The conquest of Westeros has a date, but it is still looking for its faces. Warner Bros. announced on Tuesday, September 29, that Game of Thrones: Aegon’s Conquest will arrive in theaters on June 1, 2029, directed by Owen Harris from a screenplay by Beau Willimon. Doing the math, that gives us two years and eight months to wait. The title was confirmed at CinemaCon, but the franchise’s first feature film now has its place on the calendar.

As I have written here before, bringing Game of Thrones to the cinema involves more than making the dragons bigger. The story of the conquest will establish a version of characters we know primarily through their legacy and their descendants’ interpretations. Aegon founded a dynasty, but his position as the protagonist raises a question I still consider central: will we see the man who united Westeros, or the invader who used an almost unbeatable force to impose his rule?

With a release date now set, speculation about the cast is gaining fresh momentum. The prospect of finally seeing Aegon, Visenya, and Rhaenys in theaters gives fans a concrete horizon as they imagine who might play them. Warner Bros. has yet to announce the actors, but setting the release date gives new impetus to a conversation that has followed the project for years.

Henry Cavill is one of the names most frequently suggested by fans for Aegon. His association with The Witcher helps explain the preference: audiences already know him with pale hair, a sword in his hand, and a warrior’s presence. That familiarity has also fueled confusion, including fan-made concept videos that circulated as though they were official footage. So far, there is no confirmation of his involvement or reliable reporting that he is in talks for the role.

Anya Taylor-Joy appears among the suggestions for Rhaenys, while Florence Pugh has been named in a rumor as the frontrunner for Visenya. These are different kinds of information: Taylor-Joy is a fan casting choice; the rumor about Pugh was picked up by a franchise-focused website from a post by the Culture Cave account on X. There is no confirmation from Warner Bros. or reporting from the major industry publications supporting the claim that she is in talks. These names are circulating, but we cannot yet present them as candidates actually being considered by the production.

The trio will be crucial because the conquest does not belong to Aegon alone. Visenya and Rhaenys took part in the campaign with their own dragons, Vhagar and Meraxes, alongside Balerion, ridden by their brother. The story offers room for three characters with different relationships to power, war, and their own family. My hope is that the two women receive dramatic weight that reflects their importance, rather than merely accompanying the construction of the conqueror’s image.

The confirmation of Owen Harris also deserves attention. He directed episodes of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms and has credits on Black Mirror and Mrs. Davis, while Willimon brings his experience on House of Cards and Andor. It is a combination that makes me curious about how the film will balance intimacy and spectacle. In particular, Willimon’s work on structures of power makes it interesting to imagine what he will do with a family that turns military superiority into political authority.

The idea of bringing Game of Thrones to theaters is, in fact, an old one. In 2013, David Benioff and Dan Weiss proposed ending the series with three feature films, a plan that never moved forward. George R. R. Martin also explained in 2015 that he had turned down film proposals because he feared cutting important portions of the books and concentrating the story on figures such as Jon Snow or Daenerys. Choosing a specific campaign now offers a more clearly defined focus, although we still do not know how much of the conquest will fit into this first film.

The release date is set, but the start of filming has yet to be announced. Until then, casting will remain one of the main sources of speculation. Cavill, Taylor-Joy, and Pugh make an intriguing trio on paper; the production’s challenge will be to find actors capable of bringing the tensions between these characters—and the cost of their victory—to life. After all, we know that Aegon conquered Westeros. What I want to discover is how the film will make us view that conquest.