House of the Dragon S2; E 1,2 Recap & Thoughts (Patreon)

I know, I know I’m late and I apologize. I promise it wasn’t great for me, but we are back Team Black … strong (lol).

Spoilers for the episodes. No book spoilers, but some book comparisons for events already seen.

Episode One: “A Son for a Son”

Directed by Alan Taylor Written by Ryan Condal

Cinematography by P.J. Dillon Editing by Frances Parker

Team Black

Following the events of the previous season, we return to Team Black with a queen in mourning. Rather than leading the charge to secure her claim, Rhaenyra is searching for the body of her second son, Lucerys Velaryon, and his dragon, Arrax, at Storm's End. She eventually finds the remains on the beach. Both she and her dragon let out a wail of sadness for their sons.

Back at Dragonstone, Daemon is acting buckwild and reckless, trying to throw his weight around by commanding Princess Rhaenys to fly with him to King’s Landing to try and take down Aemond and Vhagar. “Would that you were the king.”

Period.

Rhaenys has been the MVP thus far and her not allowing her baby cousin/former son-in-law (the North remembers) order her around is great.

When Rhaenyra does return she utters her only lines of dialogue: “I want Aemond Targaryen.”

Me too girl.

Daemon decides to don his Sith robes and makes his way to King’s Landing, hiring two assassins to enact the queen’s revenge.

Team Green

Alicent is getting munched down by Ser Criston Cole, right in Rhaenyra’s old room. Haters are the strangest creatures. The two are doing this little dalliance right before a small council meeting. Aegon is trying to do this whole king thing and decides to bring his son, Jaehaerys to the meeting where the child spends his time trolling Ser Tyland Lannister, Master of Coin. Yes, he has a twin that we met before, but that twin is at Casterly Rock.

When Aegon goes to retrieve the boy, Helaena is there sewing what we will later see is a funeral shroud. Helaena tells her brother-husband that she is afraid of not the dragons or her half-sister, but the rats.

Aegon being the opposite of magnanimous ignores his wife, mocks her, and goes about business. We see him on the Iron Throne and, to the credit of Tom Glynn-Carney, we can see that Aegon wants to be loved deeply by the smallfolk. He wasn’t loved by his own family, so it is time to rebrand. Sadly, Otto Hightower is Hand of the King and hasn’t actually trained Aegon in how to be king. Every time Aegon tries to say something it is shot down by Otto.

Otto and Alicent hope that once the excitement of being king winds down, they will be able to steer his rule as they wish it. Why that is the plan … I can not say. I’ve never been Hand of the King.

Alicent is conflicted about the bloodshed she is a part of, starting with her son Aemond, who she blames for Lucerys’s death, and her household staff that was killed off and replaced by Lord Larys. She goes to pray for them because well right now prayers is all she has, since she complains about not being supported by her father in the small council.

Actually, I stand corrected. She also has Ser Cristin who I’m sure with his massive madonna whore complex is content to be her little toy for now.

Smallfolk

It seems the complaints found a home and we have more focus on the smallfolk. We are introduced to Alyn of Hull in Driftmak who speaks to Lord Corlys. Two Black men are talking together. Are they related? Probably.

We also are introduced to Hugh Hammer as one of the smiths trying to get money for the services they are going to render to the crown. He will be important later on.

And then of course there are the two assassins who will end out the episode…

Blood & Cheese

A former goldcloak dubbed Blood and a ratcatcher named Cheese are paid to kill Aemond Targaryen. Eyepatch, sapphire eye, hair pressed by a cast iron. Kinda anime hot in some people’s opinions. The two infiltrate the palace and fail to find Aemond. They do find Helaena and her twins: Jaehaerys and Jaehaera. She tries to bribe them with a necklace, but they put a knife to her neck and tell her to identify the boy child. Giving in to fear she points at Jaehaerys.

Blood and Cheese subdue the child and remove the boy’s head. Helaena grabs her daughter and runs to where any scared young girl would go—her mother’s room. Only to find her mother enjoying the beast with two backs with Ser Cristin Cole.

Thoughts, Subplots, and Well … In the Books (nerd glasses motion)

A lot happened this episode. Starting with Blood & Cheese there was a lot of conversation about if it lived up to expectations. I think the failure of the moment isn’t so much the total change in tension, but instead highlights a problem from back in season one.

The Dance of Dragons is a family drama. This is a civil war between half-siblings. People are killing their nephews and nieces en mass. While we are not clear on the ages because the entire cast is very-very much too young for most of the characters—most of the characters are young adults. Helaena is roughly twenty-one years old, Aemond is twenty, and Aegon is twenty-four. Jace is 16, Luke was 14, and their youngest brother is meant to be 13, but he’s clearly been aged down. These are young people fighting a war they didn’t start. Their children are dying at the hands of their kin back and forth.

But overall we have no idea how these relationships work besides general animosity. We have not spent any time with Jaehaerys before this moment so while the incident is horrific, it is narratively a bit meh.

In the source material, Aegon and Helaena have another son, Maelor, who is younger. When Blood and Cheese arrive they hold Helaena and Alicent captive at knifepoint with the threat of death and sexual violence. They ask Helaena which of her son’s should die and she picks Maelor. Cheese tells Maelor that his mother wants him dead and Blood decapitates Jaehaerys. It is a chilling moment because of all the players involved.

Maelor doesn’t exist at this moment according to the showrunners:

I mean, just very simply, Maelor has not even born in the storyline. We did have to compress time in season one to make it so that we didn't have to recast every character on screen. We were just recasting the kids, so to speak, as we went along, and part of that meant that Aegon and Helaena's children were younger, as are Daemon and Rhaenyra's children younger at the very end of this, because not as much time passed after their marriages to give time for all these kids to grow up. | Ryan Condal—TVLine

The time skips, in my opinion, were a huge mistake in terms of the crafting of the world and I wish we had spent just a bit more time seeing the siblings interact.

Something that fans had been looking forward to was the introduction of Cregan Stark because we were told in the book that they hunted, drank and became bros together. Some folks wanted to see if that closeness was pride-close or just bro-close. We got a quick taste of the North and while I get for plot reasons they couldn’t drag it out—Winterfell teases are cruel.

Episode Two: “Rheanyra the Cruel.”

Directed by Clare Kilner Written by Sara Hess Cinematography by Alejandro Martínez Editing by Crispin Green

Team Green

Nothing really kills a celebratory period like the murder of a small child. The fallout of Blood & Cheese is felt immediately and Aegon deals with it with anger. Not that one can blame him for that kind of anger. Once again, Team Green has Glynn-Carney to thank for bringing a lot of humanity to the character. Yes, Aegon sucks, but that doesn’t mean he has to remain a one note kind of character.

Aegon wants to strike out emotionally, but Otto Hightower hasn’t inflicted two generations of trauma to not take the opportunity to take advantage of a chance. In order to use the death of the young prince to win over the small folk and create “fake news” (not my words) propaganda against Rhaenyra's cause. It won’t matter if she really did the crime if they said she did it first.

Aegon doesn’t want to parade his son like that, but Alicent convinces him to allow it—only to then be made uncomfortable when she and Helaena both must sit behind the funeral cart.

The scene is horribly sad, especially with the tension of something happening to the baby as the wheel gets stuck for a moment. I thought ol’boy was going to lose his head again. This is Game of Thrones, they’ve done worse.

While this goes on Aegon, with the help of Ser Larys finds Blood and bludgeons the child-killer to death. No complaints.

Ser Cristin Cole feels guilty that instead of guarding the Queen, he was letting the Queen ride him into furthering his madonna-whore complex. He decides to take out his misplaced anger on Arryk by sending him to assassinate Rhaenyra, by pretending to be his twin brother, Erryk.

Wow … glad to know Shakespeare was always on the pulse of things.

Thing escalate when Aegon makes the unilateral decision to hang all the rat catchers in King’s Landing. An act that sends Otto into a rage that doubles once he finds out about Seri Cristin’s dog shit plan.

Now, I don’t “like” Otto Hightower, but there is no denying that Rhys Ifans plays the character perfectly. The pent-up frustration, the disbelief in being surrounded by his own wasteful family. He and Lady Featherington would have a lot to discuss. The reward for his verbal lashing of his grandson sees his title of Hand of the King removed and granted to Ser Cristin Cole.

Good luck, babe.

Alicent tries to tell her father she will keep working on Aegon, but Otto decides to go visit his other grandson, Daeron in Oldtown, before agreeing to go Highgarden to secure the seat for Aegon. She tries to confess her “sins” to Otto, but he smoothly tells her “I don’t wish to hear of it.” Instead, she decides to ignore her crying son and has angry sex with Ser Cristin Cole.

Mother of the year.

Team Black

Rhaenyra is agog at the idea that people think she could have caused harm to “Helaena of all people.” The side-eye around her entire council is violently loud before she meets eyes with her uncle-husband, Daemon. He did that shit.

She confronts Daemon about his actions and he makes it clear that he never intended for a child to die, just Aemond. The two argue, with Rhaenyra pressing Daemon about his loyalty to her as his queen. And rejects the idea that neither she or her late father were afraid of Daemon because of his perceived greatness. They were afraid of his true loyalty.

Daemon flies off in a hissy fit ignoring his daughter, Baela. Baela is asked by her step-mother/cousin to make a patrol around King’s Landing because unlike, Daemon she can be trusted. Scenes like this remind me of how robbed we were of more scenes between Rhaenyra and Laena. The two were close friends and I think that at times it is a really disappointing that we added all these Black characters—but other than Corlys, they are all very underdeveloped. This episode is probably the most we have seen Baela talk.

She goes out to practice her crossbow and talks to Jace about his two dads. He got Laenor and Ser Harwin and both, despite the faults they had, loved Jace and his brothers very much. In some ways it speaks to Rhaenyra’s own feelings of unease (and to a degree selfishness) that led her to marry Daemon. He brings her a duel sense of legitimacy and grief.

In good couple news we get a scene between Corlys and Rhaenys where we see that despite time apart and the death of their children, the couple have come to an understanding about each other. They are both power players and Corlys is now comfortable submitting to Rhaenys. It is a marriage of love, comfort (and a bit of mess).

Rhaenyra interrogates Mysaria and the two somewhat bond over Daemon’s fuckboy nature. Being an overall girl’s girl Rhaenyra lets Mysaria go. As the later is being led to the ship she notices Ser Arryk on his way to the castle. Having just seen Ser Erryk, Mysaria senses something is not right.

The Smallfolk

Before we get to the big moment, lets talk about the smallfolk. We are introduced to Addam of Hull, brother to Alyn. Addam is excited at the idea of his brother growing in ranks under Lord Corlys. Addam later on in the episode sees a dragon flying above. From the color, we can guess that this might be Seasmoke, Laenor’s dragon.

Seeing the bodies of all the rat catchers was traumatic and intense. Aegon really wasted all that good favor in less than a day. The crowds for the young princes’ funeral were clearly on his side and we see Hugh Hammer’s wife there and they talk about the price good since the war. Inflation, the most relatable storyline.

We also see Aemond at a brothel with an older woman. He mentions that he does feel guilt about what happened to Luke. The woman he is with reminds him that when princes’ anger it is the small folk that feels it.

Farewell, My Brother

Alright so the big tentpole moment of the episode is the duel between the Cargyll Twins, Erryk and Arryk. Not only is this a fucking horrible plan, but it also very much delivers the visual sorrows of this entire conflict: brother vs brother. Ser Arryk the Green is sent on this horrible mission and it brings him into conflict with his brother.

They two fight and it is clear that they are evenly matched. The agony is the tension of killing your twin. In the end Ser Erryk the Black wins but it is a shallow victory. He has spilled the blood of his kin and due the whole parent trap situation, he can never be a true member of the Queensguard. So he takes his own life in front of his queen.

Thoughts, Subplots, and Well … In the Books (nerd glasses motion)

A really strong episode. The fallout of multiple deaths is sometimes more important than the death itself. There was never any turning back, but now Alicent knows that letters aren’t enough.

We got amazing acting from the members of Team Green, especially Otto Hightower. It makes you wonder why he thought that Aegon was fit for this role. At least with Joffrey and Tywin Lannister, Tywin held such sway that when Joffrey tried it he could just be sent to bed. Plus, Joffrey was around 15-16 in the show and only 13 in the books. Aegon is grown, entitled, and untrained.

I feel like this feels like an oversight on all their parts. Especially since when it comes to actually running the nation, Otto and Alicent have the most experience. This should have been the layup.

Daemon sometimes comes across as one-note because the writing only seems to acknowledge that he does love his family in background shots or one-off-scenes. I do truly believe that Daemon loved his brother, his second wife, his girls, and Rhaenyra and her children. He’s also just an entitled ass nugget like all Targaryen men.

I’m invested in what comes next.

For those looking for the non-American Civil War parallel within the twin duel, GRRM has said it is based on the story of Balin and Balan from later Arthurian Legend.

Alright, see you next week. Hopefully, everyone realizes they need better security by then.