House of the Dragon is back and this time, HBO left the title on by mistake! Oh, the Black Queen. What can that entail? We had some bets last time if the queen would take the throne instead of her son. Now, with things up in the air, there might be a time for it to still come true.
What is coming true now is an obvious award for the costume and design department. These robes are regal, yet not gaudy as other shows have their royalty in. What also is coming is the other princess coming with bad news. The King is dead and the princess escapes with a dragon. The question of why she doesn’t burn everyone to the ground is posited and the answer is a bit lacking. Now she thinks the war isn’t hers to begin? She flip flops more than a fish on the back of a zoomanity actor.
Seriously, if they don’t win for costume design…
Princess Rhaenyra gives the news to her sons whilst she is in a painful labor more blunt than we’ve seen anyone in this show. As Daemon talks to the King’s Guard, he wonders out loud to which king they pledge now. He does so with a dragon about to go all Trogdor on them if they say the wrong thing. This foreshadows something that will happen in the Game of Thrones. I wonder if Danny knew of this story when she burninated the people who did not declare their allegiances correctly?
Speaking of declaring correctly–just how many births does this show have? Even Nick Cannon is like ‘maybe you should pull out?’. There a a lot of powerful scenes here that I just can’t show because they are a bit too graphic. You know the ones of which I speak.
A picture is worth 1,000 words
The literal blood on her hands is something she’ll try to avoid or embrace later?
As they burn a baby body, we see a guest to the island. This one carrying a crown. One fit for a king–and fit it does! This scene sets up that there are a lot of truly loyal people to Rhaenarys and she didn’t have to threaten them in some weird coup attempt. The calm of the true King and her court is a marked difference from that of King’s Landing. You get the sense that the King chose wisely with naming his daughter as the next ruler.
With the new small council in session, we see something of a treat. We see the war table in all its glory, It’s a cool visual and I bet the GoT people wish they could have had this one for themselves.
Now you know what to get me for Christmas!
As Daemon talks about dragons, we get a glimpse of just how many dragons in the world there are. This is no longer just the three we saw Danny have or even the few we’ve seen thus far. The new dragon riders (the girls we hope!) are introduced and teased.
What is also teased is if the queen’s daddy is going to go up in smoke. We can only hope. However, he still lives to ‘offer terms’. The feeling here seems to be one of a war brewing and one where the coup side is pressing hard to start whilst the rightful heirs try to avoid burning their kingdom down at all costs.
Stark, Tully, and B-Raths are being sent nice terms by the new king, too. How nice of the king. Too bad, this is going to send a very loud message to hate the southerners. A message that they remember well into the Game of Thrones.
With a single tear, she commands more respect that the fake king ever will.
Speaking of Game of Thrones, it seems that Queen (gee, I thought it would be King but you know with pants), knows that if the dragons are used, the cities will burn. She, unlike Danny, is not willing to pay that price. In this, we see a maturity that is missing (perhaps) in the future generations. Maybe that time at court helped form Rhae in a different way.
A different way is what she brings up, is a Song of Ice and Fire. As a reply, Daemon grabs the story by the throat — and the new Queen. ‘Dreams didn’t make us Kings, Dragons did’ – a lesson that Danny learned on her own.
He looks better on his deathbed than most characters look normally. I haven’t seen hair this good since Dennis Miller circa 1992.
A lesson one learns on their own is not soon forgotten as the Lord of the Tides makes a scene from his deathbed. This goes back to the King when he did the same. Maybe he can bury the hatchet for Daemon killing his brother and Rhae ‘allowing’ his son to ‘be killed’. Maybe when her sons marry his daughters, things will change. It would be, so far, one of the few marriages that the kids involved with would actually want.
Without marriage it still goes for the full support of their house. It seems that Rhae is trying to hold the realm together without fighting anyone. She is calculating. This will play off differently than how Daemon reacts. This is a bit of a yin/yang dynamic. Now, with Velaryon on their side, things go a bit quickly. Whomever owns the sea, owns the war. Or so GoT would have led us to believe until everyone, including Danny, forgot it.
The most well light shot of the season is also one of the most impactful.
As their mom gives them the Coward of the County treatment, the two would-be-kings get their assignments. One is off to talk to the Starks and the other the B-Raths. Does this mean we get to see the great grandpa of Ned Stark for three seconds before he’s beheaded by a flying owl?
What we also get to see is Matt Smith trying to charm another dragon by his song. With the scars on his face, it makes me realize that he’s not immune to fire like Danny was. Was Danny a freak? Was she getting some gene that affected only a few of her kind?
My grandma, what big TEETH you have…
Speaking of her kind–it looks like Solid Snake beat the kid to the message. As the lord of the area seemingly can’t read nor care for anyone who isn’t bribing him, the Solid Snake asks for his eye. In a fit of almost sanity, the lord doesn’t allow the eye to be taken. However, that kid better get on his dragon and run before Solid Snake catches up. I mean, unless we get to see a dragon fight right now in season 1. It would be pretty cool. To see something in this lightning storm.
Ever wonder if HBO is purposely making the scenes dark so they force people not to screenshot in reviews?
Maybe this is the act needed to start the war. The loss of her son? (Just guessing–nothing happened yet)
Ohh!! Called it! Solid Snake is riding his dragon that is definitely needing to check for performance enhancers with this one. That dragon is so big, it has three moons circling around it.
If we learned anything from the previous movies it’s if they didn’t figure out how to compensate for the lack of heat….BOOM! Called it! The dragon bites the other one in half and a war is started. Oddly, it seems Solid Snake is a complete idiot who knows he lost control of his emotions and didn’t know there was a real consequence to it. There is a parallel here that I’m avoiding but you can draw a similar conclusion yourself.
And to your left, you’ll see the starting of a war…that happens because another kid falls to their doom…
We knew this was coming. We knew the war had to start somehow. We knew Rhae wouldn’t do it without a real catalyst that made her push the realm into war. She knew what war would be. She did everything in her power to avoid it–until that decision was taken from her. She lost her father, her baby, and her son in the same day. This isn’t war, this is a mother scorned.
Will we see another King of the North? Will a King of the North be the prize for fighting for Rhae? Does Matt Smith come back with a fez (I hear they go great on dragon back)? Are we going for the showdown of …wait…the next season comes out in 2 years?! I think with that long of a cliffhanger, we might even see GRRM finish the book series! All that and more on then next exciting episode of ‘remind me in 2 years’.
All of us waiting two years for the next episode…
