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This recap of\u00a0House of the Dragon\u2019s premiere episode contains spoilers for\u2026 well, for\u00a0House of the Dragon\u2019s premiere episode. That\u2019s pretty much what a recap is. Proceed accordingly.<\/p>\n
And we\u2019re back. All of us \u2014 HBO, the Seven Kingdoms, you, and me of course, the guy who\u00a0recapped\u00a0Game of Thrones<\/em>\u00a0for NPR lo those many years ago. We\u2019re all of us here, back on our dragonscat.<\/p>\n I\u2019ve written a couple\u00a0handy\u00a0primers\u00a0to help us all get in the right headspace, but essentially: Forget what you know, you won\u2019t need it much.\u00a0House of the Dragon<\/em>\u00a0opens about 200 years before the events of\u00a0Game of Thrones<\/em>. The now 100-year-old Targaryen Dynasty is at its height, as the royal family holds the reins to 10 full-grown dragons.<\/p>\n We open at Harrenhal, the vast ruined castle that got famously\u00a0dracarys<\/em>ed by Aegon the Conqueror, founder of the Targaryen Dynasty, a century before. We\u2019re witnessing the Great Council of 101 AC, where the inheritor of the Iron Throne will be decided.<\/p>\n In this corner: Rhaenys Targaryen, the king\u2019s granddaughter (she\u2019s standing beside her husband Corlys Velaryon, aka the Sea Snake \u2014 we\u2019ll be seeing a lot more of him).<\/p>\n Sponsor Message<\/p>\n In that corner: the king\u2019s grandson Viserys Targaryen, standing beside his wife Aemma Arryn, who is pregnant with their daughter, Rhaenyra Targaryen. (I know, I know \u2014 we\u2019re not even two minutes in and already there\u2019s a Rhaenys and a Rhaenyra to contend with. Not to mention the fact that most of the characters are sporting the same long, plantinum-blonde wig. Welcome to the Targaryen Dynasty.\u00a0Edgar Winter\u00a0is coming.)<\/p>\n The Great Council chooses Viserys, even though Rhaenys is older, because the patriarchy is nothing if not utterly predictable.<\/p>\n Never saw\u00a0Game of Thrones<\/em>? Here\u2019s a\u00a0reference guide\u00a0to catch you up.<\/strong><\/p>\n Opening credits! Which expressly do\u00a0not\u00a0<\/em>send us swooping over a map of Westeros to visit clockwork versions of the various locales that will figure in this week\u2019s episode. Instead, we just zoom into the three-headed dragon sigil of House Targaryen.<\/p>\n Take that a signal that\u00a0House of the Dragon\u2019<\/em>s chief conflict won\u2019t manifest, as\u00a0GoT<\/em>\u2018s did, as a sprawling worldwide clash involving numerous far-flung Houses and kingdoms. Here, the battle lines will largely be drawn within a single family, in just a few familiar locations. No map necessary.<\/p>\n We get a dragon\u2019s-eye view of King\u2019s Landing, which is looking a bit more precisely rendered these days. We may be 172 years in the past, but the servers in HBO\u2019s VFX department have had four years of updates since\u00a0GoT<\/em>\u00a0ended, and it shows.<\/p>\n That giant domed building dominating the skyline? That\u2019s not the Great Sept of Baelor, which won\u2019t be built for years. That\u2019s the Dragonpit, where reside the royal family\u2019s dragons.<\/p>\n We meet teenaged Rhaenyra and her friend Alicent Hightower, daughter of Otto Hightower, who\u2019s the Hand of the King. They walk through the same courtyard in the Red Keep that Cersei will turn into a giant\u00a0Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?\u00a0<\/em>board, centuries later.<\/p>\n The show puts more of its chess pieces on the board: Queen Aemma is pregnant again, and offers the headstrong Rhaenyra some truly terrible \u201clie back and think of Westeros\u201d motherly advice. Corlys Velaryon (told you!) warns that some of the Free Cities have formed an alliance called the Triarchy, and their admiral \u2014 one Craghas Drahar, aka Crabfeeder \u2014 is brutally ridding the Stepstones (a string of islands between Westeros and Essos) of pirates. Put a pin in that; it\u2019ll come back.<\/p>\n Enter: Daemon Targaryen, the King\u2019s cheeky \u2014 well, cheekbony, anyway \u2014 younger brother. He\u2019s sitting on the Iron Throne, which looks much more jagged and dangerous than we remember. I mean, the tetanus risk\u00a0alone<\/em>.<\/p>\n Daemon and Rhaenyra evince an easy familiarity with each other. We\u2019re meant to pick up on something else between them too \u2014 and if that squicks you out, hoo boy, are\u00a0you\u00a0<\/em>watching the wrong show, about the wrong family. He gives her a gift, an amulet of exceedingly rare Valyrian steel \u2014 the same thing his sword, Dark Sister, is made of.<\/p>\n The king has a wound on his back that refuses to heal. He says it\u2019s from sitting on the Iron Throne \u2014 which is something taken directly from the books that\u00a0Game of Thrones<\/em>\u00a0never picked up on; the Iron Throne is not meant to be place where anyone can rest easily. The royal coffers probably come with a line item for Band-Aids and hydrogen peroxide.<\/p>\n Were you thinking that House of the Dragon was seeming a little light on\u00a0GoT<\/em>-level violence, thus far? Oh, you sweet summer child. This next sequence, in which Daemon leads the City Guard (aka the Gold Cloaks) as they attack King\u2019s Landing\u2019s seedy underbelly by sticking their swords into a lot of seedy underbellies, should keep you sated for a while.<\/p>\n The next day, Ser Otto Hightower attempts to shame Daemon for his impulsive action, but the prince is supported by Corlys Velaryon and, conditionally, the king himself. There will soon be a tournament, after all, held to celebrate the impending birth of the king\u2019s child, which (the king is certain) will be a boy. Lots of visiting nobles. The king rationalizes that Daemon\u2019s show of force will help protect the people. Daemon peaces out before anyone can say \u201cGold Lives Matter,\u201d so that\u2019s a good thing. In a brothel scene of the sort that comes factory-installed in George R.R. Martin shows, we meet Daemon\u2019s paramour, a sex worker named Mysaria, and learn that he\u2019s been having trouble \u2026 landing the dragon, as it were. Earlier, we learned that he\u2019s married to a lady of the Vale, but doesn\u2019t much care for her. All of which is laying the track to remind us that he\u2019s a true Targaryen \u2014 and thus a man of very specific, plantinum-haired tastes.<\/p>\n The jousting tournament is a bloody and barbaric affair, mostly between knights that have never known real war. Daemon defeats Otto\u2019s son, and looks pretty damn smug about it. But he, in turn, loses to the mysterious and handsome Ser Criston Cole, upon whom Rhaenyra bestows her favor. Remember his name, he\u2019ll figure largely in what\u2019s coming.<\/p>\n While all of that\u2019s going on, the queen goes into labor, and it doesn\u2019t go well. The child is breached. The king is summoned to her side and they get to share a tender moment before he gives his permission to have her baby removed surgically. (The queen, notably, is not consulted in the matter.) The show really lingers on this sequence, daring us to keep watching; if the point is to remind us how dangerous childbirth can be, even in a world full of magic, mission accomplished.<\/p>\n The queen dies. Soon after, her child \u2014 a male heir \u2014 dies as well.<\/p>\n We get a glimpse of Targaryen funeral rites, as Rhaenyra instructs her dragon to burn her mother and brother\u2019s corpses on a pyre. Very metal.<\/p>\n Given the tragedy, the king\u2019s High Council is divided on whom should eventually succeed him. Corlys cites precedent and makes a case for Daemon. But others, led by Otto, maintain that Daemon is too impulsive, too ambitious, too cruel for the Iron Throne. (Daemon, for his part, is Jay Leno-ing this meeting, which is to say: He\u2019s listening in. He\u2019s not, like, driving a classic car and wearing a lot of denim. Just to be clear.)<\/p>\n Instead, the other Council members suggest Rhaenyra. Cue the requisite \u201cA .. a\u00a0girl<\/em>? On the\u00a0Iron Throne?<\/em>\u201d spluttering and pearl-clutching and monocle-dropping. The king storms out, leaving the question unanswered.<\/p>\n Otto talks to Alicent, his very! young! daughter, and suggests she go to visit the king in his chambers. To offer him \u2026 a kind ear.<\/p>\n For a start, at least.<\/p>\n Yes, it\u2019s gross, but it\u2019s part of George R.R. Martin\u2019s whole deal. Fish gotta swim, birds gotta fly, dads gotta exploit their young daughters.<\/p>\n Alicent visits the king, and we learn he\u2019s the Seven Kingdoms\u2019 equivalent to a model railroad guy: He seems to be carving an enormous scale model of King\u2019s Landing out of stone.<\/p>\n Contractually-Obligated Brothel Scene 2. Daemon toasts the king\u2019s late infant son, calling him \u201cThe Heir for a Day.\u201d This angers the king, who promptly calls Daemon on whatever the Westeros equivalent of a carpet is.<\/p>\n The brothers exchange fiery words of resentment. The king orders Daemon to leave King\u2019s Landing and return to his wife in the Vale \u2014 and tells him he\u2019s no longer heir to the Iron Throne. As if in answer, the Iron Throne promptly gives the king yet another nasty cut.<\/p>\n In the cellars of the Red Keep, the king and Rhaenyra chat, under the huge looming skull of Balerion, the dragon that their ancestor, Aegon the Conqueror, rode as he set about, you know, conquering.<\/p>\n The king tells his daughter that their ancestors should never have messed with dragons, that they\u2019re a dangerous force beyond man\u2019s control. And then he kind of sneaks in that she\u2019s the new heir to the Iron Throne.<\/p>\n Cut to: the Iron Throne. The lords of the Seven Kingdoms swear fealty to the king\u2019s newly named heir, Princess Rhaenyra, one by one. House Velaryon, House Hightower, House Baratheon, and then \u2014 just as we get a flashback of the king warning Rhaenyra that the world will end with a great winter \u2014 we get a shot of the current Lord of Winterfell, Rickon Stark, swearing the oath with those round Northern vowels I\u2019ve missed so much. A nice touch.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Daemon and Mysaria leave King\u2019s Landing in a huff.<\/p>\n A huff, in this case, is a saddle on the back of Daemon\u2019s dragon Caraxes. The fact that he takes Mysaria with him strongly suggests he\u2019s not going back to the Vale as instructed.<\/p>\n Parting thoughts:<\/p>\n <\/p><\/div>\nFeaturing a dragon-drop interface<\/h3>\n
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Here comes the blood<\/h3>\n
![\"In](\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/eve-best-steve-toussaint_wide-2435077957a7d7e6fbeea3aa77ec01b53be1e027-s1100-c50.jpg\" "\\"In")
This meeting could have happened over chain-mail<\/h3>\n
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