Game of Thrones - House of the Dragon [HBO]

[Smoove_B]

Yes, it does feel like they're being a bit more subtle with things. Not only the short time jump but also

Spoiler:

the problematic wounds on the King, both of which are tied to sitting on the throne

You'd think maybe they'd look into fixing that somehow.

[hepcat]

Yes, it does feel like they're being a bit more subtle with things. Not only the short time jump but also

Spoiler:

the problematic wounds on the King, both of which are tied to sitting on the throne

You'd think maybe they'd look into fixing that somehow.

Blanket technology is a thousand years or more into their future.

[El Guapo]

Yes, it does feel like they're being a bit more subtle with things. Not only the short time jump but also

Spoiler:

the problematic wounds on the King, both of which are tied to sitting on the throne

You'd think maybe they'd look into fixing that somehow.

From what I've read from GoT experts / nerds, the point of the Iron Throne design is both to show off how badass Targaryans are / how they've vanquished so many enemies, but also because the King is not supposed to sit easy on the throne. Also there's a superstition around getting yourself cut on the throne, because it is perceived to be a sign of unworthiness on the part of the King (that the throne is basically rejecting them).

So like he *could* fix the throne to make it more comfortable, but given the context that would make him look weak / unworthy.

They also seem to be hinting that part of the issue is with his vague health conditions, as opposed to the throne itself.

[Sudy]

I liked episode two a lot even thought it was a bit predictable. I agree about it moving at a fast speed but I don't have trouble adjusting to it as long as there's sufficient exposition.

- It's fascinating to have a weak but likable king.
- Considine's acting is most impressive, but Ifans also nails his role in an understated fashion.
- Usually I like stubble but damn if I'm not itching to give Considine a shave. No doubt his appearance is meant to say something about his character. Or maybe it's just Considine's trademark? It's nearly impossible to find a pic of him clean shaven.
- Both episodes have been loaded with well-played subtext... but does it seem a bit surface level? A bit dumbed down? Usually I'm not great at detecting subtext on first viewing, but a lot of it seems obvious here.
- I still question the use of the GoT theme. I get that it ties the series together, and much like the Star Trek: The Motion Picture theme, it deserves to be heard again. But that theme likely wouldn't be held in such esteem were TNG to have been cancelled after its first weak season. HotD may already have been renewed, but it seems unlikely it will ever meet the standards set by the first several seasons of GoT. Why not use a variation on the theme instead?
- The opening credits are beautiful, but they'll never be as iconic as GoT's. I'm also shocked we're seeing a full title sequence in 2022. I much preferred the abbreviated one in the pilot.

Meat spoilers:

Spoiler:

- The foley artists seemed to be mugging for the camera with the sound effects of Rhaenyra pulling apart her meat in her scene dining with Viserys. It was very distracting.

[El Guapo]

Yeah I think I agree on the GoT theme. It was cool to hear it again, though I think I'd have preferred either more of variation on it or just go with something shorter. But not a big deal either way. I'll also say that I wasn't totally following what the sequence was showing exactly - obviously there was a flow of blood, and various sigils that I assume were house sigils, but I'm not sure if there was much else that I was supposed to take from it.

[Smoove_B]

From what I've read from GoT experts / nerds, the point of the Iron Throne design is both to show off how badass Targaryans are / how they've vanquished so many enemies, but also because the King is not supposed to sit easy on the throne. Also there's a superstition around getting yourself cut on the throne, because it is perceived to be a sign of unworthiness on the part of the King (that the throne is basically rejecting them).

I'm a bit rusty (ha!), but I don't remember this being a thing in the GoT series or the books. But again, it's been a long time so maybe I'm just forgetting. Maybe after whatever is going to happen here ultimately happens, they're going to buff the throne down a bit.

They also seem to be hinting that part of the issue is with his vague health conditions, as opposed to the throne itself.

Right...there's something else going on (I think). I'm enjoying the mystery, quite frankly, and that it's not been something being hammered over your head as a viewer. I'm quite curious to see where it's all going.

[Jaymann]

Yes, it does feel like they're being a bit more subtle with things. Not only the short time jump but also

Spoiler:

the problematic wounds on the King, both of which are tied to sitting on the throne

You'd think maybe they'd look into fixing that somehow.

Blanket technology is a thousand years or more into their future.

But they are solid on maggot technology.

[El Guapo]

From what I've read from GoT experts / nerds, the point of the Iron Throne design is both to show off how badass Targaryans are / how they've vanquished so many enemies, but also because the King is not supposed to sit easy on the throne. Also there's a superstition around getting yourself cut on the throne, because it is perceived to be a sign of unworthiness on the part of the King (that the throne is basically rejecting them).

I'm a bit rusty (ha!), but I don't remember this being a thing in the GoT series or the books. But again, it's been a long time so maybe I'm just forgetting. Maybe after whatever is going to happen here ultimately happens, they're going to buff the throne down a bit.

I've read about it in some of the House of the Dragon summaries. Not sure the origin - maybe it's a Targaryen-era thing covered in Fire & Blood.

[Chraolic]

I'll also say that I wasn't totally following what the sequence was showing exactly - obviously there was a flow of blood, and various sigils that I assume were house sigils, but I'm not sure if there was much else that I was supposed to take from it.

I think it might be a very literal take on the Targaryen bloodline.

[Smoove_B]

But they are solid on maggot technology.

Which is something we still do today!

[hepcat]

Well...YOU...not WE.

[Jeff V]

But they are solid on maggot technology.

Which is something we still do today!

I understand it can be quite effective, if disgusting.

[Isgrimnur]

Don't forget the leeches.

[Jeff V]

Don't forget the leeches.

Walleye love'em, how can I forget them? For some reason they creep out my wife and kids though.

[hepcat]

“Rhaenyra, I’ve decided to marry my cousin.”

“My god, father, you can’t marry your 2nd cousin!”

“She’s actually my 1st cousin.”

“Oh thank goodness, you had me scared there for a second.”

Spoiler:

Also, the scene with the king and the potential child bride was disturbing. I wasn’t aware this was a remake of the Jerry Lee Lewis story.

[Smoove_B]

Not his cousin

Spoiler:

It's his 12 year old niece

[hepcat]

Yeah, but 1st niece and 2nd niece aren’t a thing.

I will forever think of him as King Jerry Lee now.

[El Guapo]

Yeah, but 1st niece and 2nd niece aren’t a thing.

I will forever think of him as King Jerry Lee now.

I mean, he did turn her down,

Spoiler:

in favor of the much more mature 15 year old (best friend of his daughter).

[hepcat]

I loved the after credits scene where they rolled a piano into the small council chamber and he played it while standing up before setting it on fire.

[Jaymann]

I loved the after credits scene where they rolled a piano into the small council chamber and he played it while standing up before setting it on fire.

Directed by Roman Polanski?

[hepcat]

In all seriousness, this second episode was MUCH better than the first one. They kept Snidely Whiplash to a minimum and let us see less of the one note characters.

[Max Peck]

Not his cousin

Spoiler:

It's his 12 year old niece

Spoiler:

IIRC she's the daughter of his cousin, not of his sister. We're 2 episodes in and we already need a family tree to keep track of just how inbred the royals are.

[Smoove_B]

Yeah, I'm clearly confused and need a tree. All the white hair is confusing me.

Spoiler:

I thought Rhaenys was Viserys' older sister, passed over as the rightful heir because she was a woman. But I guess she (and her sister?!) were married to Viserys' father's brother - who was king, but without a male heir it passed to his nephew (Viserys)? So much incest I can't keep up.

Easier to track when people are tossing kids out of windows.

[hepcat]

Welp, my google search history now includes “how do you represent incest on a family tree”. At this point, thanks to OO, it’s not really enough to clear my cache. I need to burn all my electronic devices and go off grid.

[El Guapo]

I'll also say that I think the actress playing Rhaenyra is crushing it. Playing a young tough-minded girl can easily devolve into a thin caricature, and especially following Lady Mormont in GoT she could've come across as kind of doing an impression of her. But she's doing a good job conveying both determination and insecurity, and in making the character interesting and nuanced.

[El Guapo]

Welp, my google search history now includes “how do you represent incest on a family tree”. At this point, thanks to OO, it’s not really enough to clear my cache. I need to burn all my electronic devices and go off grid.

Man, and you JUST got the FBI to stop tracking you following the whole NAMBLA fiasco.

[Daehawk]

You think maybe ole Doc Brown could be one of those dragon people?



Its ok Hep..as of today my Google search includes "How do you sink a super carrier?" and "Is the new Ford class carrier really unsinkable?" I knew right after I hit enter I probably shouldn't have done that or phrased it that way. But how else ya gonna find out right?

[hepcat]

Welp, my google search history now includes “how do you represent incest on a family tree”. At this point, thanks to OO, it’s not really enough to clear my cache. I need to burn all my electronic devices and go off grid.

Man, and you JUST got the FBI to stop tracking you following the whole NAMBLA fiasco.

I still feel that trade between North America and Mexico should be open and free.

[ImLawBoy]

From what I've read from GoT experts / nerds, the point of the Iron Throne design is both to show off how badass Targaryans are / how they've vanquished so many enemies, but also because the King is not supposed to sit easy on the throne. Also there's a superstition around getting yourself cut on the throne, because it is perceived to be a sign of unworthiness on the part of the King (that the throne is basically rejecting them).

I'm a bit rusty (ha!), but I don't remember this being a thing in the GoT series or the books. But again, it's been a long time so maybe I'm just forgetting. Maybe after whatever is going to happen here ultimately happens, they're going to buff the throne down a bit.

I've read about it in some of the House of the Dragon summaries. Not sure the origin - maybe it's a Targaryen-era thing covered in Fire & Blood.

It was in the books and (I think) the original series. At one point Joffrey gets cut by the throne, which is supposed to be one of the signs that he is unworthy. (It was otherwise hard to tell, because he was such a subtle, nuanced character, the likes of which we are unlikely to see in this new series.)

[hepcat]

Joffrey was a sadist. That was all we needed to know about him. Was he so because he was the product of incest? Or because he played a lot of Grand Theft Auto? We will never know.

Daemon is a power hungry prince like <fill in space with any one of the 26,329 different power hungry royals we've seen in this type of show/story>

Now, if Daemon grows beyond power hungry prince/adds more to his resume beyond power hungry prince (unlike Joffrey who just kept on sadism-ing until he died and was summarily replaced with a brunette clone named Ramsay Bolton who also probably played way too much GTA), then I'll be more invested in his story.

In summary: neither were more than surface deep. But I'm hoping that changes for the Doctor...er....David Coverdale...er....Daemon.

Right now, Princess Feral Kid has my attention, as does her aunt (?), her angry husband, Otto and his machinations, and the crab loving pirates of Crabby Bay.

Nothing is standing out yet, but at least now the story is taking shape for me. I want the politics and the backstabbing, and we're getting there now.

[msteelers]

Daemon is a power hungry prince disgruntled second son like <fill in space with any one of the 26,329 different power hungry royals we've seen in this type of show/story the vast majority of the main characters in this series>

Fixed that for you.

[McNutt]

The crab thing confuses me. Is this a society that is built around torturing hapless sailors? They need to stop showing them as the mindless evil sadists and expand their story. It's okay to mention that they treat prisoners cruelly and then show it as necessary, but to build up a culture as just horrible with no insight into what's really going on is an odd choice.

Again, subtlety is not this show's strength.

This show has potential, so I'm sticking around. It's not as bad as I might make it out to be. I just wish they didn't feel the need to hold our hand and tell us who is bad and who is good.

[hepcat]

My guess is that we're getting a glimpse of the crab loving pirates of Crabby Bay as filtered through the eyes of their victims...as brief as those eyes remain in their sockets, that is. I'm betting next episode we'll start getting into the where and why they freed all those crustaceans from the local Red Lobster and gave them nice homes inside enemy sailors.

[ImLawBoy]

Why on earth would they spend time detailing Crabland? It's there to force a conflict among the major characters and to get the plot moving. Is this one of those things where you complain if they don't detail Crabtopia, but you'd also complain if they wasted time detailing Crabsylvania since it's not really important to the main point of the story?

Did the original GoT spend a lot of time explaining to us why the slavers weren't really so bad, and in fact the slaves might have been better off with their kindly masters than if they had been forced to fend for themselves? No, it was one-note. They were bad, and they served to move the story along (until GRRM got so bogged down in it that he paralyzed himself).

[Smoove_B]

I just wish they didn't feel the need to hold our hand and tell us who is bad and who is good.

I think it's the nature of the story style - classic high fantasy.

They haven't made it into a show yet (for reasons I don't understand) but if you want a world and characters of gray, go read the First Law Trilogy. Its the series that had me get back into reading fantasy again. I've read through the entire series (~6 books) about 3 times because it's so good.

[ImLawBoy]

I just wish they didn't feel the need to hold our hand and tell us who is bad and who is good.

I think it's the nature of the story style - classic high fantasy.

They haven't made it into a show yet (for reasons I don't understand) but if you want a world and characters of gray, go read the First Law Trilogy. Its the series that had me get back into reading fantasy again. I've read through the entire series (~6 books) about 3 times because it's so good.

But GoT has characters who were gray. Jaime may have never fully redeemed himself, but he certainly wasn't the caricature of evil throughout the series that he was in the first episode. Robert Baratheon had some good intentions, but he was a lousy king who succumbed to his vices. Bronn and Tyrion were hardly noble throughout and did what needed to be done. Danaerys . . . well, c'mon. There was even a character named Grey Worm!

I know that it's been decided that the characters in HotD will never evolve or develop in any way, but if this were a series written by people with a track record of having complex characters who evolve over the course of a series, you could certainly see Rhaenyra take a dark turn. You could see Viserys so flummoxed by his incompetence (and possibly mind controlling maggots?) that he makes regrettable decisions. You could see Corlys turn on his king and attempt to ally himself with Daemon. You could see Daemon struggling with loyalty to his brother and his ambition.

[hepcat]

Is this one of those things where you complain if they don't detail Crabtopia, but you'd also complain if they wasted time detailing Crabsylvania since it's not really important to the main point of the story?

Hopefully you’re not talking about me too. I didn’t call for a deep dive into the world of Crabby Bay. But I would like some reason for their crustacean based cruelty. That doesn’t mean I need more than “because they’re pirates and that’s a scare tactic”. I understand that sometimes you just need a galvanizing force to move the story along.

However, if they DO become more than just a story driving tool, I would hope they’d flesh them out.

I know that it's been decided that the characters in HotD will never evolve or develop in any way,

I think you’re a bit overly dramatic. I’ve repeatedly said I hope they grow the character beyond mustache twirling robber baron. I just felt they tried way too hard to make us hate him in episode one. I would have preferred a more nuanced approach.

[El Guapo]

The crab thing confuses me. Is this a society that is built around torturing hapless sailors? They need to stop showing them as the mindless evil sadists and expand their story. It's okay to mention that they treat prisoners cruelly and then show it as necessary, but to build up a culture as just horrible with no insight into what's really going on is an odd choice.

Again, subtlety is not this show's strength.

This show has potential, so I'm sticking around. It's not as bad as I might make it out to be. I just wish they didn't feel the need to hold our hand and tell us who is bad and who is good.

There's no such thing as crabland. They're talking about the Crabfeeder, who is a specific sailor / quasi-pirate aligned with the free cities. His deal is that he feeds the sailors / soldiers that die in battle to him and his crew to crabs (which is why the defeated sailors at the start of ep. 2 were covered in crabs). Hence, you know...crabfeeder. It's a branding thing for that guy, but there's not some island or nation devoted to crab worship.

[hepcat]

, but there's not some island or nation devoted to crab worship.

Well thanks a lot, captain buzzkill.

I had visions of a deconstruction of SpongeBob SquarePants like The Boys does for The Avengers.

[Smoove_B]

But GoT has characters who were gray. Jaime may have never fully redeemed himself, but he certainly wasn't the caricature of evil throughout the series that he was in the first episode. Robert Baratheon had some good intentions, but he was a lousy king who succumbed to his vices. Bronn and Tyrion were hardly noble throughout and did what needed to be done. Danaerys . . . well, c'mon. There was even a character named Grey Worm!

I know that it's been decided that the characters in HotD will never evolve or develop in any way, but if this were a series written by people with a track record of having complex characters who evolve over the course of a series, you could certainly see Rhaenyra take a dark turn. You could see Viserys so flummoxed by his incompetence (and possibly mind controlling maggots?) that he makes regrettable decisions. You could see Corlys turn on his king and attempt to ally himself with Daemon. You could see Daemon struggling with loyalty to his brother and his ambition.

That's all fair. To be clear, I don't have any issues with anything from the GoT series or what's been presented so far in HOT D. I think they've made it clear that there both internal and external pressures impacting what I am perceiving to be the main story (I haven't read the book(s) so I don't know anything other than this show).

I do think there are some over the top characters in the GoT universe, but I don't have any issues with any of it. For The First Law series, the author actively subverts expectations and intentionally keeps you guessing about motivations and alliances, right until the very end of the original trilogy. It's fantastic.