# House of the Dragon spoiler thread



## Morrus (Aug 22, 2022)

First episode — dragons, a tourney, lots of political conversations! Matt Smith chewing the scenery. 

What did you think?


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## payn (Aug 22, 2022)

Looks great, narration bit was odd, wish they slowed the pace down more for exposition. Felt like they crammed too much in one pilot. I guess the coming episodes will tell if that's an issue or not.


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## Morrus (Aug 22, 2022)

As I understand it the first season covers a lot of years.


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## John R Davis (Aug 22, 2022)

I enjoyed it. 
Wasn't confused by lots new names.
Liked Matt Smith


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## Tonguez (Aug 22, 2022)

The story was spoiled by gratuitous whores and facesmashing and ballbreaking, the story is quite plausible (if unremarkable) and they did try to give it some emotional gravitas despite Matt Smith chewing up the scenery

its not as compelling as the Stark saga, but the dragons and succession crisis were nice elements


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## Aeson (Aug 23, 2022)

So much blond hair. So much...


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## payn (Aug 23, 2022)

Aeson said:


> So much blond hair. So much...








That family needs a lot of shampoo and conditioner!


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## Zaukrie (Aug 23, 2022)

Hard to say yet. It certainly looks great. But I'll need to see most of the year to see how I feel about the story. This episode was carrying a lot of exposition weight...


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## pukunui (Aug 23, 2022)

Like I said in the other thread ...



pukunui said:


> Just watched the first episode. It was a decent enough start. I liked the pageantry of it. The dragons were cool. The choral version of the GoT theme during the end credits was a nice touch. I appreciated that Viserys is being cut by the Iron Throne.
> 
> Will keep watching for now.


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## Older Beholder (Aug 23, 2022)

I enjoyed the first episode, I'd set my expectations pretty low which always helps.
It hit all the right notes for me, although didn't quite feel like the event television that the original series was. But a solid start with lots of political intrigue. It was always going to feel smaller in scale than Game of Thrones due to the focus on the Targaryen house.

Ten dragons!


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## Sepulchrave II (Aug 23, 2022)

I haven't read the books. The show felt a little stiff to me, but I'm hoping that the actors grow into their characters. I'm hoping that there isn't too much casual cruelty, as I find GRRT verges on misanthropic at times.

But I've just finished _The Sandman_ and the third season of _For All Mankind_ so I need something else to watch.


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## wicked cool (Aug 23, 2022)

good but not great. 

liked
call backs to old houses
the trees
changes to the throne room
the dragons

the bad
the sex scene added really nothing to the show and was just there. same with 90% of the tourney  GOT added them but they often added to the plot (secret affairs etc)

So far the characters themselves arent as interesting. Matt smith comes off as interesting but hes a shadow compared to every lannister from GOT etc (he comes off as brutal but not with his acting). If you back and read the episode 1 recap of GOT on hbo its a much better show with a lot more happening 

the baby dying-something was left on the cutting room floor (no pun intended). we see the mother die and hear the baby crying and he has a son . next thing its a funeral for 2 dead bodies and talk of no heir. WTH?


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## Imaculata (Aug 23, 2022)

What was up with that wagon? Was that a CGI wagon pulled by real horses?


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## Morrus (Aug 23, 2022)

wicked cool said:


> the baby dying-something was left on the cutting room floor (no pun intended). we see the mother die and hear the baby crying and he has a son . next thing its a funeral for 2 dead bodies and talk of no heir. WTH?



There’s some things that nobody wants to see.


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## RuinousPowers (Aug 23, 2022)

It was...ok. Haven't read the book, but was there a need for all the whoring? Like, are the brothels just filled with potential heirs and claimants to the throne by now? All kinds of dirty fighting, right in the open, at the king's own tourney, and everyone is just fine with it?


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## payn (Aug 23, 2022)

RuinousPowers said:


> It was...ok. Haven't read the book, but was there a need for all the whoring? Like, are the brothels just filled with potential heirs and claimants to the throne by now? All kinds of dirty fighting, right in the open, at the king's own tourney, and everyone is just fine with it?



I was left rolling with laughter of the scene in the brothel with the prince. The one where a fella just torso twists so he can give the prince attention as he speaks. Thats great stuff there.


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## RuinousPowers (Aug 23, 2022)

payn said:


> I was left rolling with laughter of the scene in the brothel with the prince. The one where a fella just torso twists so he can give the prince attention as he speaks. Thats great stuff there.



I just feel that if the rulers of the land, for hundreds of years, just hung out in brothels, it would be a lot more accepted. Maybe it would have been more geisha-esque, even. I'm no prude, I just don't think it really added to the story much.


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## payn (Aug 23, 2022)

RuinousPowers said:


> I just feel that if the rulers of the land, for hundreds of years, just hung out in brothels, it would be a lot more accepted. Maybe it would have been more geisha-esque, even. I'm no prude, I just don't think it really added to the story much.



There is a film by Paul Verhoeven that I think is the best medieval depiction called _Flesh and Blood_. There is a superstitious religion, dirty, nasty, debauchers of people. It's shocking to watch because its so contrary to our modern values and norms. I think its a good exercise to examine that once in awhile. The scene with the prince's speech is just such an occasion. It's so out of the ordinary, a den of debauchery, yet still an adherence of respect for authority, thats just great writing.  

For the prince, they seemed to be developing a relationship here. As you seen one scene hes with a madam, and then he shows her his dragon. Thats foreshadowing the closeness of that relationship. I wouldn't call it gratuitous either.   

I had more an issue of them making face hamburger out of random knights. I mean, is it typical for a dozen or so men to buy the farm at these tourneys? That seemed a little over the top to me. Especially, in contrast of the prince yielding. Why did all these other guys just eat it?


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## wicked cool (Aug 23, 2022)

Morrus said:


> There’s some things that nobody wants to see.



right but how did the baby die? the baby was crying. the dr says you have a son and then blam its dead? i think they edited out something . a line would have been helpful. Sire the baby died and we couldnt save it. she died in a horrible way and they could have said we couldnt save both.As a viewer i agree with you but it wasnt good storytelling

Happens all the time on television. probably a ton on shows like greys anatomy. plus we had white walkers killing babies in GOT


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## payn (Aug 23, 2022)

wicked cool said:


> right but how did the baby die? the baby was crying. the dr says you have a son and then blam its dead? i think they edited out something . a line would have been helpful. Sire the baby died and we couldnt save it. she died in a horrible way and they could have said we couldnt save both.As a viewer i agree with you but it wasnt good storytelling
> 
> Happens all the time on television. probably a ton on shows like greys anatomy. plus we had white walkers killing babies in GOT



Im guessing they cut a scene for time. This whole episode felt rushed like they had to fit 10 gallons in a 5 gallon bucket.


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## Zaukrie (Aug 23, 2022)

wicked cool said:


> right but how did the baby die? the baby was crying. the dr says you have a son and then blam its dead? i think they edited out something . a line would have been helpful. Sire the baby died and we couldnt save it. she died in a horrible way and they could have said we couldnt save both.As a viewer i agree with you but it wasnt good storytelling
> 
> Happens all the time on television. probably a ton on shows like greys anatomy. plus we had white walkers killing babies in GOT



Ya, I don't know why we need that at all. Babies die all the time. I actually found it more powerful to see the wrapped body.

I find i don't need the gore, frankly. They could make the same points without it. 

As for the prince, he's an interesting mix. He seemed very caring at the funeral, for example.


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## Morrus (Aug 23, 2022)

wicked cool said:


> right but how did the baby die? the baby was crying. the dr says you have a son and then blam its dead? i think they edited out something . a line would have been helpful. Sire the baby died and we couldnt save it. she died in a horrible way and they could have said we couldnt save both.As a viewer i agree with you but it wasnt good storytelling
> 
> Happens all the time on television. probably a ton on shows like greys anatomy. plus we had white walkers killing babies in GOT



I understand . You want more information than I want.


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## RuinousPowers (Aug 23, 2022)

payn said:


> There is a film by Paul Verhoeven that I think is the best medieval depiction called _Flesh and Blood_. There is a superstitious religion, dirty, nasty, debauchers of people. It's shocking to watch because its so contrary to our modern values and norms. I think its a good exercise to examine that once in awhile. The scene with the prince's speech is just such an occasion. It's so out of the ordinary, a den of debauchery, yet still an adherence of respect for authority, thats just great writing.
> 
> For the prince, they seemed to be developing a relationship here. As you seen one scene hes with a madam, and then he shows her his dragon. Thats foreshadowing the closeness of that relationship. I wouldn't call it gratuitous either.
> 
> I had more an issue of them making face hamburger out of random knights. I mean, is it typical for a dozen or so men to buy the farm at these tourneys? That seemed a little over the top to me. Especially, in contrast of the prince yielding. Why did all these other guys just eat it?



It seems you know more of the story than I, to me it looked like a throwback to Tyrion and Shae but without the fun.


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## wicked cool (Aug 23, 2022)

Morrus said:


> I understand . You want more information than I want.



i guess. i was just like wait what...
. shrugs shoulders


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## Older Beholder (Aug 24, 2022)

I was talking to a friend of mine who said he watched the episode with his pregnant wife. I can't even imagine how rough that must have been. That scene was rather graphic.


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## Sepulchrave II (Aug 24, 2022)

Morrus said:


> I understand . You want more information than I want.edw



It's interesting - I feel the opposite way. To me, the scene of the forced Caesarian was TMI: unnecessarily gratuitous, and its visual horror actually detracted from the impact of the king losing his wife (and child) after being confronted with an impossible choice. What we didn't see was his emotional reaction upon learning that his heir had died, which struck me as a missed opportunity for development and audience investment in the character.

I felt the "tourney" was overly brutal and felt more like a gladiatorial contest. It seems that this kind of attrition amongst your mounted aristocracy wouldn't be very sustainable, but maybe it's intended to demonstrate the overall decadence of a kingdom that's been at peace for so long.


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## Zardnaar (Aug 24, 2022)

The house succession rules are moronic. Basically there are none. 

Daemon or Rornaye(sp?) Should be the heir depending on the rules with the heir after that being the queen that never was son at least until one of them has a kid (or male kid if it'sale preference).

 The reason they have succession laws fair or not was to prevent situations like this. The dynasty has been in power over 100+ years by now.

 Dagger used to kill the night king made a cameo.

 I liked it though probably not as good as S1E1 of GoT hard to say. 

 Instead of 5 kings I can think of three claims but when two rude dragons the third won't matter to much.


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## Dioltach (Aug 24, 2022)

wicked cool said:


> right but how did the baby die? the baby was crying. the dr says you have a son and then blam its dead? i think they edited out something . a line would have been helpful. Sire the baby died and we couldnt save it. she died in a horrible way and they could have said we couldnt save both.As a viewer i agree with you but it wasnt good storytelling
> 
> Happens all the time on television. probably a ton on shows like greys anatomy. plus we had white walkers killing babies in GOT



The baby is in the maester's arms, and makes a choking noise. The maester looks worried. I think that's all you need, particularly in a show that's about a war of succession.


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## Dioltach (Aug 24, 2022)

Costumer in Hollywood must be one of the best jobs in the world right now.


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## pukunui (Aug 25, 2022)

Zardnaar said:


> Dagger used to kill the night king made a cameo.



I thought it looked familiar!



Dioltach said:


> The baby is in the maester's arms, and makes a choking noise. The maester looks worried. I think that's all you need, particularly in a show that's about a war of succession.



I noticed that but was still a bit surprised when the next scene showed two bodies on the pyre.


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## Zardnaar (Aug 25, 2022)

I didn't notice two bodies on the pyre.


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## Rabulias (Aug 25, 2022)

We saw lots of ancestors of the GoT houses, but did I miss it or did we not see any Lannisters?


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## billd91 (Aug 25, 2022)

Sepulchrave II said:


> I felt the "tourney" was overly brutal and felt more like a gladiatorial contest. It seems that this kind of attrition amongst your mounted aristocracy wouldn't be very sustainable, but maybe it's intended to demonstrate the overall decadence of a kingdom that's been at peace for so long.



I was thinking it was a bit too much at first, but now, I'm not so sure. The tourney competitors were generally young men who had lived in relative peace. Open up a outlet for violence and they erupt. That may become a theme for the rest of the series based on my delve into the story of the Targaryen war of succession that we're heading into.
It's an echo (pre-echo?) of the same issue in GoT/War of the Roses when big standing forces with not enough to do against outside enemies turn on each other.


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## Tonguez (Aug 25, 2022)

billd91 said:


> I was thinking it was a bit too much at first, but now, I'm not so sure. The tourney competitors were generally young men who had lived in relative peace. Open up a outlet for violence and they erupt. That may become a theme for the rest of the series based on my delve into the story of the Targaryen war of succession that we're heading into.
> It's an echo (pre-echo?) of the same issue in GoT/War of the Roses when big standing forces with not enough to do against outside enemies turn on each other.



I just wondered where are the families of the killed knights - why arent there friends piling in to stop their champion being slaughtered and why arent their fathers there demanding the kings justice. One would think that a knight getting their face smashed to mince would be a just cause for war and does the king really want that?



Zardnaar said:


> I didn't notice two bodies on the pyre.



there was a little bundle wrapped next to the queens body, I thought that was more jarring than if they had shown the baby die at the birth - an omg the baby died moment.
that said like Sepulchrave I think having the king holding his son as the baby dies and then hear him cry out in anguish might have been a chance to build some sympathy for the character


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## Wolfram stout (Aug 25, 2022)

Rabulias said:


> We saw lots of ancestors of the GoT houses, but did I miss it or did we not see any Lannisters?



No named Lannisters, but when the knights line up for Daemon to chose his first opponent, one of the knights is wearing the Red with Gold Lion tabard. So I expect some named Lannisters soon.


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## billd91 (Aug 25, 2022)

Tonguez said:


> I just wondered where are the families of the killed knights - why arent there friends piling in to stop their champion being slaughtered and why arent their fathers there demanding the kings justice. One would think that a knight getting their face smashed to mince would be a just cause for war and does the king really want that?



Probably because those are rules of the game. This isn't *A Knight's Tale* where the jousting is just sport. This is a much more violent tourney where contestants can and do take it farther and know that might happen. Not that some behavior might not drive a vendetta - just not necessarily one that could be officially sanctioned.


Tonguez said:


> there was a little bundle wrapped next to the queens body, I thought that was more jarring than if they had shown the baby die at the birth - an omg the baby died moment.



Oh, yeah. Definitely highly jarring to see the wrapped baby body. I approve of the choice made by the director/editor/whomever decided that would have maximal impact.


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## pukunui (Aug 26, 2022)

Yeah, the lethality of the melee is a bit ahistorical. It was meant to be a mock battle. Perhaps we will see some fallout from the deaths at the tourney in later episodes ... although we're going to get a time skip to when Rhaenyra is an adult soon, so I don't know ... maybe tourneys are just more lethal in Westeros and it's just par for the course.


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## Zardnaar (Aug 26, 2022)

pukunui said:


> Yeah, the lethality of the melee is a bit ahistorical. It was meant to be a mock battle. Perhaps we will see some fallout from the deaths at the tourney in later episodes ... although we're going to get a time skip to when Rhaenyra is an adult soon, so I don't know ... maybe tourneys are just more lethal in Westeros and it's just par for the course.




 Tourneys could be lethal irl a king died due to one. 

 That was more gladiator games though.


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## pukunui (Aug 26, 2022)

Zardnaar said:


> Tourneys could be lethal irl a king died due to one.



Absolutely. It's just that they weren't generally intended to be, whereas the tourney in this show is presented as though the lethality is perfectly normal and expected. No one even seems to get upset by Daemon's unsporting use of his jousting lance (like they were all expecting him to cheat).


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## Older Beholder (Aug 26, 2022)

I think the tournament (and the brutality of it) is meant to mirror the birth, which is why we cut back between the two events.
There was a line previously in the show about a women's womb being her battleground or words to that effect (can't remember it exactly). This is the point that's being driven home by the juxtaposition of the two events.

I would also suggest the shape of the jousting arena also adds to this theme, I mean it's not really that subtle:


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## Henadic Theologian (Aug 26, 2022)

Tried it, didn't like, but then again I thought Game of Thrones after the first few seconds was over rated too, I stopped watching GoT after the one likable, good person, none evil character, the sex worker got turned into a pin cushion.


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## Mort (Aug 26, 2022)

Thought it was a bit of a show start, plot wise - though we know where things are moving to shed likely will speed up fast. I'm willing to give it a shot after the first episode.

But I have to say, I 100% agree with the critics throwing shade at the wigs. They're just terrible. Considering the budget and how great the outfits look - is just crazy that the wigs look so flat and lifeless!


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## Stalker0 (Aug 29, 2022)

So far the plot of the show is ok, but I think the biggest thing its missing compared to the original is just the personalities.

Ned Stark, Robert Baratheon, Tywin Lannister.....these are larger than life characters that just jumped on the screen due to some amazing work by their actors. Even though we had the newcomers like Emilia Clark and all of the stark kids, they were backed by powerful actors that really pushed the narrative forward in that first season.

I'm not feeling any of that so far. The acting is "fine", but I'm not "feeling" the plot from anyone really, its just scenes and talking, but no one really embodies the characters like I felt in that first GoT season.


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## Zardnaar (Aug 29, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> So far the plot of the show is ok, but I think the biggest thing its missing compared to the original is just the personalities.
> 
> Ned Stark, Robert Baratheon, Tywin Lannister.....these are larger than life characters that just jumped on the screen due to some amazing work by their actors. Even though we had the newcomers like Emilia Clark and all of the stark kids, they were backed by powerful actors that really pushed the narrative forward in that first season.
> 
> I'm not feeling any of that so far. The acting is "fine", but I'm not "feeling" the plot from anyone really, its just scenes and talking, but no one really embodies the characters like I felt in that first GoT season.




 That and it's more if the same. 

 Enjoyed it though but it's also early. Better than season 8 worse than 1 imho as expected. It's leaning more towards season 1 than 8 though at least for me as I want to see more.


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## Imaculata (Aug 29, 2022)

I reserve judgement till I've seen more episodes. It takes time to get used to a new cast, and to remember all their names.


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## Tonguez (Aug 29, 2022)

Second episode was good, slow paced but got in a lot of story and character points laid down.

and it had no sex or blood, and relatively mild gore so it seems that episode one was all bluster and hopefully we get actual storytelling from this point on.


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## pukunui (Aug 29, 2022)

I enjoyed ep 2 more than the ep 1. Rhaenyra is starting to show her strength and conviction.

As an aside, I would love to see a series set in old Valyria.


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## Morrus (Aug 29, 2022)

pukunui said:


> I enjoyed ep 2 more than the ep 1.




Me too! Less setup, more plot!


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## wicked cool (Aug 29, 2022)

second episode was better but still has problems.  i thought Rhys (hightower) and Paddy (viserys) were very good and Rhys at the bridge really brought the tension

Would have liked to have seen more of the crab leader. We got much more in GOT from small villians such as craster etc.Instead we got tie to post crawl over with crabs several times

would have liked more to the last minute decision. felt like the red wedding all over again 

thought the scene with matt smith and his bride to be was awful. acting was really bad


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## Zaukrie (Aug 29, 2022)

That was better than episode one, but it still looks better than the plot / characters are. I agree with the post above, I just am not feeling any of these characters having the gravitas of ANY of the characters in the original show (yet). All that said, it is still good tv (I was hoping for more than good, though).


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## Aeson (Aug 29, 2022)

Don't get attached to the young actors. They'll all be replaced by adult actors by midseason.









						'House of the Dragon' co-creator Ryan Condal says the characters who are 'truly children' are the only ones who will eventually swap actors
					

The showrunners made a commitment early on in the process to have the youngest characters, including Rhaenyra and Alicent, recast as they age.




					www.insider.com
				




I like that they changed the opening sequence and theme. In the first episode I hoped they would bring back the GoT theme and they did.


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## Rabulias (Aug 29, 2022)

Aeson said:


> Don't get attached to the young actors. They'll all be replaced by adult actors by midseason.



Yeah, this is why I am giving this til at least that changeover to begin judging the series; this is all setup and extended prologue, IMO.

I agree with many that while the story is interesting so far, none of the characters have risen to GoT levels yet. And the dialog, while very good, has not generated anything akin to the more quotable GoT (mostly from Tyrion). Otto's "The gods have yet to make a man who lacks the patience for absolute power, Your Grace," comes close.


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## Morrus (Aug 29, 2022)

GoT wasn’t that great at first. I think there’s some rose tinting going on here. It took a season to hit its stride. This is just as good as early GoT, and _looks_ way better.


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## payn (Aug 29, 2022)

Rabulias said:


> Yeah, this is why I am giving this til at least that changeover to begin judging the series; this is all setup and extended prologue, IMO.
> 
> I agree with many that while the story is interesting so far, none of the characters have risen to GoT levels yet. And the dialog, while very good, has not generated anything akin to the more quotable GoT (mostly from Tyrion). Otto's "The gods have yet to make a man who lacks the patience for absolute power, Your Grace," comes close.



I loved the "men will torch the realm before letting a woman rise to the iron throne" line a lot.

I think the hand and sea snake are building up great, though the time jumps worry me. All this exposition and posturing will just disappear into the ether as time goes on. Hope I'm wrong.


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## pukunui (Aug 30, 2022)

Morrus said:


> GoT wasn’t that great at first. I think there’s some rose tinting going on here. It took a season to hit its stride. This is just as good as early GoT, and _looks_ way better.



Same. Took me all of season 1 to actually get into the show.

I wonder how many time jumps there will be over the course of this show.

Also do we think it will ultimately end with Rhaenyra 


Spoiler



being fed to her half-brother's dragon


?


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## Benjamin Olson (Aug 30, 2022)

So far the Medievalist in me loves this show. I worry it's a bit slow-paced for general audiences who aren't as enthralled by the subtleties of dynastic politics when they are at lower drama, lower action moments.


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## Tonguez (Aug 30, 2022)

pukunui said:


> Same. Took me all of season 1 to actually get into the show.
> .
> Also do we think it will ultimately end with Rhaenyra being fed to her half-brother's dragon?



Your spoiler didn’t work dude!

But yeah I didn’t actually start watching GoT until season 5 (after my parents had bought a box set of DVDs) - I then went back and binged those first 4 seasons


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## pukunui (Aug 30, 2022)

Tonguez said:


> Your spoiler didn’t work dude!



What do you mean? This is how it looks for me:


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## Tonguez (Aug 30, 2022)

pukunui said:


> What do you mean? This is how it looks for me:
> 
> View attachment 259640



Tis Cool , the dangers of participating in spoiler threads
But for some reason my display defaulted to the full comment being visible - and it was a big spoiler!


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## pukunui (Aug 30, 2022)

Tonguez said:


> Tis Cool , the dangers of participating in spoiler threads
> But for some reason my display defaulted to the full comment being visible - and it was a big spoiler!



Weird! I've changed it to the other type of spoiler just in case that happens to anyone else.

I spoiled it for myself by reading about Rhaenyra on a wiki. (Haven't ever read any of the books.)


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## Rabulias (Aug 30, 2022)

@Morrus can we decide (and clarify in the thread title) whether this Spoiler Thread includes spoilers from the books? I have not read the books this is based on either, and would like to avoid non-show-sourced spoilers. Thanks!


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## Zaukrie (Aug 30, 2022)

Rabulias said:


> @Morrus can we decide (and clarify in the thread title) whether this Spoiler Thread includes spoilers from the books? I have not read the books this is based on either, and would like to avoid non-show-sourced spoilers. Thanks!



I too hate this. But good luck stopping it.


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## Rabulias (Aug 30, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> I too hate this. But good luck stopping it.



Maybe, but it would be a nice courtesy to let folks know what to expect here in this thread. And was done for the Wheel of Time thread, notifying users that it includes book spoilers. It's up to the originator of the thread to change the title (or not).


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## wicked cool (Sep 5, 2022)

Was an ok episode 3. Slow until final moments.


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## payn (Sep 5, 2022)

wicked cool said:


> Was an ok episode 3. Slow until final moments.



I actually thought it was the best episode so far.  Feels like things are finally settling in.


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## wicked cool (Sep 5, 2022)

payn said:


> I actually thought it was the best episode so far.  Feels like things are finally settling in.



I thought episodes de 2 was best. I wanted more from crabman. Speaking of it looked like he had stone skin disease


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## Tonguez (Sep 5, 2022)

I watched the 2 Rings of Power episodes right before watching this and much prefer the Rings of Power. HoD Is okay so far but not compelling, I think ep 2 was good as it laid the foundation for the wider plot and at least ep 3 is rolling them out, though the time jumps may  potentially confuse things and the battle was a bit Meh .

We’re first told that Daemons forces are losing and the Crabfeeder holding out in the Stepstones then in one move Daemon pulls a ruse takes out half the enemy forces and cuts the crab feeder in half - off screen!! We don’t even get to see the epic boss fight 

It’s not very satisfying so far but it’s not horrible like GoT series 8.

And at least the gore served the story and the sex was confined to the tapestries


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## Zaukrie (Sep 6, 2022)

It was ridiculously easy for them to win that battle they'd been losing for two years.


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 6, 2022)

Yeah, this show really doesn't benefit from being released so near to Rings of Power and Sandman, both of which are much, much better shows.

And I think the mean-spiritedness of this franchise may be a mismatch for a larger part of the audience nowadays, given how many mean-spirited years we've just been through.

It's not _bad_, but it's definitely in third place up against two other titans of fantasy, both of which have shows out this summer. It'd be better up against Wheel of Time, but I can't imagine Amazon cooperating with that match up.


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 6, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> It was ridiculously easy for them to win that battle they'd been losing for two years.



The commentary afterward said that, without the fresh troops attacking at the end, it would have been a loss. They did a bad job of conveying that within the episode, though.


----------



## payn (Sep 6, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> Yeah, this show really doesn't benefit from being released so near to Rings of Power and Sandman, both of which are much, much better shows.
> 
> And I think the mean-spiritedness of this franchise may be a mismatch for a larger part of the audience nowadays, given how many mean-spirited years we've just been through.
> 
> It's not _bad_, but it's definitely in third place up against two other titans of fantasy, both of which have shows out this summer. It'd be better up against Wheel of Time, but I can't imagine Amazon cooperating with that match up.



I found plenty of mean-spiritedness in _Sandman_. Maybe even worse than anything we have seen in GoT. I think this might be a taste perspective on your part. Though, I do agree that these are all high quality well executed programs with HotD coming in third for my tastes. 

The fantasy genre is getting difficult to parse. _Sandman_ is clearly going with a dark fairy tale angle, RoP a high epic fantasy with the world at stake, and HotD palace intrigue slow burn into high fantasy. Violence and sexuality in RoP are dramatic high notes, in HotD they are ambiance, and in _Sandman_ they are emotionally dramatic. They are more disparate than would seem at first glance, and shouldn't be compared so lightly, IMO.


----------



## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 6, 2022)

payn said:


> I found plenty of mean-spiritedness in _Sandman_. Maybe even worse than anything we have seen in GoT. I think this might be a taste perspective on your part.



I think they're different. In Westeros, being violent and mean isn't seen, in an authorial sense, as incorrect. They're just things that happen (the fact that the author made them happen is a whole separate thread). In Sandman and Lord of the Rings, they are clearly seen as wrong.

When bad things happen in Sandman, they're the result of things going wrong and bad choices and there's almost always punishment for them, even if it is on a timeline that means only immortals see the punishment come to pass.

There is an intentional sense of morality in Gaiman's and JRRT's works, whereas GRRM was intentionally working against such notions.


----------



## payn (Sep 6, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> I think they're different. In Westeros, being violent and mean isn't seen, in an authorial sense, as incorrect. They're just things that happen (the fact that the author made them happen is a whole separate thread). In Sandman and Lord of the Rings, they are clearly seen as wrong.
> 
> When bad things happen in Sandman, they're the result of things going wrong and bad choices and there's almost always punishment for them, even if it is on a timeline that means only immortals see the punishment come to pass.
> 
> There is an intentional sense of morality in Gaiman's and JRRT's works, whereas GRRM was intentionally working against such notions.



I'm not sure we read and viewed the same _Sandman_.


----------



## Zaukrie (Sep 6, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> The commentary afterward said that, without the fresh troops attacking at the end, it would have been a loss. They did a bad job of conveying that within the episode, though.



There's commentary? They show didn't make that clear at all.


----------



## wicked cool (Sep 6, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> Yeah, this show really doesn't benefit from being released so near to Rings of Power and Sandman, both of which are much, much better shows.
> 
> And I think the mean-spiritedness of this franchise may be a mismatch for a larger part of the audience nowadays, given how many mean-spirited years we've just been through.
> 
> It's not _bad_, but it's definitely in third place up against two other titans of fantasy, both of which have shows out this summer. It'd be better up against Wheel of Time, but I can't imagine Amazon cooperating with that match up.



I disagree. Not seeing a clear front runner . All have flaws


----------



## Marc Radle (Sep 6, 2022)

Interestingly, most other forums and YouTubers I tend to watch / read seem to feel House of the Dragon is better than Rings of Power, and I don’t really hear or see all that much discussion about Sandman at all …


----------



## Zaukrie (Sep 6, 2022)

Marc Radle said:


> Interestingly, most other forums and YouTubers I tend to watch / read seem to feel House of the Dragon is better than Rings of Power, and I don’t really hear or see all that much discussion about Sandman at all …



Sandman might be top ten all time tv for me. No idea how you aren't hearing about it much.


----------



## payn (Sep 6, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> Sandman might be top ten all time tv for me. No idea how you aren't hearing about it much.



I dont go on twitter, or most social media, but I didnt even know _Sandman_ was available until browsing NF. I am now hearing from a lot of people I know that they are watching and digging it. Everyone seems to know about RoP and certainly HotD as they have both strong media campaigns and word of mouth.


----------



## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 6, 2022)

payn said:


> I'm not sure we read and viewed the same _Sandman_.



Sandman is a years-long story about the consequences of Morpheus' crappy decisions coming back to haunt him. There is a right and wrong in Gaiman's version of the universe, even if consequences take a while to arrive (a bit like real life that way).


----------



## billd91 (Sep 6, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> There's commentary? They show didn't make that clear at all.



That is interesting. I was under the impression that the coming intervention by the crown may have goaded Daemon into going along with the Velaryon plan in order to resolve the situation without needing the save from his big brother.


----------



## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 6, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> There's commentary? They show didn't make that clear at all.



Yeah, you have to scroll through the credits. It really should be a separate file, but HBO Max is making a lot of weird choices nowadays.


----------



## Zaukrie (Sep 6, 2022)

billd91 said:


> That is interesting. I was under the impression that the coming intervention by the crown may have goaded Daemon into going along with the Velaryon plan in order to resolve the situation without needing the save from his big brother.



Yes? But all those troops we saw were there for two years, weren't they? Then they just win? Not great writing, not for me.


----------



## Tonguez (Sep 6, 2022)

Corlys “_we’ve been here 2 years and we’re losing this war!_”
Soldier “_Lo!, the king has just sent reinforcements but they’ll take no time to get here, oh look theyre here already, just out of camera shot!_”
Prince Daemon “_oh bother_” ~_whack, whack~_ “_okay CV we’ll do your plan_”
_Prince Daemon rows a boat_
Prince Daemon “_hey Mr Crabby come out and play!_”
Mr Crabby “_Get em boys!_”
Prince Daemon “_huh Suckers! Oh bother I took an arrow to the knee_!”
Army “_yay!_”
Dragon “_raaaaawrrrh!_”
Daemon “_oh and heres Mr Crabby! Well, just his top half, he was so suprised his legs are still running away!”_
Corlys “_huh?_”


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 6, 2022)

.


----------



## Older Beholder (Sep 6, 2022)

I like how focused the show is on the actual game of thrones.
Every character gets more interesting with each episode. Patty Considine is doing such a good job as King Viserys, loving his portrayal.

As for the battle at the end, they used Daemon as bait to lure the crab army out of their cave.


----------



## Aeson (Sep 6, 2022)

I thought Crabby Patty was going to be a long term villain. I guess I was wrong. He did have time to die* Damon's hair. 

*No I spelled it correctly.


----------



## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 6, 2022)

Older Beholder said:


> Patty Considine is doing such a good job as King Viserys, loving his portrayal.



Yeah, he's my favorite part of the show. His flaws are human flaws and while he's bad at being a king, he's not a Bad King in the way Westeros seems to constantly have otherwise. He's a mediocre father and a terrible person to sit on the Iron Throne, but he's not monstrous and is doing the best he can, in his fumbling way.


----------



## Stalker0 (Sep 6, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> Yeah, he's my favorite part of the show. His flaws are human flaws and while he's bad at being a king, he's not a Bad King in the way Westeros seems to constantly have otherwise. He's a mediocre father and a terrible person to sit on the Iron Throne, but he's not monstrous and is doing the best he can, in his fumbling way.



Agreed. Its interesting to watch his dynamic with Rynera. As a father he wants his daughter to be happy but in doing so he is really weakening himself and frankly feeding Rynera's worst personality traits, but you can feel his struggle and I think he is genuinely trying to do the right thing...but its the weak thing.

Rynera is doing herself no favors. While she looked good in the first few episodes up against Damon, as she has grown into a teenager frankly she's a brat. For all her talk of getting supplanted in the succession, she is acting like a terrible heir: being petulant, spoiled, argumentative, and filled with nothing but complaints. She acts like limited control is no control, she is pissed she has to get married yet tries to exert no power or control over the choice until its basically thrown in her lap at the end of the episode. Instead of trying to reinforce her father's choice in her, every action she takes makes that choice look worse and worse. I am hoping that Boar (and the stag) will act as a bit of a wake up call, telling her to get her s*** in gear and start acting like she actually wants the job.

As for the end battle scene.... we have moved back into the late GOT era school of tactics. So the master plan is to send Damon out alone....hope he doesn't get instantly killed by hundreds of arrows (and of course he doesn't, because that late GOT era plot armor is back on the menu), and somehow this will coax the enemy to send out their entire army. Because.....why would they do that exactly? For all accounts the Crab guy (can't remember his name) has shown himself to be a cautious and shrewd tactician, able to beat a superior force that includes dragons. Hell the entire battle scene we see how paranoid he is about dragons, constantly checking the skies. Yet when he has Damon dead to rights, instead of...you know.... having an archer just finish the job, or send like 10 guys to surround him and take him out....he sends his whole army because reasons. It makes no sense, it's an incredibly stupid plan...and if we were back into early GOT logic.... Damon would be food for the crabs at this point.

Now if they had gone with what it first appeared, that Damon had gone rogue and took an insanely risky gambit that just let him get close enough to the Crab guy to take it out....I could buy that. Damon seems the type that would easily rather go out in a blaze of glory rather than have to bow before his brother again for bailing him out.


----------



## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 6, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> Now if they had gone with what it first appeared, that Damon had gone rogue and took an insanely risky gambit that just let him get close enough to the Crab guy to take it out....I could buy that. Damon seems the type that would easily rather go out in a blaze of glory rather than have to bow before his brother again for bailing him out.



I honestly think that's what happened.

Damon went out solo, intending to somehow convince the Crabfeeder to fight him one on one -- maybe he'd offer him a spoken line of dialogue as a bribe. As he's rowing over (wtf, you have a dragon, bro, just fly and send your dragon away), the reinforcements arrive (unhelpfully in the same livery as the troops already there, just clean), the Sea Snake realizes that Damon has gone with the "I'll take them all on solo" plan they rejected, and everyone sails and flies to the rescue.

For the sake of surprising/confusing the audience, this was all kept a secret from us. I really, really hope we get exposition at the very beginning of the next episode making this clear.


----------



## payn (Sep 6, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> I honestly think that's what happened.
> 
> Damon went out solo, intending to somehow convince the Crabfeeder to fight him one on one -- maybe he'd offer him a spoken line of dialogue as a bribe. As he's rowing over (wtf, you have a dragon, bro, just fly and send your dragon away), the reinforcements arrive (unhelpfully in the same livery as the troops already there, just clean), the Sea Snake realizes that Damon has gone with the "I'll take them on all solo" plan they rejected, and everyone sails and flies to the rescue.
> 
> For the sake of surprising/confusing the audience, this was all kept a secret from us. I really, really hope we get exposition at the very beginning of the next episode making this clear.



I saw the preview for next week after the credits and I think they will fill in the blanks. Though, I agree, they seem to be getting cagey with things and trying to keep people guessing and it usually makes for crap TV/movies.


----------



## wicked cool (Sep 6, 2022)

payn said:


> I dont go on twitter, or most social media, but I didnt even know _Sandman_ was available until browsing NF. I am now hearing from a lot of people I know that they are watching and digging it. Everyone seems to know about RoP and certainly HotD as they have both strong media campaigns and word of mouth.



Sandman has dropped to #5 on Netflix tv. You could argue it’s old but stranger things is still #6. It’s not a strong top 1-5. I enjoyed it but it seems to be losing staying power


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 7, 2022)

wicked cool said:


> Sandman has dropped to #5 on Netflix tv. You could argue it’s old but stranger things is still #6. It’s not a strong top 1-5. I enjoyed it but it seems to be losing staying power



Stranger Things is the most popular show in Netflix's history. It's not a reasonable point of comparison.


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## pukunui (Sep 7, 2022)

I found episode 3 to be a bit weird and confusing. The battle at the end was odd in ways that others have already pointed out. The Crabfeeder guy looked cool, and it would've been interesting if he'd been a longer term villain, but I guess he was just a sideshow.

The part that I liked the least was Matt Smith's close-up in the sun after he learned his brother was sending aid. It just looked bad and out of place.

Also, those were some pornographic tapestries, weren't they?

Who was that other dragon rider - the one who was whooping and hollering during the battle scene? EDIT: Apparently that's Laenor Velaryon on his dragon, Sea Smoke! I didn't recognize him.


----------



## payn (Sep 7, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> Stranger Things is the most popular show in Netflix's history. It's not a reasonable point of comparison.



Right. _Sandman _doesnt seem to be instant hit either like ST. I am hoping it will grow over time like _Breaking Bad_ did.


----------



## Olgar Shiverstone (Sep 8, 2022)

Random thought ... I can improve this series with the removal of one letter: _House of the Dagon._


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 8, 2022)

Olgar Shiverstone said:


> Random thought ... I can improve this series with the removal of one letter: _House of the Dagon._



The show/universe is already pretty nihilistic. I'm not sure how much of a difference it would make to go the rest of the distance there.


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## Older Beholder (Sep 8, 2022)

I'd seen something like this before, but this one looks like it's more up to date.
Interesting that the Sea Snake is getting his own series...


----------



## Horwath (Sep 8, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> As for the end battle scene.... we have moved back into the late GOT era school of tactics. So the master plan is to send Damon out alone....hope he doesn't get instantly killed by hundreds of arrows (and of course he doesn't, because that late GOT era plot armor is back on the menu), and somehow this will coax the enemy to send out their entire army. Because.....why would they do that exactly? For all accounts the Crab guy (can't remember his name) has shown himself to be a cautious and shrewd tactician, able to beat a superior force that includes dragons. Hell the entire battle scene we see how paranoid he is about dragons, constantly checking the skies. Yet when he has Damon dead to rights, instead of...you know.... having an archer just finish the job, or send like 10 guys to surround him and take him out....he sends his whole army because reasons. It makes no sense, it's an incredibly stupid plan...and if we were back into early GOT logic.... Damon would be food for the crabs at this point.
> 
> Now if they had gone with what it first appeared, that Damon had gone rogue and took an insanely risky gambit that just let him get close enough to the Crab guy to take it out....I could buy that. Damon seems the type that would easily rather go out in a blaze of glory rather than have to bow before his brother again for bailing him out.



yeah, Damon going full Rambo was utter stupidity, wasn't the Jon Snow charge bad enough in GoT?


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## John R Davis (Sep 8, 2022)

The King is also my favourite character. Troubled, near decent, and ultimately doomed I imagine.


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## pukunui (Sep 8, 2022)

Older Beholder said:


> I'd seen something like this before, but this one looks like it's more up to date.
> Interesting that the Sea Snake is getting his own series...
> 
> View attachment 260730



Is the Expanded GoT Universe supposed to be HBO's answer to the MCU?


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## Older Beholder (Sep 8, 2022)

pukunui said:


> Is the Expanded GoT Universe supposed to be HBO's answer to the MCU?




Pretty much. 
I should probably mention that I don’t know how real that list is, given it’s from the internet. And even if real, not everything in development is guaranteed to get made.

Personally I just want an ‘Arya : West of Westeros‘ series.


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## Zardnaar (Sep 12, 2022)

Very good episode imho. Starting to care about more of the characters. Mostly Daemon, Rhaenya, and the king. 

 GoT benefitted from Sean Bean, Lena and Dinklidge stealing the show early on.


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## pukunui (Sep 12, 2022)

That was a grim episode.

That said, I found it a bit hard to take the whole scandal seriously with all those pornographic tapestries in the background.


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## Zardnaar (Sep 12, 2022)

pukunui said:


> That was a grim episode.
> 
> That said, I found it a bit hard to take the whole scandal seriously with all those pornographic tapestries in the background.




 I need to pay more attention to the background. Missed that. 

 Starting to like the show a lot.


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## Older Beholder (Sep 13, 2022)

That was a great episode, I like that it felt a bit like its own contained short story.

One of the strengths of Game of Thrones was the dialogue and character relationships and I think House of the Dragon is doing that really well. From Rhaenyra / Alicent to Viserys / Daemon. There's lots of interesting dynamics going on between all the characters. There don't seem to be any straight out villains among the main cast, everyone is well fleshed out with both good and bad qualities, and understandable motives.

The young suitor in the throne room at the start deserves a mention as well.


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## payn (Sep 13, 2022)

Older Beholder said:


> The young suitor in the throne room at the start deserves a mention as well.



That was a great scene. Who got stabbed? Oh, it was the bigmouth.


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## Argyle King (Sep 14, 2022)

I enjoyed episode 1 and 2. They each had their flaws but were generally enjoyable and served their purpose of quickly conveying information to set the table for the series.

Oddly, I found episode 3 and the battle to be my least favorite episode. A lot of the action lacked tension. As a result, it felt overly fake. I'm not entirely sure how to explain that. How everything fit together came across as contrived. 

The dire situation of the war lacks gravitas. Despite exposition telling me how bad things are, I don't believe it, and it doesn't seem that most of the people on screen fully do either. 

The ensuing battle then undercuts any seriousness which may have existed by showing Crabfeeder's forces as a (momentary) combination of incompetent and poorly led. As that's the only time the audience sees Crabfeeder and his forces, there aren't any other scenes from which ideas about the enemy can be drawn. 

I believe the intent was to try to show Daemon as badass during his beach charge, but it had the opposite effect for me. By taking away any of the elements which made Crabfeeder a competent adversary, you also undercut the value of the protagonist's victory. All of that is then followed by a flat and unsatisfactory end to the situation.

I'm not sure how it is written in the books. But how it was filmed and choices about what to show or not show didn't make a lot of sense. The second half of episode 3 felt disjointed and confusing. 

Not every episode can be great. That's true of any show. Even so, the third episode was a bad time to have a dip. The first two set the table. Then kinda nothing happens.

Another thing I've noticed is a lack of a character or a performance to rise to a higher level. For example, Charles Dance's portrayal of Tywin was phenomenal -elevating both the show and everything around him. While there are no performances which I would say are bad in HoD, a few come across as lesser versions of other characters. Matt Smith's Daemon started out as a bright spot, but the flat ending of episode 3 didn't do it any favors.

Hopefully, it's just one stumble along the way of finding the show's footing. I think how episode 4 recovers (or doesn't) will echo throughout the rest of the show.


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## Zardnaar (Sep 14, 2022)

To be fair Dance stole the show. It never really recovered after Tywin died.


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## Stalker0 (Sep 14, 2022)

Argyle King said:


> The dire situation of the war lacks gravitas. Despite exposition telling me how bad things are, I don't believe it, and it doesn't seem that most of the people on screen fully do either.



I'll agree with this. As much as the show is trying to convince us that this is critical for trade and XYZ, it just comes across as a minor peasant revolt all things considered.

The tensions with the free cities at least has more stakes, and it plays it what people bring with them from the other show. We know these cities can be powerful, and so an actual conflict with them could have real stakes.


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## pukunui (Sep 19, 2022)

Well, that was an intense episode.

Thoughts:

*Poor Laenor.
*Daemon is awful, and I'm sorry, but Matt Smith is just not doing it for me. I do not like his performance in this show.
*Alicent is damned if she does, damned if she doesn't.
*I would watch a show about Rhaenyra and Ser Criston running away to Essos, getting married, and going on adventures together.
*I still can't take Alicent's hand-wringing about Rhaenyra's "immorality" seriously when she's literally surrounded by tapestries depicting orgies - even in the room where she spends time with her children!
*Alicent has stopped Ser Criston from killing himself. Is she now going to protect him from punishment in order to use his knowledge against Rhaenyra later on?
*Le roi est mort. Viva le reine?

So will the next episode be the one where we get the older actors for Rhaenyra and Alicent?


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## Zardnaar (Sep 19, 2022)

Kinda got attached to the younger actors. Will the timejump work?


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## pukunui (Sep 19, 2022)

Hey, just for the record, Joffrey spoiled the ending of House of the Dragon loooooong before I did!

In other words, if you've watched Game of Thrones, you should know how this prequel is going to end without needing to read the books.



Tonguez said:


> Your spoiler didn’t work dude!
> 
> But yeah I didn’t actually start watching GoT until season 5 (after my parents had bought a box set of DVDs) - I then went back and binged those first 4 seasons






Rabulias said:


> @Morrus can we decide (and clarify in the thread title) whether this Spoiler Thread includes spoilers from the books? I have not read the books this is based on either, and would like to avoid non-show-sourced spoilers. Thanks!






Zaukrie said:


> I too hate this. But good luck stopping it.


----------



## John R Davis (Sep 19, 2022)

Very tense build up during the dance. 
Oh something epic is gonna happen!
Oh. Damp squib


----------



## Stalker0 (Sep 19, 2022)

pukunui said:


> *I still can't take Alicent's hand-wringing about Rhaenyra's "immorality" seriously when she's literally surrounded by tapestries depicting orgies - even in the room where she spends time with her children!



I can agree, though I think Alicent is my favorite character right now. Her father gave her that intense (and probably very accurate) prophecy. At some point Rhenera's reign will be threatened, her son will be used for leverage, and Rhenera will be incentived to "deal" with her son. So will she strike first?

The dance was solid, though I wasn't too surprised. Classic GoT blunder, guy figured out some secret intel (Christian was with Rhenera), got cocky, and instead of holding onto that very vital piece, he immediately spills the bean to the guy to try and work some leverage. And..... got got.

I really liked Alicent's actress, its going to be hard to adjust to the timeskip. Meanwhile Rhenera I can take or leave, though its very strange to me that they have made her the posture child for the show (literally she's the main thing on the poster) but is getting replaced mid season.


----------



## pukunui (Sep 20, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> I can agree, though I think Alicent is my favorite character right now.



I would agree but I still just can't get over her moralizing in a room full of tapestries graphically depicting orgies. Like, it's OK to have those on your walls - even in the room where you nurse your kids - but it's not OK to visit a place where the depicted activities actually take place? It just does not compute for me.

Also, she really ought to be more upset with her father, since he's the one who put her in such a terrible position in the first place.


----------



## wicked cool (Sep 20, 2022)

The fist fight at the end. Did the knight just jump into the crowd after the conversation


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## pukunui (Sep 20, 2022)

wicked cool said:


> The fist fight at the end. Did the knight just jump into the crowd after the conversation



Yes, it would appear Ser Criston's feelings of guilt and shame got the better of him and he used the cover of the dancing crowd to assault Ser Joffrey. 

Apparently in the book Ser Criston 


Spoiler



kills Ser Joffrey in the wedding tourney while jousting and it's left open as to whether it was deliberate or an accident. (Same with Daemon's killing of his wife, Lady Rhea.) I was reading a review from someone who was saying they preferred the book's more ambiguous takes on these events over the show's methods. I have to agree.


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## Zardnaar (Sep 20, 2022)

pukunui said:


> I would agree but I still just can't get over her moralizing in a room full of tapestries graphically depicting orgies. Like, it's OK to have those on your walls - even in the room where you nurse your kids - but it's not OK to visit a place where the depicted activities actually take place? It just does not compute for me.
> 
> Also, she really ought to be more upset with her father, since he's the one who put her in such a terrible position in the first place.




 You're the one noticing all this porn in the background I haven't seen any of it. 

 Romans had some interesting art as well but still preached morality. 

 In the show what women can get away with vs the men are two different things.


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## pukunui (Sep 20, 2022)

Zardnaar said:


> You're the one noticing all this porn in the background I haven't seen any of it.



It's pretty bloody obvious! I'm surprised you haven't noticed it yet. 









						The Targaryens’ Home Decor in House of the Dragon is Extremely NSFW
					

House of the Dragon’s royal family are clearly very… comfortable with their sexuality.




					www.denofgeek.com


----------



## Tonguez (Sep 20, 2022)

Zardnaar said:


> You're the one noticing all this porn in the background I haven't seen any of it.




You seriously havent seen the tapestries on the wall in Alicents room?



			alicents tapestries - Google Search


----------



## pukunui (Sep 20, 2022)




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## Zardnaar (Sep 20, 2022)

Tonguez said:


> You seriously havent seen the tapestries on the wall in Alicents room?
> 
> 
> 
> ...




 Nope I normally look at the actors. 

 Also missed the baby on the pyre episode 1.


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## Older Beholder (Sep 20, 2022)

pukunui said:


> I would agree but I still just can't get over her moralizing in a room full of tapestries graphically depicting orgies. Like, it's OK to have those on your walls - even in the room where you nurse your kids - but it's not OK to visit a place where the depicted activities actually take place? It just does not compute for me.
> 
> Also, she really ought to be more upset with her father, since he's the one who put her in such a terrible position in the first place.



The rumour was not just a visit to a brothel/orgy, it was that she slept with her own uncle. I’m not sure that erotic tapestries are quite on the same level as actual incest…

Initially I think Alicent is upset as much out of jealousy as anything, here Rhaenyra gets to sleep with whoever she chooses while she is stuck in a forced marriage…

…But, I think the main reason Alicent is upset when she learns the truth, is that Rhaenyra is lying to her (on the memory of her mother) which means that she’s playing the ‘game of thrones’ and thus, the life of her son is potentially in danger.

There‘s multiple layers of implications to everything that’s said in the series, personally I’m really enjoying the show for that reason.


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## Zardnaar (Sep 20, 2022)

Alicents father laid it out. King dies you and your baby are a target.


----------



## pukunui (Sep 20, 2022)

Zardnaar said:


> Alicents father laid it out. King dies you and your baby are a target.



Yeah, but her father’s the one who put her in that position in the first place.


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## Zardnaar (Sep 20, 2022)

pukunui said:


> Yeah, but her father’s the one who put her in that position in the first place.




  True. Senior nobles don't really have choices though.


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## pukunui (Sep 20, 2022)

Zardnaar said:


> True. Senior nobles don't really have choices though.



He didn’t have to throw his own daughter at the king. Viserys was right when he accused Otto of wanting to put his own blood on the throne.


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## Zardnaar (Sep 20, 2022)

pukunui said:


> He didn’t have to throw his own daughter at the king. Viserys was right when he accused Otto of wanting to put his own blood on the throne.




 Maybe but that applies to anyone wanting to marry into the royal family. Any child of that union is a Targaryen anyway

 Otto is right though when he was talking to Alicent. IRL kings who screwed up the succession don't tend to be remembered to fondly.


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## pukunui (Sep 20, 2022)

Yes, Otto was right, but the whole situation is entirely his doing. If he hadn’t foisted Alicent on the king, she wouldn’t be in the position she’s in now. That’s my point.


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## Tonguez (Sep 20, 2022)

Older Beholder said:


> The rumour was not just a visit to a brothel/orgy, it was that she slept with her own uncle. I’m not sure that erotic tapestries are quite on the same level as actual incest…



I thought inbreeding was accepted practice for Targaryans, Deamon intimated it was their way and sibling unions seemed to be normal-ish in their lineage.

In comparison You’ve got an old king taking his daughters teen companion  as a replacement queen in a room hung with erotic tapestries, that seems equally scandalous really - especially with the added scandal of her being pimped out by he father The Hand…


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## Older Beholder (Sep 20, 2022)

Tonguez said:


> I thought inbreeding was accepted practice for Targaryans, Deamon intimated it was their way and sibling unions seemed to be normal-ish in their lineage.




Sure, if we’re taking Daemon’s word on things. Alicent isn’t Targaryen though, so I can understand her point a view on the matter, like I said above, there are a number of reasons she’s mad about what Rhaenyra did. It’s not just moral judgment, there’s also jealousy, etc.

Pukunui said that Alicent‘s moralising did not compute with him because of the tapestries. I was explaining why I thought it made sense that her character would act that way.


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## Zardnaar (Sep 20, 2022)

Tonguez said:


> I thought inbreeding was accepted practice for Targaryans, Deamon intimated it was their way and sibling unions seemed to be normal-ish in their lineage.
> 
> In comparison You’ve got an old king taking his daughters teen companion  as a replacement queen in a room hung with erotic tapestries, that seems equally scandalous really - especially with the added scandal of her being pimped out by he father The Hand…




 You're judging it with modern values. Nobility often didn't have to much choice in terms of marriages. In some cases the law drastically narrowed down the options.

 Valyria is more like the Romans with incest being fine, Westeros not so tolerant of incest. 

 It's a feudal society but not monotheistic and their pornographic images in the background isn't any worse than what they've found in Pompeii.


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## billd91 (Sep 20, 2022)

Tonguez said:


> I thought inbreeding was accepted practice for Targaryans, Deamon intimated it was their way and sibling unions seemed to be normal-ish in their lineage.



It is, and if the show follows the book, there's more to come.

That said, marrying a couple of closely related Targaryans in an incestuous relationship to protect the bloodline is one thing. From Viserys's perspective, your brother having extramarital sex with your unmarried daughter who is supposed to be a virgin bride for whomever you can forge a beneficial political bond with - that's entirely different. And the bitter words between Viserys and Daemon alludes to the differences in expectations in their patriarchal society.


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## Stalker0 (Sep 20, 2022)

billd91 said:


> It is, and if the show follows the book, there's more to come.
> 
> That said, marrying a couple of closely related Targaryans in an incestuous relationship to protect the bloodline is one thing. From Viserys's perspective, your brother having extramarital sex with your unmarried daughter who is supposed to be a virgin bride for whomever you can forge a beneficial political bond with - that's entirely different. And the bitter words between Viserys and Daemon alludes to the differences in expectations in their patriarchal society.



Yeah the issue is not that Rhenera slept with her uncle, it’s that she slept with anyone.

Ruining her virtue greatly weakens her prospects and is another weapon for her enemies to use to weaken her claim to the throne.

And yes it’s exceedingly unfair, but it’s also exceedingly true.


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## Zaukrie (Sep 20, 2022)

The last two episodes were so much better than the previous ones it's almost hard to believe they are the same show.


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## pukunui (Sep 20, 2022)

According to actor Paddy Considine, Viserys is suffering from leprosy.

Perhaps it’s just because he’s the king, but I’m surprised Westeros doesn’t isolate lepers from the rest of society like medieval Europeans did.










						King Viserys is suffering from a form of Leprosy, says actor Paddy Considine
					

King Viserys Targaryen is shown to have a sore on his back in the first episode of House of the Dragon. Throughout the series, we see the sore gradually worsen, and fingers are lost. What exactly is this? Paddy Considine, the actor who plays the character King Viserys Targaryen, recently...




					wikiofthrones.com


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## payn (Sep 20, 2022)

pukunui said:


> According to actor Paddy Considine, Viserys is suffering from leprosy.
> 
> Perhaps it’s just because he’s the king, but I’m surprised Westeros doesn’t isolate lepers from the rest of society like medieval Europeans did.
> 
> ...



Yeap, that is what I guessed after the episode. I originally thought it was some type of allergic reaction to the iron throne. That would have been more poetic. 

I'm guessing they went to lengths to hide it from people because he is the king. Anybody else would have been shipped off.


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## pukunui (Sep 20, 2022)

payn said:


> Yeap, that is what I guessed after the episode. I originally thought it was some type of allergic reaction to the iron throne. That would have been more poetic.



Leprosy is a bacterial infection. Medieval hygiene being what it was, Viserys must have had the bacteria on him when he got cut by the throne. (Or the throne has mystically cursed him with it for being unworthy, if we want a more fantastical explanation.)


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## payn (Sep 20, 2022)

pukunui said:


> Leprosy is a bacterial infection. Medieval hygiene being what it was, Viserys must have had the bacteria on him when he got cut by the throne. (Or the throne has mystically cursed him with it for being unworthy, if we want a more fantastical explanation.)



Im not sure I agree with the unworthy take on King Viserys. Nor the idea he made many mistakes. Perhaps sat on the fence at times he ought to have acted, but he never did anything rash, or terrible, or stupid. My take was more that Viserys was a good man, and thus the throne rejected him for that sin alone.


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## pukunui (Sep 20, 2022)

payn said:


> Im not sure I agree with the unworthy take on King Viserys. Nor the idea he made many mistakes. Perhaps sat on the fence at times he ought to have acted, but he never did anything rash, or terrible, or stupid. My take was more that Viserys was a good man, and thus the throne rejected him for that sin alone.



Absolutely! What the throne considers to be unworthy might not be the same as what we would consider to be unworthy.

That being said, I view the whole “the throne rejects the unworthy” thing as a superstition. I don’t think there’s meant to be anything supernatural about the throne in actuality.


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## Stalker0 (Sep 20, 2022)

payn said:


> Im not sure I agree with the unworthy take on King Viserys. Nor the idea he made many mistakes. Perhaps sat on the fence at times he ought to have acted, but he never did anything rash, or terrible, or stupid. My take was more that Viserys was a good man, and thus the throne rejected him for that sin alone.




This is a common theme among GoT, what does it take to be a good king. Obviously you don't want to be a Tyrant, but you do need people to follow and obey you, and sometimes that requires a little bit of fear.

Viserys seems like a good man for the most part, but a good king? He's not a bad king, but you could argue his weakness has weakened his house and position over time.


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## Tonguez (Sep 21, 2022)

pukunui said:


> Absolutely! What the throne considers to be unworthy might not be the same as what we would consider to be unworthy.
> 
> That being said, I view the whole “the throne rejects the unworthy” thing as a superstition. I don’t think there’s meant to be anything supernatural about the throne in actuality.



yeah its a Throne made of the swords of conquered enemies I'm sure being nice to kittens arent necessarily its idea of Worthiness


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## payn (Sep 21, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> This is a common theme among GoT, what does it take to be a good king. Obviously you don't want to be a Tyrant, but you do need people to follow and obey you, and sometimes that requires a little bit of fear.
> 
> Viserys seems like a good man for the most part, but a good king? He's not a bad king, but you could argue his weakness has weakened his house and position over time.



IDK, he managed to stay out of wars of attrition and save face as long as he could. The cost was mitigated when he wed his daughter to win his ally back. I guess, sure, he never rode his dragons to battle and laid to waste hundreds of thousands of lives, but we saw how awful that was in GoT. I'd say Viserys was a pretty good king who maintained an era of relative peace. Beautifully noted in his scene with Lord Lyonel Strong his new hand. Every man dreams of fame and glory, only the foolish throw away everything in its pursuit.


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## Zardnaar (Sep 23, 2022)

pukunui said:


> According to actor Paddy Considine, Viserys is suffering from leprosy.
> 
> Perhaps it’s just because he’s the king, but I’m surprised Westeros doesn’t isolate lepers from the rest of society like medieval Europeans did.
> 
> ...




Jerusalem had a leper king.


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## wicked cool (Sep 26, 2022)

Good episode. Sort of surprised they replaced basically 1 actress due to age
The man with the cane. Who is he related 2 and was he blackmailing the queen at the end?


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## billd91 (Sep 26, 2022)

wicked cool said:


> Good episode. Sort of surprised they replaced basically 1 actress due to age
> The man with the cane. Who is he related 2 and was he blackmailing the queen at the end?



Multiple actresses - Rhaenyra and Alicent are both recast with older actresses.
And Larys Strong is the younger son of the Hand of the King, Lyonel Strong (and younger brother of Harwin Strong).


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## Zaukrie (Sep 26, 2022)

I think the new actresses were quite good.


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## FitzTheRuke (Sep 26, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> I think the new actresses were quite good.




Yeah, it'll take a second to get used to them, but they were good.


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## Zardnaar (Sep 26, 2022)

Transition to the new actors was smoother than I thought.


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## Older Beholder (Sep 26, 2022)

Amazing to see Viserys was still kicking after all those years. I was expecting the episode to open with his death.

The transition to the aged up actors was pretty smooth… Alicent in particular.


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## wicked cool (Sep 26, 2022)

billd91 said:


> Multiple actresses - Rhaenyra and Alicent are both recast with older actresses.
> And Larys Strong is the younger son of the Hand of the King, Lyonel Strong (and younger brother of Harwin Strong).



So he had his own family killed


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## Zaukrie (Sep 26, 2022)

wicked cool said:


> So he had his own family killed



Yes he did.


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## John R Davis (Sep 26, 2022)

I was most surprised the King is still going ( may r he outlives then all!)


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## Aeson (Sep 26, 2022)

The Sea Snake's children had also aged up. The son was in the previous couple of episodes. I don't think the daughter was though. I think she came and went in the same episode.


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## Rabulias (Sep 26, 2022)

Older Beholder said:


> Amazing to see Viserys was still kicking after all those years. I was expecting the episode to open with his death.





John R Davis said:


> I was most surprised the King is still going ( may r he outlives then all!)



In the scene where Lyonel is offering to resign as Hand, when Viserys stands up, you can see that his left arm looks like just black bone.


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## Rabulias (Sep 26, 2022)

Aeson said:


> The Sea Snake's children had also aged up. The son was in the previous couple of episodes. I don't think the daughter was though. I think she came and went in the same episode.



Yes, she was in an at least two earlier episodes, by two actresses, I believe. One when she was about 12 and walking with Viserys on a "date" when he was considering her as a wife. The other was just the last episode where she was about 15 at the wedding festivities. It was there she was making eyes at Daemon, leading to their marriage that we see in this episode.


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## Aeson (Sep 26, 2022)

Rabulias said:


> Yes, she was in an at least two earlier episodes, by two actresses, I believe. One when she was about 12 and walking with Viserys on a "date" when he was considering her as a wife. The other was just the last episode where she was about 15 at the wedding festivities. It was there she was making eyes at Daemon, leading to their marriage that we see in this episode.



I meant the actress came and went in this episode.


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## Dire Bare (Sep 27, 2022)

Aeson said:


> I meant the actress came and went in this episode.



Yeah, with a bang!

Sorry.

But . . . I felt like we lost a character we'd been with the entire season so far, despite being portrayed at three different ages by three different actresses. All three actresses were good!


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 27, 2022)

I hope Martin is in therapy, given that being a woman in his novels so consistently means exposing them to violence and death.

And no, it's not "realistic." His books have zombies, dragons and magic abortion tea. It's an authorial choice.


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 27, 2022)

Dire Bare said:


> But . . . I felt like we lost a character we'd been with the entire season so far, despite being portrayed at three different ages by three different actresses. All three actresses were good!



She was an excellent character. I'd love to have seen at least one POV episode with her adult self before having her removed from the stage like this. To be fair, I felt the same way about Daemon's last wife. Dude's got his issues, but he has good wives.


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## Dire Bare (Sep 27, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> I hope Martin is in therapy, given that being a woman in his novels so consistently means exposing them to violence and death.
> 
> And no, it's not "realistic." His books have zombies, dragons and magic abortion tea. It's an authorial choice.



I don't know . . . horrible things happen to just about everybody in this franchise. Women, men, children . . .


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## Dire Bare (Sep 27, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> She was an excellent character. I'd love to have seen at least one POV episode with her adult self before having her removed from the stage like this. To be fair, I felt the same way about Daemon's last wife. Dude's got his issues, but he has good wives.



Yeah, his first wife seemed like an amazing character we got to enjoy for ONE SCENE.


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 27, 2022)

Dire Bare said:


> I don't know . . . horrible things happen to just about everybody in this franchise. Women, men, children . . .



I don't know how to find it now, but I remember, late in the original show's run, someone had a graph of how every character ended up, and female characters were proportionally much, much more likely to have been harshly treated.

I have a hard time even imagining a male Stark being raped, whereas it happened to Sansa on screen and it was a looming threat for both her mother and Arya at other points.


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## Mercurius (Sep 27, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> I hope Martin is in therapy, given that being a woman in his novels so consistently means exposing them to violence and death.
> 
> And no, it's not "realistic." His books have zombies, dragons and *magic abortion tea.* It's an authorial choice.



Not at all - it is probably pennyroyal, or something similar. Sort of "herbal plan b." It exists in the real world.


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## Mercurius (Sep 27, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> I don't know how to find it now, but I remember, late in the original show's run, someone had a graph of how every character ended up, and female characters were proportionally much, much more likely to have been harshly treated.
> 
> I have a hard time even imagining a male Stark being raped, whereas it happened to Sansa on screen and it was a looming threat for both her mother and Arya at other points.



I'm not sure why this is shocking, considering the "dark Medieval" aesthetic that Martin was going for.

If Martin has a fetish for torture, it isn't necessarily woman-centric, but just towards people in general. Lots of bad things happened to everyone. I mean, probably the most unrelenting torture porn arc in any of the shows was gifted to Theon "Reek" Greyjoy.

I only read the first book, but I remember someone saying that the show was actually far darker with more torture and sex. Not sure if that is true, though.


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## Mercurius (Sep 27, 2022)

As for episode 6, I'm still enjoying it but skipped a beat with the time jump and new actors. I found myself missing Milly Alcock, the actress who played young Rhaenyra. Everyone else felt disposable, but I had kind of grown attached to her.


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 27, 2022)

Mercurius said:


> I'm not sure why this is shocking, considering the "dark Medieval" aesthetic that Martin was going for.



It's the exact opposite of shocking. If anything, it's enervating and incredibly predictable. GRRM is 74 years old and still writes like a teenage edgelord.

The basic premise of this series is tragic enough -- it's King Lear if Lear was trying to make everyone happy, rather than being a raging narcissist. We don't need to keep killing women in childbirth to make it dark or a tragedy.


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 27, 2022)

Mercurius said:


> As for episode 6, I'm still enjoying it but skipped a beat with the time jump and new actors. I found myself missing Milly Alcock, the actress who played young Rhaenyra. Everyone else felt disposable, but I had kind of grown attached to her.



Daemon's second wife apparently tamed the oldest living dragon in the world, which I'm told gets played up in the books. It seems a huge shame to show us the adult version of the character and then shuffle her off stage so quickly. I'd love to have spent more time with many of the characters who've flitted on and off stage in this show.


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## Stalker0 (Sep 27, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> I have a hard time even imagining a male Stark being raped, whereas it happened to Sansa on screen and it was a looming threat for both her mother and Arya at other points.



Well we haven't seen a female stark that was pushed out of a window and crippled for life, than taken to some ancient mystic that for all intensive purposes destroyed his personality and replaced it with the "3 eyed raven". As Bran noted many times, "I'm not Bran Stark, not anymore".

Yeah its sucked for the stark women, but its been no damn picnic for some of their men either.


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## Stalker0 (Sep 27, 2022)

So I like a lot about the timeskip. Brings in an interesting new group with the kids, sets some interesting new plots in motion, I personally like the new Rheneryes (the younger actress never really did it for me) but I will miss the younger Alicent.

That said, it does feel like some of the early stuff is now "wasted". For example, the end of the last scene where the king fainted with blood coming out of his head....yet he lives 10 more years. Damon had the whole stepstones victory....but it didn't amount to a damn thing, now we are back at it again. It seems like the whole Rheneryes vs Damon thing the show set up early was a total red herring, ultimately it may be more Rheneryes vs Alicent (or at least their kids) in the final showdown.


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## Mercurius (Sep 27, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> It's the exact opposite of shocking. If anything, it's enervating and incredibly predictable. GRRM is 74 years old and still writes like a teenage edgelord.
> 
> The basic premise of this series is tragic enough -- it's King Lear if Lear was trying to make everyone happy, rather than being a raging narcissist. We don't need to keep killing women in childbirth to make it dark or a tragedy.



I mean, maayybeee....seems like an uncharitable reading. I think we can accuse Martin with being rather interested/obsessed with torturous things happening to his characters, and he certainly likes to be edgy, but that's just part of the tone of this style of fantasy. 

And to be clear, I'm generally not overly attached to "grimdark" (or "grrmdark"), but I think Martin does what he does quite well. And it seems to me that your issue is with grimdark as a whole. It isn't everyone's cuppa.

As for women dying in childbirth, it happened a fair amount during the Middle Ages. Not sure about the actual stats. I personally wouldn't have depicted it twice - seems excessive - but that might be more the decision of the showrunners than GRRM himself. But the ratio isn't unrealistic if you compare it to the number of children born and depicted in the series.


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## pukunui (Sep 27, 2022)

wicked cool said:


> So he had his own family killed



Yep. Larys and his killer bees. He's a pretty evil fellow.



Rabulias said:


> In the scene where Lyonel is offering to resign as Hand, when Viserys stands up, you can see that his left arm looks like just black bone.



I think that's just his sleeve. I expect his arm is completely gone.


Laena's suicide by dragon was sad. I was relieved to see Daemon looking horrified, though. It seems he really did care about her.


It seems like instead of the gratuitous sex scenes we got in GoT, we're now getting gratuitous childbirth scenes and ... teenage boys jerking off in open windows. I was half expecting him to fall _out_ the window when his mother walked in on him!

We certainly got more time with the dragons during this episode, which was nice.


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## Zardnaar (Sep 27, 2022)

Mercurius said:


> I mean, maayybeee....seems like an uncharitable reading. I think we can accuse Martin with being rather interested/obsessed with torturous things happening to his characters, and he certainly likes to be edgy, but that's just part of the tone of this style of fantasy.
> 
> And to be clear, I'm generally not overly attached to "grimdark" (or "grrmdark"), but I think Martin does what he does quite well. And it seems to me that your issue is with grimdark as a whole. It isn't everyone's cuppa.
> 
> As for women dying in childbirth, it happened a fair amount during the Middle Ages. Not sure about the actual stats. I personally wouldn't have depicted it twice - seems excessive - but that might be more the decision of the showrunners than GRRM himself. But the ratio isn't unrealistic if you compare it to the number of children born and depicted in the series.




 10% iirc. One reason royal lines got traced through father's. Mother's died a lot.

 Death toll even worse for young kids. Something like one in three.

 Numbers are similar apparently across cultures in pre industrial societies.

 Compared to what happened irl shows not brutal enough. 

 Classics lecturer did a run down on life expectancy.


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 27, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> Yeah its sucked for the stark women, but its been no damn picnic for some of their men either.



I don't think the _what_ is the only way to look at it. The _how_ is important, too. 

When the Mountain killed the Viper in a duel, it was shocking and violent, but it was also extremely brief. Unless viewers rewound and did a freeze frame, we have more of an impression of what went down than details. (Although when Joffrey is killed, we get a nice clear close-up of what his face looked like caved in, reinforcing how bad it is to be LGBT in a GRRM world.)

When Aemma is going through difficult childbirth and then the deadly c-section, we linger on it. There are close-ups. We hear her agony. We watch everyone's face during. I suspect the entire scene was many times longer than the Mountain/Viper duel.

Yes, a lot of guys die in these stories. But with the exception of Theon, it's typically shocking and short. With women, the violence is typically on camera and dominates a scene, like the rape of Sansa.


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 27, 2022)

Mercurius said:


> I mean, maayybeee....seems like an uncharitable reading. I think we can accuse Martin with being rather interested/obsessed with torturous things happening to his characters, and he certainly likes to be edgy, but that's just part of the tone of this style of fantasy.



Nothing about what an author chooses to include or not to include is beyond his control, especially if you're one of the authors who _defined_ this particular style of fantasy.

And Sansa being raped in a story doesn't mean that the show has to then turn it into a protracted on-screen violation. It could be brief and shocking, as the violence mostly is with men, or the audience could just hear it happening through a closed door or we could hear servants talking about it. (Shakespeare's plays were violent, but the worst of it was typically relayed through exposition.)

The shows' tone isn't inevitable, it's a clear choice. They _want_ you to know what happens to these women.


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## payn (Sep 27, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> I hope Martin is in therapy, given that being a woman in his novels so consistently means exposing them to violence and death.
> 
> And no, it's not "realistic." His books have zombies, dragons and magic abortion tea. It's an authorial choice.



Two things, first how much of HotD is actually Martin's writing? Honest question, I dont know. I do know that much of the last few seasons he had very little to do with. Second, I think the whole exposing woman to violence and death is terrible is a bit overblown. I am thinking of the joker just now. "When men are exposed to violence and death its according to plan and everyone is fine. When Women are exposed to violence and death; everybody loses their minds!"


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## billd91 (Sep 27, 2022)

Mercurius said:


> I'm not sure why this is shocking, considering the "dark Medieval" aesthetic that Martin was going for.



It's not merely "dark Medieval". GRRM was specifically inspired by the War of the Roses period when he thought up the Song of Ice and Fire saga. Add to that the brutality of wars of succession as we've got in House of the Dragon and you've got a recipe for some pretty spectacular violence, double-dealing, backstabbing, and on and on. And the wild part is that the levels of violence aren't all that unrealistic. There are a number of historical sources that suggest the homicide rate in the inspirational time periods may have been as much as 2 magnitudes higher than modern society.


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## Marc Radle (Sep 27, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> Although when Joffrey is killed, we get a nice clear close-up of what his face looked like caved in, reinforcing how bad it is to be LGBT in a GRRM world.)



Wait … what??


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## payn (Sep 27, 2022)

Marc Radle said:


> Wait … what??



Yeap, I was thrown for a loop for a second too. Joffery is the name of Laenor's paramour that Ser Cristen punched to death. Including this point right after a GoT reference got away from me for a second.


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## Mercurius (Sep 27, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> Nothing about what an author chooses to include or not to include is beyond his control, especially if you're one of the authors who _defined_ this particular style of fantasy.



We can hold GRRM 100% accountable for his books, and at least _partially _accountable for the Game of Thrones series. But House of Dragons? I'm not sure how much editorial control he has.


Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> And Sansa being raped in a story doesn't mean that the show has to then turn it into a protracted on-screen violation. It could be brief and shocking, as the violence mostly is with men, or the audience could just hear it happening through a closed door or we could hear servants talking about it. (Shakespeare's plays were violent, but the worst of it was typically relayed through exposition.)
> 
> The shows' tone isn't inevitable, it's a clear choice. They _want_ you to know what happens to these women.



Look, I get it: it is a dark world and you don't like it. But you also seem rather insistent on making it yet another example of misogyny and/or fetishizing violence against women. I just don't agree. Martin might have a fetish for violence/torture etc in general, but I don't see him--at least as expressed through his writing--as being particularly misogynistic, especially when you keep in mind how well his female characters are written - that they are every bit as complex as his male characters are.


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## payn (Sep 27, 2022)

Mercurius said:


> We can hold GRRM 100% accountable for his books, and at least _partially _accountable for the Game of Thrones series. But House of Dragons? I'm not sure how much editorial control he has.
> 
> Look, I get it: it is a dark world and you don't like it. But you also seem rather insistent on making it yet another example of misogyny and/or fetishizing violence against women. I just don't agree. Martin might have a fetish for violence/torture etc in general, but I don't see him--at least as expressed through his writing--as being particularly misogynistic, especially when you keep in mind how well his female characters are written - that they are every bit as complex as his male characters are.



Excellent points. I think its worth noting that the Jaime and Cersei Sept scene was not a rape in Martin's writing, but was on the series. The Sansa scene might not even be in Martin's books (if he ever finishes them).


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## Mercurius (Sep 27, 2022)

payn said:


> Excellent points. I think its worth noting that the Jaime and Cersei Sept scene was not a rape in Martin's writing, but was on the series. The Sansa scene might not even be in Martin's books (*if he ever finishes them).*



That's the real question, no?


----------



## Stalker0 (Sep 27, 2022)

Mercurius said:


> That's the real question, no?



Is that even a question at this point? I think the simple is answer is....no, martin will die before he finishes the series, based on simple maths of human life expectanacy and how long each book seems to take. My money is on one more book, I'll give them that, but I think that's it.


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## billd91 (Sep 27, 2022)

payn said:


> Excellent points. I think its worth noting that the Jaime and Cersei Sept scene was not a rape in Martin's writing, but was on the series. The Sansa scene might not even be in Martin's books (if he ever finishes them).



If anything involving Ramsey Bolton and Sansa comes up it will be in a substantially different context since Sansa wasn't being married off to Bolton in the books - that was her old friend Jeyne Poole in the guise of Arya though it is known she is badly abused by Bolton.


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 27, 2022)

payn said:


> I am thinking of the joker just now. "When men are exposed to violence and death its according to plan and everyone is fine. When Women are exposed to violence and death; everybody loses their minds!"



The same Joker who shot Barbara Gordon through the spine and then took off her clothes to send pictures of her paralyzed, bleeding out and naked to her father and Batman?

That's not as good of an example as you think.

There's a whole lot of pop culture that uses violence against women as either motivation for men to be heroic (Women in Refrigerators) or, worse yet, as just background noise.


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 27, 2022)

payn said:


> Yeap, I was thrown for a loop for a second too. Joffery is the name of Laenor's paramour that Ser Cristen punched to death. Including this point right after a GoT reference got away from me for a second.



We're now up to three Joffreys in this franchise now, since the new baby is named after the one who got punched to death. Presumably Joffrey from GoT isn't named after any of the two from HoD.


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 27, 2022)

billd91 said:


> And the wild part is that the levels of violence aren't all that unrealistic.



The "realism" argument is silly. This is a story with magic, dragons and zombies. There's no requirement for any of this.

And, separately, there's no need to show us graphic violence in loving close-ups, especially when it's not portrayed that way for the straight male characters. The Sansa rape scene could have been we see her looking scared, the door closes, we hear a muffled scream. The showrunners _chose_ to depict violence against women on screen.

Folks here are getting pretty defensive about this. If you're secretly the showrunners, posting on ENWorld is a weird use of your time. And if you're GRRM, I think you know how we'd prefer how you spend your time. 

For everyone else, you're allowed to watch and enjoy the show. There's no need to ride to the defense of a bunch of Hollywood millionaires. But everything you're watching on screen is an authorial choice, not something that "has" to happen. And some of their choices are questionable (and I'm not just talking about the writing of the last two seasons of Game of Thrones).


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## payn (Sep 27, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> The same Joker who shot Barbara Gordon through the spine and then took off her clothes to send pictures of her paralyzed, bleeding out and naked to her father and Batman?
> 
> That's not as good of an example as you think.
> 
> There's a whole lot of pop culture that uses violence against women as either motivation for men to be heroic (Women in Refrigerators) or, worse yet, as just background noise.



No, I was thinking _The Dark Knight Joker_, and it doesn't even matter that it was the joker who said it, but the point in the statement. 

You seem to have a general distaste for the material of Martin, and that is fine. What is strange is this projection as if its something terrible about the man himself, and I don't think its fair as the series isn't all his material.


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## Mercurius (Sep 27, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> Is that even a question at this point? I think the simple is answer is....no, martin will die before he finishes the series, based on simple maths of human life expectanacy and how long each book seems to take. My money is on one more book, I'll give them that, but I think that's it.



You're probably right. I feel for the guy - I'm guessing he's thoroughly burnt out and writing it gives little joy, especially considering it was completely on screen (regardless of how poor one thinks season 8 was).

Even more baffling is Patrick Rothfuss' inability to write the third book in his series. I know and empathize with the fact that he's had mental health issues, but it isn't like he hasn't been publicly active and, well, it has been 11+ years. But that's another topic....


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 27, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> Is that even a question at this point? I think the simple is answer is....no, martin will die before he finishes the series, based on simple maths of human life expectanacy and how long each book seems to take. My money is on one more book, I'll give them that, but I think that's it.



Yeah, Martin is old, obese, insists on going to conventions and getting COVID despite saying ahead of time that he knows he's in a high risk group.

 I think we're going to be in a Christopher Tolkien scenario where his estate will announce they've got a giant pile of notes for someone to make sense of and we will eventually get material based on it, but almost certainly not both Winds of Winter and A Dream of Spring. Hopefully they will actually finish the novels instead of just seeing dollar signs and deciding to chop it all up and churn out six or seven more series of novels instead of just giving us a proper ending.


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## payn (Sep 27, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> The "realism" argument is silly. This is a story with magic, dragons and zombies. There's no requirement for any of this.
> 
> And, separately, there's no need to show us graphic violence in loving close-ups, especially when it's not portrayed that way for the straight male characters. The Sansa rape scene could have been we see her looking scared, the door closes, we hear a muffled scream. The showrunners _chose_ to depict violence against women on screen.
> 
> ...



This is very ironic since you bring the subject up repeatedly, in several threads, for a show you don't even like.


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 27, 2022)

payn said:


> You seem to have a general distaste for the material of Martin



You're really jumping to conclusions here.

I have seen and experienced more horrific stuff in real life than I hope most posters here ever will and I have a remarkably high tolerance for it. 

But there is a pattern in both the books and especially the TV shows and it's not subtle.

According to interviews with The Hollywood Reporter and elsewhere, they put a lot of thought into the violence against women, because they think it's important to show it.


> Director Sapochnik told The Hollywood Reporter this production instead “pulls back” on the amount of consensual sex in the series; however, sexual assault is still very much present in the script. According to Sapochnik, the approach is done “carefully and thoughtfully” when bringing the stories of sexual violence to the screen, following criticisms of “Game of Thrones” portrayals.
> 
> “[We] don’t shy away from it,” Sapochnik explained. “If anything, we’re going to shine a light on that aspect. You can’t ignore the violence that was perpetrated on women by men in that time. It shouldn’t be downplayed and it shouldn’t be glorified.”



That's what I mean about authorial choices. Showing consensual sex is too much (?!), but when bad stuff is happening to women, they're going to "shine a light on it."


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Sep 27, 2022)

payn said:


> This is very ironic since you bring the subject up repeatedly, in several threads, for a show you don't even like.



Please stop deciding what I like and I don't like. I am saying I don't like specific choices. Please stop taking my feelings about a television show so personally.


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## billd91 (Sep 27, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> The "realism" argument is silly. This is a story with magic, dragons and zombies. There's no requirement for any of this.



Well, that's a question for the author and the choices he makes in his art. But if GRRM wants to write a world with at least some historical antecedents to accompany his fantastic elements, that isn't necessarily a cause to think he needs therapy.


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## payn (Sep 27, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> Please stop deciding what I like and I don't like. I am saying I don't like specific choices. Please stop taking my feelings about a television show so personally.



Again, with the irony. It's not personal, nothing I have said is aimed at you specifically. I've only addressed your comments.


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## Mercurius (Sep 27, 2022)

@Whizbang Dustyboots , I don't think you are being called out for not liking grimdark. To be honest, I'm not a huge fan myself; I loved Game of Thrones because it was very well done, with great characters and story, and really captured the feel of Martin's world in a way that is rare in fantasy cinema. Meaning, I liked the show _in spite of _the grimdarkishness, not because of it. While I didn't revel in the grimdark, it didn't bother me because it made sense within the context of the world.

Similarly, I'm not a fan of whimsy, which we could say is the opposite of grimdark. But I can also enjoy a whimsical story if told well.

I think what you're being called out for (or disagreed with) is drawing a line between the grimdark nature of the shows and some kind of misogyny or mental issue on Martin's part ("he needs therapy"). I don't think that's fair, at least looking at the shows and books as a whole and how Martin writes women in general. If anything, I think he should be lauded for his writing of women - how they are every bit as central to the story as men are, despite the ubiquity of sexism in the world, and the fact that they are every bit as complex, multi-faceted, etc.

Meaning, not only are the elements that you don't like not particularly focused on women (that is, in a way incongruent with the world and themes of the show), but they are simply part of the larger genre conventions of grimdark/gritty Medieval fantasy.

This is not to say that Medievalist fantasy has to be grimdark. Guy Gavriel Kay writes Medievalist/"Rennaissancian" fantasy and is far from grimdark, and is never accused of being unrealistic or not accurate to the genre, afaik. If you're saying that GoT excessively fetishizes violence and suffering (aka, "torture porn") I think you have a valid argument. But to equate all this with misogyny is uncharitable, to say the least.

I mean it is a bit like watching a Nordic Noir show and saying, "The showrunners fetishize murder - how gross; and why is it always gray and cloudy, with no sunshine and rainbows? How tedious." Or watching a whimsical fantasy and saying, "This show is so fluffy - the writers are completely divorced from reality...why isn't it grittier?"

TLDR: You don't like grimdark. I get it. To paraphrase Bobby Brown, that's your prerogative. Maybe that's enough? No one is going to (or should) challenge you on that. But your equation of GoT's grimdark elements with misogyny on Martin's part is tenuous at best, and sounds a bit witch-hunty/false accusatory, so people will respond.


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## Zardnaar (Oct 1, 2022)

No one's forcing anyone to watch or read GoT. It's not for everyone and that's ok.


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## Tonguez (Oct 3, 2022)

So just for clarity the whole reveal at the end with Qarl amd his ball headed companion rowing out to sea was all part of Laenor amd Rhynaera’s original plan?


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## Zardnaar (Oct 3, 2022)

Tonguez said:


> So just for clarity the whole reveal at the end with Qarl amd his ball headed companion rowing out to sea was all part of Laenor amd Rhynaera’s original plan?




 Seems so. I think Laenor is doing a runner with his boyfriend to one of the free cities.


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## BRayne (Oct 3, 2022)

Tonguez said:


> So just for clarity the whole reveal at the end with Qarl amd his ball headed companion rowing out to sea was all part of Laenor and Rhynaera’s original plan?




I think in retrospect it's a "let's avoid burying our gays too explicitly" _even if this is a tragic story where everyone dies_


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## Stalker0 (Oct 3, 2022)

Zardnaar said:


> Seems so. I think Laenor is doing a runner with his boyfriend to one of the free cities.



Just when you thought Gendry had invented rowing....

This was a very solid episode. I really like these kind of meeting episodes, lots of personalities and tensions all in one place, it creates interesting eruptions. The Alicent "explosion" was very interesting, as was the kid fight.

Got to hand it to the kid, he's like, "yep lost an eye, gained a dragon, totally worth it"....what a baller.

You can tell the king is basically done though, I mean the Queen literally grabbed his weapon against his explicit orders and tried to kill his daughter or grandson....and he did nothing. I mean you can argue whether the Queen was entitled or not, but the King had given express orders that this was done, and she publicly and violently disobeyed....with no repercussion. That is going to cost him I think....assuming he lives much longer.


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## Zardnaar (Oct 3, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> Just when you thought Gendry had invented rowing....
> 
> This was a very solid episode. I really like these kind of meeting episodes, lots of personalities and tensions all in one place, it creates interesting eruptions. The Alicent "explosion" was very interesting, as was the kid fight.
> 
> ...




 I don't think he will be around much longer. 


 Watched S1E10 and S2E1. 

Not quite peak GoT. HotD is holding up alright probably not as good as S1-4. There's no Need/Tyrion stand out so far imho king.

 Enjoyed tonight's episode anyway. The plots thicken.


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## Older Beholder (Oct 3, 2022)

Probably my favourite episode so far. I liked the dragon riding scene, thought the show did a good job of making it feel both terrifying and exhilarating. 

It didn’t take long (at least for me) to adjust to the aged up actors and all the new kids. I’m really looking forward to the remainder of the series.


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## Zaukrie (Oct 3, 2022)

That really was a good episode. Though the one "good" character killing off her husband set that back.....


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## Rabulias (Oct 3, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> That really was a good episode. Though the one "good" character killing off her husband set that back.....



Um, yeah, about that....


Spoiler



You realize that her husband was in on faking his death and was the bald guy in the boat at the end, right? That's why the body's face was thrown into the fire to be unrecognizable.


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## Zaukrie (Oct 3, 2022)

Rabulias said:


> Um, yeah, about that....
> 
> 
> Spoiler
> ...



It wasn't clear to me that she knew that......but I guess she likely did now that you mention it.

And, it was clearly that when we couldn't see the face, let alone when they showed him....


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## wicked cool (Oct 3, 2022)

Episode was excellent. Edge of my seat with queen vs daughter. Really good acting


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## Older Beholder (Oct 4, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> It wasn't clear to me that she knew that......but I guess she likely did now that you mention it.
> 
> And, it was clearly that when we couldn't see the face, let alone when they showed him....




We see Daemon murder someone just before the fight is staged.
Upon the reveal at the end it would imply that this was him supplying the body for the fire, and thus, he and Rhaenyra were in on the plan.


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## payn (Oct 5, 2022)

Some good tension and development. I'm not too pleased to see Laena and Laenor basically written off without much ado about the story.


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## Tonguez (Oct 5, 2022)

payn said:


> Some good tension and development. I'm not too pleased to see Laena and Laenor basically written off without much ado about the story.



Yeah especially when they pretty much erased the entire Laena- Rhaenyra relationship from the series


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## Zardnaar (Oct 6, 2022)

Older Beholder said:


> We see Daemon murder someone just before the fight is staged.
> Upon the reveal at the end it would imply that this was him supplying the body for the fire, and thus, he and Rhaenyra were in on the plan.




 Yeah good for Laenor but they still murdered someone for a body.


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## Older Beholder (Oct 6, 2022)

Zardnaar said:


> Yeah good for Laenor but they still murdered someone for a body.




I was pointing out that without that scene it would be ambiguous as to whether Rhaenyra and Daemon were in on that part of the plan, or if they had been tricked by Laenor. But yeah, I do think it still makes them more sympathetic then if they had actually murdered Laenor.


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## Tonguez (Oct 7, 2022)

Zardnaar said:


> Yeah good for Laenor but they still murdered someone for a body.



Yeah, but he was just an expendable servant, nobody in Westeros cares about dead peasants


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## Stalker0 (Oct 7, 2022)

Tonguez said:


> Yeah, but he was just an expendable servant, nobody in Westeros cares about dead peasants



Yeah by GoT standards any scheme that ONLY has one peasant die is practically the moral high ground option


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## pukunui (Oct 9, 2022)

Finally got to see the latest episode. Pretty slow start. Some of it was hard for me to see. Too dark.

The stakes are pretty well set now. The “greens” (Alicent and co) vs the “red and blacks” (Daemon, Rhaenyra and co).

The dragon scenes were good. Looking forward to seeing some dragon fights.


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## Zaukrie (Oct 10, 2022)

If he'd have named his brother heir after Damon married his daughter..... Then almost none of this would happen.....


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## pukunui (Oct 10, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> If he'd have named his brother heir after Damon married his daughter..... Then almost none of this would happen.....



Yeah, but then there'd be no more story so ... 

EDIT: Just watched tonight’s episode. Masterful performance by Paddy Considine. Finally bringing his warring family back together only to unwittingly send them hurtling apart again right at the end.

If you watch with the captions on, the very last one is “breathing stops”. Le roi est mort.

I feel like they mixed up Aegon and Aemond’s older actors. The younger Aegon had a long face while the younger Aemond had a rounder one, but it‘s the other way around with these older actors. (The captions also cheekily capitalize “Strong” during Aemond’s toast.)

It’s a bit disconcerting seeing the younger characters go through multiple actors as they grow older and seeing Viserys get more and more visibly old and frail while other characters like Daemon and Rhaenys don’t seem to age at all.

Overall I enjoyed this episode a lot.

Given that there are only two episodes remaining, I expect they’ll cover the disputed succession, and the actual “Dance of the Dragons” civil war will be the subject of season 2 onwards.

I know the dragons are expensive but I really wish we could see more of them! Hopefully in season 2.


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## Zardnaar (Oct 10, 2022)

Yah I liked tonight's episode as well. That was the last time jump afaik.


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## Rabulias (Oct 10, 2022)

pukunui said:


> It’s a bit disconcerting seeing the younger characters go through multiple actors as they grow older and seeing Viserys get more and more visibly old and frail while other characters like Daemon and Rhaenys don’t seem to age at all.



I think Viserys is being ravaged by the leprosy or whatever disease he has, so he appears to be older and frailer than he normally would be.


Rabulias said:


> In the scene where Lyonel is offering to resign as Hand, when Viserys stands up, you can see that his left arm looks like just black bone.



Obviously, I was incorrect, as this episode showed his left arm pretty much intact.


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## Stalker0 (Oct 10, 2022)

I tell you, as intense as other GOT episodes are, this episode may in fact be the saddest to me.

Watching Viserys was intense and brutal, and then for it all to slip away at the very end because of a last bit of madness. Often in GOT when things get nuts its because of scheming, or people just doing the "right thing" instead of the "smart thing". But to have things finally start to look like the possibility of healing is there....and for it to be stripped away because someone listened to an old man's final words that were for someone else.

That's just brutal...and I love it

Anyone else feel like Aemond is becoming the "true" Euron Greyjoy (to make up for the weirdo in OG GOT). With that eyepatch he just screams intensity wherever he goes. I love how he barely talks until just the right moment.


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Oct 10, 2022)

I'm starting to wonder if the Red Keep is haunted and turning young princes into weird creeps.

I mean, there are a _lot_ of weird creeps in Westeros, but per capita, princes in the Red Keep are much more likely to turn out that way. (And maybe safety rails should be put up to keep them all away from windows.)


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Oct 10, 2022)

Mercurius said:


> @Whizbang Dustyboots , I don't think you are being called out for not liking grimdark.






Mercurius said:


> TLDR: You don't like grimdark. I get it.



For the love of god, please stop trying to tell people what they like and don't like.

It's inaccurate at best, insulting at worst, and most importantly, wrong.

You, in particular @Mercurius, are smarter and capable of more discernment than this.

Yes, I should be more accurately criticizing the showrunners' rather than GRRM, for the most part, but the notion that genre or "history" compels them to have either any of the events in this dragon-and-zombies show or to depict them the way they are, rather than those being authorial (here meaning anyone who creates, including showrunners, as it seems "authorial" is throwing some of the posters here) choices is extremely silly.

A largely overlapping crew of (almost entirely male) folks made plenty of bad decisions in the later seasons of Game of Thrones (and were criticized throughout the run for many of these same issues). The notion that they're now somehow immune to criticism is weird, especially since they're capable of heights that, say, Wheel of Time has no hopes of reaching.

If they've produced everything from A+ to F material (it's hard to give "we should put Bran on the throne because something something best story" a passing grade), it's fair to ask them to aim higher than C- material, which we've had plenty of this season.


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Oct 10, 2022)

Paddy Considine deserves an Emmy nomination for this season, although I'm sorry we won't see him shuffling around as a lich in future episodes, causing more trouble by trying to avoid conflict at all costs. (I've had managers like this.)

And who knew that incestuous marriage would bring out the best in Daemon?


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Oct 10, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> Watching Viserys was intense and brutal, and then for it all to slip away at the very end because of a last bit of madness.



He was in so much pain when he left the table, I assumed that he was back on painkillers.

I had previously thought him sharing "so, this prophecy is called THE SONG OF ICE AND FIRE" was pretty clunky writing, but it's nice to see how him sharing it with only one of the young women in his life ends up being his final screw up leading to civil war.

Oh, Viserys, you should have been a minor noble free to play with your model cities and not wrecking all of these lives with your desire to have a bunch of folks clearly incapable of it play nice.


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## wicked cool (Oct 10, 2022)

Tremendous episode. I didn’t read the book so I’m enthralled with where this goes


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## pukunui (Oct 10, 2022)

Rabulias said:


> I think Viserys is being ravaged by the leprosy or whatever disease he has, so he appears to be older and frailer than he normally would be.



Oh, of course. It's very much a perception thing.



Rabulias said:


> Obviously, I was incorrect, as this episode showed his left arm pretty much intact.



Yeah, I figured his whole arm was gone, but it looks like they'd just cut it off at the elbow.


----------



## Mercurius (Oct 11, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> For the love of god, please stop trying to tell people what they like and don't like.
> 
> It's inaccurate at best, insulting at worst, and most importantly, wrong.
> 
> ...



Took me a second to remember what this was about.

Anyhow, are you saying that you _do_ like grimdark? And I don't see how that is "insulting." Weird. 

Of course GoT isn't immune to criticism, and I agree that there were lots of problems with the later seasons (e.g. the rushed culmination of the zombie apocalypse, which seems even worse now that we know it prophesied for hundreds of years). And there's nothing wrong with not liking torture porn...in general, I'm not a fan. But a lot of what you take issue with seem to be elements of the genre that GoT/HoD are part of - or at least the shows are part of (I only read the first ASoIF book, but have heard the show upped the torture porn a notch or two).

Meaning, it is a feature of the vibe they're going for. It is sort of like criticizing MCU films for having violence, when superheroes are generally violent (but for good!) or criticizing a raunchy comedy for being raunchy, or punk rock for being too angry. Genre conventions, in other words.

The GoT world is pretty dark, pretty grim, and there's a good amount of misogyny. It is dark fantasy and not to everyone's liking. The shows may be a bit gratuitous in depicting it, but a good amount of it is just the nature of the world and sub-genre.


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## pukunui (Oct 11, 2022)

So do we think that Alicent realized that Viserys' last words were meant for Rhaenyra and will thus willfully misinterpret them to further her son's claim to the throne? Or do we think she genuinely believed he was talking to her? Either way, it's tragic.

Also, next episode is episode 9. If the precedent sent by GoT is anything to go by, that means this next episode will be a real doozy in some fashion. Any speculation on what might go down? Obviously there will be a funeral for Viserys and then Alicent will move to have Aegon declared king instead of Rhaenyra. But that's all to be expected. What might happen that we non-book readers aren't expecting?


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## Zardnaar (Oct 11, 2022)

pukunui said:


> So do we think that Alicent realized that Viserys' last words were meant for Rhaenyra and will thus willfully misinterpret them to further her son's claim to the throne? Or do we think she genuinely believed he was talking to her? Either way, it's tragic.
> 
> Also, next episode is episode 9. If the precedent sent by GoT is anything to go by, that means this next episode will be a real doozy in some fashion. Any speculation on what might go down? Obviously there will be a funeral for Viserys and then Alicent will move to have Aegon declared king instead of Rhaenyra. But that's all to be expected. What might happen that we non-book readers aren't expecting?




 Viserys dead and someone getting killed or death by dragon.


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## Stalker0 (Oct 11, 2022)

pukunui said:


> So do we think that Alicent realized that Viserys' last words were meant for Rhaenyra and will thus willfully misinterpret them to further her son's claim to the throne? Or do we think she genuinely believed he was talking to her? Either way, it's tragic.



People tend to believe what they want to believe. I can absolutely see Alicent believing the king, in his final moments, finally told her "the truth" and wanting his son to succeed him.


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## pukunui (Oct 11, 2022)

Zardnaar said:


> Viserys dead and someone getting killed or death by dragon.



If someone gets killed, who would it be? We've already had suicide by dragon. There needs to be something unexpected. Unless they're _not_ going to go the same route as GoT and do the big twist in episode 9.



Stalker0 said:


> People tend to believe what they want to believe.



True.


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## Zardnaar (Oct 11, 2022)

pukunui said:


> If someone gets killed, who would it be? We've already had suicide by dragon. There needs to be something unexpected. Unless they're _not_ going to go the same route as GoT and do the big twist in episode 9.
> 
> 
> True.




 No idea stupid show. Guess I'm tuning in next week.


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## Aeson (Oct 11, 2022)

I think they need to do a DNA test to see if Daemon isn't Amond's real father. Look at that jaw line. And that smirk. They should be father and son.


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## Zaukrie (Oct 11, 2022)

Why not admit to her that you faked her son's death?


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## Tonguez (Oct 11, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> Why not admit to her that you faked her son's death?



Because she is still a rival for the throne and could have used the information against her. The betrothal of her granddaughter as queen and the other Lady of Driftmark is a much better deal.


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## Zaukrie (Oct 11, 2022)

Tonguez said:


> Because she is still a rival for the throne and could have used the information against her. The betrothal of her granddaughter as queen and the other Lady of Driftmark is a much better deal.



She's no rival at this point. And sure, that's a good deal..... But she can use every ally she can get.


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Oct 11, 2022)

Mercurius said:


> Anyhow, are you saying that you _do_ like grimdark? And I don't see how that is "insulting." Weird.



No, what's insulting is people repeatedly insisting they know my opinions better than I do.

If everyone on this board kept telling you that you hate seafood, whether or not it's true, and despite your repeated protestations, you'd likely view it as annoying at a minimum and weird harassment at worst.


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Oct 11, 2022)

pukunui said:


> So do we think that Alicent realized that Viserys' last words were meant for Rhaenyra and will thus willfully misinterpret them to further her son's claim to the throne? Or do we think she genuinely believed he was talking to her? Either way, it's tragic.



No, she was visibly baffled. She thought it was the dying rambling of a husband drugged up to the gills on milk of the poppy.


----------



## FitzTheRuke (Oct 11, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> No, what's insulting is people repeatedly insisting they know my opinions better than I do.




That's not what they were doing. They were reading the things that you wrote and drawing logical conclusions. YOU made them think that way. Give people some credit. They're not trying to insult you, they're simply trying to talk to you about the things that you're writing. If they misunderstand you, simply correct them with what you DO think. There's no need for the animosity.


----------



## Mercurius (Oct 11, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> No, what's insulting is people repeatedly insisting they know my opinions better than I do.
> 
> If everyone on this board kept telling you that you hate seafood, whether or not it's true, and despite your repeated protestations, you'd likely view it as annoying at a minimum and weird harassment at worst.



Yeah, but that's not what I said or did. No reason to make unnecessary conflict.

To use your metaphor, I see it more like you saying that you don't like food that is "fishy" and then I suggest maybe you don't like seafood, and now you're mad that I'm telling you I know your opinions better than you do.

EDIT: I just went back and re-read the last post of mine from a couple weeks ago, and am quite frankly baffled how you teased out one tiny element, magnified it and then took offense at that magnification, while ignoring the rest of what I said. Why not revisit that post and address the actual views I put forward about Martin and his world?


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## Eric V (Oct 11, 2022)

So...this huge civil war is going to happen now because of some misunderstood words from a dying man high on milk of the poppy?

Hrm.


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## FitzTheRuke (Oct 12, 2022)

Eric V said:


> So...this huge civil war is going to happen now because of some misunderstood words from a dying man high on milk of the poppy?
> 
> Hrm.




I thought for a second that you were talking about the misunderstandings here on ENWorld! "Which of us is dying, and which high on the milk of the poppy? And I think it's a bit much to describe our argument as a civil war!"


----------



## Older Beholder (Oct 12, 2022)

Great episode, you know a show is doing well when someone crossing a room to sit in a throne can have so much drama and impact. The moment when Viserys goes to say he doesn't need help a second time and it's Daemon offering gave me chills.

The memes have been pretty good too...


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## Zardnaar (Oct 12, 2022)

Older Beholder said:


> Great episode, you know a show is doing well when someone crossing a room to sit in a throne can have so much drama and impact. The moment when Viserys goes to say he doesn't need help a second time and it's Daemon offering gave me chills.
> 
> The memes have been pretty good too...
> 
> View attachment 263823




Lmao when I saw that meme on r/freefolk


----------



## Zardnaar (Oct 12, 2022)

HotD and RoP spent millions on cgi dragons and balrogs. Neither can compare with the epicness of a dying old man wanting to sit on a chair.

 Vizzy T or Bobby B best on screen king of Westeros?


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## Stalker0 (Oct 13, 2022)

Zardnaar said:


> Vizzy T or Bobby B best on screen king of Westeros?



Bobby B for the win. Don't get me wrong, that last few scenes with our Vizzy T were epic, but Bobby was just a force.


----------



## Zaukrie (Oct 17, 2022)

She had a chance to rid the world of an evil family..... Sigh.


----------



## Zardnaar (Oct 17, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> She had a chance to rid the world of an evil family..... Sigh.




 Well they're both kinda evil. 

 Think letting Rhaenya take the throne but then going to Alicents line is the "right" thing to do. 

 That ending though hot damn.


----------



## pukunui (Oct 17, 2022)

Ser Christon gets away with murder again! How does he do it?!

EDIT: And he gets a promotion even!

Larys is disgusting. I don’t know why Alicent tolerates him. (It _is _nice to see her taking her power back from her father and doing things on her terms instead of continuing to be his pawn, though.)

Good episode overall. Nice bit of spectacle at the end. Not quite on a level with most GoT ninth episodes but it was still momentous. And neither Rhaenyra nor Daemon were even in it!


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## wicked cool (Oct 17, 2022)

Graham mctavish-I expected more . Hopefully he has a bigger role going forward


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## Zaukrie (Oct 17, 2022)

Zardnaar said:


> Well they're both kinda evil.
> 
> Think letting Rhaenya take the throne but then going to Alicents line is the "right" thing to do.
> 
> That ending though hot damn.



All she did was kill innocent bystanders..... She could have taken the thrown herself. 

That was a great episode of tv. Truly


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## wicked cool (Oct 17, 2022)

the house on fire? Who was in it


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## Zaukrie (Oct 17, 2022)

wicked cool said:


> the house on fire? Who was in it



The white worm.


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## Tonguez (Oct 17, 2022)

I was so waiting for Rhaenys to end it with Dacarys

oh well Alicent gets to keep her pretty feet for another week


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## pukunui (Oct 17, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> The white worm.



Yes. What game is Larys playing at? He pushed for Alicent’s father to be brought back as hand and now he is working against him.



wicked cool said:


> Graham mctavish-I expected more . Hopefully he has a bigger role going forward



He will now travel to Essos and pledge his loyalty to Daenerys … oh wait.


----------



## Zaukrie (Oct 18, 2022)

pukunui said:


> Yes. What game is Larys playing at? He pushed for Alicent’s father to be brought back as hand and now he is working against him.
> 
> 
> He will now travel to Essos and pledge his loyalty to Daenerys … oh wait.



He needed him to get her queen and the heir king. Now that he has that, he needs to get rid of him to become Hand. That's my guess.


----------



## Zaukrie (Oct 18, 2022)

pukunui said:


> Yes. What game is Larys playing at? He pushed for Alicent’s father to be brought back as hand and now he is working against him.
> 
> 
> He will now travel to Essos and pledge his loyalty to Daenerys … oh wait.



Ya. Staring at them makes no sense. Kill them and take the throne.


----------



## pukunui (Oct 18, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> He needed him to get her queen and the heir king. Now that he has that, he needs to get rid of him to become Hand. That's my guess.



Ah yes, it's possible he wants to become Hand himself. Good guess.



Zaukrie said:


> Ya. Staring at them makes no sense. Kill them and take the throne.



I'm guessing you didn't mean to quote me again. Nevertheless, I think it's safe to say that the show would have been over at that point if Rhaenys had burnt them all to a crisp. My guess is she wanted to a) frighten them and b) show them that they couldn't hold her prisoner. That and c) she's not a murderer.


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## Zaukrie (Oct 18, 2022)

pukunui said:


> Ah yes, it's possible he wants to become Hand himself. Good guess.
> 
> 
> I'm guessing you didn't mean to quote me again. Nevertheless, I think it's safe to say that the show would have been over at that point if Rhaenys had burnt them all to a crisp. My guess is she wanted to a) frighten them and b) show them that they couldn't hold her prisoner. That and c) she's not a murderer.



Truth. But she'll have to go to war......


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## pukunui (Oct 18, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> Truth. But she'll have to go to war......



Maybe at this point she still believes war can be avoided.


----------



## Zaukrie (Oct 18, 2022)

pukunui said:


> Maybe at this point she still believes war can be avoided.



Based on centuries of history? I suppose it's possible..... But she's super smart. I just don't get why smart people keep letting their mortal enemies live. Not in that kind of world.


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## pukunui (Oct 18, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> Based on centuries of history? I suppose it's possible..... But she's super smart. I just don't get why smart people keep letting their mortal enemies live. Not in that kind of world.



Were there any precedents in that history for what is about to happen?

Yes, it was silly of the writers to put her in a position where she could have ended the story right there and then only to have her make the choice not to do so in order that the story could continue. (Out of interest, does this event happen this way in the book?)


----------



## Zardnaar (Oct 18, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> Truth. But she'll have to go to war......




 She might be willing to kill in ear but not blatant murder.


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## Tonguez (Oct 18, 2022)

pukunui said:


> . (Out of interest, does this event happen this way in the book?)



the book is entirely different, book Raenys is no where near the Red Keep when the Hightower coup occurs, she is already with Rhaenyra and co.

 The news of the coup is delivered to Rhaenyra by a member of the Kingsguard


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## Zaukrie (Oct 18, 2022)

Zardnaar said:


> She might be willing to kill in ear but not blatant murder.



Is there really a difference? In a war you help start? Not really. I'm a war likely to kill innocent people, and not the actual people that want the war?


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## Zardnaar (Oct 18, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> Is there really a difference? In a war you help start? Not really. I'm a war likely to kill innocent people, and not the actual people that want the war?




 Well the war hasn't started. We don't know enough about her in the show if she's been to war before. Right there right then she wasn't willing to personally kill them. 

 Collateral damage was fine (she was trying to escape). 

 She kind if the shows "good" person seems it was different in the books.

See where the story goes I'm sure they'll all be burning towns by season 2 or 3.


----------



## Zaukrie (Oct 18, 2022)

Zardnaar said:


> Well the war hasn't started. We don't know enough about her in the show if she's been to war before. Right there right then she wasn't willing to personally kill them.
> 
> Collateral damage was fine (she was trying to escape).
> 
> ...



Ya. She had no issue killing all the innocent peasants.... Anyway. Great episode!


----------



## Zardnaar (Oct 18, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> Ya. She had no issue killing all the innocent peasants.... Anyway. Great episode!




 In escaping she didn't go out of her way to massacre some peasants.


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## Stalker0 (Oct 18, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> Based on centuries of history? I suppose it's possible..... But she's super smart. I just don't get why smart people keep letting their mortal enemies live. Not in that kind of world.



Yeah I don't get her reasoning. If she is backing Rhanera, then taking out the rival king would not only prevent any civil war, but she would have some mad points with Rhanera in the new order.

If she wants the throne for herself....well again kill the first rival, than use Rhanera's gratitude against her.

What is she hoping to stay neutral or have driftmark someone go independent? Yeah no way that's going to last.

Maybe we will learn more of her mentality, but as of right now that was about the dumbest thing she could have possibly done.


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## Zaukrie (Oct 18, 2022)

The show runners are quoted as saying they put the dragon scene in for something cool ... And that she didn't kill them because she couldn't kill another mother? Even though she knows there will now be war with thousands of deaths... But at least the other rich and powerful people get to live.


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## Zaukrie (Oct 18, 2022)

Zardnaar said:


> In escaping she didn't go out of her way to massacre some peasants.



I'm sure their families feel better about their deaths since she didn't do it on purpose.


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## Older Beholder (Oct 18, 2022)

I thought the little kid fight club stuff was pretty dark.


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## Zaukrie (Oct 18, 2022)

Older Beholder said:


> I thought the little kid fight club stuff was pretty dark.



Very. And in true Martin form, they allegedly killed the one powerful person that cared. Given we didn't see her body....


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## Stalker0 (Oct 19, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> Very. And in true Martin form, they allegedly killed the one powerful person that cared. Given we didn't see her body....



My guess is she is still Alive but thinks the hand did the deed (instead of the crippled guy), and will plot revenge.


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## Zaukrie (Oct 19, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> My guess is she is still Alive but thinks the hand did the deed (instead of the crippled guy), and will plot revenge.



Oh, I'm sure she's alive. Maybe even on purpose for the reason you state....


----------



## pukunui (Oct 19, 2022)

Yeah, the White Worm feels a little too important to kill off so soon.


----------



## Tonguez (Oct 19, 2022)

Anyway anyone a bit iffy about the writers giving the guy with a clubfoot a foot fetish? With all the sex in GoT a foot fetish is comparitively tame, but making a point of focusing on his clubfoot as part of that scene did seem a bit on the nose (toes?).

Anyway just kicking it off, anyone want to wade in to this


----------



## pukunui (Oct 19, 2022)

Tonguez said:


> Anyway anyone a bit iffy about the writers giving the guy with a clubfoot a foot fetish? With all the sex in GoT a foot fetish is comparitively tame, but making a point of focusing on his clubfoot as part of that scene did seem a bit on the nose (toes?).
> 
> Anyway just kicking it off, anyone want to wade in to this



All I want to say is that the writers (and the actor) have done a great job making me dislike Larys more than anyone else on the show.


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Oct 19, 2022)

Tonguez said:


> Anyway anyone a bit iffy about the writers giving the guy with a clubfoot a foot fetish? With all the sex in GoT a foot fetish is comparitively tame, but making a point of focusing on his clubfoot as part of that scene did seem a bit on the nose (toes?).



Yeah, but I was mostly focused on the fact that Alicent would be completely justified if she got an axe and killed everyone in that castle.


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## Zaukrie (Oct 19, 2022)

Tonguez said:


> Anyway anyone a bit iffy about the writers giving the guy with a clubfoot a foot fetish? With all the sex in GoT a foot fetish is comparitively tame, but making a point of focusing on his clubfoot as part of that scene did seem a bit on the nose (toes?).
> 
> Anyway just kicking it off, anyone want to wade in to this



I thought showing his foot first was unreal. Like we hadn't noticed before? 

Odd little fetish. I didn't need to see him do his thing to get it though .... The show doesn't know when to not show, for me at least


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Oct 19, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> The show doesn't know when to not show, for me at least



They skipped every day of Screenwriting 101 except for the day they said "show, don't tell" and that's guided them ever since.


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## Tonguez (Oct 19, 2022)

Whizbang Dustyboots said:


> Yeah, but I was mostly focused on the fact that Alicent would be completely justified if she got an axe and killed everyone in that castle.




yeah I kept reflecting on what Rhaenys said to Alicent about always submitting to the desires of Men rather than taking the throne herself, and the Larys scene really underscores that. First her father pimps her to the king, and now even though She’s one of the most powerful woman in Westeros she still allows herself to be exploited by a petty courtier. She really should have taken an axe to him long ago - but chose not to. Should she be held responsible for her submission?

Larys due to having a disability has been ignored in life and has spun that into an unrepentantly vile personality with a awfully specific kink.

TV Tropes links the Evil Cripple trope with Envy of the Able-bodied, Crippled Genius and Depraved Deviant - Larys aint dragging his feet on any other them


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## payn (Oct 19, 2022)

Tonguez said:


> yeah I kept reflecting on what Rhaenys said to Alicent about always submitting to the desires of Men rather than taking the throne herself, and the Larys scene really underscores that. First her father pimps her to the king, and now even though She’s one of the most powerful woman in Westeros she still allows herself to be exploited by a petty courtier. She really should have taken an axe to him long ago - but chose not to. Should she be held responsible for her submission?
> 
> Larys due to having a disability has been ignored in life and has spun that into an unrepentantly vile personality with a awfully specific kink.
> 
> TV Tropes links the Evil Cripple trope with Envy of the Able-bodied, Crippled Genius and Depraved Deviant - Larys aint dragging his feet on any other them



I think that's a large part of why Rhaneys didn't burn the royal family to death. She wants to show Alicent that women's role isnt simply to just guide men to leadership. Also, burning them to a crisp just sets a precedent that you can gain the throne by killing your way to the top. You may say thats the entire Game of Thrones theme, but its done via subterfuge. If you publicly assassinate your way in, you'll have a never ending list of challengers. Also, nobody will trust you and allies are incredibly important to running the kingdom.


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## Zaukrie (Oct 19, 2022)

payn said:


> I think that's a large part of why Rhaneys didn't burn the royal family to death. She wants to show Alicent that women's role isnt simply to just guide men to leadership. Also, burning them to a crisp just sets a precedent that you can gain the throne by killing your way to the top. You may say thats the entire Game of Thrones theme, but its done via subterfuge. If you publicly assassinate your way in, you'll have a never ending list of challengers. Also, nobody will trust you and allies are incredibly important to running the kingdom.



Uh.... If she roasts them a woman becomes ruler. So I'm not sure I get your first point. Sure could take the throne, or let the real heir have it. 

As to your second point, they are literally talking about killing the real heir..... That won't be secret if they do it. My guess we are looking at war, though, so it's somehow better to kill soldiers and the occasional leader in war.


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## payn (Oct 19, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> Uh.... If she roasts them a woman becomes ruler. So I'm not sure I get your first point. Sure could take the throne, or let the real heir have it.



Alicent would be dead. She wouldn't be able to show her a world she wants to make a reality. 


Zaukrie said:


> As to your second point, they are literally talking about killing the real heir..... That won't be secret if they do it. My guess we are looking at war, though, so it's somehow better to kill soldiers and the occasional leader in war.



Right, Rhaneys wants to see the throne claimed legitimately, she is not willing to cloak and dagger kill her opponents, but challenge them in the open. Its important that folks know, not just the small council's decision, who the real Queen/King is. This will require backing of houses and folks of the realm. Yes, this likely means lots of folks are going to die.


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## Zaukrie (Oct 19, 2022)

Somehow my brain blanked out the show Alicent part there. Got it.


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## Stalker0 (Oct 19, 2022)

Tonguez said:


> yeah I kept reflecting on what Rhaenys said to Alicent about always submitting to the desires of Men rather than taking the throne herself



The problem with that is, there is NO way alicent could take the throne. That is a fantasy. She doesn't have a private army, there are several people with way stronger claims than her, and yes the woman card is going to be a negative there.

Why would anyone back her over the other more legitimate options? Her trying to go for the throne would be a death sentence. Installing her son on the throne and maintaining some power through him is the absolute best she could hope for.


----------



## payn (Oct 19, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> The problem with that is, there is NO way alicent could take the throne. That is a fantasy. She doesn't have a private army, there are several people with way stronger claims than her, and yes the woman card is going to be a negative there.
> 
> Why would anyone back her over the other more legitimate options? Her trying to go for the throne would be a death sentence. Installing her son on the throne and maintaining some power through him is the absolute best she could hope for.



I think Rhaneys was speaking in a general sense. There is an opportunity here to "break the wheel" by letting Rhaenyra claim the throne. Instead, Alicent is choosing to maintain the status quo and thus keeping women down.


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## FitzTheRuke (Oct 19, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> I'm sure their families feel better about their deaths since she didn't do it on purpose.



I get the impression that GoT nobility barely notice that commoners exist, except if they cause trouble (or are cheering for you, even if at sword-point).


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## Zaukrie (Oct 19, 2022)

FitzTheRuke said:


> I get the impression that GoT nobility barely notice that commoners exist, except if they cause trouble (or are cheering for you, even if at sword-point).



That was pretty much my point. But I was not clear!


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## Whizbang Dustyboots (Oct 19, 2022)

This was a great week for Rhaenys. You can see why there are people who still wonder what would have been, had she become queen.


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## pukunui (Oct 19, 2022)

Stalker0 said:


> The problem with that is, there is NO way alicent could take the throne. That is a fantasy. She doesn't have a private army, there are several people with way stronger claims than her, and yes the woman card is going to be a negative there.



Fast forward 200 years and Cersei fulfills that fantasy, along with Daenerys (briefly) and Sansa.


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## Zaukrie (Oct 19, 2022)

pukunui said:


> Fast forward 200 years and Cersei fulfills that fantasy, along with Daenerys (briefly) and Sansa.



You know, GRRM could have put women in charge of every kingdom in the last two seasons.....it would have been one heck of a twist. But, I don't think he has it in him......


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## wicked cool (Oct 24, 2022)

How to train your dragon the R rated version. Wow


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## Zaukrie (Oct 24, 2022)

Apparently they don't have total control...

That was real fantasy. Though, again, just kill your damn enemy when you can..... The Hand had already committed treason....


----------



## payn (Oct 24, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> Apparently they don't have total control...
> 
> That was real fantasy. Though, again, just kill your damn enemy when you can..... The Hand had already committed treason....



That treason doesnt matter until you know what allies you have. A first strike could be all the cause your enemy needs to rally at your detriment.


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## Zaukrie (Oct 24, 2022)

payn said:


> That treason doesnt matter until you know what allies you have. A first strike could be all the cause your enemy needs to rally at your detriment.



How did waiting to do anything for even one day work out? Not so well. They were at war, as soon as she decided to put on the crown.


----------



## Zardnaar (Oct 24, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> How did waiting to do anything for even one day work out? Not so well. They were at war, as soon as she decided to put on the crown.




 That's not quite true in the show. 

 They don't know where the other lord's stand. Neither side wanted to fire the first shot as such up until Aemond dragon went nom nom. 

 Dragonstone had the option of bending the knee not a bad option if Starks, Baratheon and the Vale go yeah bah we're supporting Aegon.


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## Zaukrie (Oct 24, 2022)

Zardnaar said:


> That's not quite true in the show.
> 
> They don't know where the other lord's stand. Neither side wanted to fire the first shot as such up until Aemond dragon went nom nom.
> 
> Dragonstone had the option of bending the knee not a bad option if Starks, Baratheon and the Vale go yeah bah we're supporting Aegon.



Sure, but let's be real.... She declared herself queen. She wasn't backing down at that point.

How did waiting work out? Even one days delay? But so well. 

The good guys, as good as there are anyway, always dilly dally in this world, and always pay the price.


----------



## Zardnaar (Oct 24, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> Sure, but let's be real.... She declared herself queen. She wasn't backing down at that point.
> 
> How did waiting work out? Even one days delay? But so well.
> 
> The good guys, as good as there are anyway, always dilly dally in this world, and always pay the price.




 It works better in universe though. Jon was king he still bent the knee to Daenerys. 

  They don't have much support they're only on house plus vassals. 

 We've had 3 factions all refuse to fire first. At some level they know the risks and want to solve things diplomatically probably via bending the knee.


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## Stalker0 (Oct 24, 2022)

That was a great episode. I really appreciate how we are back to more classic GOT pacing. They give the characters time to breath, we see some actually god damn war planning!

The scene with Damon and Rhenera was intense! And Luke, man you knew the whole time what probably going to happen but still the tension was so palpable.

I like that Aemond seemed so intent on getting at Luke but as soon as it happens you can see it in his eyes, the "what have I done" moment. And of course Rhenera's reaction, you know its all going to hell now.

I also thought its very interesting how much the dragon riders don't have full control of their dragons. This really highlights Daenerys and how bonded she was with her "children", while they were rebellious in their own rights, when it came to combat they fought as one.

GOT is back baby.


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## pukunui (Oct 24, 2022)

Zardnaar said:


> That's not quite true in the show.
> 
> They don't know where the other lord's stand. Neither side wanted to fire the first shot as such up until Aemond dragon went nom nom.
> 
> Dragonstone had the option of bending the knee not a bad option if Starks, Baratheon and the Vale go yeah bah we're supporting Aegon.



Yep, but then uppity little Arrax decides he has to have a go at the biggest, baddest dragon in town ...



Stalker0 said:


> I like that Aemond seemed so intent on getting at Luke but as soon as it happens you can see it in his eyes, the "what have I done" moment.



Yeah, I think he was only intending to scare Luke, maybe even force him onto the ground so he could take out an eye ... but Vhagar had other ideas. No uppity little dragon is going to breathe fire in her face and get away with it!


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## Tonguez (Oct 24, 2022)

First blood is all on Rhaenys


----------



## payn (Oct 24, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> How did waiting to do anything for even one day work out? Not so well. They were at war, as soon as she decided to put on the crown.



Because one accidental act of diplomacy amongst young men went wrong? Look at it this way, Aemond's actions are going to work in favor Rhaenyra and her cause. Even he knows it. 


Zaukrie said:


> Sure, but let's be real.... She declared herself queen. She wasn't backing down at that point.
> 
> How did waiting work out? Even one days delay? But so well.
> 
> The good guys, as good as there are anyway, always dilly dally in this world, and always pay the price.


----------



## wicked cool (Oct 24, 2022)

With the singing in the cave was that a wild dragon?


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## payn (Oct 24, 2022)

wicked cool said:


> With the singing in the cave was that a wild dragon?



Well...


Spoiler: spoiler



I believe its a 100 year old dragon that has not had a rider in a very long time.


----------



## wicked cool (Oct 24, 2022)

payn said:


> Well...
> 
> 
> Spoiler: spoiler
> ...



Thanks


----------



## Dire Bare (Oct 25, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> Uh.... If she roasts them a woman becomes ruler. So I'm not sure I get your first point. Sure could take the throne, or let the real heir have it.
> 
> As to your second point, they are literally talking about killing the real heir..... That won't be secret if they do it. My guess we are looking at war, though, so it's somehow better to kill soldiers and the occasional leader in war.



Rhaenys had not yet decided to back Rhaenyra's claim to the throne. And she's not bloodthirsty. And she had sympathy towards Alicent. Was it a tactical mistake? Sure. But humans do that, all the time, in the real world. Why not the fantasy world also?

What makes this show hard for me, is that even the "good guys" don't give a hoot for the lives of the common folk. Even one of my favorite characters, Rhaenys.


----------



## Zaukrie (Oct 25, 2022)

Dire Bare said:


> Rhaenys had not yet decided to back Rhaenyra's claim to the throne. And she's not bloodthirsty. And she had sympathy towards Alicent. Was it a tactical mistake? Sure. But humans do that, all the time, in the real world. Why not the fantasy world also?
> 
> What makes this show hard for me, is that even the "good guys" don't give a hoot for the lives of the common folk. Even one of my favorite characters, Rhaenys.



There are no good guys, clearly. Maybe the white worm? To be clear, it is starting to get harder to watch, the lack of anyone I want to root for.

I get it, she's human. All the almost good guys fill history with their mistakes. What if we got an almost good guy that didn't do most everything wrong. They could still lose, but it would be a refreshing change for this show.


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## Zardnaar (Oct 25, 2022)

Tyrion and Varys look even better now. 

 No one gives a hoot about the hoi polloi.


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## Eric V (Oct 25, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> There are no good guys, clearly. Maybe the white worm? To be clear, it is starting to get harder to watch, the lack of anyone I want to root for.



Same thing that put me off Yellowstone.

Watch for the dragons, I guess?


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## pukunui (Oct 25, 2022)

Eric V said:


> Watch for the dragons, I guess?



I'm mainly watching for the dragons! I'm hoping we'll see a lot more of them next season.


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## BRayne (Oct 25, 2022)

pukunui said:


> Yep, but then uppity little Arrax decides he has to have a go at the biggest, baddest dragon in town ...
> 
> 
> Yeah, I think he was only intending to scare Luke, maybe even force him onto the ground so he could take out an eye ... but Vhagar had other ideas. No uppity little dragon is going to breathe fire in her face and get away with it!




To be honest Vhagar probably thought Visenya had an eyepatch now and somehow the Dornish had stolen a dragon


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## payn (Oct 26, 2022)

I guess Viserys was correct, their control of the dragons is an illusion. Im betting we are gonna see more dragons gone wrong ahead!


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## pukunui (Oct 26, 2022)

payn said:


> I guess Viserys was correct, their control of the dragons is an illusion. Im betting we are gonna see more dragons gone wrong ahead!



I expect most of the dragons will die during the civil war ... given that the last dragon (pre-Daenerys) died during the reign of Aegon III, who was only the seventh Targaryen to sit on the Iron Throne and the first to do so after the civil war ended.


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## Dire Bare (Oct 26, 2022)

Zaukrie said:


> There are no good guys, clearly. Maybe the white worm? To be clear, it is starting to get harder to watch, the lack of anyone I want to root for.
> 
> I get it, she's human. All the almost good guys fill history with their mistakes. What if we got an almost good guy that didn't do most everything wrong. They could still lose, but it would be a refreshing change for this show.



If given a character that doesn't make mistakes . . . . wouldn't be very realistic or relatable. Boring show. However, I get it to a point, watching a character make a mistake that, to the viewer, just seems terribly stupid . . . can be frustrating.

No good guys . . . . the show sets us up to root for the women central to the story, Rhaenrya, Alicent, Rhaenys . . . and Rhaenyra's kids are set up as doomed innocents . . . . but with the horrible stuff all three women pull, it is getting harder and harder to root for anybody. In the Game of Thrones series, all sorts of horrible things were being done . . . . but we had the Starks, who generally made moral choices and were easy to root for. House of the Dragon, not so much.

And Rhaenrya's kids . . . just come across as weak milksops just waiting for a bigger dragon to chomp them to pieces . . .


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