Amph Game of Thrones: House of the Dragon — Fire & Blood book spoilers must be TAGGED

I loved this episode. Thought it was incredible. Except...for the twins thing, which felt half-baked and contrived. Why pretend to be his brother when he could just...pretend to defect, like his brother did? Why if Rhanery's handmaid can run and find help, Rhanery herself can't get out of that room while the doofuses fight? And I get that the queen's mercy for the White Worm leading to her salvation is a strong thematic thread (good karma and all that), but for that karma to be returned IMMEDIATELY felt far too neat and cute for this show. Had the separation between Rhaenery's mercy and the White Worm saving her been an entire season or two, great. But to have it happen in the same episode, and not only that, immediately after the White Worm is freed? That felt very forced.

But my God was the rest of it good. Starting with the very beginning. That chaos of suspicion and immediate and harsh police action is exactly what the aftermath of the murder should have looked like. And this show is doing a better job than GoT did in presenting us with a more realistic social scene. What people say and do just makes sense in this.

And Aegon's grief and wrath? Alicent's guilt and grief and fear? Man, I'm worried she's going to eventually kill Helaena to hide her secret. Perfectly acted.

9/10. Lost a point because of the hammy twins plot, which just didn't work.

 

This was even better than the premiere.

And that fight between the twins? The pointless senseless violence by different interpretations of duty, which leads to brutal sad fighting and it gets hard to tell them apart or why it must be to the death, and a grievously-injured victor to emerge but then die by their own hand anyways?

That is a great summary of this entire story.

I wonder if Daeron will have red-brown hair in the show… apparently there was a Criston/Alicent sex scene cut from Season 1.

In the episode where the kids fight, someone actually says it was Criston’s post to be guarding the kids there that night, asking where he was. And there was the parallel of that being the night Rhaenyra and Daemon actually get together. Maybe even overheard by Alicent or Criston too, stirring old memories and rumors. Hmm…
And honestly, it feels like both are hooking-up more with an aspect of Rhaenyra that they both love-hate than with each other.

I also strongly suspect that at some point, after a certain event, something will happen that didn’t in the books’ history accounts (to my knowledge). That Rhaenyra and Criston will meet again, privately, under some secret banner of temporary truce, or Rhaenyra stumbling across him alone with her dragon and deciding to spare him out of disgust. That Criston will make super clear it’s all about being a spurned lover, and Rhaenyra about how she knows he must secretly wish he was in Harwin’s place all along… and then the big reveal that Rhaenyra didn’t take the drink, and that Jace is actually Criston’s son. She got married to Laenor almost immediately after that, after all.

For Criston Cole, he was pulling off the most selfish projection (and totally self-aware of it), deflecting blame that could come to him onto someone else, and really just doing it to cover his own a** and out of unjustified spite and internal self-loathing. This is a guy who basically said in this episode to Alicent that he won’t try to do better because he’s already a bad person, basically accepting he’s an irredeemable villain already. While also harping on the purity of his image, while commenting on the dirty cloak of a knight just having a meal after doing his duty of guarding the king on a night of assassins then escorting the dead prince around the muddy streets of the capital.

Otto isn’t quite as smart as Tywin, but… he actually cares about not committing atrocities, which is a huge contrast with Tywin. And unlike Tywin, he seems to finally have a moment where he confronts and realizes the truth, and actually says it to Aegon’s face - that he put Aegon on the throne, all those decades of work, and realizes it was a horrible mistake and how much he regrets it.

This really is all Otto’s fault, in the end. Yes there was internal tension between Viserys and Rhaenyra, and especially with Daemon and the Velaryons. But they all got around to coalescing. And the Alicent-Rhaenyra split wouldn’t have happened as badly without Otto pushing Alicent’s paranoia.

Otto pushed his daughter to be the new queen, which was manipulative, and he comes across a man who can always override his empathy to go straight to political call. But this as at least politically understandable. Though his lack of comfort to Alicent shows up completely in this episode as generational trauma… where Alicent doesn’t know how to comfort Helaena, and walks in on Aegon crying and leaves without trying to comfort him even, though Aegon only looks to her asking “mother?” when Otto insists they parade his dead son around the city (only for Alicent to follow her father yet again). And in this actual episode, Otto trauma-dumps on Alicent, finally showing her some of his own emotion, and then he says he doesn’t want to hear her emotions when she finally is about to open up to him too. Which probably happened in her youth too, which is why Alicent turned to the Faith after the loss of her mother. All the family trauma and dysfunction on Team Green goes back to Otto (although Viserys has some blame there too).
Aegon, for all his flaws, was actually trying to break the cycle, by showing love and care for his son, dote on him, get him involved and prepared for ruling from an early age, just having mischievous fun with him… for all those faults and bad parenting that would introduce new problems, at least he was trying to break the cycle. His rage and grief is very real.

But even beyond just being a good dad, Otto messed up in a bigger way. We learn in this last episode that, as much as he’s obsessed with family legacy and trying make his mark, to make up for being the “second son” (like we also see with Daemon, Aemond, and Vaemond — and even last season we saw Otto’s older brother, the Lord of House Hightower, bullying him to do more to make their family proud of him) … even despite that, and his concentration on optics…. Otto finally showed that he did truly care about peace and the realm.

But think about it. That means Otto truly believed it when he said the realm would never accept a Queen to rule them, and there would be war. But what actually happened when the time came? Starks of the North and Arryns of the Vale immediately supported her. The Crownlands around King’s Landing we are told all support her. The Tully’s of the Riverlands are quiet right now, but only because they know they’ll be the main battleground of any war, like always. The Greyjoys of the Iron Islands are neutral and detached right now, but they basically always are. Dorne is truly an independent kingdom still, at this point in history, that will only change with the grandson of one of the kids we see on the show. Even House Tyrell, who control the Reach from HighGarden, who are technically the overlords of House Hightower, with Oldtown just their biggest city, is actually neutral.

The only ones actually in opposition are House Hightower, House Lannister and their lords, and House Baratheon and their lords. And if Otto, after Aegon was born, went “great! If the realm rejects Rhaenyra, the clear choice will be my grandson… but for the good of the realm, I’ll make sure my daughter and her kids stay tied closely in friendship to Rhaenyra, so they’re ready to accept her themselves, and so she never turns into a threat to them, and only have Aegon on standby in case others reject her, and also work to help other houses stay loyal to the oaths made to King Viserys…” imagine how it would be different. If there was not as big of an Alicent-Rhaenyra rift because Otto would encourage them to stay friends. We even see that Aegon actually got along fine with “the strong boys” when they were kids together (even if the example we saw was teasing Aemond). If there was no Team Green/Black divide, and Alicent invited Rhaenyra back to King’s Landing to mourn Viserys and be coronated, with Aegon on standby but supportive (and hopefully actually coached too) all would be so different. The Hightowers wouldn’t be in opposition, and Aemond wouldn’t be turning the Baratheons against Rhaenyra.
The only possible opposition left would be the Lannisters of the Westerlands… and as douchy as those brothers are, and the hilariously bad and conceited marriage proposal to Rhaenyra that she rightly rejects… they know to act in their best interests, and they would not rebel alone, they have no true stake and no way to profit from that.

The realm as actually ready to accept a ruling Queen. It’s only Otto’s own utter disbelief, his underestimation of others, that actually made this war happen and then leave all of Westeros too scared to ever have a ruling Queen again because it could turn into a civil war… even though that’s really not what happened. Lords would grumble, afraid their older sisters would press claims for inheritance. All Queen Rhaenyra would need to do is make a decree that all current lords should stay in their station, but that from now on the oldest daughter would be set to inherit first. Which would make some hot-headed sons of lords grumble and maybe have a few small hotheaded rebellions… but Targaryens would be united, large, and with many dragons, and all the major lords and ladies behind them.

And then Otto would probably have to wait one more generation, but following Targaryen tradition, and again trying to foresee and prevent future rifts, Jace would probably have married Helaena, and he’d know one of his great-grandchildren would sit on the Iron Throne. Just like he lived to see Aegon and Helaena have kids, I’m sure he’d live to see Jace and Helaena have kids.

Otto is really an older man at this point. He was not only hand of the king to Aegon’s father, he was was the last hand of the king to Aegon’s freaking Great-Grandfather. And then lived to see his own great-grandchildren, and outlive at least one of them.

It literally all goes back to Otto, like a self-fulfilling prophecy which comes true by him trying to avoid it at all costs.

I know one criticism of Season 1 was lack of perspective of the small folk, but it is built into the story (leading up to something immensely important to all history) and they’re beginning to show that here with the trade blockade causing inflation and shortages.

I think part of it was zoning-out disassociation to deal with that trauma, she’s heavily implied to be on the autism spectrum.

But it did seem like she was seeing ash covering the city…

And astute observers pointed out that Helaena had illustrations she drew of Daenerys emerging from the fire, and even of Robb Stark at the Red Wedding, in her room. Helaena has seen some ****.

 

I saw that in a New Rockstars vid. She has seen it all already.

 

We are so lucky to be getting this show right now.

S02E03 was peak ASOIAF storytelling.

I cannot wait to see what happens in the next 7 episodes of the season.

And we haven't even seen any dragon action yet.

 

“The Prince That Was Promised.”
Alicent takes another L.

 

She doesn't know it though, nor will she admit being wrong.

Please someone remind me, at that point, had Rhaenyra given birth to her Aegon? I think she must have, no?
And then Viserys is younger, and Visenya died at birth because of her grief when her dad died?
So if Rhaenyra's Aegon was a baby at that point, why couldn't HE have been the one that Viserys meant in his dying words?

 

If nothing else, Alicent was shaken. She now doubts herself. But she also realizes with her father gone and Cole in charge, her influence has diminished and she can't end this war even if she wanted to.

 

Alicent realized she misunderstood Viserys when Rhaenyra mentions “Aegon the Conqueror.”

 

They just straight up showed a bj. Take that GoT lol

This show is so good even in what is imo the slowest episode of the season yet and it’s leaps and bounds better than “the best” episode so far of The Asscolyte. That ending knocked it out of the park. Destruction is coming and Alicent now knows she made an error and is powerless to stop it now that it’s in motion. Just damn!

 

Ok so I have one minor gripe about this 3rd episode.

Spoiler

A little to quick for Rhaenyra to get to Alicent. Just a bit too easy. However, the conversation was well worth it.

Milly! Did this actress touch a nerve or what? Now she's gonna be Supergirl.

Um. Yep. That was a hard to swallow moment there I bet.

 

TV is great for long-form storytelling where you have the luxury of taking your time when unfolding plot and characterization. HBO seems to understand that better than any studio. Great, great episode. With elegant and emotionally satisfying callbacks to last season.

 

A good episode, little slow

 

What I found funny is that Alicent's brother just shows up and is like "man, that three month journey was a lot but happy to be here" and then five seconds later he agrees to accompany Cristin. I'd be like, "geez, I just got here. You go on ahead. I'll catch up in a month or so".

 

A lil something that was cleared up.

Spoiler

When Alicent says it doesn't matter what the truth is, apparently she realizes the truth but since the council and king do not listen to her and are already going to war it has all been decided no matter what she might tell them.

 

Yeah, at this point, it seems like it doesn't matter what happen prior or who killed/maimed who first or who said what - it's all leading to the inevitable war. Sad for the characters we like, happy for those who are ready for some action! I'm somewhere in the middle.

 

This season is only going to be eight episodes long.

 

For me, the storytelling is just as glorious as the action.

 

I didn't realize what was going on.

Spoiler

When Daemon goes to the castle and they all bend the knee, then this woman comes out and she remains standing. And later on she tells him he will die there and vanishes. Oh that's a ghost!

 

Yeah, I’m not itching for the action to start. The buildup is always better, and without it, the action will fall flat.

 

It was during the sequence that I went "oh yeah, Harrenhall is haunted as **** that's right." Loved that bit.

 

I love the haunted house vibe from Harrenhall.

Spoiler

Alys Rivers it seems is a 400 year old witch. And i could feel that when we saw her twice.

 

Magic