July 2024 – Simon’s Incoherent Blog

House of the Dragon: Season 2, Episode 7 – The Red Sowing

“Well then – let us raise an army of bastards.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

Now that’s more like it. This wasn’t a barnstorming, action-packed episode of House of the Dragon; but it didn’t need to be. It’s a penultimate episode, and what it needed was to set things up for the finale while providing a building sense of pace in the narrative. After last week’s ponderous instalment, I’d been uncertain it could do that, but it succeeded admirably.

House of the Dragon: Season 2, Episode 6 – Smallfolk

“There are older things in this world than you, or I, or living memory. You are not the player, but a piece on the board.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

It was another… shall we say, leisurely paced episode for House of the Dragon this week, which may not win it many more admirers from those who find the show very slow going. To be fair, this week, even I had my reservations. I’d expected a lull in the pacing after the Big Battle of ep4, but with only two episodes of the season to go, it feels like the show should be upping its pace.

House of the Dragon: Season 2, Episode 5 – Regent

“Do not underestimate your subjects. They are a thousand thousand living in the shadow of the Red Keep, and forgotten for too long.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

After last week’s Bloody Big Battle, it was back to House of the Dragon’s trademark political scheming this week – but with some justification. The fallout from the Battle of Rook’s Rest is seismic, and even if you find the show’s predilection for men with beards arguing in dark rooms tiresome, given last week’s events it was entirely necessary dramatically.

House of the Dragon: Season 2, Episode 4 – The Red Dragon and the Gold

“Rhaenyra’s supporters will believe what they wish. And so will Aegon’s. The war will be fought, many will die, and the victor will eventually ascend the throne.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

If it was a Bloody Big Battle you were waiting for, this week’s episode of House of the Dragon delivered in spades. For many people (though not me), the show’s deliberate, sometimes slow pace has been its weakness. For myself, I’ve enjoyed all the political skulduggery that’s characterised this more thoughtful prequel to Game of Thrones thus far. But even I enjoy some carnage-based medieval spectacle now and again. Especially if it involves dragons.

House of the Dragon: Season 2, Episode 3 – The Burning Mill

“There is no war so hateful to the gods as a war between kin. And no war so bloody as a war between dragons.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

This week’s ep of House of the Dragon ramped up the show’s ever-present sense of impending doom to maximum as everyone ruminated on the causes and reasons for a war that now seems not only inevitable, but imminent. From the outset, we were shown how such wars often have roots in much older grudges, as what appeared to be a trivial argument between two groups of spotty teenagers with swords quickly escalated to become the bloody battle that gave the ep its title.