House of the Dragon becomes Sky’s biggest ever US drama launch

Screen OD staff

After breaking launch records in the USA for HBO and HBO Max, House of the Dragon has done record business for its British broadcaster Sky too, with more than 4 million views for the Game of Thrones prequel already on Sky and streamer NOW since its launch. 

This makes the show, which stars Doctor Who’s Matt Smith as part of an impressive ensemble cast and is based on George R.R. Martin’s Fire & Blood, the biggest US drama launch ever on Sky and the biggest ever series premiere on Sky Atlantic in the channel’s 11-year history.

House of the Dragon, which has been a hit globally with fantasy fans, has also driven a lot of talk online in the UK with Sky’s social channels garnering 75 million impressions and 38 million video views of content to date. With three-quarters of a million Google searches for House of the Dragon and related content. That’s impressive searching people!

The show is available exclusively on Sky and streaming service NOW in the UK, but for those who don’t have either and want to try it out, the first episode of the show is available for free right now on Sky’s YouTube channel. And who said there wasn’t such a thing as a free, erm, TV show? 

MD of Content at Sky, Zai Bennett said: “Momentum around House of the Dragon just continues to build, as more and more people spread the word about its ever-current narrative of political power play married with visuals of epic scale and imagination. And thanks to Sky making the first episode freely available to watch via YouTube, more people than ever before will be able to sample the world-class world of Westeros.”

New episodes of House of the Dragon, which is set a couple of hundred years before the events of Game of Thrones and tells the story of the last days of the Targaryen dynasty are available in the UK every Monday.