House of the Dragon reviews – Simon’s Incoherent Blog

House of the Dragon: Season 3, Episode 4 – Tumbleton

“He dares me to rain fire down on a seat that raised my banner. And the realm would name me ‘Maegor Returned’. They’d rise up against me, and the same gods who delivered me to the throne would rightly cast me down.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

After a fairly eventful first three episodes, this week sees House of the Dragon settle back into the more… sedate pace for which it’s become known. That figures, what with this originally having been planned as the second episode of the season, where traditionally the political wrangling holds sway. And so it does here. If you’d been hoping that Ormund Hightower’s surprise seizing of the town of Tumbleton would lead to another Great Big Battle, you’d have been disappointed (so far).

House of the Dragon: Season 3, Episode 3 – Rhaenyra Triumphant

“The air is thick with ghosts.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

As expected after the shuffling of episodes between seasons, this week’s House of the Dragon came across very like a season opener, complete with a rather unusual (for this show) pre-credits scene. Rhaenyra has successfully taken King’s Landing. She sits on the Iron Throne. She has everything she ever wanted. And this week showed that, like so many conquerors before her, she’s finding actually running a kingdom even harder work than conquering it.

House of the Dragon: Season 3, Episode 2 – Queen’s Landing

“The boys who clung to me, who hid their little faces in my skirts – dead, so that I might sit on a throne of swords.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

It’s been a busy week, so I’m just now getting on to catching up with House of the Dragon – the very day the next episode goes out!

Continuing straight on from last week’s epic battle, this ep opens with a striking shot of its conclusion from below the waves; dragonfire flying everywhere, debris and bodies floating in the sea. But the battle’s nearly over – who has survived, and who has been horribly killed?

House of the Dragon: Season 3, Episode 1 – Salt and Sea, Fire and Blood

“We will all become beasts before our end.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

It’s been early two years since last we caught up with the ever-quarrelling Targaryen factions of House of the Dragon; and in the interim, its attempt to recreate the vibe of the original Game of Thrones has been challenged by the less complex (and more fun) Knight of the Seven Kingdoms. Can the more dour original spinoff still compete?

House of the Dragon: Season 2, Episode 8 – The Queen Who Ever Was

“The dragons dance, and men are like dust under their feet. And all our fine thoughts, all our endeavours, are as nothing.”

(SPOILER WARNING!)

House of the Dragon wound to the finale of its second season with the same mix of moments of brilliance and frustratingly uneven pacing that have characterised it this time round. This was a good episode for character development, nicely tying up some arcs that have been seriously dragging for most of the season, but in terms of advancing the plot it mostly meandered along setting up pieces for next season before suddenly dropping a plot bomb in our laps with an excellent final montage and cliffhanger.

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.