Shows Like
15 Shows Like Game of Thrones — Epic Fantasy Picks
Craving more epic fantasy with brutal politics, complex characters, and shocking deaths? These shows fill the Game of Thrones-shaped hole in your watchlist.
15 FILMS·April 2026·By MoviesPack
Section 1
The Game of Thrones Formula
Game of Thrones worked because it refused to be a safe fantasy. **Nobody was safe. Armies had consequences. Politics was more dangerous than dragons.** The show married the scope of Lord of the Rings with the scheming of House of Cards, then killed your favorite characters to remind you the world doesn't care about narrative justice. Finding something with the same teeth is hard. These come closest. [Use our tool: Shows Like Game of Thrones](/shows/similar/game-of-thrones) — algorithmically matched
Section 2
The Closest Matches
01
House of the Dragon
2022–present
★8.4IMDb
King Viserys names his daughter Rhaenyra as heir to the Iron Throne — and then takes a second wife who produces a son. The question of which claim is legitimate fractures the entire Targaryen family and eventually splits the kingdom into two camps, each with dragons, each convinced they're right. Set 200 years before Game of Thrones. The political maneuvering is sharper than the original, the consequences are real, and Season 1 sticks its landing better than GoT's final seasons ever did.
Why it matters
It's the same world, the same DNA, and arguably better-paced plotting. If you abandoned GoT in disappointment, this is the reason to come back.
02
The Last Kingdom
2015–2022
★8.4IMDb
A Saxon boy is captured and raised by Vikings after his family is killed. When he grows up, he wants his ancestral lands back — but to get them he has to serve the one English king trying to unite the country against the Norse invaders. He's loyal to Alfred of Wessex but has more in common with his Viking brothers than any Saxon lord. The battles are brutal, the political maneuvering between Alfred and the warlords rivals anything in Westeros, and the show kills beloved characters without blinking.
Why it matters
Political complexity, morally grey protagonist, and five seasons of consistently excellent television.
03
Vikings
2013–2020
★8.5IMDb
A Scandinavian farmer named Ragnar is convinced there's land worth raiding to the west. He builds a boat, takes a crew, and finds England. What follows over six seasons is his rise from raider to earl to king — and the fracturing of everything he builds as his sons inherit his ambitions and rivalries. The early seasons, particularly his alliance with an English monk named Athelstan, are intimate, vicious, and magnetic. The first four seasons are among the best historical epics ever made.
Why it matters
Power dynamics, political scheming, and religious conflict between Norse and Christian worlds — it captures the GoT appetite for political violence without the fantasy scaffolding.
04
Shogun
2024
★8.9IMDb
An English navigator shipwrecks in feudal Japan and gets caught in the middle of a power struggle between warlords competing to control the country after the heir to the throne is an infant. He speaks no Japanese, understands nothing about the culture, and everyone around him is playing a game at a level he can barely perceive. Every character has three agendas. The language barrier is a plot device — conversations are translated in ways that change their meaning. The violence is quick and permanent.
Why it matters
Intricate political maneuvering, cultural clash, and high-stakes consequences with no plot armor. GoT's spirit in a completely different setting.
05
Rome
2005–2007
★8.7IMDb
Two Roman soldiers — a rigid patrician and a street-brawler — serve Julius Caesar as he crosses the Rubicon and takes Rome, then watch the Republic collapse and the empire take shape around them. Julius Caesar. Mark Antony. Cleopatra. Octavian. The show runs these two ordinary men through the most consequential decades in Roman history, which turns out to be a brilliant way to show the machinery of power without losing the human scale. Cancelled too early because it cost too much.
Why it matters
Politically ruthless, morally complex, extraordinarily produced. The blueprint GoT learned from.
Section 3
The Epic Fantasy Shows
06
The Witcher
2019–2023
★8.2IMDb
A mutant monster hunter takes contracts across a continent full of warring kingdoms, prejudice against non-humans, and a rapidly destabilizing political order. His path keeps colliding with a powerful sorceress and a young princess who may be the key to saving or destroying everything. Based on Andrzej Sapkowski's novels — the source material for the video games. The world-building rivals Westeros. Henry Cavill was perfectly cast; his departure in Season 3 hurt the show significantly, so watch Seasons 1-2 while they're great.
07
The Wheel of Time
2021–present
★7.1IMDb
A powerful magic user arrives in a remote village and tells five young people that one of them may be the reincarnation of an ancient hero — and that the Dark One is hunting them. She has to get them to safety before the forces pursuing them destroy the village entirely. Based on Robert Jordan's 14-book series, the show has a world more populous than Westeros — more nations, factions, and magic systems — and the adaptation has been uneven, but the world is genuinely compelling.
08
The Rings of Power
2022–present
★6.9IMDb
Thousands of years before Frodo and the Fellowship, Middle-earth is at an uneasy peace — but an elven soldier named Galadriel believes the darkness isn't gone. She's right. This is the story of Sauron's return, the forging of the rings of power, and the fall of the island kingdom of Númenor. Amazon spent a reported $1 billion on production design, and it shows — this is visually the most stunning fantasy television ever made. The story is slow but rewarding for Tolkien fans.
Section 4
The Historical Epics
09
Spartacus
2010–2013
★8.5IMDb
A Thracian warrior is sold into slavery and becomes a gladiator in a Roman ludus. He survives the arena long enough to unite the slaves and spark the most famous rebellion in Roman history. Over four seasons the rebellion grows from a single house to an army that makes Rome sweat. Gratuitously violent, stylized, and surprisingly emotionally resonant. The pilot is rough but push through — by Season 1's midpoint, the show finds its groove and the finale is one of the most satisfying in television.
10
Marco Polo
2014–2016
★8.0IMDb
A young Venetian merchant's son is left as tribute at the court of Kublai Khan and has to learn to survive in the most powerful empire on earth. The political intrigues of the Mongol court — Khan's family, his ministers, his rivals, the Chinese kingdom he's trying to conquer — are dense and genuinely gripping. The outsider learning the rules of a world that will kill him is pure GoT energy. Netflix cancelled it after two strong seasons despite excellent reviews.
11
Medici
2016–2019
★7.5IMDb
The Medici family runs the most powerful bank in Renaissance Florence — and their money buys them influence over popes, kings, and city-states. The show follows the dynasty's rise and the bloody cost of keeping power in a city full of rivals who'd rather see them destroyed. Art, assassination, religious politics, and family betrayal across three seasons covering different generations. The Medici's methods of accumulating power, and the enemies they made doing it, make for surprisingly gripping drama.
Section 5
The Dark Fantasy Shows
12
Carnival Row
2019–2023
★7.6IMDb
Mythological creatures — faeries, fauns, and others — have been driven from their homelands by war and are now refugees packed into a ghetto district of a human city, denied rights, treated as a criminal underclass. A detective investigates murders in the Row while a faerie he has history with tries to survive within the system oppressing her. The political allegory is sharp — immigration, species-based prejudice, and class warfare — layered under a genuine murder mystery.
13
Shadow and Bone
2021–2023
★7.6IMDb
A map-maker in a country cut in half by a permanent supernatural darkness unexpectedly manifests a rare power — and suddenly every political faction in the empire wants to use her. Magic users called Grisha exist in a rigid hierarchy, the ruling class is threatened, and an enigmatic commander called the Darkling has plans that go back centuries. Based on Leigh Bardugo's Grishaverse novels. Ben Barnes as the Darkling is genuinely compelling, and the stakes escalate well across two seasons.
14
Black Sails
2014–2017
★8.2IMDb
Captain Flint and his crew operate out of Nassau in the early 18th century — a pirate haven outside any nation's law. The British Empire wants it back. Competing pirate captains want control of it. Flint wants to burn the whole empire down. The show starts pulpy and becomes genuinely tragic as it commits to treating every character as someone who will pay a permanent price for what they do. A prequel to Treasure Island, and the final two seasons — which turn Flint into a figure of classical tragedy — are among the best season arcs GoT fans will find anywhere.
15
Pillars of the Earth
2010
★8.3IMDb
A master builder in 12th-century England becomes obsessed with constructing a cathedral — and spends decades fighting the political and religious forces trying to destroy him and his work. A civil war rages for the English throne in the background. The church is corrupt, the nobility is murderous, and the people trying to build something beautiful keep getting crushed by people who benefit from chaos. Based on Ken Follett's bestseller. Eight tight episodes, and the medieval power games rival anything in Westeros.
Section 6
Quick Match Guide
| Want... | Watch | |---------|-------| | Same universe | House of the Dragon | | Best political scheming | Shogun, Rome | | Historical epicness | Vikings, The Last Kingdom | | High fantasy scope | The Witcher, Wheel of Time | | Visually stunning | Rings of Power | | Underrated gem | Black Sails, Pillars of the Earth | | Gladiators and blood | Spartacus |
Section 7
Want More?
- [Full list: Shows Like Game of Thrones](/shows/similar/game-of-thrones) — 20+ algorithmic matches - [Epic fantasy shows](/shows/mood/epic) — sweeping scale and high stakes - [Political drama shows](/shows/mood/political) — scheming and power plays - [Medieval shows](/shows/mood/historical) — war, kings, and swords - [What show should I watch?](/shows/discover) — random recommendation
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