You know what they say about dragons: it’s what’s on the inside that counts. And no, I don’t mean all that fire-breathing business, I’m talkin’ straight up muscle, bone, and sinew — because even when you’re creating something as VFX-heavy as Drogon from Game of Thrones, you’ve got to go well below the surface if you want to have any success.

And in this truly fascinating breakdown of the visual goings-on from, arguably, one of season five’s most riveting scenes, Mike Seymour from fxguide walks us through just how intricate all of this dragon business had to be in order to look as casually realistic and badass as it did.

As it turns out? The folks who built Drogon’s on-screen counterpart built him from the bones outward, creating a skeleton and muscle structure to figure out a natural movement flow before adding all the scales and blood and spit that ultimately made him look so ferocious on TV. This was not a dragon built on texture alone; this was a creature made to look as alive as the actors pretending to be near him on screen. He had movement! He had body! He had fire! He had soul! Oh that Drogon—always the complicated one.

How do you think Game of Thrones will top its dragon-ness in the several seasons yet to come? Let’s leave some speculative theories in the comments below.

HT: fxguide

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Alicia Lutes is the Associate Editor of The Nerdist. Find her on el Twitterino @alicialutes, or flying atop her dragon into the Dothraki Sea.