Episode 1: I can’t believe how much I wrote about House of the Dragon

Yes, this is very late. But at least it will never be as late as The Winds of Winter. If you’re wondering what I’ve been doing all week instead of sending you a recap, I watched 11+ hours of House of the Dragon, reread the entirety of Fire & Blood, as well as a whole bunch of other George R. R. Martin books people tend to ignore. My brain is now crammed with so much Targaryen history that I’m pretty sure a lot of real history has fallen out, but I consider the time well spent, as I now have two (2) things for you.

I’ll run through the differences between the book and the Season 2 premiere first, as promised, and then I’m taking a wide-ranging look back at the pivotal events made the Targaryen civil war inevitable, all the times this it could have been stopped, and why it wasn't. It is over 5,500 words long plus screenshots and stretches back to the time of Aegon the Conqueror, so I will split it into a separate update, for your sanity and mine. But first…

The Season 2 premiere, “A Son for a Son,” begins in the North, where Prince Jacerys Targaryen is convincing Lord Creegan Stark to honor his vow to Queen Rhaenyra. This does not take a lot of effort, since as Lord Stark is quick to note, “Starks do not forget their oaths.” (At least not until Robb Stark, who broke his marriage vow to House Frey, but we all know how that ended for him and everyone around him.) 

Although Lord Creegan says he must keep his attention on the Wall, he offers Jace a detachment of thousands of older warriors, or greybeards, who are still fearsome fighters. Jace accepts, and it’s all going very well until a raven arrives for Lord Creegan with the news of Luke’s death, and Creegan realizes that he’s the guy who has to tell the Crown Prince that his brother has been murdered.

In the books, Lord Creegan’s greybeards have another name: the Winter Wolves. He is canny to frame them as a particular gift to Queen Rhaenyra, as there is a long tradition in the North of older men heading south to fight before winter begins, especially when food is limited. Regardless of the outcome, their families are more likely to survive the winter without the extra mouths.

If the men die, they die with honor knowing they have saved their families from hardship. If they win their battles, they can either bring home the spoils or start a new life. But they leave assuming they’re going to die. That is all I will say of the Winter Wolves for now.

Rhaenys returns to Dragonstone from her patrol of the sea blockade, and as soon as she lands, Daemon tells her to get back on her dragon. He wants kill Aemond, but since Vhagar is the biggest dragon alive, Daemon needs another serious business dragon to take Vhagar down and kill his nephew. Rhaenys refuses because it is Daemon’s command and not Rhaenyra’s, but also because she has no interest in accelerating the violence. 

In the books, Rhaenys does run patrols to help the Sea Snake hold the blockade of Blackwater Bay, Daemon never asks her to help him kill Aemond and Vhagar. He’s not even on Dragonstone, for… reasons, though he is quite eager to take immediate revenge for Luke’s death.

In Driftmark, Corlys Velaryon the Sea Snake has returned from the sea blockade with a busted ship. He discusses repairs with a seemingly random guy in the shipyard, whom we learn saved Corlys from drowning after he went overboard in a battle. The guy, whose name is Alyn, acts super standoffish and eager to exit the conversation, even when the Lord of Driftmark says he owes Alyn a great debt.

For those not familiar with Alyn of Hull, he most definitely appears in the books; he doesn’t save Corlys from drowning; and there is a very specific reason he is acting so weird. Telling you would probably be a spoiler, so just make a note — he’s a character worth remembering.

Back in King’s Landing, Queen Helaena is more scared about rats than rival dragons, which everyone attributes to low-key mental instability, rather than the prophetic visions and dragon dreams common to Targaryens throughout history. She’s already predicted Aemond losing his eye and gaining a dragon and the entire Green vs. Black rivalry, not that anyone was listening. And the reason she’s afraid of rats is because she knows the ratcatcher is coming. 

In the books, Helaena is described as a pleasant but “strange child, slow to grow, never weeping or smiling as children do,” though she makes no lyrical predictions and no one thinks she’s weird or unstable. At least not until the death of Li’l Jaehaerys, which has an understandably negative effect on her mental health.

It seems more like the show wants to make her a prophet disguised as a fool, a dreamy Cassandra whose predictions no one takes seriously, even though they all come true. It makes Helaena a lot more interesting, though it’s not going to go any better for Helaena than it did for the princess of Troy.

Queen Alicent is occupied elsewhere by sexytime with Ser Criston Cole. You may recall that Alicent condemned Rhaenyra as a big ho for sleeping with with Ser Criston last season, and even ended their friendship over it. I’m sure Alicent thinks it’s different when she does it, or maybe that moral high ground was always just a convenient place to put her bitterness and jealousy.

Same for noted hypocrite Ser Criston, who thought breaking his vow of chastity with Rhaenyra was so shameful last season that he was ready to kill himself. Instead, he decided to betray Rhaenrya for the terrible crime of boning an incel and not becoming his wife.

But since becoming Alicent’s lover, Ser Criston suddenly seems pretty ok with having illicit with sex with a royal. Not that this makes him hate Rhaenyra any less. Alicent feels a little guilty in the end, and tells Ser Criston the hot sex is never going to happen again, which probably means it’s going to happen again.

On to the Small Council meeting! King Aegon II has brought Li’l Jaehaerys along so the new heir to the throne can learn to rule. As Li’l J is only six years old, he has some trouble focusing. So does Aegon, who interrupts the meeting to make the Master of Coin give the kid a pony ride. Anyway, the point is that Aegon loves his son-nephew, and would be really really sad if anything happened to him!

In the books, Ser Criston and Alicent never become lovers, or at least we never find out about it. Also, Li’l Jaehaerys has six fingers on his left hand six toes on both his feet, because this is the sort of thing that happens when brothers and sisters keep having kids.

Larys Strong emerges from what I assume are the Black Cells, pleased to inform Alicent that he has questioned her staff, located any spies, and put them all six feet under. Alicent is grateful but unnerved, as she always is when Larys kills a bunch of people and says he did it for her, which tends to be half-true at best.

You may remember Larys as the creepy guy who dangled information over Alicent’s head about a spy among her ladies, and then refused to share it unless she let him stare at her feet bare feet while he jerked off. They didn’t exchange many words on the subject, which made me think it wasn’t the first time.

It seems like Larys is setting himself up to be the Targaryen Littlefinger, but even Petyr Baelish knew when to the tuck the creepiness in. He may have married Sansa off to a monster, but I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t have asked to masturbate to her feet. Then again, maybe the creepiness is the point – a way to make Alicent feel as ashamed about her feet as Larys feels about his. I'm guessing. I can’t figure out the new Lord of Harrenhal or his motivations yet, which means I know exactly what the books know about him: almost nothing.

When historians write about Larys Strong later, the main thing they say is how weird it is that they know so little about him. Here’s what the Fire & Blood Targaryen history has say to about this mysterious pervert:

“The enigma that is Larys Strong the Clubfoot has vexed students of history for generations, and is not one we can hope to unravel here. Where did his true loyalty lie? What was he about? … How much of what he said was ruse of real?” 

I don't know either, no one does, but I'm excited to see the show finally fill in the some of the blanks. And it's already solved one Larys-related mystery.

Last season we learned that despite many historical rumors to the contrary, Larys actually DID kill his father (Lyonel Strong, Hand of the King) and brother (Ser Harwin Strong, secret father of Rhaenyra’s three oldest children), by pulling prisoners out of the Black Cells, having their tongues torn out, and sending them to Harrenhal to lock his father and brother in their rooms and burn them alive. This is super dark, but it is also brand-new information.

In the Targaryen histories, the identity of the true culprit behind the fire was one of those questions that just about every historian disagreed on. The ponderous Septon Eustace was sure Daemon started the fire to kill Rhaenyra’s lover, Ser Harwin, while the bawdy jester Mushroom thought the Sea Snake killed the knight for sleeping with his son’s wife. Others believed Viserys gave the command to end the whispers about Rhaenyra’s children being bastards. 

The show settles the question by claiming the even darker rumor that Larys killed his father and brother to become Lord of Harrenhal, though Larys later tells Alicent he did it to fulfill her "wish" and clear the way for Otto to return as hand. Or maybe that’s just what he’ll say if he gets caught. He does so love to implicate people.

On some beach somewhere, the grieving Rhaenyra finds a wing of Lucerys’ dragon that has washed up on shore, and finally accepts his death. She returns to Dragonstone, where everyone is gathered around the Painted Table, trying to catch her up on all the plans they made in her absence. But Rhaenyra doesn’t want to talk about those plans. She wants one thing only: Aemond Targaryen. She doesn’t actually say “dead” at the end, but I think the “dead” is silent. 

Which means it’s time for Daemon to head back to Kings Landing, and find some assassins. Fortunately, the White Worm in back in play, and back on Dragonstone, after getting caught in the sea blockade while fleeing King's Landing after Queen Alicent tried to kill her by burning her house down.

Alicent did this at the urging of Larys, who told her about a dangerous spy network that included one of her ladies in waiting, and offered to shut the whole spy network down. Hence burning down the White Worm's house, and interrogating (read: torturing) Alicent's staff. It's clear that the Larys is lying and Mysaria is no direct threat to Alicent, but you know who would consider the White Worm a serious threat? A competing spymaster trying to gain control over King's Landing. Maybe his name rhymes with "terrace." Who can say.

Anyway, the White Worm is back, and her timing couldn't be better, as Daemon needs both a killer and way to get said killer into the Red Keep. With Mysaria's help, he gets connected with Blood & Cheese. Blood is a former gold cloak who got kicked out of the City Watch for murdering someone while drunk, and Cheese is a ratcatcher whose job has given him intimate knowledge of the secret passages in the Red Keep.

Daemon meet them in King's Landing Blood & Cheese that he wants them to kill Prince Aemond, just like Rhaenyra wanted. When they ask what they should do if they can’t find Aemond, either Daemon doesn’t answer, or we don’t get to hear it, though Blood & Cheese later says Daemon wanted “a son for a son.”

Blood & Cheese head into the tunnels with a torch and a little dog for some reason, winding their way through the labyrinth to the upper level of the Red Keep, where they find Queen Helaena and her children with no guards at all. After forcing Helaena to point out the heir, Li’l Jaehaerys, they behead him as Helaena runs out of the room with Jaehaera. She races to find Alicent, who is busy banging Ser Criston Cole again, as predicted, and simply says, “They killed the boy.”

In the books, Rhaenyra never calls for Aemond’s death, and Daemon isn’t even at Dragonstone. He’s… somewhere else I’m still not going to say, because I think he’ll go later. When Daemon hears about Lucerys, he sends a message to Dragonstone promising to avenge Luke’s death, “an eye for an eye and a son for a son.” There's no indication he waits for a reply before he heads to Flea Bottom to sends Blood & Cheese on their mission. We don't hear his instructions, so there’s no way to know if he has preferences on which son dies, or if any son will do. 

And somehow, Li’l Jaehaerys' death is even worse in the books. Alicent isn't with Ser Criston Cole at the time; she's waiting for Helaena to bring her grandchildren by at dusk, something they do every night. So Blood & Cheese take Alicent hostage in her chambers, tie her up, and wait for the kids arrive. Helaena brings Jaehaerys, Jaehaera, as well as her youngest son Maelor, who managed to skip this formative childhood trauma on the show. But he's really here to make the story more upsetting in a different way.

When Helaena arrives with the children, Blood kills her guard — because at least she has one in the books — and tells Helaena she must choose which son will die. She chooses Maelor, because she thinks he’s too young to understand, and also he's not the heir to the throne.

But instead of killing him, Blood & Cheese behead Li'l Jaehaerys’ head with a single sword stroke. Maybe because they assumed she wouldn't choose the heir, or maybe because they’re just assholes. Either way, Helaena has lost her eldest son, and every time she looks at her youngest, she gets to remember that she chose him for death.

Next week: Everyone spends the whole episode being mad about what happened in this episode!