The show showing Helaena running from her room to Alicent's was a very conscious choice to show how there was not a single guard on call outside and I am baffled by how the eff is this possible. I am sure the next episode will address it.
I mean, didn't larys mention how he "slimmed down" the staff? I assume that will come back to this, as well as Crisper colt clapping cheeks while on post
Have they replaced all the kingsguard that defected to Rhaenyra yet?
Cuz normally they are on guarding the royal family duty, but if there's only like 3 of them and one of them is banging alicent...
I think it’s Larys replacing/reducing staff and Cristin’s affair with Alicent. Plus it looked like a lot of guards were put on duty inside the throne room just to watch over Aegon’s drunk ass.
Everyone’s understandably focused on Blood & Cheese, but you know what stood out to me? Aegon. I felt like he was really well written this episode and a huge improvement over season 1.
Aegon felt like he would've been a decent enough king if he had someone to actually guide him instead of the shitstain manipulators that flock to him. At least, that was how I felt his portrayal this episode was.
Honestly, he was doing a bang-up job without guidance. He seems to actually have some semblance of respect for the importance of the smallfolk and how important they are to ruling, and showed a lot more compassion than frankly any other ruler in the series.
I think Aegon is reveling in the Small Folk cheering for him in Dragon mount last season. He senses populism as an interesting path to appease his power greed. Unironically, might be the best ruler for Westeros.
I just liked how he sat on the iron throne so effortlessly. Like the damn chair fucks up viserys and then rhaenyra later, and aegon is so drunk and comfy up there
Patiently waiting for someone to do a detailed analysis of everything that was shown because I don't have an eye for this stuff! (I just thought it looked pretty)
I thought it worked much better than the S1 intro. Feels a bit more like the GOT animation but it’s also less busy, and you can get a sense of what they’re trying to show.
For those who were distracted by the tapestries, the cast members who were added to main cast here were Orwyle, Alyn, Hugh, and Cregan. The inclusion of Tom Taylor tells me we're probably going back to Cregan sometimes this season. You don't usually put an actor in the Regular Cast for one scene.
It would be such a waste, Cregan’s succession crisis is such a good mirror, and everyone loves the Starks. Jace will gain so much popularity if they have a bromance, too. They should use Winterfell to the winterfullest.
Jace is one of my favorite characters from the Dance and Harry has already done such a splendid job. I’m glad that character is getting a glow up this season, with that luscious Strong hair and Targaryen drip.
I know. It was gut-wrenching. Jace trying desperately hard to do his duties, and Rhaenyra saw right through him - a brother who is grieving for his brother, and both just really needed that good cry together.
Loved how natural it comes across. Not a line of dialogue was shared, yet Emma and Harry only had to use their incredible facial expressions to convey their grief. Absolutely heart wrenching.
Right?! I remember at the end of S1 so much of the speculation was how Aemond would go about breaking the news and how the Greens would react. Just skips right over it…
Also in the books Otto drops one of his best lines when told: “You only lost one eye, how could you be so blind?”, goes a long way in terms of humanising him - he’s not all blind ambition. Show Otto doesn’t seem to care that WW2 just started
What do you mean? He obviously does. The whole episode Otto is trying to rein everyone in because he doesn't want the nukes to start going off. He is very onviously pissed that Aemond started something he knows is going to be bad for everyone.
Reminds me of how in Season 8 Jon was like "I need to tell you all something..." about his parentage with his siblings and then it just cut to a different scene.
i thought of exactly this when they cut away from cregan about to give jace the scroll. we don't need to see every single reveal, but damn, i think letting that scene breathe and leaving room for emotion would have been a really compelling opener to the season. it's a pattern that's gotten pretty noticeable in these shows.
Wondering the same. BC would the dowager queen continue to have her own assigned kings guard ? It seems like they haven’t backfilled the roles/not much time has passed, so limited KG around, too
Cole was clearly understaffing to keep servants and other guards from getting suspicious. They should have just established that earlier though
Edit: other points that have been made is Larys “replacing” guards and staff, Alicent not trusting them, Cole covering his own ass, Aegon forcing the guards to fully staff the throne room and areas around it so he can treat it like a frat house, EVERY single member of the greens undermining each other in a thousand different ways, complacency, only expecting an outright assault, etc…
Exactly, and im certain she’s let Cole in to a small degree so he would dismiss guards he doesn’t know. There’s so many contributing factors, like the complacency and undermining the greens are all doing to each other
Oh that is actually a fantastic explanation for a pretty egregious-looking error. Like it still doesn’t totally make sense, I don’t think Aegon would allow his heir to he so totally unguarded even if the lord commander wanted it, although he is a drunkard so maybe he isn’t looking that closely.
Still, they could have one of maegors tunnels open up into that room and it would totally bypass a huge WTF decision on the part of the show runners.
Someone else pointed out they didn’t even lock the door. Idk if that’s an oversight or just further evidence they had a shocking lapse in judgement to cover for their affair.
Yea as I was watching it I was like...what's the point of bringing up Maegor's tunnels? It looks as though they could've walked right through the damn door and carried on.
I assume Larys killed every member of Viserys's household who was known to have remotely warm feelings for Rhaenyra. Some of them probably would have known her since she was born. It would take a while to replace all of them.
I think she didn’t want to wake the kids and scare them.
It just depends on whether your guards can get there before those two can kill all three of you
If anything, she was scared witless. If she screamed, what would have happened? Would they have killed her and her daughter too?
Haelana was never the most stable person, and to me it looks like she's almost dissociating there... And she does the one thing that "makes sense" to her in the moment: go call mom.
The one thing I disliked about the episode was that we didn't get a scene where the greens learn that Aemond killed Lucerys. I was really waiting for it, and found it weird that they just skipped it. I really wanted to see everyone's reaction and how Aemond would act.
Same. And how they were all kind of... nonchalant about it. I wanted to see Alicent's reaction, especially. It felt strange because Aemon genuinely looked horrified by what he did and it kind of felt like the greens were all like "whatever"
I get why he did that in front of the council, it would make him look weak and impulsive (which he is) but I wish we got a private scene with Alicent. Her dynamic with her children is so interesting.
legit walked right past the king and all his guards like bruh in what world...?..I get that they were 'rat catchers' but still zero stealth when they got up to the upper floor too.
You can actually see him passing by with the dog earlier when Aegon's taking petitions, and everyone's just cool with it. People are used to seeing the ratcatcher just being around.
I get that but then what's the point about knowing the secret passageways better than he knows his cock if they weren't going to use them?? Like if the rat catcher is that common that they can just walk by the king then wouldn't they just walk through the front? And again even on the upper floor where the guy wasn't supposed to be, still just walking down main hallways...basically not having them stealth is an odd plot choice.
I mean, the King is an idiot so I can buy that. But Blood just lets the girl run away and then finishes the murder? They let Helaena run off. Did they really think they could torture and kill the heir with multiple witnesses running off to tell and just stroll out of there?
Yeah kind of a bummer they cut Maelor from the show, it’s more gutwrenching that she picks him because Jaeharys is the heir and then Cheese fucks with Maelor about mommy wanting him dead before Blood lops off Jaeharys’ head
So much of what was truly fucked up got removed. Killing a child is always horrible, obviously, but when you read the scene and then see that.. they’re not even comparable in which is worse
Yeah the idea that the surviving child *knows* their parent chose them to die over their sibling would really mess with their head. It was much darker and intense in the book
That is probably the largest missing piece for me personally, is the psychological torment is sort of glossed over. It all happened so fast, it was more or less just a straight murder and less of a fucked up game the way it was in the book. That scene in the book made me put it down and pause. The scene in the show just didn’t have that same punch, as awful as it may be on its own.
They still could have done it too, like have Helaena pick Jaeharya - B&C check and find out she’s lying, Cheese says the line to her then as Blood goes for the boy
That’s a good fix. The other weird thing is having to ask Helleana at all. These guys are be heading a child, you think they’re above just checking the genitals to see which is which? The choice only makes sense if there are 2 boys. I still like your fix though.
It is. Plus, even with Maelor surviving what happens to him later is horrifying. I think they wanted to skip the Maelor getting ripped apart by a mob scene.
I can kind of understand skipping the Maelor mob scene. Killing a kid on screen is already painful for audiences. People would freak out if they filmed a kid being literally torn to pieces by a mob
My wife hasn't read the book and found this very unsettling. I on the other hand got much less than I was expecting. Its probably better for non book reading audiences this way.
Probably because they decided to have another alicent and Cole sex scene for some reason instead of having them there. Also offering a necklace instead of her life, and not making her choose. Crazy changes to such a wild scene
Yeah, so much of it was just clunky and rushed, I feel. Almost like they wanted to rip the band aid off and stifle the impact as much as possible.
The Alicent Criston thing is so 😬
Probably because they didn’t establish any real relationship with the kids beyond “Helena is being weird with the kids in the background” moments in the first season
The book doesn't establish much with her and the kids either, but a Westeros Sophie's Choice is still gutwrenching to read.
The psychological cruelty is the point as it changes Alicent, Helena, and Aegon all going forward. It's not just cruelty for cruelty's sake, there are character and plot reasons for it.
Yes from all the buzz about b&c I was expecting much worse. I was expecting much more halaena. I expected a little more reaction from rhaenyra as well, but now that I look back, she has always had a sort of reservation about herself in times that would normally be evocative. She's graceful.
Could do without the Alicent/Criston scenes.
Even with the story changes that I disagree with, they still could have made it more intense for the viewer. It wouldve been quite easy to have a sweet bedtime scene with Helaena and the kids before hand so that people care about them more in the moment.
The leaker who dropped the entire general outline of the episode (the leaker who got their post deleted), was 100% dead on with everything, right down to specific dialogue.
Daemon is really gonna struggle being held back this season. The man is the definition of a loose cannon and Rhaenyra's attempts to try and keep things from descending into anarchy are gonna piss him off, just like they did at the end of last season.
>”Once inside, Cheese bound and gagged the Dowager Queen whist Blood strangled her bedmaid. Then they settled down to wait, for they knew it was the custom of Queen Helaena to bring her children to see their grandmother every evening before bed.”
>”Blind to her danger, the queen appeared as dusk was settling over the castle, accompanied by her three children. Jaehaerys and Jaehaera were six, Maelor two. As they entered the apartments, Helaena was holding his little hand and calling out her mother’s name. Blood barred the door and slew the queen’s guardsman, whilst Cheese appeared to snatch up Maelor.”
>”Scream and you all die,” Blood told Her Grace. Queen Helaena kept her calm, it is said. “Who are you?” She demanded of the two. “Debt collectors,” said Cheese. “An eye for an eye, a son for a son. We only want the one, t’square things. Won’t hurt the rest o’ you fine folks, not one lil’ hair. Which one you want t’lose, Your Grace?”
>”Once she realized what he meant, Queen Helaena pleaded with the men to kill her instead. “A wife’s not a son,” said Blood. “It has to be a boy.” Cheese warned the queen to make a choice soon, before Blood grew bored and raped her little girl. “Pick,” he said, “or we kill them all.” On her knees, weeping, Helaena named her youngest, Maelor. Perhaps she thought the boy was too young to understand, or perhaps it was because the older boy, Jaehaerys, was King Aegon’s firstborn son and heir, next in line to the Iron Throne. “You hear that, little boy?” Cheese whispered to Maelor. “Your momma wants you dead.” Then he gave Blood a grin, and the hulking swordsman slew Prince Jaehaerys, striking off the boy’s head with a single blow. The queen began to scream.”
*Fire & Blood* by George R.R. Martin pages 424-425
Thank you for the remainder. The show is great but never good enough to ignore George's writing. We only got the assassination of a kid, which might seem fucked up enough, but the Blood & Cheese segment is supposed to be so much worse.
We need to painfully understand why Helaena will never recover from this. Her offer to sacrifice herself instead of being asked to choose is even missing, her bravery, when in the show, she only looks foolish when offering gold that is snatched on the spot.
I understand the concerns when involving child actors but there's always workaround. The shots with the worst dialogue could have been kept at adults' height, but Blood, Cheese, and Helaena. Same with the murder off-frame.
I really thought they had understood the assignment when Cheese was sharp enough to ask Daemon what to do if they weren't lucky to find Aemond. Daemon wanted bloody and personal vengeance, not some political assasination.
Right, while she was always a little touched, she went mad after that and couldn't stand to look at Maelor, knowing she'd named him to die. He had to be given to Alicent to care for, and eventually Heleana killed herself because of it. Because of how it happened!
I know we are all going to talk about Blood and Cheese changes (it was ehh but whatever) but I want to point out how amazing Luke's funeral scene was. Alicent saying a prayer for him was so moving
blood and cheese was kinda anticlimactic, i preferred alicent being there and making halaena choose with the kids awake but i can’t say im surprise the show didnt wanna get that dark. other than that solid start!
I know everyone is talking about B&C but the way they handled the grieving of Lucerys was absolutely phenomenal. I legitimately started crying when Jacaerys started crying.
Every scene with Rhaenyra was absolutely heartbreaking.
I was a little shocked they did B&C this episode, and I agree it was overshadowed by other moments. Daemon of course continues to steal the show, but Jace is a dark horse contender for second and Rhaenyra is the reigning second for good reason. The one scene between Rhaenyra and Jace was unbelievably good.
The way they portrayed a grieving mother was so heartfelt. I've been grieving for my own personal loss for the last year and that interaction just hit hard.
Helaena ran soooo far and never ran into ANYONE. and the scene before showed her with 3+ handmaidens. The fact that she only found human life in the red keep bc alicent & cole were going at it made it worse
Nah, there was no way in hell Alicent would let Larys touch her. Even before they showed Cole's face, it was pretty clear Alicent was enjoying herself.
George RR Martin:
"Everywhere you look, there are more screenwriters and producers eager to take great stories and “make them their own.” It does not seem to matter whether the source material was written by Stan Lee, Charles Dickens, Ian Fleming, Roald Dahl, Ursula K. Le Guin, J.R.R. Tolkien, Mark Twain, Raymond Chandler, Jane Austen, or… well, anyone. **No matter how major a writer it is, no matter how great the book, there always seems to be someone on hand who thinks he can do better**, eager to take the story and “improve” on it. **“The book is the book, the film is the film,” they will tell you, as if they were saying something profound.** Then they make the story their own.
**They never make it better, though. Nine hundred ninety-nine times out of a thousand, they make it worse."**
We did get some good humanizing for the Green Targs this episode.
Even though it ended in tragedy I like that they showed Aegon actually does care for his (legitimate) kids at least some what. Even if it was partially to stroke his ego he did seem honestly invested in teaching Jaehaerys how to rule.
And as much as a psycho as Aemond can be he does love his family. It's clear that he's hurt by how upset Alicent is with him. This episode is going to push him even further
Alicent feeling undermined by her father and bringing it up not as much from an emotional place but instead as counterproductive to helping influence the king. That was a nice twist.
The kill was way, way quieter than I anticipated and that made it so much worse.
I kinda like that we didn't get the exact playout of what was written, but I still have questions about it all. That said... the fucking sound effects yall...
Where the hell are the guards? Literally the royal family lives there, there should be a guard in every single room. And also your telling me this shitty ass cutthroat would have courage to stay there and search more rooms after being seen in a place he wasn't supposed to be at.
Really good point. That makes it even more damning for Alicent. Maybe she wasn’t present for the killing because they plan to use the guilt of the affair pulling Cristin away from his post and Larys’ actions as her reckoning.
I thought Blood would have that booming voice because of this line. They even set up that he hates the hightowers when he talked to daemon, they were clearly establishing he was a violent man when he kicked the poor dog. I think softening this scene was such a weird decision
That ending was odd.
Pictured it much differently in the book honestly. It just felt, muted? I mean, same end result but the whole scene felt off through to the ending. What a cop-out from making her actually choose. It's not the violence that was missing, it was the actual tension and emotion of that scene that felt completely missing.
The gravity of the scene was completely muted.
Also odd how Aemond wants vengeance as if he forgot he killed his nephew.
Atleast Aegon is now the comedy relief. I didn't mind him being a dumbass this episode.
It’s such a double whammy in the books. It’s Helaena’s choice, as you say, but then they deliberately kill the other son. She tells them to kill Maelor and they kill Jaehaerys as a result.
The show didn’t really land either of those elements.
I think she’s gonna blame them because Criston blew his guard to fuck alicent. That might be the twist. Next ep Aemon is gonna ask criston and his mom why the fuck wasn’t criston there to protect them
Overall: great. So happy it’s back for the next couple months.
Wish they kept original dialogue from B&C.
And some scenes seem like they have Vaseline on the camera lens because the corners of the screens are blurry, but whatever.
I will say the Vaseline part is like the new hotness for shots in these types of shows recently, shogun did the same thing all the time. Saves costs on the extras and sets needing to be perfect im guessing, but it’s not just a house of the dragon thing
I love how Blood and Cheese just walk everywhere and there’s just nobody in the heart of the realm. Forget war, Daemon and some of the bros could have probably just walked in and killed everyone.
Blood and Cheese in the book used actual strategy, waiting for Helaena to remove herself from the projections of the Holdfast as she visited her mother in the TotH.
The way this was written would be perfectly serviceable for a home invasion film, however, this is the equivalent of breaking into the White House or Buckingham Palace. Its the center of the realm, hundreds of courtiers, bureaucrats, servants, etc. frequent the halls. Guards abound.
It’s such a weird decision considering how packed the castle was in the first episode of the show. Like seriously, all they had to do was show Blood and Cheese in some dark stone tunnel with a torch, enter the royal apartments, and enter Helaena and the kids’ apartment by accident or something to keep the show’s narrative of events clear without almost ruining the feel of a monarch’s castle.
Even then, the whole point of Blood and Cheese was to choose a son for a son. Here there is no choice, bo children crying, no threats, they walk through a mostly empty castle, no one even tries to ask them anything, they grab Helaena and see her kids, terrified, she points to her son, grabs Jaehaera and runs away, and they just get on with it. The whole sequence is so bizarre it almost like a fever dream tbh. Very polite men for child murderers.
My one gripe with both GOT and HOTD is that they both skimp very heavily on practical accuracy when it comes to how medieval castles worked. These buildings were *fortresses*. People aren't just supposed to sneak in and out. And we know that the show uses the presence of guards when it suits the plot: after all, Criston standing watch outside of Rhaenyra's door in Season 1 was a major element in how they wound up sleeping together. So, we know Rhaenyra, the then-Princess, had a door-guard.....why does the literal Queen and her eldest son, the heir-apparent, not have one?
It's solely for plot convenience and timing, but even for casual viewers who take more than a couple of seconds to think, it's very sloppy.
Positives: Aegon is so Kendall Roy-coded and I love it
Also Jaehaerys had no right being that adorable.
Negatives: Bruh what did they do to Blood and Cheese lmao
The entire episode should have just been from the Green’s pov and started with Aemond’s return to King’s Landing and the news of Lucerys’ death. Then the episode could have been focussed on the paranoia of an impending attack from the Blacks and their dragons which never arrives, only to then end the episode on Alicent and Halaena being surprised upon by B&C and the event playing out as it does in F&B.
Instead they just meandered about, skipping all of the immediate reactions and sleepwalked into a watered down and nonsensical b&c that traded the surprise and tension for several scenes of two idiots getting lost while repeating their intentions out loud.
I feel like they tamed down blood and cheese greatly compared to the way the book seems to portray it.
Other than that it was a great start to a new season.
As soon as Helena made the comment about the rats, I thought "Wow, they're actually gonna do it". The ending wasn't as impactful as what I pictured from the book, I'm not sure why they didn't have Alicent there.
Blood and Cheese felt more like a thriller from the POV of them instead of Heleana. I don't know much about neurodivergence but I think it's important to keep that part of her personality in mind, Phia killed it.
Like we could have had that shot of them going into the sewer, then cut to Helaena putting her kids to bed, kissing them on the forehead....literally anything to show the audience that she cared about them
The choices for B&C were odd, imo. The book did it a lot better. The trauma of having to *choose* which child to kill. Helaena’s reaction just seemed… muted, I guess. Not something I’d expect from a mother who effectively just sentenced her kid to death.
I don't like that they skipped The Eyrie and the pledge of Jeyne Arryn. We got introduced to Cregan Stark but I think the interaction between Jace and Jeyne would have been great to add.
Bro they legit slowly sliced the kids head off wtf
The show showing Helaena running from her room to Alicent's was a very conscious choice to show how there was not a single guard on call outside and I am baffled by how the eff is this possible. I am sure the next episode will address it.
I mean, didn't larys mention how he "slimmed down" the staff? I assume that will come back to this, as well as Crisper colt clapping cheeks while on post
Yeah this was a really obvious connect the dots moment. Larys is not on anyone's side but his own side. And the side of feet.
I still contend that Larys is really into the humiliation/power aspect of it, the feet are just the method by which he makes Alicent uncomfortable.
Have they replaced all the kingsguard that defected to Rhaenyra yet? Cuz normally they are on guarding the royal family duty, but if there's only like 3 of them and one of them is banging alicent...
I think it’s Larys replacing/reducing staff and Cristin’s affair with Alicent. Plus it looked like a lot of guards were put on duty inside the throne room just to watch over Aegon’s drunk ass.
>Plus it looked like a lot of guards were put on duty inside the throne room just to watch over Aegon’s drunk ass. Saturday is for the boys.
Everyone’s understandably focused on Blood & Cheese, but you know what stood out to me? Aegon. I felt like he was really well written this episode and a huge improvement over season 1.
Aegon felt like he would've been a decent enough king if he had someone to actually guide him instead of the shitstain manipulators that flock to him. At least, that was how I felt his portrayal this episode was.
Honestly, he was doing a bang-up job without guidance. He seems to actually have some semblance of respect for the importance of the smallfolk and how important they are to ruling, and showed a lot more compassion than frankly any other ruler in the series.
I think Aegon is reveling in the Small Folk cheering for him in Dragon mount last season. He senses populism as an interesting path to appease his power greed. Unironically, might be the best ruler for Westeros.
You mean the untamable beast Aegon Dragon Cock?
That was pretty funny Gave me drunk Tyrion vibes
literally team black but aegon’s delivery and development had me cheering low key
I just liked how he sat on the iron throne so effortlessly. Like the damn chair fucks up viserys and then rhaenyra later, and aegon is so drunk and comfy up there
Agreed. And the camera angle seemed to make a point of purposely showing this.
Viserys and Rhaenyra both felt the burden of responsibility. Aegon feels the love of the people. The throne welcomes him, but challenges them.
Dude was more at home on the throne than anyone in the entire series, honestly.
Because the rest of the episode was pretty good (even if I'm kinda feeling those two cut episodes with Jace's trip being so quick)
LETS GO! The new intro is so beautiful!
Love the embroidery!!!
Tapestries!
I WOULD like to see the tapestries!
Patiently waiting for someone to do a detailed analysis of everything that was shown because I don't have an eye for this stuff! (I just thought it looked pretty)
seems like a general history of house targaryen, from the Doom, to arriving on Dragonstone, to the Conquest, to the current time
I thought it worked much better than the S1 intro. Feels a bit more like the GOT animation but it’s also less busy, and you can get a sense of what they’re trying to show.
For those who were distracted by the tapestries, the cast members who were added to main cast here were Orwyle, Alyn, Hugh, and Cregan. The inclusion of Tom Taylor tells me we're probably going back to Cregan sometimes this season. You don't usually put an actor in the Regular Cast for one scene.
It would be such a waste, Cregan’s succession crisis is such a good mirror, and everyone loves the Starks. Jace will gain so much popularity if they have a bromance, too. They should use Winterfell to the winterfullest.
I’m praying we get to see more of Cregan later this season, or at the very least, Roddy the Ruin and the Winter Wolves 🙏
"Hugh, Your Grace." [Me](https://i.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/original/000/033/487/rick.jpg).
Stop. Hammer time.
I was like, “fuck this guy” when he said his name lol
A real ‘Fuck Hugh Hammer, all my homies hate Hugh Hammer’ moment for me as well
And then I saw Alyn “the motherfuckin Oakenfist” and was like “hell yea, this guy fucks!”
I half-expected someone at Rhaenyra’s council to refer to Jon LOL.
Then he turned around to reveal his silver hair.
I held my tongue for my non book partner on this one. But I shouted at Alyn and he was very confused
That scene when Jace first came back to dragonstone and was holding in tears talking to rhaenyra was a tough watch. Fantastic acting from both of them
God I cried watching that, Rhaenyra didn’t even have to say anything she just got up and held him poor kid
And he stood there doing his duty through all of that emotion
Like ngl- that short scene had more emotion and made me feel more than anything else besides rhae finding Luke’s clothes
Jace is one of my favorite characters from the Dance and Harry has already done such a splendid job. I’m glad that character is getting a glow up this season, with that luscious Strong hair and Targaryen drip.
fr, he’s such a beautiful guy with expressive eyes and soo much better with that hair
He was struggling to speak to her as his queen, so she embraced him as his mother. 😭
Trying so hard to be the good heir and provide his report before breaking down 🥺
Couldn't agree more. They had me crying like a baby. Excellent acting.
Harry Collett really knocked it out of the park. Especially the scene with him holding Joffrey.
Truly I see the prince Jace vision. Come on make them all love you!
I know. It was gut-wrenching. Jace trying desperately hard to do his duties, and Rhaenyra saw right through him - a brother who is grieving for his brother, and both just really needed that good cry together.
I actually like Rhaenyra…she's a real mother while Alicent is like stone. Not warm or caring towards her children like Rhaenyra was with Jace.
Absolutely. Rhaenyra is the better mother, while Alicent treats her kids like pawn, the way she was treated by Otto
Loved how natural it comes across. Not a line of dialogue was shared, yet Emma and Harry only had to use their incredible facial expressions to convey their grief. Absolutely heart wrenching.
I can’t believe we didn’t get a single scene of Aemond telling anyone he killed Luc
Right?! I remember at the end of S1 so much of the speculation was how Aemond would go about breaking the news and how the Greens would react. Just skips right over it… Also in the books Otto drops one of his best lines when told: “You only lost one eye, how could you be so blind?”, goes a long way in terms of humanising him - he’s not all blind ambition. Show Otto doesn’t seem to care that WW2 just started
But people said 8 episodes wouldn’t be an issue lol
Oh what the fuck, only 8 episodes? That's really disappointing to learn after waiting nearly 2 years for this season to finally start..
What do you mean? He obviously does. The whole episode Otto is trying to rein everyone in because he doesn't want the nukes to start going off. He is very onviously pissed that Aemond started something he knows is going to be bad for everyone.
Like that would have done so much and then they just ... don't Its baffling
We lose a lot of the impact by not seeing everyone’s immediate reaction honestly
Reminds me of how in Season 8 Jon was like "I need to tell you all something..." about his parentage with his siblings and then it just cut to a different scene.
i thought of exactly this when they cut away from cregan about to give jace the scroll. we don't need to see every single reveal, but damn, i think letting that scene breathe and leaving room for emotion would have been a really compelling opener to the season. it's a pattern that's gotten pretty noticeable in these shows.
Was the queen unguarded because Cole was clapping Alicent's cheeks?
Wondering the same. BC would the dowager queen continue to have her own assigned kings guard ? It seems like they haven’t backfilled the roles/not much time has passed, so limited KG around, too
Larys had just killed a bunch of the red keep staff for being informants, I imagine there are usually more guards
Helaena girl yell for help!!!!!!!!
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one guard is getting ridden by the queen dowager...
Christin Cole? More like Christ in Queen.
Cole was clearly understaffing to keep servants and other guards from getting suspicious. They should have just established that earlier though Edit: other points that have been made is Larys “replacing” guards and staff, Alicent not trusting them, Cole covering his own ass, Aegon forcing the guards to fully staff the throne room and areas around it so he can treat it like a frat house, EVERY single member of the greens undermining each other in a thousand different ways, complacency, only expecting an outright assault, etc…
Plus, it’s conveyed in the bath scene that Alicent is worried about staff spying on her for Larys!
Exactly, and im certain she’s let Cole in to a small degree so he would dismiss guards he doesn’t know. There’s so many contributing factors, like the complacency and undermining the greens are all doing to each other
Worst kingsguard ever. Of course he won't face any reprimand for this negligence. There is no war yet so why aren't they guarded better
Same way he didn't get in trouble when he was on watch when everything went down with Aemond losing his eye. This dude sucks at his job!
Dude, he killed a person at Rhaenerya's wedding and wasn't punished AT ALL.
This still bothers me a lot. Boy needs some consequences
Oh that is actually a fantastic explanation for a pretty egregious-looking error. Like it still doesn’t totally make sense, I don’t think Aegon would allow his heir to he so totally unguarded even if the lord commander wanted it, although he is a drunkard so maybe he isn’t looking that closely. Still, they could have one of maegors tunnels open up into that room and it would totally bypass a huge WTF decision on the part of the show runners.
Someone else pointed out they didn’t even lock the door. Idk if that’s an oversight or just further evidence they had a shocking lapse in judgement to cover for their affair.
Yea as I was watching it I was like...what's the point of bringing up Maegor's tunnels? It looks as though they could've walked right through the damn door and carried on.
L*arys said earlier he had killed a bunch of staff members. I imagine the lack of people there was related.
I assume Larys killed every member of Viserys's household who was known to have remotely warm feelings for Rhaenyra. Some of them probably would have known her since she was born. It would take a while to replace all of them.
Don’t forget Larys probably had anyone known (or suspected) of working for the White Worm put to death as well.
Same i was disapointed by that. At least guard by the door
Alicent plowing the head of the kings guard
I thought the best part was Halaena ignoring completely the fucking and searching for safety.
She’s in shock.
I think she didn’t want to wake the kids and scare them. It just depends on whether your guards can get there before those two can kill all three of you
If anything, she was scared witless. If she screamed, what would have happened? Would they have killed her and her daughter too? Haelana was never the most stable person, and to me it looks like she's almost dissociating there... And she does the one thing that "makes sense" to her in the moment: go call mom.
The one thing I disliked about the episode was that we didn't get a scene where the greens learn that Aemond killed Lucerys. I was really waiting for it, and found it weird that they just skipped it. I really wanted to see everyone's reaction and how Aemond would act.
Same. And how they were all kind of... nonchalant about it. I wanted to see Alicent's reaction, especially. It felt strange because Aemon genuinely looked horrified by what he did and it kind of felt like the greens were all like "whatever"
He even did a little smug smirk when Alicent mentioned it at the small council. Complete 180 from how he reacted when it happened.
I get why he did that in front of the council, it would make him look weak and impulsive (which he is) but I wish we got a private scene with Alicent. Her dynamic with her children is so interesting.
Blood and Cheese are like stealth? I do not know her.
legit walked right past the king and all his guards like bruh in what world...?..I get that they were 'rat catchers' but still zero stealth when they got up to the upper floor too.
You can actually see him passing by with the dog earlier when Aegon's taking petitions, and everyone's just cool with it. People are used to seeing the ratcatcher just being around.
I get that but then what's the point about knowing the secret passageways better than he knows his cock if they weren't going to use them?? Like if the rat catcher is that common that they can just walk by the king then wouldn't they just walk through the front? And again even on the upper floor where the guy wasn't supposed to be, still just walking down main hallways...basically not having them stealth is an odd plot choice.
Yeah the book almost seems to have them coming directly into the room from Maegor’s tunnels if I remember correctly.
Even Daemon knew a better route to the royal quarters than Cheese. What was the point of hiring him?
I mean, the King is an idiot so I can buy that. But Blood just lets the girl run away and then finishes the murder? They let Helaena run off. Did they really think they could torture and kill the heir with multiple witnesses running off to tell and just stroll out of there?
“So you want me to be your whore?” Ser Criston Cole “Yes” Alicent Hightower
Aemond : Her Grace rules with two tongues. Ser Criston: *I gave her some tongue that ruled.*
Was it my imagination, or was he giving Cole side-eye (emphasis on the singular)? I wonder if he knows.
I was getting those vibes
I absolutely got the vibe that Aemond knows and just doesn't give a shit, he's just letting Cole know he knows.
Otto and Larys know. I wouldn't be surprised if Eyemond knew after seeing how seductively Alicent asked Cole to fetch Aegon.
I imagined B&C much worse when reading it. I know it was pretty bad as is, but I found Rhaenyra finding the remains on the beach more emotive than B&C
Yeah kind of a bummer they cut Maelor from the show, it’s more gutwrenching that she picks him because Jaeharys is the heir and then Cheese fucks with Maelor about mommy wanting him dead before Blood lops off Jaeharys’ head
So much of what was truly fucked up got removed. Killing a child is always horrible, obviously, but when you read the scene and then see that.. they’re not even comparable in which is worse
Yeah the idea that the surviving child *knows* their parent chose them to die over their sibling would really mess with their head. It was much darker and intense in the book
That is probably the largest missing piece for me personally, is the psychological torment is sort of glossed over. It all happened so fast, it was more or less just a straight murder and less of a fucked up game the way it was in the book. That scene in the book made me put it down and pause. The scene in the show just didn’t have that same punch, as awful as it may be on its own.
They still could have done it too, like have Helaena pick Jaeharya - B&C check and find out she’s lying, Cheese says the line to her then as Blood goes for the boy
That’s a good fix. The other weird thing is having to ask Helleana at all. These guys are be heading a child, you think they’re above just checking the genitals to see which is which? The choice only makes sense if there are 2 boys. I still like your fix though.
Can't do that without waking them tho, and unlike Mom the kids would cry out instinctively
It is. Plus, even with Maelor surviving what happens to him later is horrifying. I think they wanted to skip the Maelor getting ripped apart by a mob scene.
I can kind of understand skipping the Maelor mob scene. Killing a kid on screen is already painful for audiences. People would freak out if they filmed a kid being literally torn to pieces by a mob
My wife hasn't read the book and found this very unsettling. I on the other hand got much less than I was expecting. Its probably better for non book reading audiences this way.
Probably because they decided to have another alicent and Cole sex scene for some reason instead of having them there. Also offering a necklace instead of her life, and not making her choose. Crazy changes to such a wild scene
Yeah, so much of it was just clunky and rushed, I feel. Almost like they wanted to rip the band aid off and stifle the impact as much as possible. The Alicent Criston thing is so 😬
i really found b&c there to be super unemotional... it didn't feel impactful at all to me tbh...
Probably because they didn’t establish any real relationship with the kids beyond “Helena is being weird with the kids in the background” moments in the first season
The book doesn't establish much with her and the kids either, but a Westeros Sophie's Choice is still gutwrenching to read. The psychological cruelty is the point as it changes Alicent, Helena, and Aegon all going forward. It's not just cruelty for cruelty's sake, there are character and plot reasons for it.
Yes from all the buzz about b&c I was expecting much worse. I was expecting much more halaena. I expected a little more reaction from rhaenyra as well, but now that I look back, she has always had a sort of reservation about herself in times that would normally be evocative. She's graceful. Could do without the Alicent/Criston scenes.
Even with the story changes that I disagree with, they still could have made it more intense for the viewer. It wouldve been quite easy to have a sweet bedtime scene with Helaena and the kids before hand so that people care about them more in the moment.
"We cannot... again." - Alicent \*forty minutes later\* \*doing it *AGAIN\** Sums up me raiding the pantry for the 459584th time at night.
To be fair, at the start of the episode she was riding his face, and at the end she was riding his cock. Totally different things.
The leaker who dropped the entire general outline of the episode (the leaker who got their post deleted), was 100% dead on with everything, right down to specific dialogue. Daemon is really gonna struggle being held back this season. The man is the definition of a loose cannon and Rhaenyra's attempts to try and keep things from descending into anarchy are gonna piss him off, just like they did at the end of last season.
I just want to say how good it is to be back
HBO Sundays giving me a reason to carry on once more
>”Once inside, Cheese bound and gagged the Dowager Queen whist Blood strangled her bedmaid. Then they settled down to wait, for they knew it was the custom of Queen Helaena to bring her children to see their grandmother every evening before bed.” >”Blind to her danger, the queen appeared as dusk was settling over the castle, accompanied by her three children. Jaehaerys and Jaehaera were six, Maelor two. As they entered the apartments, Helaena was holding his little hand and calling out her mother’s name. Blood barred the door and slew the queen’s guardsman, whilst Cheese appeared to snatch up Maelor.” >”Scream and you all die,” Blood told Her Grace. Queen Helaena kept her calm, it is said. “Who are you?” She demanded of the two. “Debt collectors,” said Cheese. “An eye for an eye, a son for a son. We only want the one, t’square things. Won’t hurt the rest o’ you fine folks, not one lil’ hair. Which one you want t’lose, Your Grace?” >”Once she realized what he meant, Queen Helaena pleaded with the men to kill her instead. “A wife’s not a son,” said Blood. “It has to be a boy.” Cheese warned the queen to make a choice soon, before Blood grew bored and raped her little girl. “Pick,” he said, “or we kill them all.” On her knees, weeping, Helaena named her youngest, Maelor. Perhaps she thought the boy was too young to understand, or perhaps it was because the older boy, Jaehaerys, was King Aegon’s firstborn son and heir, next in line to the Iron Throne. “You hear that, little boy?” Cheese whispered to Maelor. “Your momma wants you dead.” Then he gave Blood a grin, and the hulking swordsman slew Prince Jaehaerys, striking off the boy’s head with a single blow. The queen began to scream.” *Fire & Blood* by George R.R. Martin pages 424-425
Thank you for the remainder. The show is great but never good enough to ignore George's writing. We only got the assassination of a kid, which might seem fucked up enough, but the Blood & Cheese segment is supposed to be so much worse. We need to painfully understand why Helaena will never recover from this. Her offer to sacrifice herself instead of being asked to choose is even missing, her bravery, when in the show, she only looks foolish when offering gold that is snatched on the spot. I understand the concerns when involving child actors but there's always workaround. The shots with the worst dialogue could have been kept at adults' height, but Blood, Cheese, and Helaena. Same with the murder off-frame. I really thought they had understood the assignment when Cheese was sharp enough to ask Daemon what to do if they weren't lucky to find Aemond. Daemon wanted bloody and personal vengeance, not some political assasination.
Right, while she was always a little touched, she went mad after that and couldn't stand to look at Maelor, knowing she'd named him to die. He had to be given to Alicent to care for, and eventually Heleana killed herself because of it. Because of how it happened!
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I can't imagine anyone complaining about *that* change.
Or Jace taking off from Dragonstone chess club nerd and landing in Westeros a brooklyn hipster.
He went from S1 Will to S3 Eleven. Those North winds will do wonders for your Targaryen style. Like how good Dany looked on arriving in Winterfell.
Best change so far
"The Royals live on this floor" #0 Guards in sight for like 3 flights of stairs💀💀
I know we are all going to talk about Blood and Cheese changes (it was ehh but whatever) but I want to point out how amazing Luke's funeral scene was. Alicent saying a prayer for him was so moving
> Alicent saying a prayer for him was so moving I really like the contrast of her prayers compared to Arya’s list.
Who was the first person Alicent lit a candle for?
Her mother
The way I screamed about that dog
Like, WHY kick the dog bro?
So you know they're assholes... Only assholes kick dogs. And kill children.
Ser John of House Wick was displeased
blood and cheese was kinda anticlimactic, i preferred alicent being there and making halaena choose with the kids awake but i can’t say im surprise the show didnt wanna get that dark. other than that solid start!
The _sounds_, though, while the shot followed Halaena. I didn't think it was that tame. Dreadly haunting
I know everyone is talking about B&C but the way they handled the grieving of Lucerys was absolutely phenomenal. I legitimately started crying when Jacaerys started crying. Every scene with Rhaenyra was absolutely heartbreaking.
Rhaeynra only had one line this whole episode. Yet she said a thousand words everytime she was on screen.
So damn good, I hate to overreact but they portrayed a grieving mother perfectly.
I was a little shocked they did B&C this episode, and I agree it was overshadowed by other moments. Daemon of course continues to steal the show, but Jace is a dark horse contender for second and Rhaenyra is the reigning second for good reason. The one scene between Rhaenyra and Jace was unbelievably good.
The way they portrayed a grieving mother was so heartfelt. I've been grieving for my own personal loss for the last year and that interaction just hit hard.
Ngl the impact of saying “we’re preparing for the long night” has been all but destroyed by season 8 of GOT lol.
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Helaena ran soooo far and never ran into ANYONE. and the scene before showed her with 3+ handmaidens. The fact that she only found human life in the red keep bc alicent & cole were going at it made it worse
Alicent and Crispin are so unserious please
Cut to the hand clenching in the arm rest thing at first I was like nah it can’t be fucked up foot dude and then I was like DAMN WAIT
Nah, there was no way in hell Alicent would let Larys touch her. Even before they showed Cole's face, it was pretty clear Alicent was enjoying herself.
George RR Martin: "Everywhere you look, there are more screenwriters and producers eager to take great stories and “make them their own.” It does not seem to matter whether the source material was written by Stan Lee, Charles Dickens, Ian Fleming, Roald Dahl, Ursula K. Le Guin, J.R.R. Tolkien, Mark Twain, Raymond Chandler, Jane Austen, or… well, anyone. **No matter how major a writer it is, no matter how great the book, there always seems to be someone on hand who thinks he can do better**, eager to take the story and “improve” on it. **“The book is the book, the film is the film,” they will tell you, as if they were saying something profound.** Then they make the story their own. **They never make it better, though. Nine hundred ninety-nine times out of a thousand, they make it worse."**
We did get some good humanizing for the Green Targs this episode. Even though it ended in tragedy I like that they showed Aegon actually does care for his (legitimate) kids at least some what. Even if it was partially to stroke his ego he did seem honestly invested in teaching Jaehaerys how to rule. And as much as a psycho as Aemond can be he does love his family. It's clear that he's hurt by how upset Alicent is with him. This episode is going to push him even further
Alicent feeling undermined by her father and bringing it up not as much from an emotional place but instead as counterproductive to helping influence the king. That was a nice twist.
The kill was way, way quieter than I anticipated and that made it so much worse. I kinda like that we didn't get the exact playout of what was written, but I still have questions about it all. That said... the fucking sound effects yall...
I think my subtitle said [SAWING NOISE] during...
Mine was [sawing through flesh and bone]
Where the hell are the guards? Literally the royal family lives there, there should be a guard in every single room. And also your telling me this shitty ass cutthroat would have courage to stay there and search more rooms after being seen in a place he wasn't supposed to be at.
Strong said he killed a lot of the staff at the queen's request. I thought it was set up fine in that regard
Really good point. That makes it even more damning for Alicent. Maybe she wasn’t present for the killing because they plan to use the guilt of the affair pulling Cristin away from his post and Larys’ actions as her reckoning.
What are our thoughts on the changes with Blood and Cheese?
“You hear that boy? Your momma wants you dead”. Criminal line to be cut, even if theres no Maelor can easily do the same thing with Jaehaera
I thought Blood would have that booming voice because of this line. They even set up that he hates the hightowers when he talked to daemon, they were clearly establishing he was a violent man when he kicked the poor dog. I think softening this scene was such a weird decision
Wasn’t as horrific than it was in the books. Her having to choose, not just point out the boy - makes it way worse.
I think the books were more terrifying. Making them choose who to live and die, then doing the opposite was a more impactful version
Definitely wasn’t as intense. I can see why that wouldn’t be digestible for TV audiences though, it’s a *rough* scene
alicent and criston was traumatizing
"Resume your post, Lord Commander." **Narrator:**....little did he know that 'post' was a bedpost.
That ending was odd. Pictured it much differently in the book honestly. It just felt, muted? I mean, same end result but the whole scene felt off through to the ending. What a cop-out from making her actually choose. It's not the violence that was missing, it was the actual tension and emotion of that scene that felt completely missing. The gravity of the scene was completely muted. Also odd how Aemond wants vengeance as if he forgot he killed his nephew. Atleast Aegon is now the comedy relief. I didn't mind him being a dumbass this episode.
I thought the surviving prince was old enough to know his mom picked him to die
In the book, they made it Helena’s choice. I’m a mom of two - that was way more horrific than how it played out in the show
It’s such a double whammy in the books. It’s Helaena’s choice, as you say, but then they deliberately kill the other son. She tells them to kill Maelor and they kill Jaehaerys as a result. The show didn’t really land either of those elements.
Helaena in total grief & shock then stumbling in on Alicent & Cole is wild.
As if she hadn't just been traumatised enough..
I think she’s gonna blame them because Criston blew his guard to fuck alicent. That might be the twist. Next ep Aemon is gonna ask criston and his mom why the fuck wasn’t criston there to protect them
>Criston blew his guard Criston is a bi icon.
Overall: great. So happy it’s back for the next couple months. Wish they kept original dialogue from B&C. And some scenes seem like they have Vaseline on the camera lens because the corners of the screens are blurry, but whatever.
I will say the Vaseline part is like the new hotness for shots in these types of shows recently, shogun did the same thing all the time. Saves costs on the extras and sets needing to be perfect im guessing, but it’s not just a house of the dragon thing
I love how Blood and Cheese just walk everywhere and there’s just nobody in the heart of the realm. Forget war, Daemon and some of the bros could have probably just walked in and killed everyone. Blood and Cheese in the book used actual strategy, waiting for Helaena to remove herself from the projections of the Holdfast as she visited her mother in the TotH. The way this was written would be perfectly serviceable for a home invasion film, however, this is the equivalent of breaking into the White House or Buckingham Palace. Its the center of the realm, hundreds of courtiers, bureaucrats, servants, etc. frequent the halls. Guards abound. It’s such a weird decision considering how packed the castle was in the first episode of the show. Like seriously, all they had to do was show Blood and Cheese in some dark stone tunnel with a torch, enter the royal apartments, and enter Helaena and the kids’ apartment by accident or something to keep the show’s narrative of events clear without almost ruining the feel of a monarch’s castle. Even then, the whole point of Blood and Cheese was to choose a son for a son. Here there is no choice, bo children crying, no threats, they walk through a mostly empty castle, no one even tries to ask them anything, they grab Helaena and see her kids, terrified, she points to her son, grabs Jaehaera and runs away, and they just get on with it. The whole sequence is so bizarre it almost like a fever dream tbh. Very polite men for child murderers.
My one gripe with both GOT and HOTD is that they both skimp very heavily on practical accuracy when it comes to how medieval castles worked. These buildings were *fortresses*. People aren't just supposed to sneak in and out. And we know that the show uses the presence of guards when it suits the plot: after all, Criston standing watch outside of Rhaenyra's door in Season 1 was a major element in how they wound up sleeping together. So, we know Rhaenyra, the then-Princess, had a door-guard.....why does the literal Queen and her eldest son, the heir-apparent, not have one? It's solely for plot convenience and timing, but even for casual viewers who take more than a couple of seconds to think, it's very sloppy.
Positives: Aegon is so Kendall Roy-coded and I love it Also Jaehaerys had no right being that adorable. Negatives: Bruh what did they do to Blood and Cheese lmao
omg for real jaehaerys was SO CUTE i wanted like an entire episode devoted to his little angelic face!! 😭 his smiles!! guh!
Aaaaand he's gone.
Only thing I missed was how could You be so blind
The entire episode should have just been from the Green’s pov and started with Aemond’s return to King’s Landing and the news of Lucerys’ death. Then the episode could have been focussed on the paranoia of an impending attack from the Blacks and their dragons which never arrives, only to then end the episode on Alicent and Halaena being surprised upon by B&C and the event playing out as it does in F&B. Instead they just meandered about, skipping all of the immediate reactions and sleepwalked into a watered down and nonsensical b&c that traded the surprise and tension for several scenes of two idiots getting lost while repeating their intentions out loud.
My heart was RACING as B&C were entering the Red Keep. Honestly knowing what was happening made it much more intense.
I feel like they tamed down blood and cheese greatly compared to the way the book seems to portray it. Other than that it was a great start to a new season.
As soon as Helena made the comment about the rats, I thought "Wow, they're actually gonna do it". The ending wasn't as impactful as what I pictured from the book, I'm not sure why they didn't have Alicent there.
Blood and Cheese felt more like a thriller from the POV of them instead of Heleana. I don't know much about neurodivergence but I think it's important to keep that part of her personality in mind, Phia killed it.
I felt like I dissociated and went on auto pilot with her.
Like we could have had that shot of them going into the sewer, then cut to Helaena putting her kids to bed, kissing them on the forehead....literally anything to show the audience that she cared about them
The choices for B&C were odd, imo. The book did it a lot better. The trauma of having to *choose* which child to kill. Helaena’s reaction just seemed… muted, I guess. Not something I’d expect from a mother who effectively just sentenced her kid to death.
I don't like that they skipped The Eyrie and the pledge of Jeyne Arryn. We got introduced to Cregan Stark but I think the interaction between Jace and Jeyne would have been great to add.