Monday, August 29, 2022

My Review of House Of The Dragon's 1x02: "The Rogue Prince"

 


Written by Ryan Condal
Directed by Greg Yaitanes

Daemon (to Corlys, re Viserys): "I will speak of my brother as I wish. You will not."

Into the second episode now and things are certainly moving at quite a pace. Time often does in this world bit we had something of a jump here where Viserys has gone from grieving over the loss of Aemma to ow being strong armed by his council into getting a new wife. The idea of Rhaenyra being a future queen really has threatened their delicate sensibilities, something which Rhaenys took immense satisfaction in pointing out.

Especially when it comes to both Otto Hightower and Corlys Velaryon aka the Sea Snake. Both men have had the same idea of using their daughters to get closer to the Iron Throne. Needless to say, at one of them actually succeeded with the idea while the other took their defeat rather poorly and threw their lot with Daemon by the end of this episode. It's not hard to guess who is it?

I am really glad that Viserys had the decency to turn down Lady Laena (Nova Foueillis-Mose) because watching both Corlys and Rhaenys trying to marry off their child to a man nearly four times her age was unsettling. Viserys at least had the sense to be against the idea and not go through with, even though it put him on shaky ground with the easily slighted Corlys.

Then there was Otto Hightower whose plans to get Alicent married to Viserys managed to pay off. Its still massively inappropriate but there was the sense in the episode that Alicent and Viserys genuinely cared for one another. However, I think we can all assume that Alicent's friendship with Rhaenyra has definitely gone down the drain along with the latter's chances of getting the Iron Throne.

Speaking of Rhaenyra, she has better instincts for the kingdom than her father does, which was why I think both Otto and Corlys and even Rhaenys were determined to undermine. You know who didn't though? Yup, the guy mad at being replaced by his niece, who even went as far as to steal a dragon egg and pretend that he took Mysaria for a wife and she was pregnant. 

Daemon had the perfect chance to kill Rhaenyra on the spot and he chose not to. He literally had the bigger dragon and army and yet, he listened to Rhaenyra and handed the egg back to her. Whatever issues he might have with Viserys, he undeniably respects both him and Rhaenyra. He wouldn't even let Corlys talk poorly of his brother in front of him.

Daemon and Corlys's  team up to one side, another lingering threat of this episode was the introduction of the Crab Feeder aka Prince Admiral Craghas Drahar causing trouble for Viserys and Corlys at the Stepstones. It's not quite White Walkers stuff but it's an interesting set of problems for the Kingdom outside of the more personal ones presented at the moment.

- The theme tune literally is Game Of Thrones all over again with the title sequence being somewhat similar, though with plenty of blood spilling. It looks great.
- Congrats on the show getting an early second season renewal. The ratings alone for the first episode were a record for HBO.
- Rhaenyra took Ser Criston Cooe as her Knight for the White Cloak Guards. She was mentioned to be fifteen while Laena was mentioned to be twelve. I assume Alicent is similar in age to Rhaenyra.
- Daemon's dragon is called Caraxes while Rhaenyra's is Syrax. Both have great entry scenes in this episode. Daemon has currently taken over Dragonstone. Laena also seemed interested in missing dragon, Vhagar.
- Viserys does seem to be rotting away as this episode had his finger in maggots in order to stop it from rotting completely.
- Chronology: Six months since the events of the first episode.

The Rogue Prince started off as a surprisingly slow episode and shorter than the opening one but in spite of pacing, things actually moved along faster than expected. I anticipated there would be a threat to Rhaenyra's claim to the Iron Throne and this episode presented several while Daemon's various shades make him a rather compelling character to watch.

Rating: 8 out of 10

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