HBO Bounces Back

Game of Thrones, HBO’s massive high-fantasy series based on George R. R. Martin’s popular A Song of Ice and Fire books, finally has a premiere date: Sunday, April 17. It’ll be the popular pay-cable net’s highest profile launch since the Martin Scorsese-directed pilot of Boardwalk Empire aired last fall.

Game of Thrones

Empire was fantastic. Its first year was the best season of television HBO has given us since Deadwood and The Sopranos ended their runs. Empire was also an easier sell than Thrones. Who doesn’t want to watch a prohibition era-set mob series with guns, gambling, broads and Steve Buscemi? And all brought to you by the guy who served as David Chase’s right-hand man on The Sopranos. (His name is Terence Winter. He’s smarter than you and me.)

The fantasy genre isn’t as universally appealing, and its success will largely hinge on whether HBO can get people besides the swords-and-sorcery crowd to tune in. There is hope. Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings Trilogy trilogy still stands as one of the best events to come out of Hollywood in the last decade, and HBO has swiped one of that trilogy’s cast members – Boromir himself, Sean Bean — to star. Plus, not many predicted that one of the fall’s biggest breakthrough hits would be a frickin’ zombie show, but The Walking Dead ended up being just that.

If Game of Thrones delivers on its promise of high fantasy for grownups, it could very well set up the best year of television HBO’s had since its Sopranos/The Wire/Six Feet Under glory days. It’s no secret that the network passed on Mad Men, an oversight the execs there are likely still embarrassed by. AMC and FX have stolen much of HBO’s buzz with their seemingly endless slates of dramas that connect with either critics, audiences or both. (Think The Walking Dead, Breaking Bad and Justified.)

2011 could be the year HBO reclaims the title. In addition to Thrones, the network is planning to roll out season four of True Blood (which is trash, but trash people really seem to like), a second season of Boardwalk Empire, and the debut of Luck, a Dustin Hoffman-starring horse-racing drama from the great David Milch (who gave us Deadwood and the bizarre but underrated JohnFrom Cincinnati). On the comedy side, Curb Your Enthusiasm will be back, and hell, even the final season of long-past-its-prime Entourage may re-enter the water-cooler conversation. Although perhaps just to toast the fact that it finally ended.

Thrones will set the pace, though. We’ll know by May just how much HBO is stepping up their game.