Last week’s episode, The Green Council centered on the Green part of the approaching struggle, so it is sensible that this week’s season finale of House of the Dragon must give us the viewpoint of the Blacks. The finale doesn’t pull any punches and firmly units the board for the seasons to return. The hurricane certainly broke, and the dragons will dance.
Season Finale Thoughts
The episode will get instantly to the purpose as Rhaenys flies to Dragonstone to tell Rhaenyra in regards to the passing of her father, in addition to the usurping of her throne utilizing Aegon and Alicent. Whether because of deficient timing or emotional trauma, Rhaenyra is going into labor, and, yikes…it’s a harrowing ordeal to witness. Rhaenyra refuses help, opting to undergo during the ache of childbirth on her phrases, a stark distinction to her mom’s compelled cesarian within the premiere. Despite taking regulation of the beginning and forcing the target audience thru an uncomfortable little while, Rhaeynera’s kid is stillborn whilst additionally appearing indicators of being misshapen, most likely a byproduct of incest. In what will have to quantity to a question of hours, she’s misplaced her throne, her father, and her kid. But the display isn’t performed taking from Rhaeynera simply.
Meanwhile, Daemon is able for the chance to struggle, believing Alicent and the Greens murdered his brother to make a grasp for the Iron Throne. To be truthful, we don’t know if the milk of the poppy without delay killed him or now not, so this accusation isn’t 100% loopy, however, given he’s offered restricted data and his personal bias, he rushes to conclusions. This episode and its predecessor have each made it transparent that Rhaeynera and Alicent aren’t actively looking for struggle, with Rhaeynera making it transparent she doesn’t wish to throw the area into chaos, and Alicent legitimately believes to be in the precise. These two aren’t drawing swords, however, males like Daemon are fast to ship ravens out to allies and ship troops onto the citadel partitions, fortifying their place and bolstering their place. We’ve noticed identical behavior from Corlys, who steadily retreats into warfare when confronted with emotionally demanding situations.
Daemon, in his anger and bloodlust, is one thing of an enigma in this episode. One minute, he’s bowing to his queen and presenting her together with her father’s crown, the following he’s choking her over Aegon’s Dream (the Song of Ice and Fire) and perilous firey loss of life at the former Kingsguard contributors, which makes it arduous to grasp if we’re meant to be rooting for him once more. In the primary part, Daemon used to be one thing of a wild card anti-hero who would in the end melt over the process of his 2d and 3rd marriages. He appeared emotionally distraught over the loss of life of his brother, however, lashes out at his spouse with adverse violence and as such, the target audience is left perplexed (in a great way) about whether or not we’re meant to root for this one thing just right, now and again unhealthy co-lead.
We additionally see that Lord Corlys has made restoration and despite some reservations about pledging loyalty to Rhaeynera because of the “death” of Lenor, he in the end pledges fealty to the Black Queen. This implies that Rhaeynera now controls the Stepstones and the tough Valeryon fleet, which can block industry to King’s Landing from Blackwater Bay. But all over again, Rhaeynera states she isn’t looking for struggle and when confronted with a proposition from Otto Hightower, she in reality considers it…after throwing his Hand of the King pin into the abyss and mentioning him as a traitor. Once extra she displays restraint within the grand scheme of items, eager about the great of the area as opposed to her place and gear. Daemon would reasonably burn his youngsters alive than have them be cupbearers to Aegon, however, Daemon isn’t eager about some random farmer within the Riverlands-Rhaenyra is, no less than in that second.
Rhaeynera opts to appear to her allies to gauge her place earlier than making any declarations of struggle or guarantees to Otto and sends her eldest youngsters, Jacaerys and Lucerys to the Targaryan oath keepers to carry true to their phrase. Jacaerys ventures north to the Vale and Winterfell and Lucerys ventures a brief adventure away to Storm’s End….and that is the place all of it is going to hell.
Even when Rhaeynera used to be pronouncing that Lucerys could be welcomed as a prince with open palms, I knew one thing used to be off. Rhaeynera used to be too assured in Burros Baratheon’s loyalty. That feeling most effective intensified with Lucerys landing at Storm’s End, which in step with its namesake, used to be being pelted using a hurricane. But Lucy and his dragon, Arrax, weren’t the one visitors on the stay; Aemond and his behemoth dragon had arrived first, securing the loyalty of the Baratheons to the Greens. Lord Baratheon roughly had some degree when chastising Lucerys. Aemond introduced with him a wedding proposal, which might unite the Baratheons with the Targaryens all over again, whilst Lucerys’ reminder of outdated oaths most effective made Burros Baratheon indignant, declaring that his area isn’t assaulted canine, looking ahead to their grasp to unharness them onto their enemies. Considering Lucerys is already betrothed, he couldn’t declare one in all Borro’s daughters and used to be promptly kicked out of the stay, however now not earlier than Aemond requests the younger messager reduce out his eye. Aemond unearths his false eye, a blue sapphire, which provides the required impact to make one each mystified and freaked out. Lucy refuses his uncle’s request.
While this warfare is instantly put down, the problem doesn’t finish there. As Lucy escapes Storm’s End on Arrax, we see the large Vhagar chase Lucerys and his dragon down. Almond doesn’t appear to wish to kill Lucerys, most effective torment and bullying his nephew for maiming him all the years in the past, however, Lucy’s dragon does now not take kindly to being hunted and assaults Vhagar without command and earlier than you’ll say Storm’s End, Vhagar has disobeyed Aemond’s instructions and kills Lucerys and his dragon. I like how the dragons are noticed as unpredictable beasts right here as an alternative to broken-in horses and they may be able to disobey instructions. Characters like Aemond, who can’t be a lot older than 18, are necessarily in partial command of a nuclear arsenal and don’t clutch the overall energy they may be able to sow.
Rayner can have been in search of a diplomatic resolution out of this struggle to give protection to the area. But now that her son has died at the hands of one of the most Green dragons, the one’s reservations are actually off the desk. She’s misplaced her son, her daughter, her father, and her crown. She’s misplaced such a lot in this kind of quick subject of time, however, the homicide of her son used to be the general straw. After ten episodes of setup, the struggle is after all on.
Season One Thoughts
So how used to be House of the Dragon general? That’s a fascinating query, I believe. After the primary episode concluded, my first response to the display used to be “it was okay”. It had some fascinating moments however I didn’t find myself emotionally invested in the characters straight away, which used to be a stark distinction (heh) to the premiere of Game of Thrones, the place I used to be straight away onboard with the likes of Jon, Tyrion, and others.
This sentiment in large part endured over the following 3 episodes. While the tale used to be fascinating, I wasn’t tremendously invested in the characters at this level. Who used to be I meant to root for? Rhaenyra wasn’t a sympathetic lead, opting to pout and insurrection, whilst Viserys didn’t do anything else to organize his inheritor for the obligation of the ruling. Rhaenyra used to be nonetheless serving as a cupbearer at the moment, as an alternative to having training in the ruling. There had been a large number of fascinating issues in thought, such because the stag hunt and Otto manipulating his daughter into the guts of the King, however, the Crab Feeder arc felt roughly tacked on, Daemon didn’t do too a lot and Rhaeynra wasn’t a very fascinating lead.
I additionally discussed it on a lot of occasions during my weekly critiques, however, the CGI on this display felt a lot more obtrusive and noticeable in comparison to Game of Thrones, in large part because of the loss of on-location images this time round. King’s Landing, as an example, is shot in large part in the studio with further images in England, while it used to be firstly filmed in Dubrovnik, which has a lot more dynamic herbal lightning than dreary England does. The color pallet additionally feels muted and flat now and then. When look at clips from Game of Thrones, that display pops and lines in a large number of scenes outdoors. House of the Dragon steadily felt boxed inside of or suffered from the uncanny valley because of the fairway display backgrounds or synthetic lightning and the dragons themselves felt a lot more synthetic than they did in Game of Thrones. That mentioned the finale’s results had noticeably progressed over the remainder of the season, suggesting they allotted way more funds for that episode than the remainder of the season when it got here time for VFX. The bridge at Dragonstone, for example, appeared ways higher than it did in episode 3.
But issues modified relating to the tale by the point of episode 5 came about and the display took a large swing upwards. From that episode onwards, House of the Dragon used to be firing at complete energy. In episode six, the actors taking part in Rhaeynra and Alicent had been elderly up and the following few episodes featured large skips in time, permitting their youngsters to age up from kids to youngsters. It used to be a bit jarring, and true and allowed for some important personality moments, mainly between Daemon and Laena to go undeveloped. But what we had been seeing used to be beautiful cast stuff, with outstanding writing and performing throughout. I discovered myself engrossed in the tale and realized to comprehend one of the foundations established in previous episodes. The display used to be offered a transparent case for us, the target audience, to root for the Blacks, however,, because of the principles in position, we understood that this struggle isn’t so simple as just right as opposed to evil. There is a slew of brokers with their very own agendas, loyalties, ideals,, and ambitions. With her son murdered whilst serving as a messenger, I’m keen to guess that Rhaenyra, who has long gone from fed up early life to peace-seeking Queen, will now unharness firey hell upon her enemies.
The display had outstanding performance, specifically from Paddy Considine as Viserys, advanced and layered characters, actually just right writing, and numerous intrigue and subtext. Despite a rocky basis and a few tough CGI during, House of the Dragons ended up handing over a pleasing and, ahem, the sturdy first season that excelled in characterization. I’m indisputably excited for its go back, on every occasion that can be. Homework for myself earlier than season two returns: learn Fire and Blood. Thanks for becoming a member of me on this journey over the last ten weeks!
