House Of The Dragon Season 2

 

House Of The Dragon (Season 2)

King Viserys died and there was a crisis. The Green faction of the ruling family led by Viserys' widow Alicent put her eldest son Aegon on the throne. The Black faction led by Queen Rhaenyra, Aegon’s significantly elder half-sister forms on the island of Dragonstone. In the closing scenes of Season One, Rhaenyra’s son Lucerys and Aegon’s brother Aemond encounter one another; Lucerys had put out Aemond’s eye when they were younger. Both fly their dragons and Aemond’s much older and larger one defeats and kills Lucerys.

Rhaenyra’s paralysed by the death of her son. Alicent isn’t, though Aegon is not serious, he thinks being king is enough, everyone should do what he says. He appoints some of his fun-loving companions to the Kingsguard to the annoyance of Sir Cristen Cole, now the Lord Commander.

The Kingsguard immediately fail. Rhaenyra’s husband (Viserys’s brother) Daemon resolves to take revenge and hires assassins to kill Aemond. But the one with access to the castle, a rat-catcher, gets lost and instead they kill Aegon’s infant son. This outrage infuriates Rhaenyra, causing her to split with Daemon. The sympathy of the common people this evokes is immediately squandered by Aegon who has all the rat catchers hanged in retaliation.

Daemon decides to take matters into his own hands and goes to the Riverlands to raise an army there. Two feuding houses, kept in check during Viserys’s reign, each pick a side to conduct their own private war. The paramount lord of the Riverlands is old and dying, His heir, the grandson, young, untried and without authority to get things under control. Daemon makes his base in the ruined castle of Harrenhall, where he has bad, sometimes prophetic dreams.

Aegon decides to take action to revenge his son. Both sides have dragons and are unwilling to risk them. Rhaenyra, on the island of Dragonstone, has been able to blockade the city of Kings Landing, leaving the populace poor and hungry. Aegon is impulsive rather than thoughtful. He sends an army out to force the surrender of local towns and castles that are wavering or declared for Rhaenyra.

Both Rhaenyra and Alicent try for moderation, despite the provocation. But both press their claims, refusing to negotiate. Rhaenyra tries to break the deadlock, sneaking in to see Alicent but it is too late, events have a momentum of their own. Blood has been shed, armies are on the march and dragons are fighting.

There’s as much plotting as the first season, and the two camps that lazily formed over twenty years have solidified. And we know that the attempts to keep things under control, to negotiate a peace, devise a solution, those are futile. A civil war – one with dragons – will break out.

It’s in the details, the decisions that the characters make that get diverted, the efforts to set traps or cut through difficulties that this season excels. Aemond and Sir Cristin Cole have their own plans on how to conduct the war, for their own reasons. And on the other side Daemon has his own claim to the throne, and if it comes down to a fight, who has the experience, who is the foremost warrior of the realm?

The reluctance to use dragons is brought into focus; if dragons are the tangible sign of the divine right of House Targaryen to rule then seeing them die raises questions for the ruling house. And Rhaenyra has dragonless riders on Dragonstone, enough to change the course of the war. The show highlights how everyone is working in the dark, at cross-purposes. And no amount of magic or dragons can stop the coming fire and blood.

Watch This: More pseudo-medieval fantasy plotting, now with open warfare
Don’t Watch This: Noble people dragged down into the dirt, cunning people made into fools by circumstance