Marriage is hard. All your partner’s problems become your problems, too. Those difficulties can range from fixing a flat tire to washing the dishes to your former best friend/stepmother conspiring the night your father died to steal your spot on the Iron Throne. Family, am I right? For some reason on House of the Dragon, the Targaryens love to complicate domestic life even further by marrying their siblings and other immediate family members.
In season 2, episode 2, Rhaenyra (Emma D’Arcy) finally understands that marrying her uncle was a bad idea. As you may recall, Daemon (Matt Smith) secretly hired two assassins named Blood and Cheese to sneak into the castle in King’s Landing and kill a child. Even worse, they cut off his head! King Aegon II’s (Tom Glynn-Carney) rage says it all in this episode. Break a few more of those big, weird marbles, my king! Murdering a kid is insane.
Obviously, Rhaenrya feels awful. The entirety of Westeros thinks she’s a “slayer of infants” now. “They’re accusing me?” she asks the messenger. “But it’s a lie!” Sorry, Queen. Talk to your uncle-husband. He’s smirking at the council meeting while everyone else is simply stunned. “Did you send assassins to murder children in their beds?” she asks him, already knowing the answer. “You’ve wounded me….Weakened my claim to the throne!” Rhaenyra, it’s time to fire your husband.
Given how the two argue, it’s unbelievable that they ever got along. “I’ve never trusted you wholly,” Rhaenyra says, following up with one of the spat’s best stingers: “Have you used me as a tool with which to grasp at your stolen inheritance?” Ouch. Daemon throws a cup at the wall and then grabs her neck. “You think me some kind of monster?” he asks, sulking. Yes, man! This argument is post–child murder, or did you forget already? A guy named Blood just sawed a kid’s head off his body. After more delusional grandstanding from Daemon–during which he confirms every statement that Rhaenrya said about him–he storms out on Caraxes. Rhaenyra then sends Baela (Bethany Antonia) to spy on King’s Landing. “We can afford no further mistakes,” she says.
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King Aegon II (Tom Glynn-Carney) throws a fit after his son is murdered. I would, too!
Jaehaerys’s Death Is Good, Actually
Back in King’s Landing, Otto Hightower (Rhys Ifans) seeks to turn the young heir’s death into clout. “Let them see the child” with a funeral procession, he suggests. “Let them look upon the works of this pretender to the throne.” It’s a horrible, shameful scheme to skew the public’s emotions in the crown’s favor. Aegon II is disgusted by the idea. “I will not have my little son’s body dragged through the street like a dead dog,” he proclaims. Otto corrects him. “Not dragged. Honored! Escorted to the dragon pits to be honored as a Targaryen prince.” Alicent (Olivia Cooke) and Queen Helaena (Phia Saban) should ride in the procession as well. “The realm must see the sorrow of the crown,” he explains. I have to hand it to Otto. As manipulative as the spectacle seems, he’s a genius. Everyone involved may hate it—especially Helaena—but he’s the Hand for a reason.
Meanwhile, Larys Strong (Matthew Needham) captures Blood. He tortures him to find out why he killed Jaehaerys, which isn’t that difficult of a task. Just one scene later, Blood squeals, saying that Daemon hired him. He even sells out the rat catcher! Larys steps aside and lets King Aegon II bash his brains in with a giant club. He passes his grieving sister-wife on the stairs and says nothing. Then he hangs every rat catcher in the city and dangles their rotting carcasses from the castle walls. Notably, Cheese is among them. (RIP Blood and Cheese. You were both terrible humans.) “Oy, who are they?” one townsperson asks in a thick accent. Believe it or not, I want you to keep your eye on this seemingly random guy with just one line in this episode. That’s all I’ll say for now.
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Meet Hugh the blacksmith! He’s one of several new characters in season 2.
It’s Time to Meet a Dozen New Characters
Remember Hugh (Kieran Bew)? He’s the blacksmith who asks King Aegon II for more money to build his massive dragon-killing ballistas. Well, he had the good lighting during that scene in the premiere for a reason—because he’s back in episode 2. Hugh reveals that he’s still waiting for that extra dough to arrive.
There are some more side characters we need to tear through. Alyn (Abubakar Salim)—the new sailor who reportedly saved Corlys (Steve Toussaint) from pirates—has his own side character now. Meet his brother, Addam (Clinton Liberty). He has a Mercutio from Romeo and Juliet vibe. For some reason, he speaks like no one else does on this show. “Well met, brother!” Addam says. “I am one of a dozen shipwrights from Hull to attend with all speed to your fleet….To serve with the Sea Snake is to make your fortune. Had I had such a chance, I would leap at it!” Cool! Thanks for telling me exactly who you are and what you’re all about right up front. Seasmoke flies overhead and Addam stares at the dragon for a significant amount of time.
There’s more! Mysaria (Sonoya Mizuno) must stake a claim to any sort of plot in season 2 if she wants to stick around. So she bonds with Rhaenyra over their shared hatred of Daemon. “He’s gone…a week or forever, I do not know,” Rhaenyra tells her. “He does that,” Mysaria responds. Rhaenyra also reminds us that the White Worm’s “web runs unseen through King’s Landing,” bolstering the idea once again that Mysaria possesses a secret underground spy network. Outside their conversation in Dragonstone, Baela practices her skills with a crossbow. They wouldn’t show us this if it didn’t matter, I presume. I guess we should expect Baela to kill someone with a crossbow at some point in the future. Foreshadowing!
Ser Criston, Step on Down!
When Otto Hightower finds out that Aegon hanged all the rat catchers for the public to see, he’s pissed. All the sympathy they won with their funeral spectacle? It’s all gone now. He calls the young Aegon feckless and selfish, claiming that it was his conspiracy that put his grandson on the throne in the first place. Hearing enough, Aegon II calls for his grandfather to remove his badge as Hand of the King and give it to Ser Criston Cole (Fabien Frankel). “You were my father’s Hand,” he tells Otto. “My new Hand will be a steel fist.”
Naturally, Cole is conflicted. He failed to prevent the tragedy because he wasn’t standing watch that evening as the Lord Commander of the Kingsguard. Instead, he was boning Alicent. It may have been twenty years since his star-kissed night with Rhaenyra, but his largest weakness is still his greatest downfall: forbidden romance. How can you resist a man with a hundred pounds of armor? But Ser Criston doesn’t deal with his issues in healthy ways, either. Finding Ser Arryk Cargyll’s (Luke Tittensor) cloak muddied from the funeral procession, he reprimands the knight for ruining “a symbol of our purity.” It’s not a good look for Cole, but I can’t lie and say that our knight constantly projecting his own problems onto others isn’t fantastic comedy. When he tells Ser Arryk, “You’ve so easily sullied our ancient honor”? Chef’s kiss.
Then Ser Criston changes his tune. On second thought, the guy he was just unfairly insulting as an incompetent novice in front of everyone is actually the best guy for a suicide mission. He basically says: You know how you conveniently have a twin brother in Rhaenyra’s army with basically the same name as yours? (Ser Arryk and Ser Erryk.) Why don’t you pretend to be your brother (Elliott Tittensor), sneak into Dragonstone, and kill Rhaenyra before the war begins? “As you command,” Ser Arryk responds.
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Your mission, should you choose to accept it…
Brother vs. Brother
Arryk quickly marches off to Dragonstone and strolls right in without a single problem. He makes it all the way to Rhaenyra’s room before a tip from Mysaria alerts his twin brother to his presence. Then Ser Erryk runs in to protect his queen. Chaos erupts. It’s brother versus brother, and it’s impossible to tell the difference between Ser Arryk and Ser Erryk. The next few minutes are full of: No, shoot him! I’m the real Ser Arryk! No, not me! He’s the fake Ser Erryk! In a not-quite-so-shocking finale, the two brothers kill each other. Ser Erryk wins, I believe. Then he falls on his own sword because he can’t bear to live knowing that he killed his twin brother. Obviously, the actors are twins in the real world…so this must’ve been a blast to film.
Back in King’s Landing, Otto tells Alicent that he plans to travel home to Oldtown now that he’s been dismissed. “The Hightowers still have strength and you have a son there who will take more kindly to instruction,” he says. “Dareon may yet help us in weeks to come.” Wait, hold on! Dareon?!? I don’t know if I can handle a side quest for Otto as well. How many characters are we talking here? I’m already trying not to spoil the fact that random townspeople are important. Now you’re throwing Alicent’s third son, Dareon Targaryen, into my lap as well? It’s time to update Esquire’s Targaryen family tree.
Strap in, folks. A ton of new people—with even crazier names!—are potentially coming our way. Mushroom. Trumbo. Hugo Vance. Believe me or not—these are all real names of characters from the book. As in the case of Alicent and Ser Criston’s new relationship, I don’t know whether to slap these House of the Dragon writers or give ’em a big ol’ smooch.
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