House of the Dragon Season 1 Finale: "The Black Queen"

Hopefully Daemon gets to show what he can do in the episode, after the focus being off him recently.

 

I watched it....

 

I caved and watched it and honestly I didn’t hate the changes they made. Social media, on the other hand, is MAD.

I’ll post my review after Sunday’s show.

 

Oh, now I need to find out the changes.

 

The problem with all the changes is that everything apart from the source material seems to be just a succession of goofy "Oops' did I just do that" types of accidents and screw-ups bordering on contrived coincidences. It's not compelling, it's goofy AF. It's the same issue I had with Ozarks. This show might have just "Jumped the Shark" for me. I've objectively enjoyed the show up until this point. But this, I can't let slide. This particular style of writing conflict is a personal pet peeve of mine lol.

 

I saw someone on twitter say

"Dance of the Dragons? More like a war of the whoopsies".

And now I can't stop laughing at everything lol.

 

I was ok with the alleged objective adaptation until I saw how some key points is playing out. Now I'm not sure anymore . It now seems more like a black comedy that's trying to take itself too seriously.

 

I haven't read the book yet (plan to amend that soon) but isn't it more or less a history book told by unreliable sources who weren't there at the time anyway? Not going into details about Episode 10 until after it airs but as far as the changed detail of Alicent mistaking Viserys's final words as wanting his son to claim the throne instead of Rhaenyra, for example...it doesn't make much of a difference at all because when Alicent divulged that information to the council Otto more or less said, "Well that's nice, but be that as it may, we were always going to give Aegon the crown over Rhaenyra once Viserys had died anyway". You still get the same outcome.

I don't see that as much of a deviation compared to what was done in the back half of Game of Thrones, especially with GRRM's full participation here.

 

Shame that it leaked early. I prefer when we all see it roughly the same time. Excitement building!

 

…every line Daemon says on the bridge was legendary.

Rhaenyra is a dope Queen.

DRAGON ON DRAGON CRIME.

 

What was that dragon that Daemond was trying to tame/connect with?

Also, what happens to Viserys’ dragon now? And… where is it?

 

It's honestly starting to make me appreciate them just turning Dany heel. Yeah it was stupid and basically went against nearly all but the final season's build, but at least they left the intent in there.

 

If the idea is they're unreliable, a lot of the "rumors" have come true on the show. Like the father of Rhaenyra's kids.

 

What is with them and the birthing scenes! are they trying to make up for lost time because no one got knocked up in the original? Not counting Red giving birth to shadow.
haha

 

I assume

Spoiler

Daemon walked into the dragon and was controlling it or just simply broke something with it during the song. That was like a Super Heavyweight vs an Atom weight haha

 

Daemon was waking up his grandfather’s dragon, Vermithor the Bronze Fury. Basically their deterrent against Vhagar.

And Viserys was the last person to ride Balerion the Black Dread. When Balerion died of old age Viserys never claimed another dragon.

 

Thanks for clearing it up I was confused on the dragon he was talking too. I thought that was Aemond's and he somehow sneaked into the castle. Aemond's dragon did belong to Daemon's last wife and he took when he was a kid after. I assumed he was trying to do something to remind the dragon of her. Maybe so no one else could control them.

 

Basically with dragons, once a rider claims them they’re bonded for life. It’s a pretty deep (surprisingly emotional) connection and it’s only broken when either the rider or dragon dies, so the only way to get Vhagar back would be to kill Aemond.

 

It's basically a Cohen Bros show now lol.

 

It was a fantastic episode, but it's so cruel to end the season like that. I almost wish episodes 2 and 3 had been condensed into one to allow for one more episode this season, since the ending of this finale really made it feel like the true "episode 9" in the vein of GOT. But I suppose everything will only escalate from here.

We didn't really get to know Lucerys that well but it was still an absolute shock to see THAT happen to him and his poor dragon. I was actually nauseous watching that, it's definitely up there with the Red Wedding and Oberyn Martell as far as gruesome shocking deaths go. Aemond not meaning to kill Luke is an interesting choice, since we know at this point that he's also somewhat intelligent, at least in comparison to his brother. He'd know damn well that killing a messenger, especially a prince, is grounds for all-out war to follow, hence the "I'm so f'ed" face after it happened. By extension, he should've also known that his biggest and oldest war-veteran dragon wouldn't be in a "just ****ing around" mood like he was.

Apart from that, Emma D'Arcy and Matt Smith absolutely killed it in this episode. Some of the best work of the season for both of them. The stillbirth scene was a rough watch, though. I especially loved the "rematch on the bridge" with Otto Hightower and I was also glad to see Corlys back before the end of the season.

Overall this show really surpassed my expectations and I'm all in for season 2. I really did think that this storyline would be wrapped up in one season but in hindsight I can clearly see that it wasn't enough time. Either way, I just picked up Fire and Blood today so I'll definitely be caught up with everything by the time season 2 airs, which will hopefully be early in 2024, maybe taking the old spring slot that GOT had.

 

Holy crap! I can easily say this finale was far and away superior to Rings. The next season will hard to wait for, I want to see it now!

 

Damn, now that is how you set up a second season. As cold as it was what happened to Lucerys it's what needed to happen to really get things going and start an all-out war.

Vhagar chasing Arrax was like something out of a horror movie, and I loved every minute of it, especially when you could barely see her moving among the dark, rainy clouds.

I also loved everything with Daemon in this episode and can't wait to see Vermithor unleashed.

 

I also love how this show made me feel so sad for Vhagar having to burn her rider four episodes ago to now being absolutely terrified of her.

 

What a tease this season was with dragon on dragon violence but they gave it to us to have us foaming at the mouth waiting for s2