth fighting beside. EMy house — its name, its future, the position I intend to leave it in when I'm gone. NEXT QUESTION → 04 How do you deal with your enemies? A house's method reveals its character as clearly as its words ever could. AHonestly — I face them directly, and I give quarter when it's warranted. BThoroughly — I don't leave loose ends, and I don't make the same enemy twice. CDecisively — fire answers questions that diplomacy only delays. DHead-on — I'd rather meet a threat on the battlefield than behind closed doors. EElegantly — I prefer to make former enemies into allies, or at least into people who owe me something. NEXT QUESTION → 05 What kind of ruler do you believe in? Westeros is full of answers to this question. Most of them end badly. AA just one — someone who serves the realm rather than using it, who leads by example rather than fear. BA capable one — someone smart enough to navigate the game, ruthless enough to win it, and realistic about what winning costs. CA transformative one — someone who doesn't just rule what exists but reshapes what's possible. DA strong one — someone whose authority is beyond question because the alternative is obviously worse. EA wise one — someone who understands that the realm is fed by more than armies, and that a full stomach keeps more peace than a sharp sword. NEXT QUESTION → 06 You suffer a devastating loss. How does your house respond? How a house handles defeat tells you more about it than how it handles victory. AWe grieve, properly and together — and then we endure, because endurance is what we do. BWe adapt. We reassess. And we ensure that whoever caused this loss comes to regret it completely. CWe burn hotter. Setbacks don't soften us — they clarify what needs to happen next. DWe hit back. Grief and revenge are the same motion in our house. EWe regroup quietly, rebuild our position, and return when we're ready — on our terms, not theirs. NEXT QUESTION → 07 Which of these truths about Westeros do you most believe? Every house has a philosophy. This is yours. AThe lone wolf dies, but the pack survives. Nothing matters more than the people you protect. BA Lannister always pays their debts — in gold or in kind. Reputation is built on consistency. CI am the blood of the dragon. Some destinies are written before the person who carries them is born. DOurs is the fury. When we move, we move completely — and we don't stop until it's done. EGrowing strong means knowing when to bloom and when to wait. Patience is its own kind of power. NEXT QUESTION → 08 The Iron Throne is within reach. What do you do? The answer reveals not just your ambition — but your character. AClaim it only if the realm needs me to — and rule in a way that makes it worth having. BEnsure someone who owes us sits in it. The power behind the throne is safer than the throne itself. CTake it. It was always meant to be mine — I feel that in my bones and in my blood. DSeize it — with both hands, without hesitation. Opportunity in Westeros does not wait to be asked. EPosition my house to be indispensable to whoever sits there — influence outlasts any single reign. REVEAL MY HOUSE → The Maester Has Spoken Your House Is…Your answers point to the great house whose words, values, and way of surviving in Westeros match your own. Bend the knee — or don't. That's very much up to you. 🐺 House StarkWinter is Coming — and you have always known it. You prepare not out of fear but out of duty, because the people who depend on you deserve someone who takes the long view. You lead with honour even when it costs you, because you understand that a reputation built on integrity is the only one worth having. Your loyalty to family and people runs deep — not as sentiment but as a code that doesn't bend when things get difficult. The North endures because Starks endure — not by being the cleverest players in the game, but by being the kind of people others are willing to follow into the cold. You are that kind of person. The pack survives. The lone wolf dies. You already know which one you are. 🦁 House LannisterYou understand the game — its rules, its exceptions, and exactly when the rules become the exception. You play it without illusions and without apology. You are sharper than most people realise, and you have learned to use that gap to your advantage. A Lannister always pays their debts — and you always keep your word, because your word is an instrument of power, and instruments must be kept in working order. You love your family with a ferocity that sometimes blinds you, and you know it, and you do it anyway. The lion doesn't concern itself with the opinion of sheep. Neither, in the end, do you. 🐉 House TargaryenYou carry a sense of destiny that is difficult to explain and impossible to ignore — the feeling that you are not simply participating in the world but meant to reshape it. You are capable of extraordinary things, and you know it, and that knowledge is both your greatest strength and your most dangerous quality. Fire and blood are not just words to you — they are a philosophy about what change requires and what it costs. The Targaryens at their best were transformative rulers who broke chains and defied the limits of what anyone thought possible. At your best, so are you. The dragon has three heads. You are one of them. 🦌 House BaratheonYou are a force — direct, powerful, and difficult to ignore when you enter a room or a conflict. You do not negotiate with challenges. You meet them. Ours is the fury — and yours is a kind of intensity that commands attention, respect, and occasionally fear from those who underestimate what's behind it. You value strength and straight dealing. You'd rather know where you stand in a fight than navigate a web of courtly whispers. The Baratheons built their house on the back of one of the greatest military victories in Westerosi history — and then struggled with what came after. The lesson of your house is that winning is not the end of the story. Governing is. You are learning that too. 🌹 House TyrellYou understand that power does not always announce itself — that sometimes it arrives with flowers, good wine, and a smile that doesn't quite reach the eyes. Growing strong is your house's motto, and you live it: patiently, strategically, always investing in the relationships and resources that will matter most when it counts. You are charming by choice and calculating by nature — a combination that makes you one of the most effective players in any room you enter. The Tyrells fed King's Landing and shaped its politics without ever sitting on the Iron Throne — and they were arguably more powerful for it. You know that the person who controls the food controls the kingdom. And you always know where the food is. ↻ RETAKE THE QUIZ 3 'Kingdom' (2019–2021) Credit: Netflix Kingdom is a South Korean historical fantasy series set in the Kingdom of Joseon, a historical realm which once encompassed the Korean Peninsula. Shortly following the Imjin War against the Japanese Empire, at the turn of the 17th century, the King of Joseon comes down with smallpox. He has just married a new wife, who belongs to the tyrannical Haewon Cho clan. The queen is pregnant, expecting a son, although the King dies of his affliction before she can give birth. The problem is, the King's adult son from a previous relationship is next in line. To secure their claim to the throne, the Haewon Cho clan decides to bring the King back from death using a mythical resurrection plant. Unfortunately, they underestimate its capabilities, turning the King into a zombie and unleashing a zombie horde. The zombies in this show are not like typical zombies from fiction. They are much more aggressive and turn into ordinary corpses during the day, only hunting at night. Amidst the war with the Haewon Cho, the royal family must fight to contain the growing infection. Part fantasy and part horror, Kingdom is based on a webtoon turned graphic novel. While the show received near-perfect reviews, Netflix sadly soft-canceled the series. They didn't officially say it's been canceled, but with no new content since 2021, it's safe to say it's probably done for. That said, this show has everything that House of the Dragon fans will love. It's got a cast of memorable characters, a dark fantasy setting, medieval kingdoms, feuding royals, and brutal violence. If this show were more popular and lasted longer, it could have been some serious competition for House of the Dragon. 2 'The Wheel of Time' (2021–2025) Image via Prime Video The Wheel of Time actually was decent competition against House of the Dragon. Based on the series of 15 novels by Robert Jordan (later finished by Brandon Sanderson after Jordan tragically died of a heart condition), the series is set on Earth, thousands upon thousands of years in the future. A cataclysmic event a millennium prior put the world back into the Stone Age and completely reshaped the continents, which is why the tech is still pretty medieval in this show. In this new age, it is said that a chosen one called the Dragon Reborn is soon to rise. Their fate is to either save the world from the clutches of the Dark One, or to destroy it. Amazon Prime's abrupt cancellation of this show made a lot of fans very angry, prompting a massive campaign to try and salvage the show. While this was unsuccessful, the response indicated just how popular and loved the show was. While the tone isn't quite as mature as House of the Dragon, it is still a show designed for adults. The violence can still be pretty graphic, and the series does delve heavily into romantic relationships and political narratives. However, it has a style that is completely its own, and it certainly doesn't feel like it's trying too hard to be the next House of the Dragon or the next Game of Thrones. It's honestly a shame that this series got canceled, especially because it was just starting to hit its stride. 1 'A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms' (2026–Present) Image via Steffan Hill/HBO To be fair, A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms is another spin-off of Game of Thrones, and is thus set in the same universe as both Thrones and House of the Dragon. That doesn't mean it isn't a rival, though. The two prequel series are created by different people, have completely different vibes, and are set at different points in the history of Westeros. This prequel is set 100 years prior to Thrones, and 200 years after House of the Dragon, and bears a much more intimate scale. The story is about a hedge knight called Ser Duncan the Tall (Peter Claffey) and his squire, nicknamed Egg (Dexter Sol Ansell), who travel throughout the land looking for contracts to take on. The show isn't quite as political as the other two shows set in Westeros, and it's much more of an adventure story than a story about a massive conflict, but that doesn't mean it's any worse. The show has been wonderfully received and has become a new favorite amongst fantasy fans. However, the graphic, medieval violence is still there, as is the snappy dialogue and cast of memorable and lovable characters with their own distinct personalities. Even though the two shows are made by the same network, it's safe to say that they still compete with each other.