House of the Dragon – Second of His Name

Three episodes into House of the Dragon and I remain absolutely flummoxed as to why the series is unfolding the way that it is. It’s not that the show is churning through years of time episode to episode – I understand that it wants to jump into the actual war for the Iron Throne and that the series is set to replace its four youngest cast members (that would be Alicent, Rhaenyra, and the rarely seen Laena and Laenor Velaryon) in the coming episodes as the characters hit full adulthood. It’s that the series is doing so without taking the time and energy to spend any damn time exploring these characters – and, with this week’s quick end to the war in the Stepstones, refusing to spend time exploring what the series wanted us to see as key plot points as well. A new show needs to take the time to teach its audience how to watch the series – how it will explore themes, how characters will interact, how to deduce what is important and what can be discarded. What House of the Dragon has taught us thus far is that it doesn’t particularly care about the motivations of its characters, that it likes trotting out its CGI creatures in lieu of character development or spending time exploring plot points, and that it doesn’t matter why a character decides to do something – the series is simply going to jump forward next week anyway, so that choice, want, need, or desire will be long gone by then. That’s not a great look for a series that wants to be the second coming of a show that, for all its failings at the end, was so deeply focused on character driving its plot that when it forgot that in its final season, the series suffered extensively for it.

Last week, I lamented that we didn’t know why any of the key characters wanted the power of the Iron Throne. Well, this week we’re no closer to getting that understanding. We do get a brief look into Otto Hightower’s machinations in continuing to push Alicent to do his bidding – although we also see that she’s less his puppet than he believes. We get a long treatise in the importance of Rhaenyra’s potential romantic match – and plenty of people pushing Viserys to name little Aegon the heir – but we don’t really get much in the way of understanding what Rhaenyra wants out of all this. Yes, she thinks she deserves to remain the heir (and who can blame her?) and that she is scared her father is going to abandon her once more (again, who can blame her?), but I would have loved her scene with Ser Criston to include her talking about why she wants to become queen and how she sees that future unfolding. That was the perfect moment to give us a deep look into her character and we got . . . a boar attack where she took out her anger on the boar?

Similarly, the war in the Stepstones was such a missed opportunity to get more information on the Velaryon characters and Daemon. But instead, we see that Daemon is willing to put himself in danger only after hearing that his brother is going to send ships to save him from the quagmire he and his cousin have found themselves in? Sure, that speaks to the insane depths of Daemon’s pride – that he cannot stomach his brother’s aid and is willing to walk into a situation where he isn’t expected to survive to prevent his aid – but we don’t get any scenes that show us more about what life has been like these past two years in this war. After all the set-up this fight had, Daemon wins the war in the span of a 15 minute sequence? Well, that’s just plain disappointing. Hell, we didn’t even get an understanding of what the war was about – who was this seemingly powerful Crab Feeder and how did he manage to get an army behind him to attack the Step Stones? Is there greater threat to the Seven Kingdoms? Was this a one-off thing? Instead of an actual arc, this particular story felt like a wasted stepping stone to keep driving the story forward so that we can get to more in-fighting with the Targaryens. Yes, the whole point of the story is the Targaryen family history, but to understand their fights, we need to understand the world they are living in. And if the show isn’t interested in giving us the lay of the land beyond King’s Landing – who are the powerful houses they might need to align with, what’s going on outside of the Seven Kingdoms that might pose an issues down the line, who can we trust and who can’t we – then the series becomes so insular that it lives and dies on our understanding of these central Targaryens’ and their immediate allies.

And if that’s the story House of the Dragon wants to tell, it needs to take the time to ground the story in the complexities of these key characters – something it isn’t doing to its own detriment. We should know why each character wants to sit on the Iron Throne at this point – and just wanting to be king or queen isn’t a good enough reason. We should be starting to see their allies lining up behind them – which houses are supporting Daemon, who wants to honor their past commitment to Rhaenyra, and who does Otto have in his back pocket for Aegon. And we should be beginning to understand much more about the Velaryon family side of things than we do at this point – considering they’re going to be key power players in the war to come.

I loved Game of Thrones – until the final season and a half. I’ve read George R.R. Martin’s books. I really love this world he has created. And I want to love this show – I want it to give me the same excitement and enjoyment that I received from the early years of Thrones. I want to be excited to see the double and triple crosses as the characters play the game of thrones. I want to see them plot and scheme and attack with their dragons. I want to care about these characters and the journey they are embarking on. But in order for all that to happen, the show needs to show that it cares about these characters and their stories. Right now, it’s just going through the motions, moving pieces on the game board with no heart or character development. Until the writers show they want us to know about these characters and why they want what they want, House of the Dragon is going to keep failing to reach its potential.