Image via Netflix
Published Oct 14, 2026, 6:03 PM EDT
Dyah (pronounced Dee-yah) is a Senior Author at Collider, responsible for both writing and transcription duties. She joined the website in 2022 as a Resource Writer before stepping into her current role in April 2023. As a Senior Author, she writes Features and Lists covering TV, music, and movies, making her a true Jill of all trades. In addition to her writing, Dyah also serves as an interview transcriber, primarily for events such as San Diego Comic-Con, the Toronto International Film Festival, and the Sundance Film Festival.
Dyah graduated from Satya Wacana Christian University in October 2019 with a Bachelor's degree in English Literature, concentrating on Creative Writing. On March 2026, Dyah graduated with Master's degree in English Literature Studies, with a thesis on intersectionality in postcolonial-feminist studies in Asian literary works.
Born and raised between Indonesia and Singapore, Dyah is no stranger to different cultures. She now resides in the small town of Kendal with her husband and four cats, where she spends her free time cooking or cycling.
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High fantasy comes with high expectations. The genre is best known for delivering magic, spells, and the occasional quest to save humanity. While the majority of fantasy shows have excelled at delivering all of the above, there's also the challenge of convincing audiences why they should care about these imaginative realms. For all of high fantasy's elaborate concepts and imaginary worlds, the best shows are the ones audiences can relate to season after season.
Whether it's the details that go into building the landscape or the characters' evolution, each season must show that a series isn't complacent or content to remain stagnant. From a popular Game of Thrones prequel to an ambitious animated show inspired by a video game, here are high fantasy shows with no bad seasons, ranked.
5 'The Witcher' (2019–Present)
Image via NetflixIn a world crawling with deadly monsters and dangerous magic, Geralt of Rivia (Henry Cavill and Liam Hemsworth) has built a living hunting beasts in The Witcher. But no amount of swordsmanship can prepare the witcher for a destiny that binds him to Ciri (Freya Allan), a young princess whose life is upended when the Nilfgaardian Empire conquers her homeland. Their connection stems from the Law of Surprise, an ancient custom that ties Geralt to Ciri before she is even born. When their paths finally cross, Geralt takes the fugitive princess under his protection, training her to become a capable warrior. Alongside Yennefer (Anya Chalotra) and Jaskier (Joey Batey), he must keep Ciri safe from powerful enemies seeking her otherworldly abilities.
Granted, loyal fans were shocked by Cavill's sudden departure after Season 3, especially since he was the face of The Witcher. But it's important to remember that the show isn't just Geralt's story. It's also about the people who join him along the way. Over four seasons, Geralt and his crew have gone through significant character development, especially considering that all four started in places where they were underestimated and undervalued. Slowly, they've learned to embrace their strengths, find their voices, and figure out where they belong. They're finally standing up for themselves, even if they don't always get it right, and learning to own what they want and what they're capable of.
4 'Arcane' (2021–2024)
Image via NetflixBased on the world of League of Legends, Arcane is set in the deeply divided cities of Piltover and Zaun. While Piltover flourishes as the City of Progress, Zaun's undercity remains trapped in poverty and oppression. Orphaned sisters Vi (Hailee Steinfeld) and Jinx (Ella Purnell) grow up on the streets, bound by a tight sibling bond. However, an explosive tragedy tears their lives apart, sending them down separate paths. Years later, they reunite as adults on opposite sides of a resistance: Vi fights for coexistence, while Jinx embraces a path of destruction that threatens to tear their already fractured world apart.
For all of Arcane's steampunk aesthetic, it also has an intricate high fantasy theme, thanks to Hextech, a system of magic-based technology designed to help Piltover prosper. But magic is something no amount of advanced technology can fully explain, and what begins as a pursuit of knowledge and science in Season 1 becomes a larger-than-life, almost godlike pursuit of the true source of magic in Season 2. Calling Arcane a masterpiece barely does it justice. In an era where AI-generated visuals have been overshadowing creative processes, Arcane's one-of-a-kind video game-inspired art style is a true testament to the craft and a love letter to animation.
3 'His Dark Materials' (2019–2022)
Image via HBOBased on Philip Pullman's fantasy novels, His Dark Materials follows Lyra Belacqua (Dafne Keen), an orphan living at Jordan College in Oxford with her daemon, Pantalaimon (Kit Connor), and her best friend, Roger Parslow (Lewin Lloyd). In this world, every human has a daemon, an animal companion that represents their soul. Lyra's life takes a turn when her uncle, Lord Asriel (James McAvoy), returns from the Arctic with news of a mysterious particle called Dust and his research into parallel worlds. After he leaves again, Lyra is taken in by the charming Mrs. Coulter (Ruth Wilson), just as children begin disappearing across the city.
His Dark Materials is basically a darker, more philosophical version of Harry Potter. Its young characters start out hopeful and curious, but that innocence doesn't last long once they discover the dark secrets adults are willing to sacrifice children to learn in the name of science. On the grander side of things, the series shows how dangerous things can get when powerful institutions force their beliefs on everyone else. In Lyra's world, the people in charge want to control what others can learn, believe, and think for themselves. But curiosity and free will are exactly what Lyra refuses to give up, making her journey about more than just magic and adventure.
Collider Exclusive · 8 Questions · 2 Minutes Which Game of Thrones House Do You Belong To? Stark · Lannister · Targaryen · Tyrell
Your drink, your weapon, your seat at the table, what you do to somebody who wrongs you. Eight quick calls and we will tell you whose banner you should actually be standing under. Four houses are still in this: the cold one, the rich one, the one with the dragons, and the one that has never needed a sword to get its way.
🐺Stark(Game of Thrones)
🦁Lannister(Game of Thrones)
🐉Targaryen(House of the Dragon)
🌹Tyrell(Game of Thrones)
CLAIM YOUR HOUSE →
01
What is your go-to at the feast? Everybody has one, and everybody's says something.
ADark ale by the fire, nothing fancy. BWhatever costs the most in the cellar. CWhatever gets poured, drunk far too fast. DOne cup, slowly, while I watch the room.
NEXT QUESTION →
02
Pick a weapon off the wall. You get one. Choose quickly.
AA greatsword, heavy and honest. BA dagger, plus a second one nobody knows about. CFire, obviously. DNothing sharper than the things I can say.
NEXT QUESTION →
03
Where do you end up sitting? The seating plan is the politics.
AHigh table, quietly wishing I was outside. BNext to whoever actually matters. CWherever I like, because people move. DA corner seat with a view of everyone.
NEXT QUESTION →
04
What do people get wrong about you? Reputation arrives about a week before you do.
AThat I am cold, when I am only quiet. BThat I say what I mean the first time. CThat I might be bluffing. DThat I am harmless.
NEXT QUESTION →
05
One free evening in King's Landing. Where do you go? Nobody plots every single night.
AOut of the city entirely, heading home. BSomewhere expensive, with people who owe me. CWherever it is loud and slightly dangerous. DA long dinner where everybody talks too much.
NEXT QUESTION →
06
Somebody wrongs you. What happens next? This is the real personality test in Westeros.
AI say it to their face, once. BI wait, because they will need me eventually. CEverybody hears about it before morning. DThey never find out it was me.
NEXT QUESTION →
07
Your people are in trouble. What is your first move? No time to think about this one.
AI turn up, even when it is a terrible idea. BI pay for the problem to go away. CI go after whoever caused it. DI already called in that favour last week.
NEXT QUESTION →
08
Be honest. What do you actually want? Eight questions in, this is the one that decides your house.
ATo go home, and then to stay there. BTo own the room without sitting at the head of it. CThe crown, with everybody watching. DTo be the one everybody genuinely likes.
REVEAL MY HOUSE →
The Banner Is Raised Your House Is…
Four houses, four completely different theories about how you survive a world like this one. Here is where your banner belongs, what the name would cost you, and what it would buy.
House Stark
You belong in the North, where the weather does most of the arguing and nobody is impressed by a title. The Starks are the only great house on this list who genuinely believe that being right matters more than winning, which is exactly why the show spent eight years punishing them for it.
- Your loyalty runs to people rather than to crowns, and you would rather lose a war honestly than win one by doing something you would have to hide.
- The Stark tragedy is a simple one, since a family raised to keep its word ended up surrounded by people who treat a promise as an opening bid.
- You are the one who thinks about the winter while everybody else is still enjoying the summer, and the realm never thanks anybody for that.
- What saves the Starks in the end is not swords. It is the fact that the children grew up and became four completely different kinds of dangerous.
House Lannister
You belong to the house that worked out early on that gold moves faster than armies. Casterly Rock runs on leverage, reputation and the certainty that everybody at the table owes you something, and you are perfectly comfortable with all three.
- You play a longer game than the people around you, and you would rather own the outcome quietly than be seen winning in public.
- Family is the thing you would burn the realm for, which is both the best and the very worst quality this house has.
- Tyrion, Jaime and Cersei are three of the most compelling characters on television precisely because they were raised with everything except the ability to be simple about it.
- You are not the villain of your own story. You are simply the one who read the rules properly and decided to use them.
House Targaryen
You belong to the house that conquered a continent and never quite got over it. Targaryens do not ask for a seat at the table, because in their version of events the table was theirs to begin with, and that certainty is either magnificent or catastrophic depending on the week.
- You feel things at full volume, and nobody who has ever met a Targaryen has described one as measured.
- House of the Dragon made the family far more interesting than the original show could, because here the enemy is not some other house. It is the rest of the bloodline.
- Season 3 landed on HBO in June 2026 and pushed the civil war into the part everybody who read the book has been dreading for years.
- Your great strength and your great problem are the same thing, which is that you genuinely believe the story was always going to end with you.
House Tyrell
You belong to Highgarden, where nobody raises their voice and everybody gets exactly what they came for. The Tyrells feed the realm, charm the realm and quietly steer the realm, and they have never once needed to win a battle to get their way.
- You understand that being liked is a weapon, and you are genuinely better at it than the people who spend their lives trying to be feared.
- Olenna is the most quietly ruthless character in the entire series, and she does all of it from a chair with a bowl of fruit in front of her.
- Your house wins by being useful, since a kingdom that cannot eat without you will forgive you almost anything.
- The risk of being a Tyrell is simple enough. Charm works beautifully on everybody except the one person who has stopped caring what anyone thinks.
↻ RETAKE THE QUIZ
2 'Avatar: The Last Airbender' (2005–2008)
Image via NickelodeonA hundred years ago, the Fire Nation unleashed a brutal war that wiped out an entire people and plunged the world into chaos. With the Avatar—the only one capable of stopping the war—missing for a century, the Fire Nation has grown more powerful with every passing year. That is, until siblings Katara (Mae Whitman) and Sokka (Jack De Sena) stumble upon a boy frozen in an iceberg. Aang (Zach Tyler Eisen) is the long-lost Avatar, and he must master all four elements to restore balance to a world torn apart by war. Joined by Katara and Sokka, he sets out to learn the remaining elements, all while evading the relentless Prince Zuko (Dante Basco), who hopes to capture him and reclaim his honor.
Avatar: The Last Airbender is a masterclass in bringing high fantasy to both its intended children and preteen audiences without infantilizing its moral lessons, which is why the show hits home for adult audiences, too. As aspiring benders and warriors, Aang and his gang still have a long way to go before they can fully master their abilities. But that journey comes with sacrifices that even grown-ups would think twice about making. Complete with a reinvented version of Earth that takes the familiar concept of the four elements and builds a new system around them—inspired by real-world Asian, Indigenous, and Himalayan cultures and philosophies—Avatar: The Last Airbender is a breath of fresh air in the typically Western-centric fantasy genre.
1 'House of the Dragon' (2022–Present)
Set nearly 200 years before the events of Game of Thrones, House of the Dragon chronicles House Targaryen’s reign at the height of its power, when dragons still rule the skies of Westeros. When King Viserys I Targaryen (Paddy Considine) names his daughter, Rhaenyra (Emma D'Arcy and Milly Alcock), as his heir, her claim to the Iron Throne faces growing opposition, especially after he marries Alicent Hightower (Olivia Cooke and Emily Carey) and fathers sons of his own. What begins as an internal family dispute spills into the wider kingdom, eventually escalating into a full-blown civil war over who gets to rule the realm. It’s a succession war between members of the same bloodline, with each side fighting to prove their worth.
Game of Thrones might have kicked off George R. R. Martin's on-screen adaptations, but the original series lost its way in later seasons with some questionable plot and character decisions. House of the Dragon, on the other hand, keeps things focused on one family while giving fans plenty of what makes this world so fun to watch—dragons. The family drama and political backstabbing are just as messy, but the real treat is seeing all that tension explode into bloody battles. Some fights last 15 minutes, while others take up nearly an entire episode, and the dragon duels are a spectacle in their own right. For high fantasy fans, it's definitely worth a look.
