House of the Dragon (Game of Thrones) Thread

[gunnar hendershow]

Spoiler

I didn't find the Blood and Cheese part too strange. I think a big point that's been established is that there is quietly no control in place at the Red Keep. The staff got purged, the king is way out of his depth, Alicent is off having her endless sexcapade since she is being blocked from doing anything else, and the other elites are just internally fixated on getting everything lined up far away up for the inevitable war. They even make a point to establish how confident they are King's Landing and the Red Keep are guarded and everyone seems to just take that for granted - like they're all the mayor from Jaws. It's poignant visually to just have Blood and Cheese scurry right under everyone's nose (like rats) without a moment's thought by anyone. A long run of the abdication of responsibility you get when everyone is all disoriented & concerned on something else.

The killing itself however was not a really powerful scene and I think they're super sensitive to certain depictions and the public response to them. It's also really hard to get Haleana's character to work for me, a lot of coding is tough to pull off in the TV medium. And nobody can just outright diagnose her since this world doesn't "know" about autism. Just very messy. Books will always have a significant advantage on that point.

 

[Mick]

4 hours ago, Schlitzbrille said:

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Conisdering the child being threatened was six and there's documented cases against eight year olds after the First Battle of Tumbleton then yeah it's a positive change

 

but seriously what the actual fuck grrm

 

 

 

Spoiler

I mean, Joffrey ordered the death of all of Robert's Bastards, including a baby, so.....

 

[Szumi]

Spoiler

It was just so bizarre to me how little sense it made that they just stumble their way through the Red Keep and into the Queen's chambers. Just so dumb. But even besides that, there's just zero tension for me almost the whole time. Go back and forth between them going through the castle and Haelena putting the kids to bed. Or Aemond in his chambers to give the belief he's going to get assassinated.

I think the other big issue is that we've pretty much been given zero reason to care at all about Haelena or her kids. She's spoken maybe 6 lines the whole show. She has zero character development. Almost everything you know about her is from people who read the books and tell you about her being a precog. The show hasn't done anything to emphasize it, to the point I've seen many fans online confused about it and/or missed the 3 times now she's essentially predicted the future. 

It's just horrendously bad execution for me.

 

[Mick]

Spoiler

She wasn't even described like that in the books. And they do mention the Targaryens that aren't exactly playing with full decks. 

 

[Mx. Canadian Destroyer]

17 hours ago, Mick said:

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I was a bit disappointed with how it went. I don't have a problem with Daemon sending them to kill Aemond, I actually like that as a plot point, since The World of Ice And Fire is basically recapping the events from the perspective of an Archmaester. So, Daemon doesn't come off nearly as evil as he did where it was basically "Kill this kid". 

In terms of 'evilness', I did think it worked better the way it was written in the book; in that, it was them making Helaena choose which to die between Jaehaerys and Maelor (who was two). Helaena picked Maelor, since she figured, as best as she could, given the circumstances, that the was too young to understand what was going on. Instead, they kill Jaehaerys. 

 

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Helaena basically loses all interest in everything, even refusing to be around Maelor since she knows she picked him to die. 

 

 

Spoiler

I thought the way they filmed everything was not great but in terms of the implications of the event, I feel like they did a good enough job. Halaena will still feel incredibly guilty about choosing her son to die. I'm actually totally fine with the way this will play out from the perspective of Halaena/Alicent/Rhaenyra/Daemon but I just thought the way they got there could have been more suspensful/thrilling/etc.

 

[gunnar hendershow]

3 hours ago, Mx. Canadian Destroyer said:

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I thought the way they filmed everything was not great but in terms of the implications of the event, I feel like they did a good enough job. Halaena will still feel incredibly guilty about choosing her son to die. I'm actually totally fine with the way this will play out from the perspective of Halaena/Alicent/Rhaenyra/Daemon but I just thought the way they got there could have been more suspensful/thrilling/etc.

 

Spoiler

I watched the after credits where they go inside the episode and they creatively seemed very proud they only focused on Blood and Cheese. It seems like they really didn't want to leave the audience in suspense about who they'd kill and instead operated under the premise that they were making a scene for people unfamiliar with the source material yet who also heard about the mythical unnamed assassins called "Blood and Cheese". We the audience are told they're going to assassinate Aemond, we briefly see that he's in conversation with Ser Otto and then nothing else.

So their entire attempt wasn't to build any suspense about who would die but instead try and leave you in suspense about the assassins themselves; namely, will they even pull this off. I mentioned I had no trouble with the logic of them just waltzing in an earlier post. But from an execution standpoint they constructed a sequence involving characters people unfamiliar with the source material have zero emotional investment with and for whom people familiar with the source material already know how the events play out. And they definitely seemed to take "our fans know Blood and Cheese!" on one hand and then on the other "our fans have no idea how this sequence plays out!" largely based on how they talked at the end of the episode.

Anyway, most of the people who've reviewed the season seem to all stress that this is a slow season until it suddenly isn't. And I guess that's the challenge of adapting something that is meant to be a sprawling, multi-years history ain't it.

 

[FLiam]

Spoiler

The best thing about the entire episode was Rhaenyra’s one spoken line.

 

[Tigerstyle]

What I took away from the episode and the reason why they rushed the ending and just kind of put it in is they want you to know the greens are bad and the blacks are good

[Bobfoc]

3 minutes ago, Tigerstyle said:

What I took away from the episode and the reason why they rushed the ending and just kind of put it in is they want you to know the greens are bad and the blacks are good

The team whose leading figures have committed such crimes as spousal murder, killing an innocent bystander to fake a death and obliterating thousands of civilians at a coronation is good?

[Schlitzbrille]

Spoiler

Team Shepherd

 

[Mick]

30 minutes ago, Bobfoc said:

spousal murder,

She died in an accident  

30 minutes ago, Bobfoc said:

killing an innocent bystander

He lived in King's Landing. He's not innocent  

30 minutes ago, Bobfoc said:

fake a death

How is that one bad?

31 minutes ago, Bobfoc said:

obliterating thousands of civilians at a coronation

TBF it's a big city and living space is at a premium  . 

[Schlitzbrille]

Breakspear 🥵😭

[Mick]

4 minutes ago, Schlitzbrille said:

Breakspear 🥵😭

 

[Bobfoc]

I don't know who any of those actors are, but I've always loved that GRRM named a character Aerion Targaryen.

[Schlitzbrille]

22 minutes ago, Bobfoc said:

I don't know who any of those actors are, but I've always loved that GRRM named a character Aerion Targaryen.

Remember: MUPPET TULLY GANG

[FLiam]

On 18/06/2024 at 17:05, Schlitzbrille said:

Breakspear 🥵😭

Is this another spinoff show? 

I only know Sam Spruell as he was terrific in Fargo.

[Schlitzbrille]

28 minutes ago, FLiam said:

Is this another spinoff show? 

I only know Sam Spruell as he was terrific in Fargo.

Yep, adaptation of Dunk & Egg

[Mick]

10 minutes ago, FLiam said:

Is this another spinoff show? 

I only know Sam Spruell as he was terrific in Fargo.

Yeah; A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms is a series of three novellas following around hedge knight named Ser Duncan the Tall, as well as his squire....

 

Spoiler

Prince Aegon Targaryen, known as 'Egg'. THE Egg that Maester Aemon mentioned, later King Aegon V "The Unlikely", grandfather of Aerys II and Great-Grandfather of: Robert, Renly, Stannis, Rhaegar, Viserys and Daenarys. 

 

[Bobfoc]

It's also another series of books GRRM hasn't finished yet.

[Schlitzbrille]

Spoiler

TESSARION TIME BOIS, DAERON'S COMING