House of the Dragon – A Son for a Son

By: Kelly Kearney

After a two-year hiatus, the dragons are back and Westeros is on the brink of a bloody civil war as the green and black councils take up arms for King Aegon and Queen Rhaenyra after the death of Prince Jacerys at the hands of his cousin, Aemond Targaryen. It’s vengeance and warring families in Season 2 of the “Game of Thrones” prequel, and in the first hour, fans finally get the blood and cheese moment they’ve been waiting for. It might have failed to live up to the book’s grotesque recount but it equally shocked and horrified the viewers watching it play out on their screens. It’s a son for a son in the “House of the Dragon” premiere.

The Night’s Watch

Starting the season with new opening credits that are certain to change with each episode, the season two premiere hits the ground running as we head to Winterfell and meet the Starks. Cregon Stark (Tom Taylor)– the Lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North, gives new watch member Prince Jacaerys Valeryon (Harry Colette) a tour of the wall. It is both an honor and a curse to be a member of the Night’s Watchman, and the Prince is feeling the weight of that role. Full of Stark history, Cregon tells the young Jace that he is loyal to his mother, Rhaenyra (Emma D’Arcy), but cannot risk sending his soldiers south to fight for her, “winter is coming.” Standing in the same spot where his grandparents, King Viserys (Paddy Considine) and his Queen, once stood when they visited with their dragons, Jace looks out across the baron and frigid landscape asking what’s out there that requires all of Stark’s soldiers, “death?” he wonders. Cregon never answers, and that is as good a hint as any that something more dangerous than the wildlings exists beyond the wall. Considering both of the royal’s dragons refused to cross the wall, it sounds like the White Walkers were even a threat back then—not that the Night Watchman has seen them in their snow-white flesh. Jace’s introduction to The Wall is cut short when he gets a messenger raven informing him of his brother Lucerys’(Elliot Grihault) death at the driving hands of Aemond (Ewan Mitchell) and the gnashing teeth of his dragon, Vhagar.

Cregon isn’t the only new character we are introduced to in the opening minutes; we also meet Alyn of Hull (Abubakar Salim), a blacksmith who gifts Lord Corlys Velaryon (Steve Toussaint) with a sword he commissioned by Lucerys—the named heir of Driftmark and now-dead Prince. Corlys isn’t well after the Master of Ships took a beating when his royal fleet got into battle offscreen. The sea snake owes Alyn a thank you for pulling him out of the sea and saving his life; he tells the man he is now indebted to him. Alyn doesn’t appear honored to hear this, and considering how the royals in charge behave, who could blame him?

The Schemers of King’s Landing

Speaking of the royals, newly crowned King Aegon (Tom Glynn-Carney) is having issues with his hand, the always-scheming Otto Hightower (Rhys Ifans). When King Aegon, who is testing out the title of “Magnanimous,” holds court to grant the wishes of his kingdom’s “little people,” he strives to be the benevolent leader his father was and provide for those in need. Otto steps in every time to guide him away from his kindness, counseling him to be more prudent with his generosity, or else everyone in the kingdom will be at his court with their empty-handed requests. It is clear the King does not have a taste for ruling and would rather spend time with his oldest son, Jaehaerys (Jude Rock), who is a precocious kid and a bit of a nuisance at council meetings. The tension is building between Aegon and Hightower—a man who has served three kings and might be wearing out his Iron Throned welcome. These bad vibes between the two come into play later, when Larys Strong (Matthew Needham) kills off several members of the Keep’s untrustworthy staff and now wants King Aemond to dispatch Hightower and make him the new Hand. Larys should not be trusted, but Aegon has no idea the lengths this man will go to to weasel his way into the royals’ lives. Queen Alicent has already gotten a taste of the man’s threats, and Aegon would be wise to avoid him.

Over at the Red Keep, Alicent’s (Olivia Cooke) relationship with Ser Criston Cole (Fabien Frankel) is as hot as ever. In between meetings with the council and preparing for this Green vs.  Black Civil War, the two take intermittent hook-up breaks. In the two-year hiatus, it seems Alicent has grown fond of Ser Criston, and the relationship between the two remains one of the biggest secrets she keeps. Sleeping with the Queen goes against Cole’s oath as the King’s Guard, as celibacy is expected and sex with a queen is a no-no. Nobody knows what’s going on between the two, but at the end of the episode, at least one of Alicent’s children, the new Queen Helaena (Phia Saban), finds out after one of the most brutal moments of the episode, which we will get to in a moment.

Dragonstone and a Mother’s Grief

At Dragonstone, Daemon (Matt Smith) feels helpless after the news of Lucery’s death. His wife, Queen Rhaenyra, rode off on her winged beast, so he requires the former Queen-Who-Never-Was, Rhaenys (Eve Best), to help him find his wife as well as rain down fiery hell on the Greens. If the queen is missing, Rhaenys assumes she is scouring the coastline looking for proof her child is gone. Without his body, she can’t wrap her head around the idea that Lucery is dead, and this is something Rhaenys understands. When her child was killed, she too could not move on until she held the body close to her chest. Daemon gets serious and attempts to blame her for not extinguishing Aegon’s bloodline when she and her dragon interrupted his coronation in season 1. If she wasn’t saying no before, she does after that, and when he tries to pull rank and order her to join him, her mood sours. She is too exhausted from her long flights to organize a naval blockade to protect Dragonstone and Driftmark. So when he won’t drop it, she reminds Daemon of his rank. She only takes orders from the queen, and he doesn’t look like a queen. This emasculates Daemon, a man who, since the start of this series, has wanted nothing but the respect that comes with occupying the Iron Throne—the seat he thinks is rightfully his.

When we eventually find Queen Rhaenyrs by Shipbreakers Bay, she has an aerial view of a group of men dragging something large out of the ocean. She swoops down, and her dragon scatters the locals in fear. When she sees what is in the net, there are no words that can describe the pain written on her face. In fact, the queen barely speaks at all in this episode; all of her emotions play out in the physical torment on her face. The net contains the remains of her child and his dragon. On the beach, she crumbles and cries out in pain alongside Cerax, who mourns the loss of her child as well. Now that she’s seen Luke and knows that he’s gone, she flies back to Dragonstone with only one thing on her mind. She wants to amend the Targaryen. Revenge is her only source of happiness now.

Blood and Cheese

In a moment that all book fans have been waiting for, the first episode did not hold back any punches. Queen Rhaenyrs wants a son for a son—Aemond’s blood will flow for what he did to Lucerys, and Daemon wants nothing but to make his wife happy. After summoning his ex-lover, (Mysaria Sonoya Mizuno), he uses her network of spies to find two useful idiots to do his deadly dirty work. Donning a hooded disguise, he heads to King’s Landing to bribe a disgraced Kingsguard, Blood (Sam C. Wilson), and the Red Keep’s rat catcher, Cheese (Mark Stobbert), to sneak inside the royal’s living quarters and kill Aemond Targaryen. Earlier in the episode, Queen Heleana had been uttering something to her brother-husband, Aegon, about her fears of rats, and now we know why. Blood and Cheese make their way through the castle, eventually finding the queen’s bedroom, where they hold her at knifepoint and order her to tell them which of her children is the male heir. Since both of her children are identical twins—especially while sleeping in their beds and under the covers—the paid assassins have no clue which child to kill. Of course, none of these children are at fault for Lucery’s death, and not the blood that Queen Rhaenarys wants to be spilled, but Damon didn’t hire the bright vagabonds in the streets, so mistakes—kind of collapsing sort of mistakes—were made. Rather than having the men kill both of her children, Queen Heleana points out Prince Jaehaerys and then runs through the castle, clutching her other child to her chest. The killing doesn’t play out exactly like it does in the book, but it’s as gruesome as anything on the page. If you had to turn the sound down during this scene, You Are Not Alone, the noises coming out of these men decapitating this child are enough to give you nightmares. Silently, in a panic, Heleana runs into her mother’s chambers, where she sees her having sex with Ser Criston Cole. Not only is he breaking his celibacy oath, but he also falls short of protecting the heir to the throne while in Alicent’s bed.

Rhaenyra never got her vengeance on Aemond, but the death of the young Prince Jaehaerys is enough for Team Green to light a match under the upcoming and historical War of the Dragons. It’s grieving mother against grieving grandmother, family against family, dragon against the dragon, friend against friend, and green against black, with the other side being able to hold the distinction between good and evil. Westeros will know the fire of vengeance and a mother’s broken heart. Season 2 is a world-burner, and now that the match has been lit, the war is just getting started.