Alright, House of the Dragon viewers, after a struggle watch of Episodes 5 and 6, I am going to go ahead and address Cersei’s longed-for elephant in the room: Ryan Condal and his writing team are falling into the same trap that the Game of Thrones Season 8 writers did and the show is worse for it.
A reminder of what episodes 5 and 6 entailed:
Look, the past two episodes have not been without their epic dragon appearances and emotional gut-wrenching scenes. The MVP of Episode 5 was Lady Baela Targaryen (Bethany Antonia)! Not only did she seamlessly step up as her grandmother Rhaenys (Eve Best)βs successor in badassery and giving her grandsire Corlys the kick in the butt he needed, but she channelled her 8-x great-niece Daenerysβs firm belief that she is a dragon through and through with that βI am Blood and Fireβ one liner. I literally got goosebumps!
Olivia Cooke continues to make Alicent Hightower the character I love to hate watch. From Episode 5’s complete dissociative scene at the Small Council meeting to the realisation that her last kid Daeron turned out pretty awesome BECAUSE she did not raise him, Cooke ensures that Alicent’s emotions and motivations are complex but relatable to her audience.
Hell, even Seasmoke has grown as a character this season, blasting a would-be rider (RIP Ser Steffon!) as well as stalking, pursuing and finally conquering the object of his affection, Aadam of Hull (Clinton Liberty). I will laugh at this scene for the rest of my days:
So why do I find myself unsatisfied?
Well, here’s the thing: Condal and his writers are taking shortcuts, overlooking key plots, not spending enough time on character development for soon-to-be key Dance of the Dragon players and spending WAY too much time on Daemon’s hallucinations.
I am a HUGE Daemon fan and don’t get me wrong, any time Matt Smith is on screen, he is utterly compelling, but this isn’t Daemon’s story nor Aemond’s (Ewan Mitchell). However, we do not need to see the one f***ing his mother (I am going to need to scrub my brain really hard to get rid of the image of mother and son copulating and forgive myself for being turned on by the scene until I realised that THAT was his mom!) or the other going the overly-done second son wants the Iron Throne so he attempts to kill his brother, the King, route (Aemond, take a leaf out of Prince Harry’s book and go be happy on an island with a beautiful, intelligent, loving woman, PLEASE!).
Just like the stupid setting up of woman against woman strife, the pointless romance between Cersei and Euron Greyjoy and the uber quick ocean travelling in GOT Season 8, we’re now being fed an impotent Daemon, far too dumbed down explanations of the dragon seedlings (despite ALL of the heavy foreshadowing in the first four episodes) and murky characters not living to their full potential (Larys Clubfoot’s arc in the source novel Fire and Blood looks more and more unlikely to be full explored).
I understand that with the shortened episode order and so much ground to cover, that details may fall by the wayside. I am not one of those “everything from the book must be in or I will not watch it” fanatics but I DO need the content that is offered to make sense.
GOT‘s first six seasons sizzled because the two people who were actually playing the Game of Thrones were the two obscure and dodgy characters, Littlefinger and Varys. Their scenes were heavy with political intrigue, their minds this sapiosexual’s biggest wet dream. In HOTD, while I find Mysaria (Sonoya Mizuno) both beautiful in appearance and brilliant of mind (that medieval version of UBER Eats was EVERYTHING!), I long for someone on the Green Council to match her. Larys (Matthew Needham) is grossly underused by Team Green and the show’s writers.
Daenerys (Emilia Clarke)’s vision of Khal Drogo (Jason Momoa) and their son in GOT Season 2 was effective because it was a short take- a mere glimpse into the life she could have had if they’d lived AND it gives her the motivation to continue to fight for what she lost. Daemon’s hallucinations in HOTD are starting to feel like screen time fillers and just an excuse to keep the former cast around. Please, for the love of all that is holy, stop this shit!
Add to that the fact that author and universe creator George RR Martin is off writing blog posts about what a “real” dragon and the Targaryen crest should look like, instead of, oh, I don’t know, actually FINISHING The Winds of Winter novel or f***ing giving the show writers useful notes, and you have the makings of what will soon be yet another Internet war on this show.
Old Gods and New, please, PLEASE let the final two episodes of this season be better. May The Stranger come for Criston Cole, may The Mother watch over our Targaryen babies and may the Lord of Light guide Rhaenyra (Emma D’Arcy) to victory (after she taps the White Worm’s hot ass!)
House of the Dragon airs on MAX each Sunday, on Mnet 101 on Mondays at 9pm and is available for streaming on Showmax.