House of the Dragon - S01E01-02 - The Heirs of the Dragon & The Rogue Prince

[00:00:00] Hey listeners, if you've been listening to our show, chances are you've heard the wonderful

[00:00:07] contributions of our favorite Tolkien scholar Marilyn R. Pukila. Marilyn just launched her own

[00:00:12] podcast on our network called Rings and Rituals. Join me and Dr. Sara Brown on our journey through

[00:00:17] The Lord of the Rings, The Rings of Power, through the lens of ritual. Episodes drop every

[00:00:22] other Wednesday on the Rings and Rituals feed linked in the show notes. See you there!

[00:00:50] Welcome to the House of the Hounds. We're The Lorehounds, your guides to the Dance of the Dragons.

[00:00:55] I'm John. And I'm David and this is our coverage for Season 1 Episodes 1 and 2 titled The Heirs of

[00:01:02] the Dragon and the Rogue Prince of the HBO Max Original Series House of the Dragon.

[00:01:09] Today we'll start off with our personal backgrounds on the series before diving into a deeper

[00:01:13] discussion of the episodes. We don't have any listener feedback for this first episode,

[00:01:17] but we hope we'll have some comments next episode. If you would like to send us and please do so,

[00:01:23] you can send email to hotd at thelorehounds.com. That's H-O-T-D at thelorehounds.com. Or you can

[00:01:33] always head over to our website and use the contact page and there you can either record us

[00:01:39] a voicemail which we can drop right into the podcast or use the contact form.

[00:01:43] Also, if you want to support our community, you can do it on Supercast or Patreon. Join the

[00:01:48] conversation on Discord or take a listen to our affiliate podcast. Links to all that are in the

[00:01:53] show notes. I think we have some housekeeping to add some House of the Dragon keeping.

[00:01:58] We got to clean our dragon house. Clean the dragon pit. Yeah, yeah, that's what the

[00:02:04] novices have to do, right? Yeah, so we may be, you know, we're launching a new feed here,

[00:02:09] David. We may be having some new listeners, so maybe let's just say hello. Hello. We're the

[00:02:13] Lorehounds. We've done a lot of episodes so far. I think almost 300 now. Wow, my God. It's almost

[00:02:19] like we were good, you know, reasonable at this podcasting thing. And we sponsor several other

[00:02:27] podcasts as well. It's true. It's true. We like to talk about nerdy things, TV, video games,

[00:02:32] books, all that jazz. Yep. And we are here for season two of House of the Dragon. We did

[00:02:38] not do season one. We were just getting into our podcasting field and we started with the rings of

[00:02:44] power, so we are doing a breakdown of the first season ahead of season two. That's the goal here.

[00:02:52] That's what we're starting with right now. Yeah, I think it'll help at least for us to get

[00:02:59] warmed back up, to remember these characters and these places and the various story lines

[00:03:06] that we're going to be dealing with when it comes to season two. So I think it's a really good way

[00:03:11] for us to sort of prime our own pumps as well as to get everybody excited. I know there's going to be

[00:03:16] a lot of podcasts out there, so and a lot of people are already starting their season one

[00:03:22] rewatches and that kind of stuff. So if you found your way here or if you're a long time

[00:03:26] listener, I know we've got a lot of OG rings of power listeners still with us.

[00:03:31] Welcome and yeah, let's keep it rolling.

[00:03:35] Valar Mogulis.

[00:03:38] Very good. I forgot about that. God, it's been so long.

[00:03:40] You've got to respond Valar Dohares.

[00:03:42] Yeah, that's what I mean. It's been so long.

[00:03:45] We got it. Don't worry. I'm here for you.

[00:03:48] Yes, you are. You're the head on this one.

[00:03:51] Here's the thing. So I thought I was not going to be the head on this one because

[00:03:56] I have had an on again off again relationship with George R. R. Martin and the House of the Dragon

[00:04:02] Game of Thrones franchise. And then I thought to myself, you know, we did a season guide,

[00:04:09] a show guide for Shogun. We did it for True Detective and you really had the helm on those

[00:04:15] two. So I wanted to pitch in. I wanted to do some work on this one. And me and Aaron K.

[00:04:21] And Brian 8063 on the discord. We really put together this really thorough show guide. I mean,

[00:04:27] it's there's a character guide. There's a family tree. There is an episode guide with a full recap

[00:04:32] and images and everything. There is a dragon bestiary. There's a location guide. And I think

[00:04:40] it's going to be a huge help both to us to reference the season and totally to our

[00:04:44] patrons because that is a Patreon exclusive or I guess you'd say subscriber.

[00:04:50] Whether you're on Patreon or Supercast. Correct. It's an exclusive subscriber benefit. So

[00:04:56] you can get that if you sign up with us. The cool thing about the show guide is,

[00:05:05] well, we're building it in Notion, right? Which is this weird databasey note taking

[00:05:11] application that's really super versatile. And with a click of a button, you can publish

[00:05:16] stuff live to a website. You can bed in different kinds of media and links and things.

[00:05:23] And we had a lot of success with both True Detective and Shogun using the platform.

[00:05:29] And one of the use cases for it is, if you're watching the show, you know, live or later on,

[00:05:36] and you try to remember who a character is or a particular dragon or something like that,

[00:05:41] you can be on your phone and this thing scales really nicely with all the images and everything.

[00:05:47] It's got an app too. You can do the Notion app. You can. You could also do the Notion app or just,

[00:05:52] you know, through the web page. And you can quickly find, oh, who's that character? And you

[00:05:56] can click through. And the amount of reference material you guys have embedded into these

[00:06:01] things. Like if you look at Renea or somebody like that, you know, with lots of kids and

[00:06:06] relatives, you know, all of that stuff is linked and crossed linked.

[00:06:10] And yeah, you can click on her dragon. It'll bring you to the page. You can see pictures of everybody.

[00:06:15] I'm really proud of what we did with it. I am super impressed.

[00:06:19] You know, because I'd been dabbling for a while, you know, with our show tracker

[00:06:22] and some other things. And then you're like, oh, well, you know, should I, you know,

[00:06:25] let me give it a little dabble. And you took off, man, you're like a duct of water with

[00:06:30] this thing. I do love my pretty graphics and whatnot. Although Aaron Kay is really

[00:06:35] responsible for the pretty graphics. He even made like custom house sigils for all the

[00:06:41] characters. I know, right? Like crazy. Just crank them out so fast too.

[00:06:46] And yeah, we've got Brian who's a, who's a historian and librarian by trade in his real life.

[00:06:52] And he's in there with making sure I'm accurate. And that's right with you with the big book.

[00:06:56] What's the big book called again? Fire and Blood. Fire and Blood.

[00:06:59] And he's also got the world of Westeros. I think it's called nice. Very cool.

[00:07:04] So yeah, so that's a subscriber exclusive benefit. And so if you're interested, we have our Patreon

[00:07:11] and for as little as three bucks a month, you could subscribe and get that. Or

[00:07:18] we have started using a new platform called Supercast that we really like. We really like

[00:07:22] the way it functions. And one of the things that it offers us rather than just having a

[00:07:30] a subscriber system that's more built for podcasters, better built for podcasters than Patreon

[00:07:38] has is or has been is we can do something called the season pass what we call a season pass,

[00:07:44] which we can offer exclusive content where you can do a one time payment. So you don't have to

[00:07:50] subscribe and on a monthly thing or do other if you're just like, Hey, I like what these guys

[00:07:55] are up to. I like the Lorehounds community. I just want to throw them some support

[00:07:59] you get an ad free version of the podcast, you get the show tracker. And for what it's 10 bucks flat

[00:08:08] forever. Yes, forever. This is a lifetime you have our episodes forever. Yeah, if you're just

[00:08:14] interested in House of the Dragon and you want it forever and you don't want a recurring subscription,

[00:08:18] that's who this is for. Right. So ad free feed and the show tracker guide and early access as

[00:08:24] well as soon as we get the podcast edited, we get them out and you can have them right away. And so

[00:08:30] it's I think supercast we've been toying with this idea of the season pass for a while because we

[00:08:36] know some people they come around for a particular show or that's like the only time they really

[00:08:41] listen up to these kinds of podcasts and they are really appreciative and they want to support

[00:08:47] but they don't want to go through the hassle of subscribing and unsubscribing

[00:08:52] and then we're like, oh, why are people unsubscribing? You know, then we're all sad and everything is

[00:08:56] like, no, this is a much easier way. You can just buy the season and get all the normal benefits

[00:09:03] without all of the subscriber hassle. Remember, you used to be able to buy CDs. That's right. You

[00:09:08] would get all the tracks and then that would be that we've done business. So this is our way

[00:09:12] of, you know, rewinding time. Bring you back there. So there is a link in the show notes

[00:09:17] for this episode to the season pass and or if you want to pop on the discord and ask us a question

[00:09:24] there, we can always, you know, share the link that way. But definitely check it out if that's

[00:09:28] something that seems to work for you. John, enough salesmanship enough to tell everybody

[00:09:34] about let's talk about the show a little bit. You, sir, you, sir, were famously bankrupt at

[00:09:42] the end of Game of Thrones. It's true. You did you burn all your books? Did you like throw

[00:09:49] everything out the window? No, they're just in my basement. Okay. Mold collecting mold in the corner.

[00:09:54] Yeah, yeah. Because you were a super fan. I was, let me tell you how into what I was. I had the

[00:10:01] Game of Thrones risk game. Every single week, I would take out the board and I would take out

[00:10:08] the pieces for the different factions and I would place them where the different factions were on

[00:10:13] that episode. And I was trying to visualize where they could go next. It didn't help me a lot with

[00:10:20] jetpacking, but sure, you know what? It was still fun. It was fun. I had watch parties for the

[00:10:25] last season. Like I would invite a bunch of friends over we would have snacks. And then I

[00:10:30] would enforce a no talking rule during the episode. I was so into it. I was so into it.

[00:10:37] You know, I was listening to a lot of bald move podcasts at the time. Sure. And I had the house

[00:10:41] snow t-shirt. I was like really, really, really like I enjoyed this world more than I enjoyed

[00:10:48] Tolkien at the time. Wow. Right. And I think this is your you got into Tolkien because of this,

[00:10:53] right? Yes. This is my villain origin story. You back you went in backwards.

[00:10:57] I did. And and really, I think that if the last season of Game of Thrones hadn't crashed

[00:11:03] and burned, the Lorhounds wouldn't exist because I wouldn't have been driven into the arms of JR.

[00:11:09] Well, thank God for that. Thank God for the double D's for screwing the pooch. That's the only time

[00:11:15] I'll ever agree to that. Yeah. So anyway, this show came along and we were already you know,

[00:11:21] at the time we were working under bald move and they were covering it in full and that's

[00:11:26] their big, you know, flagship show. So I got to watch, I got to listen. And I'm watching it

[00:11:31] and I'm like, is this good? Did they make me care about this again? And I was thinking about today

[00:11:39] why that is, why they were able to bring you back in. First of all, they kept D&D

[00:11:45] far away from us. Very far. The creators of Game of Thrones locked out far away from this.

[00:11:50] They are nowhere near it. They brought George back and he's doing it. And it's kind of an

[00:11:57] interesting thing because we think about prequels and we think about, oh, well, we already know where

[00:12:01] they're going to end. So they're not that interesting, right? That's one of the inherent

[00:12:05] weaknesses of prequels. But something like this is a retelling in a canon way,

[00:12:14] something that was only available as a retelling of history in universe before.

[00:12:21] So if you don't know, if audience, Fire and Blood, the book that this is based on, a portion of that

[00:12:28] book, is told as a maester in the time of, you know, the current day like Jon Snow era,

[00:12:35] writing a history of the Targaryens. And he's going through the writings of the contemporaries

[00:12:40] of this era. But he wasn't there. And so he's missing a lot of details. And so it's really

[00:12:48] bare bones. So now we have the show is telling a more full story and this is considered the canon of

[00:12:54] what actually happened. And we know that because George is involved. So I'm thinking, this is like

[00:12:59] if JR Tolkien were still alive and he's like, okay, well, the Red Book, which is what the Lord

[00:13:05] of the Rings is supposed to be, it's supposed to be an internal telling of the adventures of

[00:13:08] the Hobbits. Right. The Red Book was, you know, that's what they knew. But now in the show,

[00:13:14] we're going to have Gandalf's perspective and we're going to have Saruman's perspective, right?

[00:13:19] Like I'm going to show you all the things that the Hobbits never knew. Right. And take you into the

[00:13:27] world and actually see how the, yeah, the different beats of the story actually played out

[00:13:34] as opposed to just knowing the ending or having the broad strokes. Right. And so that's why this

[00:13:39] show is so interesting is that there are still surprises to be had even though it's a prequel.

[00:13:44] And I'm really enjoying that. I think in the last couple of years, and I think

[00:13:50] for me, the epitome of this would be better called Saul is where we know where the train car

[00:14:00] of the story has to hook up as the prequel. And so we know how it resolves, but there's so much

[00:14:07] tension and excitement that gets generated in how are they going to, how have they put themselves

[00:14:13] into this corner or how have they twisted these things like, well, we're here and we know we've

[00:14:18] got to get there. How the hell are they going to do that? And I find that really exciting

[00:14:22] and interesting. And I think season one, well, we're just starting our rewatch. So, you know,

[00:14:29] we've got a, it's interesting, you know, having watched one and two, and I'm really curious

[00:14:34] to see how the rest of the season shapes up as on the rewatch. I guess I should

[00:14:41] talk about my origin story a little bit. I think it was 2000, it must have been 2011 or was it

[00:14:51] 12? I'm trying to remember now what the year, it's all blurry back then. I'd been

[00:14:57] out and about in the world doing various things. And I kind of had washed up

[00:15:01] back on the shores of my hometown of Seattle. And I was house sitting for some friends over

[00:15:08] the Christmas time. And I had been pretty checked out on what was going on in modern media and

[00:15:16] television and things like that. Everything except really, except for Battlestar Galactica,

[00:15:20] the Ronald Moore reboot. That's another story. And so I flick on, they didn't have a really

[00:15:27] great TV. And I didn't really have a lot going on. I was just kind of like,

[00:15:32] found, oh, they're like, oh, they got HBO. Okay, cool. And then I'm looking around. Oh,

[00:15:37] Game of Thrones. Okay, what's this? And I binged the entire first season in like two nights.

[00:15:44] It was like in crowds. Like, oh my God, I was completely captivated.

[00:15:49] And then I've just sort of stayed with the series over the years. I've read

[00:15:54] what books we have, you know, of the main story. We're still missing one.

[00:15:59] Two. We're missing two. We're missing two? Oh, my bad. Yeah.

[00:16:03] But I've never read any of the extended history stuff. I've never got into the

[00:16:07] encyclopedic nature of the world. I think for me, Dune fills that space a little bit more of

[00:16:14] the big IP where I sort of reach deeper into the lore and the world building and stuff.

[00:16:20] And so anyway, I think, yeah, I mean, I'm a pretty average Game of Thrones fans when it

[00:16:27] comes to the original series. Really great at the beginning and then the end kind of just got

[00:16:32] weird and disappointing. And you know, we're all expecting that Grand Slam. And it was just

[00:16:37] kind of weird. Tough. It's tough. You know, we're not going to re-litigate the end of

[00:16:42] game. No, no, no, we're not going to re-litigate it. I'm sort of talking about sort of where

[00:16:45] my vibe is. So going into House of the Dragon, I was excited to see if they could,

[00:16:50] you know, pull something together. And for me, what was really exceptional

[00:16:58] was Paddy Constantine's performance as Viserys Targaryen. And the story of

[00:17:09] Rhaenyra and Allicent, I just thought was super compelling. And I really

[00:17:18] got re-excited for this world and for this kind of storytelling. So I think I'm along with you

[00:17:25] pretty excited for what we're going to get this season to see what, where I mean, we've got a

[00:17:29] shorter episode run, we're at eight instead of 10. And they've done all the play setting.

[00:17:38] And so now they're going to really get into this story, which I don't know because I haven't

[00:17:42] read the books that have this sort of prehistory stuff in them. So I'm really just on the edge

[00:17:49] of my seat going, like, okay, cool, like, what are you going to tell us? What are you going to show

[00:17:53] us? Yeah, so I want to dovetail that into our spoiler policy here. If you're new here,

[00:17:58] we pretty much do every show like this, but we're not going to talk about anything past what

[00:18:03] we're covering. So when we talk about season two episode one, we're not going to talk about

[00:18:09] anything future, whether it's from the book or not. If we've seen leaks or something,

[00:18:14] if the book is there, we're just not going to talk about it. And I think we've gotten pretty good

[00:18:18] about not being cutesy about it. Right. And yeah, we really work hard to not spoil people.

[00:18:24] I think for this rewatch, let's make a decision right here, David, are we talking about

[00:18:28] the rest of season one for this rewatch podcast? I think it's fair to talk about

[00:18:33] the rest of season one in this. I think so too. I think this can be,

[00:18:36] people have already done the live watch on this. So yeah, and we're two years, a year and a half,

[00:18:42] two years, you had time. Yeah, you had time. All right. So that's our policy then going forward.

[00:18:47] I mean, maybe we'll be lights will be like we won't be like we'll all lose about it.

[00:18:51] Yeah, we'll allude to things, but we're not going to be like in episode six. No.

[00:18:55] But yeah, so I think for season one, and this tracks with the show tracker to with

[00:19:00] the rather the show guide is that there's a full season one recap and it doesn't

[00:19:04] distinguish between episodes. Right. But one season two starts now all of the,

[00:19:10] you know, the show guide and the podcast are going to be limited to what you've seen on screen.

[00:19:15] We're never going to talk about something that has not shown up on screen yet.

[00:19:18] And yeah, I guess to say we don't have screeners so we're watching live with everybody else.

[00:19:23] And I mean, I'm going to ask for them, but I am almost firmly

[00:19:28] Yeah, it's a little.

[00:19:29] Thinking that we're not getting them.

[00:19:30] Yeah, no. And it's a bit it's May.

[00:19:32] This starts in two months and a half away.

[00:19:34] Usually they do screeners like right.

[00:19:36] That's true. That's a good point.

[00:19:37] Yeah. We should ask. I mean, you know, now is around the time that I usually ask.

[00:19:43] What's the stupid quote about missing all the shots you never take?

[00:19:45] Right. We did get true detective screeners and that was HBO.

[00:19:48] We've got lots of cool screeners foundation and bunch of other stuff. So why not?

[00:19:52] All right. Well, my fan bankruptcy is cured.

[00:19:58] There's cash in the bank. You have internet points in the bank.

[00:20:01] I went to Essos and I got a loan from what is it? The Iron Bank?

[00:20:08] The Iron Bank, yeah.

[00:20:10] And we are all set to go. So let's talk about the episodes itself.

[00:20:15] I did a summary of each of the episodes. So I just wanted to recap what happened.

[00:20:19] And then I broke it out by topic underneath.

[00:20:22] Okay.

[00:20:22] And we're going to talk about the episodes together.

[00:20:24] Got it. All right. And just sort of a big

[00:20:27] big long, but then we'll swim through all the different topics.

[00:20:30] Yeah. Okay. It's good.

[00:20:32] All right. Here we go. So in episode one, we meet King Viserys Targaryen,

[00:20:37] king who was selected as heir to the throne after Rhaenys, his cousin was passed over.

[00:20:43] He hopes for a male heir and nine years into his rule,

[00:20:46] his wife dies in childbirth with his son who dies a few hours later.

[00:20:51] His brother Damon mocks the death of Viserys' son,

[00:20:54] leading Viserys to disinherit Damon and name his daughter Rhaenyra,

[00:20:58] the heir to Dragonstone and the Iron Throne.

[00:21:01] Meanwhile, Otto Hightower schemes to place his daughter Allison in the position of the king's

[00:21:08] next wife. The king also ignores the threat of the triarchy and the stepstones to the

[00:21:12] disappointment of Coralus Valyrian. So that's episode one. Let's pause there.

[00:21:17] Okay.

[00:21:18] Overall thoughts on how this did as a series opener.

[00:21:22] It had a lot of work to do. It had to not only establish its own footing, but it had to

[00:21:31] hit certain nostalgia buttons for Game of Thrones and to set us in placing, oh yeah,

[00:21:42] I remember these vibes and I think everybody freaked out when they saw the Cat's Paw in

[00:21:47] Viserys' Bell. Did that show up in episode two or episode one? I can't remember, but

[00:21:51] I don't remember, but yeah.

[00:21:52] Specifically, but yeah, we had to remember that, oh, this is the world. They had to wow us

[00:21:58] with some dragon stuff and a little bit of the gore and the violence. It had a lot of work to do

[00:22:06] and it had a lot of work to wind up the primary characters so that they could start to get in

[00:22:14] and I think largely it did that. With one major criticism, and I don't know if we'll

[00:22:22] maybe we'll talk about it later, but there's like just one giant like really guys, did you

[00:22:26] really have to do this in episode one?

[00:22:28] Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, let's talk about it as we go through. I'm sure you're

[00:22:32] referring to Emma's big scene.

[00:22:35] The birthing, the the the Cicera section thing. Yeah, not good.

[00:22:42] I want to talk about where my wife was in her life when we watched that.

[00:22:45] Yeah, I remember talking with you about it. Anyway, okay, so outside of that,

[00:22:50] I felt that this did a really good job of establishing the new series while at the same time

[00:22:59] letting the hardcore fandom of the previous series feel like we got you, right? We know the

[00:23:07] ending was a little messy and we know people love that world, this world

[00:23:11] and so I think it was very confident and really took everybody sort of firmly in hand.

[00:23:16] I enjoyed episode two much better just on a storytelling level, but I thought episode one

[00:23:20] did what it was supposed to do. Yeah, episode one drags a little bit. It's just jam packed with

[00:23:27] lore and I will say because I was so fan banged crooked when I started watching this.

[00:23:31] Yeah, how are you with it? I get to the beginning and we get this opening where it's

[00:23:37] 100 something years before Mad King Eris and then Daenerys Targaryen and then it fades out to where

[00:23:44] you see 170 something years before Daenerys Targaryen and I'm like, I don't ever want to

[00:23:52] fucking hear about Daenerys Targaryen again. I was kind of just like, is this going to be a

[00:24:00] cheap like remember, remember Daenerys? Remember what happened in Game of Thrones?

[00:24:06] And it wasn't and really that was the last time that happened and I get why they had to

[00:24:10] sort of appeal to that. So I'm not faulting them and I think it was a good decision in hindsight,

[00:24:17] but boy was I salty when that came on screen. But it really did very quickly become one

[00:24:24] of my favorite shows of the year. I think it was in my top 10 list that year.

[00:24:27] And they kind of had to do that to give us a sense of placement in time to know where we

[00:24:34] were. So if somebody new or mildly knowing the world, whatever fandom you're in and if you have no

[00:24:41] fandom then it didn't matter. It was just like, oh, whatever. And they didn't linger on it so much

[00:24:48] so that new people coming to the property were confused by it. It just was like, whoop,

[00:24:54] it's gone. And here we are with our primary story.

[00:24:58] Yeah. And we're in a really interesting place because people who watch Game of

[00:25:02] Thrones and you might not even remember this and I would encourage you to not go back and

[00:25:05] watch it if you don't want spoilers. But there's a whole scene where Joffrey is talking about the fate

[00:25:11] of Reneara and like completely spoils the whole thing. So be careful, be careful rewatching Game

[00:25:18] of Thrones. Right. And that is a tricky part about this is that this is all quote unquote

[00:25:23] known history, right? If you do any light googling, I think that's another really good

[00:25:27] thing about the show guide. Yes. As well is that if you just go on the internet and you start

[00:25:33] searching, you're going to stumble into all kinds of facts and information. Whereas a show guide

[00:25:40] is very tightly focused on our primary characters and our world based on season one and season

[00:25:46] one only. So you're not going to get accidental spoils, accidentally spoiled.

[00:25:52] Yeah. And so every episode as characters die will move them to the deceased column.

[00:25:57] But like, you're not going to get spoiled on that by googling. So anyway, so I that's a great

[00:26:02] point is things will be live updated in comparison to Google. And you can and you get the information

[00:26:08] without getting spoiled, right? Who is that character? Like what is the twin brothers?

[00:26:12] Like which one is which? Oh man. I finally know that and I'm proud of myself because

[00:26:19] I had to when I made the show guide. Good job. All right. So episode two, Damon has taken

[00:26:25] over Dragon's throne for six months. He recently declared his intention to marry his mistress,

[00:26:30] Missaria. He also steals a dragon egg that was meant for Balan, the king's late son who died as an

[00:26:37] infant. Otto is sent to a dragon stone to parlay but almost causes a battle to break out.

[00:26:43] Reneara arrives on dragon dares Damon to kill her and claim the throne

[00:26:49] and takes the dragon egg back. Meanwhile, Coralus becomes increasingly frustrated with

[00:26:55] Viserys's passivity toward the stepstones. Seeing vulnerability in the crown, he proposes a marriage

[00:27:02] between his daughter, Lena and the king. Viserys instead chooses Allison Hightower

[00:27:07] and Coralus leaves the small council angrily. Later, he meets with Damon and invites him

[00:27:12] to join him in a war effort against the triarchy. Do you remember that

[00:27:23] gut punch in your stomach? You're like, oh they are definitely going to try to take the throne.

[00:27:29] I did read Fire and Blood a while ago. I totally forgot everything in it.

[00:27:33] It's just out of my brain. So I do know the very ending of this but I forgot pretty much

[00:27:38] all of the middle details. Okay. And so when that happened with me, I was like, oh boy,

[00:27:46] is this how the Dance of the Dragon starts? It's not. Right, no. It's not. There's so much more

[00:27:53] to come. I thought that episode two was much, I enjoyed episode two much better and not for

[00:28:03] the one scene. That really weighs episode one down. We got to spend time with our primary characters.

[00:28:12] We got to start to see the setups of where things are going to start to go wrong.

[00:28:19] We get some great tension with Coralus and then the whole thing of his,

[00:28:27] the offer of a betrothal of his daughter. Some comedy in there too.

[00:28:33] Yes, some comedy, just the uncomfortableness of the whole question of what is a marriageable age

[00:28:41] and that kind of stuff. And so yeah, it was just a much more interesting episode.

[00:28:49] And then I was like, ah okay here we go. We've got big mystery. The Cat's Paw is

[00:28:55] definitely all over episode two. We get the setup for the song of Ice and Fire and the connectivity to

[00:29:05] Game of Thrones. And so I just felt like as a opener episode, being in that first

[00:29:12] introductory phase, it did a really, really good job. I think episode one had to be a lot more

[00:29:19] smoke and fury and flash and hey, Game of Thrones is back kind of thing. Episode

[00:29:24] two really got back into the storytelling, which is what I think a lot of people love about this.

[00:29:30] Yeah, we love a good sword fight but we're investing characters first and we really

[00:29:36] got characters in episode two. Well that's the thing is we just got off of Shogun, right?

[00:29:42] Where there was really not a lot of violence at least at a large scale

[00:29:46] and yet it felt like it was action packed. And I think that House of the Dragon

[00:29:51] does a really good job of that part of Game of Thrones.

[00:29:54] Could we slightly, I'm just curious, having done Shogun and podcasted about it

[00:30:03] and really, we all really enjoyed it, compare it. I'm curious as to the comparison. Maybe

[00:30:09] it's still too early to do it. I just thought Shogun was so elegant in its storytelling

[00:30:15] and it didn't need to go to turny nights getting their heads chopped off and all of this kind of stuff.

[00:30:22] And at the same time, the characters were so forward and the storylines were so strong.

[00:30:30] I don't know, it was just such an elegant show. And so I'm really curious to see how it compares

[00:30:35] to... And everybody was, well the showrunners and the writers were, and Shogun were like,

[00:30:41] please don't compare us to Shogun, compare us to Succession or something else, right?

[00:30:45] Yeah.

[00:30:46] Don't do Game of Thrones, House of the Dragon. But yet that's a natural comparison because these are

[00:30:53] big stories like this.

[00:30:54] Yeah. I mean, I see what they're trying to say but yeah, it's...

[00:30:58] I think recency bias, I really like Shogun, but at the same time and I agree with you

[00:31:03] saying there's some level of gratuitous violence inherent in the Song of Ice and Fire

[00:31:09] Universe and that's not... Part of that you can blame on D&D and Game of Thrones.

[00:31:15] But part of it is just George, right? George writes a really violent series.

[00:31:19] It's true.

[00:31:20] A lot of people die in this series and in brutal ways.

[00:31:23] And that's just part of his world. Something that Brandon Sanderson said.

[00:31:26] Brandon Sanderson finished the Wheel of Time books and so people always go to him,

[00:31:30] oh, you're going to finish George's books when he dies.

[00:31:32] And he said, I don't think I can because George and not an insult but George is a

[00:31:38] fundamentally pessimistic writer. That world is pessimistic and I like to write in optimistic

[00:31:44] worlds and the Wheel of Time is an optimistic world. So are Brandon Sanderson's books.

[00:31:48] And so this is a fundamentally pessimistic world. A lot of people die in this world.

[00:31:55] If you're a peasant in this world, you're totally fucked.

[00:31:58] Let's just be honest. You're just totally fucked.

[00:32:00] We're watching the best of the best in this world, the best standard of living

[00:32:05] and they're still dying in childbirth and being forced to have C-sections and living horribly, right?

[00:32:12] Right. Yeah, that's a good point.

[00:32:15] So that's that for the episode Recaps. We'll be right back with Morehouse of the Dragon.

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[00:33:25] Bill. And we're back with Morehouse of the Dragon. So David, you and I have to talk about

[00:33:38] the more specific parts of the episode. Viseris T. As king. I want to talk about

[00:33:45] how good he is of a king or how not good. What do you think overall?

[00:33:49] He is not a great king. I think that the on balance and knowing sort of what we know for

[00:33:57] the season, which I also find exciting to rewatch the season now sort of having forgotten a lot

[00:34:06] of details but also knowing the overall arc and where we're going. And so

[00:34:11] when certain little things happen, we're like, oh, okay. Here's where it begins. Here's where

[00:34:19] things are going to start to unravel or decompose maybe even if that's our,

[00:34:25] if we want to talk about that stuff. And I just have to think Viseris was the wrong choice.

[00:34:32] I really think Rhaenys should have been chosen but as she says,

[00:34:37] you know, the men of this world aren't going to do that.

[00:34:40] They would rather put the realm to the torch than see women on the Iron Throne.

[00:34:44] Exactly. And he's a lot of ways, a lovely man, a caring man, a passionate man,

[00:34:52] very intelligent about a lot of things. And he's just and he's taken up a very difficult

[00:34:58] job and he has a difficult

[00:35:03] relationship with his brother. And I think he on balance doesn't do a good job.

[00:35:12] The realm is a mess. And I think it's an episode two where they do such a good storytelling job of

[00:35:21] creating the conditions for the big mess that results at the end here.

[00:35:28] Yeah.

[00:35:29] You know, as I said before, Patty Constantine's performance, this was a performance of a lifetime.

[00:35:37] Literally.

[00:35:38] This performance blew me away. It was so good to watch his arc and the way that he played

[00:35:45] the character and what he did with him. And I was so impressed by the acting chops of Patty.

[00:35:55] And so that, I love watching this slow decline of this not-so-great king.

[00:36:02] So there's like assessing him in world and then assessing the character from a storytelling and

[00:36:08] the technical acting aspects of it. And that stuff is perfect, so, so good. But as a king,

[00:36:15] yeah, he kind of sucks.

[00:36:17] He does a great job, Patty. Patty does a great job of making you wonder every episode. How is

[00:36:23] this guy still alive?

[00:36:25] Exactly.

[00:36:27] Absolutely. Yeah. So, Renees does a great job of painting the picture in the first episode

[00:36:33] when they're watching the tourney. She says, these boys have never seen war.

[00:36:38] And that's a problem because they think it's glorious.

[00:36:42] Right.

[00:36:43] It reminds me of Nagakato and Shogun, right? Oh, the glory of your first kill.

[00:36:48] Right. Yeah.

[00:36:48] Oh, it's going to be a great death. And that show did dealt with that theme really well.

[00:36:52] And I think that this show will too once we get there. But boy, you know, we've learned at

[00:36:58] the beginning that Jaehaerys, who is the prior king, the one that leaves Viserys the Throne,

[00:37:05] was a really great king. He like pulled the realm all together. He had a big arrow of peace.

[00:37:11] There's a lot of tragedies he's left without an obvious error. That's the problem.

[00:37:16] What's going on with it? It's funny too because in Shogun, here we go. Here we go.

[00:37:20] We're just going to be doing this Shogun.

[00:37:22] Just for episode one probably.

[00:37:24] I think it's going to carry on.

[00:37:26] I'm just glad that we have a full season of coverage before season two to get the Shogun comparisons out.

[00:37:33] Okay, fair enough. And I think it's comparison out of love.

[00:37:38] These are two great things and we can't help but be drawing parallels around them.

[00:37:44] Oh, now I forgot my point. What was the point?

[00:37:46] Don't probably talk about the Tycho.

[00:37:48] What's that?

[00:37:49] You're probably talking about the Tycho.

[00:37:50] Yes. Yes. That's right. With the heirs, all of these problems just come down to

[00:37:54] you know, can fertility questions, right?

[00:37:58] Well, he had sons. They died. That's the problem.

[00:38:02] Oh, that's true.

[00:38:03] Yeah. Yeah. No, that wasn't the issue. It was that he got way too old and then they died.

[00:38:09] Right.

[00:38:10] That's not the issue with Viserys. Viserys is still alive enough.

[00:38:16] I'll say with his health conditions, but alive enough to still sire heirs at this age.

[00:38:23] And it seems like he and Aima were not a very good match biologically probably because of the incest.

[00:38:30] And that is what it is.

[00:38:32] Well, I think just the point being when dealing with feudal societies and lines of succession that

[00:38:41] are in this case, patrilineal, you're going to run into problems. You're just going to run

[00:38:47] into problems. Right.

[00:38:49] And you know, it's not like that we're not having problems of our own when it comes to election

[00:38:54] stuff, but you know, we can clearly see who's the heir of whom is the central crux of whether

[00:39:05] you're a small folk or middle folk or what have you, your lives really depend.

[00:39:10] The middle folk is shrinking.

[00:39:12] That's right. Make the middle folk great again.

[00:39:16] The, your lives are so affected by the fact of who's who at court. And you know, it kind of

[00:39:27] sucks. It does suck, but we're not here to talk about that. We're here to live with the bourgeoisie

[00:39:33] of this world. So other points about Viserys. Yeah. I mean, obviously I think that we

[00:39:40] could all agree, Rhaenys would have been a better ruler. Yes. Could she stop them from killing her

[00:39:45] because she's a female ruler? I think she would have been a really great queen.

[00:39:49] Yeah. Let's like just extracting that whole conundrum out and would she have been a fair

[00:39:57] and wise ruler who would have, you know, brought stability and prosperity to the realm? I mean,

[00:40:03] that's sort of the value judgments that we make about whether a good monarch is a good

[00:40:07] monarch or not. I tend to think that she would have been maybe a tough nut, but I think ultimately

[00:40:16] the realm would have been very stable in her hands. I think she's very fair. I think she is

[00:40:22] really in tune with the vulnerabilities of the crown and really in tune with like make the tough

[00:40:30] decision. I mean, she says to, you know, she seems really pragmatic even when she talks

[00:40:35] to her daughter. She's like, you won't have to bed him until you're 14. Right? Like she tells

[00:40:39] her daughter what she needs to hear. And by the way, that's a whole disgusting situation, but I'm

[00:40:45] just talking facts here about how Rhaenys is. She's very pragmatic. No. And I think that brings

[00:40:51] up a good point about how we're going to address some of these complex topics. I mean, we are

[00:40:55] here where we are now with our values and our moral sensibilities. And we have a reaction

[00:41:02] to the stuff that we see. And we're going to, I think, talk about that stuff. At the same time,

[00:41:06] it's a story and how far we want to get it to the quote unquote realism of the imagined fictional

[00:41:14] world, but it's stuff that we know has had happened. Right? There's real world analog to it.

[00:41:21] I'm going to say, I'm not going to do the ew incest thing on this podcast because guess

[00:41:26] what? That's this whole fucking family. And we're just going to be here all day doing that.

[00:41:30] So obviously, nobody wants incest in the real world. That's what this family is doing, whatever.

[00:41:35] Right. But I will, I think even the show wants us to see how gross it is that Lena is being offered

[00:41:42] to this old man and that Allison's being offered to this old man. It's almost like they show us

[00:41:48] Lena being offered to Viserys to emphasize how gross it is that Allison is being offered

[00:41:54] to Viserys. Right? She's just a couple years older, really. Yeah, that's true. Not much older.

[00:42:03] Yeah. I think she's supposed to be 15. Okay. And then what is Lena 12?

[00:42:10] I think that's right. Yeah. I think 12 is right. Yeah. It's not great. It's not great.

[00:42:15] And yet it is. So if we go back to assessing, oh, what's his name? Of course I blank his name right

[00:42:27] now. Viserys. Sorry. Good thing I had the show guide right here to look at. Viserys on his

[00:42:35] decision making. And I think this is a really interesting point

[00:42:38] is that he had to make a decision with his head when faced with the question of my wife or my child

[00:42:52] or both, right? That horrible conundrum that he was in. Which I don't fault the story for at all

[00:42:59] in terms of having that as a story element plot. Like that's all fine. My problem has been

[00:43:04] with the visual depiction of it. But the fact that he makes this, his heart says,

[00:43:14] I love my wife and I don't want to lose her. But his head is like, I got to have a son for the

[00:43:19] realm, right? That's the really important thing. So then when he is the choice of Lena and Allison,

[00:43:27] he goes with his heart, the human heart in conflict with itself. And he chooses Allison's

[00:43:34] and that just, pardon my French, just fucks everything up.

[00:43:38] That is the... Well, he goes with an organ. Let's just say that.

[00:43:41] No, I think he's hard because I think they actually have a genuine release, even though

[00:43:46] it's gross that Otto has put Allison into that position. I think there is a genuine

[00:43:51] affection between the two that has not manufactured, the circumstances were manufactured.

[00:43:59] And I think it's just an interesting thing that in one part he leads with an intellectual decision

[00:44:07] and then another part he leads with a heart led decision. And neither... They're both sort

[00:44:13] of wrong in the circumstances. And I kind of feel for the Saras, like the guy can't win for trying.

[00:44:24] It doesn't matter what he does. He's just not able to work it out. He's just the wrong guy in the chair.

[00:44:32] Yeah, I think that this show and Game of Thrones is the same thing well, which is

[00:44:36] it does well that it makes you root for people and root against people at different times.

[00:44:42] Totally so good. And Viserys, you look at him in that C-section room and by the way,

[00:44:47] you've now jumped to three different sections of my outline and I've now reordered it for you

[00:44:50] because you threw a live grenade into it. But so Viserys, you're seeing him in that C-section

[00:44:57] room and you're like, man, I fucking hate this guy. He should not be doing this.

[00:45:03] And I do want to talk about would Aima ever have survived that? But let's save that for

[00:45:10] a minute. But then at the same time, you have him grieving and you have him trying to connect with

[00:45:16] Reneira and you have him, I think, trying to keep the realm together. I think he's trying.

[00:45:21] He just doesn't know how. Absolutely. He's trying. There's no question about that.

[00:45:26] It's just also like he's just not the right guy. Well, the thing is like if you're somebody

[00:45:31] like Viserys and you don't and you don't really have the expertise to do this,

[00:45:35] you call on your advisors, but he ignores all his advisors. That's kind of the problem.

[00:45:40] Except for Otto, of course. Otto is a yes man, right? Otto keeps telling him, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:45:48] Everything's good. But he then nudges him at the right moments.

[00:45:54] But he went to Lionel Strong and said, hey, I need some straight up advice. And Strong gives

[00:46:00] him straight up advice. Yeah, no, I'm not saying that Otto always gives him bad advice.

[00:46:07] I'm just saying that Otto will defend very strongly the king's decision. So when Coralus is

[00:46:13] challenging him about the step zones, he's like, hey, that's your motherfucking king over there.

[00:46:19] You don't mess with him. He's not going to the step zones right now, buddy. We can't afford a war.

[00:46:27] Yeah, whether he's a yes man, I don't know. I just kind of, because he's so motivated by

[00:46:32] his own motives. Well, I think he... Now we're jumping. We're really jumping all over your

[00:46:37] outline of the stage. We are. It's all over now. This is a free roll.

[00:46:40] It's a free roll. So Otto plays the part of a yes man.

[00:46:48] He is very agreeable to Viserys at all points. When he goes to him, when I lost my own lady wife.

[00:46:57] Right, yeah. So slimy, so manipulative. Yeah. And that's what I'm saying. And

[00:47:02] that may come back to bite him. I won't allude to it or not. But Otto is very much playing the

[00:47:09] part of a yes man so that when he pushes the king to do something, the king is like, yeah,

[00:47:16] so Otto's always on my side. That sounds like a great idea. But also, does he... Let me ask you

[00:47:21] something. In these two episodes at least, does he ever ask the king to do anything?

[00:47:26] Never. No, right? He leads him to water. I think the only time that he

[00:47:33] kind of forces something directly is going to Dragonstone. Sure, but he doesn't say you have to.

[00:47:41] He just says, well, he stole Balen's egg. Right. But then he puts himself forward and

[00:47:48] says, it'd be better if I went. Yeah. So no, he doesn't ever... And I think that's where the

[00:47:57] character is very good at being the character. Yeah, at being a master manipulator and being

[00:48:03] a very effective hand of the king. The hand of the king is such a... What's that?

[00:48:08] Remember, I said a very leal hand of the king. Remember that whole thing? Everybody was saying

[00:48:13] leal for a long time after it. Right, I know. For a long time after. So, well, let's quickly

[00:48:18] circle back to the birth thing because that's where you had started this segment of the conversation

[00:48:25] before I rudely exploded it. No, no, no. Don't worry about it. That's what we're here for.

[00:48:30] So I also want to make clear to listeners if you're not usually here. We generally do

[00:48:37] scene by scene recaps. The reason that we're not right now is that we're doing two

[00:48:39] episodes at a time catching up to watch season two. Once we get to season two,

[00:48:44] we'll be doing scene by scene recaps again. Yeah. But these are going to be more

[00:48:48] generalized and meta conversations. Well, I like these because they let us...

[00:48:53] Right now, I think this is a good way to prep because we get to dive a little deeper into

[00:48:56] like the motivations and the characterization of everybody. I think it's actually been

[00:49:00] a nice conversation so far. So far. And now we're going to talk about something nuts.

[00:49:04] So, OK. So the birth scene, my wife was six months pregnant when this came out and

[00:49:13] she was scheduled to have a C-section. She knew she was going to have a schedule.

[00:49:19] And she's a fan of the show as well, right?

[00:49:21] She... So, OK. She had the same reaction to me at the end of Game of Thrones.

[00:49:26] OK. And then this is the first episode. So she wasn't sure she was going to come back to

[00:49:30] this. And she found out what happened in it afterwards. And she's like, no, no, no, no,

[00:49:36] no. I'm never watching this show ever. And then episode two I put on and she walked into the

[00:49:41] room and she was like, oh, that seems pretty good. So she's watched from episode two on.

[00:49:46] OK. She said, I will never watch episode one. Fair enough. Never, ever, ever.

[00:49:50] And then the other night I did get her to watch the first half before...

[00:49:52] Before the scene. ...the season. I said, OK, leave now.

[00:49:55] Right. So... Anyway, she was very terrified.

[00:50:00] From... Yeah, that is terrifying. And I get... There's a part of me that understands and appreciates

[00:50:09] what they were trying or what was sort of going forward with this, where they were

[00:50:15] not only setting up the disparity between gender roles in this world, which is a big

[00:50:20] part of the story. And the bed is the woman's battlefield, the womb,

[00:50:27] and the... Versus the men as they intercut the scenes and all that kind of stuff.

[00:50:31] I have no problem with the fact that Viserys comes out, has to make a terrible decision.

[00:50:42] And we lose these two characters. We lose Emma and Balon. That's all fine in the story.

[00:50:51] I just don't know that they needed to be as graphic and gory. And I don't know that they

[00:50:56] needed to be as graphic and gory with the tourney scenes, with the knights as well getting their

[00:51:01] heads split open, which I also found a little confusing. Now, I'm no medieval historian.

[00:51:06] But in attorney, I don't think you're supposed to be intentionally killing people like this.

[00:51:10] Yeah, but then Damon shows up and everyone's like, all right.

[00:51:14] Yeah.

[00:51:15] You know, it just seemed for an episode one of a show that's trying to recalibrate the fandom,

[00:51:23] I just thought it was too much.

[00:51:25] I agree. I think they learned the wrong lessons from what people liked about Game of Thrones with

[00:51:30] that. But then it never happens again that season, right? There's really not the level of extreme

[00:51:36] gore you get in the picture. Never again. So then you're questioning yourself. It's not

[00:51:39] the boys. Yes, that's true. And that's fine. A little bit on the margins is fine. I get it.

[00:51:46] They want to make him a spooky guy. I mean, if you're going to go into the boys territory,

[00:51:52] then stick with it, right? That's that show. The Boys is that kind of graphic.

[00:51:58] So if they never brought that kind of stuff forward again, then I would say by the measure

[00:52:03] of the show in the show's own measure, it was gratuitous and unnecessary.

[00:52:10] Shoken to the exact same thing. I know we keep going back to it, but the boiling

[00:52:14] scene in the first episode, you're very right. That is very why do we need this? And they never

[00:52:19] went back to that level of violence. What is it about these shows where they're like,

[00:52:24] you know, we really need to hook everyone, something that they feel nauseous about.

[00:52:29] Maybe the algorithm knows something that we don't know about ourselves.

[00:52:35] Well, anyway, it was a horrifying scene, but what was cool about it, I will say,

[00:52:41] well, a few things. One is I really appreciate that they interwoven the tourney with Earth.

[00:52:49] Yep. I would have been fine with all that too just without the uber graphic, right?

[00:52:55] But I got the point. I got what they were going for. So yeah, it was. I thought it was effective

[00:53:01] in that regard. Especially because earlier you have Emma saying to Raniera, you know,

[00:53:07] the the birthing bed is our battlefield. That is the war we fight. And we, here we go.

[00:53:14] We saw that in Shogun as well, right? The gender disparities, the disparities,

[00:53:18] the differences between the genders and the gender roles. Yeah. And both are just

[00:53:23] as deadly. We learn true, true. And and how power is wielded. I think that's an interesting question

[00:53:32] by the different genders and how you actually accomplish something, whether it's your will

[00:53:40] or the will of your your legal order or what have you. How you how you operate in the world

[00:53:47] is predetermined with these ways. And so it's interesting to see how men and women

[00:53:53] respond differently in these situations. Yeah. So do you think that Emma could have survived?

[00:54:00] Because I think that's kind of a debatable point that changes the ethics of this a lot.

[00:54:04] It's kind of like the question at the end of The Last of Us, but I don't want to spoil that.

[00:54:07] But yeah, this this whole like, could she have survived because the maester, Melos,

[00:54:13] he says or Melos, he says, hey, King Buddy, one or the other. No, he says

[00:54:20] the king must make a choice whether to save one or lose both. Right. Well, right.

[00:54:26] Right. So what he's saying is either you cut her open and take the baby and the baby survives

[00:54:31] or they both die because his birth is not going to go through. So yeah, I just don't know enough

[00:54:37] about birthing physiology to comment. Well, it sounds like the baby was breached. And if the baby's

[00:54:44] breached, this is a real thing like a ton of women died. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely. The C-section

[00:54:49] was developed. Yeah, it's safely and humanely and with proper medical. And the baby will die too

[00:54:56] because the baby can't get out. Yes, exactly. So I don't know how I don't know how that

[00:55:01] situation like that's where I'm not qualified to speak is I don't know how that the situation

[00:55:06] resolves in either case. It'd be interesting to hear some, you know, I know we have some medical

[00:55:16] folks in our fandom and our listenership if anybody wants to write in and set at least me

[00:55:21] straight. I don't know. You've got more experience with it because you actually had to go through

[00:55:25] that procedure. We didn't. Yeah, no, my wife had two C-sections. So I've seen it happen.

[00:55:30] Right. So yeah, it was, I don't know. Again, I think it's from a storytelling purpose,

[00:55:40] it's perfect. It's a perfect setup for the Saras, right? Yeah, I mean this guy who has a hard time

[00:55:47] making decisions. And then when he should be making a decision with his head, he's making it

[00:55:53] with his heart and vice versa. Like I need an air, I need an air, I need an air. Yeah.

[00:55:57] Well, and also she sets them up for it earlier on. She goes, this is the last time

[00:56:01] the Saras, like I can't do this again. Yeah, for sure. And I mean, not to, well,

[00:56:07] I don't know where we're going to start talking about this, but talking about

[00:56:11] Raniera and her being designated the air at the end of the day. Yeah, let's say that a minute.

[00:56:17] We've jumped around enough. I have some more things to say over here. Please do.

[00:56:23] You know, you look at this whole I need an air thing.

[00:56:30] Raniera clearly feels passed over her whole life.

[00:56:34] You know, she feels like, oh, I could be the air the whole time, but I'm just sitting here

[00:56:39] totally right in my mind. Well, while he goes and tries to get my mom to give him a son.

[00:56:45] And I think the most horrifying thing about this scene is that he takes away Amos agency,

[00:56:54] because if you sit here, right, if you go next to her, if Milo goes next to her and says,

[00:56:58] well, yeah, you're not going to survive this. You're just not. I can try to save the baby now,

[00:57:05] which will kill you, but you're probably not going to survive anyway. What do you want

[00:57:09] to do? I think maybe she says yes. I mean, I don't know her that well,

[00:57:13] but there's a chance she says yes. And if she says no, then that's her choice too.

[00:57:17] And I think that that's the problem is that Viserys completely takes that away by having

[00:57:22] them hold her down forcibly and she's begging him, please no. And you know, we've seen rape,

[00:57:29] we've seen sexual assault in this series, but in this world before I should say,

[00:57:33] because Game of Thrones had a lot of it. This is it feels even worse, doesn't it?

[00:57:40] I think I remember the discussion after this episode surrounded centered around a lot of this

[00:57:51] question of agency. Yeah. And the show addresses that later. And I don't want to,

[00:58:00] we said we were going to be gentle about illusions. Yeah. And I don't remember how

[00:58:02] the show does address this later. Okay. And I don't remember that. So that's good that we

[00:58:06] were not. But yeah, I think this idea of had Viserys asked just a very practical question

[00:58:18] and not been so stuck with this, you know, because he's so he's in a fever dream about the song

[00:58:24] and Ice and Fire making sure that, you know, all of this stuff has passed down and his own legacy

[00:58:29] as well as the larger legacy. Yeah, he's blinded in that moment to and then he loses both right. So

[00:58:41] he ends up like getting the worst outcome of all that. But yeah, had he asked,

[00:58:47] had he asked would have when Balon had survived maybe I don't know, like, you know,

[00:58:52] Oh no, I don't think Balon was Balon was done for speaking with they just couldn't make healthy

[00:58:57] kids. They had one lucky shot with the renera. Right. And after that, the incest was not doing

[00:59:01] them any favors on genetics. Right, right. No, but I agree from our, you know,

[00:59:07] from I think not even from a time displaced moral value standpoint, if he loved her,

[00:59:15] the way that he professed, he would have asked her. Yeah, to say, Hey, you know, this is

[00:59:21] or I have, I'm the king, I've made, I've made a decision and this is what we're going to do.

[00:59:26] And at least told her, but nobody told her anything. They just started strapped, you know,

[00:59:30] I don't want to get into it. How terrifying. I think that I think that combined with the

[00:59:35] the goriness of the shooting, the scene, both of those combined are I think was what I react

[00:59:39] strongly to. Yeah, I mean, even the attorney, the attorney let me it rub me less wrong because

[00:59:48] all of those nights chose to be there and chose to compete for glory. Fair point. She

[00:59:52] didn't choose to be there. She's having another son out of duty. No, she didn't choose to have somebody

[00:59:56] else physically restrain her. Well, that you know, but she that's the problem. I don't even think she

[01:00:03] really chose to be in this childbirth bed at all. Like she sure want to have another child at this

[01:00:08] age, but she was doing her duty. Right. She said this is my duty. Yeah. It was bad. It was

[01:00:14] bad all around bad time. I think we can move on from it. There enough. I do want to talk

[01:00:21] a little bit more about Viserys. He's ignoring the step zones until it's way too late, right? Like

[01:00:26] he's so passive about everything. He's so interested in the comforts of being king. I

[01:00:34] got to have a tourney. I don't even know if I'm having a male heir, but I guess I will just

[01:00:38] have a tourney because it's a great time and all my friends are coming and we're going to have

[01:00:42] you know, we're going to watch the Super Bowl here. I think well, it's trying to separate

[01:00:47] story from practicality or what have you, but Renea has the right of it. She's just like send a dragon.

[01:00:58] You know, but he's does she have the right of it? She does in my opinion. Okay. Okay. I think it's

[01:01:04] I think it's debatable because there is a good point that is made which is

[01:01:09] you know, those are a lot of free cities to start a war with. Like, you know,

[01:01:14] SOS is completely ruled by these free cities and essentially Valeria was like Rome in this world

[01:01:21] right. And Valeria basically ruled this whole continent. And then when it fell, there were all

[01:01:28] these separate countries that propped up that call themselves the free cities. You got three

[01:01:34] countries involved in this. And it sounds like the king doesn't really have a ton in the coffers

[01:01:39] to fund a war. So you really want to do that? That's tough.

[01:01:43] This is I think my point is that

[01:01:49] you have a dragon. It's a show of force. They're challenging you they're challenging your shipping.

[01:01:55] So you have legitimacy to react with force, I think. And you go, yeah, maybe you get some

[01:02:02] people on the ground, you get a little intel like okay, where is the crab feeder guy himself?

[01:02:07] And then you just go and you just burn him and then leave everything else alone, right?

[01:02:10] We're just like, we're not going to stand for this. You can't attack our ships without reprisals.

[01:02:15] We're going to do this one surgical strike and it's over. And if you've got a problem with it,

[01:02:18] come back and talk to us. But we're not going to allow this to go forward.

[01:02:22] Well, Damon had a dragon and it took him three years.

[01:02:24] Well, they're at this point of an entrenched

[01:02:29] battle when the whole tactical situation, well, okay, that's future problem is

[01:02:35] the crab feeder is doing, you know, when we were trying to find Saddam Hussein in Iraq, right?

[01:02:41] Like we couldn't just send in the drones because guess what? He was hiding in caves and whatnot.

[01:02:47] He was hiding in bunkers like people are smart. People who are using guerrilla tactics like this

[01:02:53] are hard to get. Well, I think we should say this with the nuclear warhead. You still got

[01:02:59] to figure out where to hit. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. I think there was earlier on.

[01:03:04] I think there's a way to do that. But that's a later episode. Disagree.

[01:03:09] We could talk about it at that episode. I think is the... No, we're talking about it now. Oh,

[01:03:13] okay. All right, I'm just joking. But anyway, the point is, Viserys, he is, I know everybody

[01:03:18] said I came out swinging on second breakfast this month. Did you see all that conversation?

[01:03:23] Yeah, yeah. Apparently I offended people by saying, skun. Skun.

[01:03:27] Anyway, second breakfast if you haven't, if you don't know is our Patreon exclusive,

[01:03:33] our subscriber exclusive show. We talk about breakfast, food and life. Yeah.

[01:03:38] Anyway, where were we? We got pulled all the way down to the stepstones and we haven't even

[01:03:44] got there in the show yet. One more thing about Viserys, his parenting technique.

[01:03:49] Who is he aloof? He does not know how to talk to Renea. And what breaks my heart

[01:03:55] is that Allison actually does a really good job of pushing them together. She says to both of them

[01:04:00] that you need to make the effort. And then once they're together, Renea says, please,

[01:04:06] it's me to hear you say you're in grief and I'm sorry about earlier. And he just interrupts her.

[01:04:13] He interrupts her and doesn't even let her finish the thought. And that clearly hurts

[01:04:17] her. She tries again to talk and then he's like, oh, you're young. He's just really dismissive

[01:04:22] of her. It's frustrating to watch that scene where they're starting to make some inroads and to repair

[01:04:29] their relationship. And he just trashes it in an instant. I take my three-year-old more seriously

[01:04:37] than he takes Renea. And the other thing that upsets me about his relationship with his daughter

[01:04:46] is, dude, if you're going to set her up to be the heir, start training her, start teaching

[01:04:53] her, start roping her, start listening to her. But he just completely, it's an empty setup and

[01:05:00] it's so frustrating to watch that as a parent, as an active current parent right now to see.

[01:05:06] Yeah, he never prepared her for anything. No, really frustrating, really frustrating.

[01:05:12] All right. So speaking of the 15-year-olds who are living too maturely, Allison,

[01:05:20] with her father Otto, let's just pour one out for Allison. Poor Allison.

[01:05:26] She's going through a rough time. Poor Allison at this stage, but later things change. But anyway,

[01:05:34] that's the future. But that's the point, right? It's like she was really put into the situation.

[01:05:38] She didn't want to be in the situation and she was a really good friend to Renea this

[01:05:43] whole time, right? She's like, hey, you know when I lost my mom, this is what helped me

[01:05:46] feel closer and come here. Don't piss off the septum. Yeah, she's pushing her to be

[01:05:53] closer with her dad. She's really a very good friend. But you could also tell that she's kind

[01:05:59] of a narc in a way that Renea never has been. Well, it's the mom friend. It's the kid who

[01:06:07] is a rule follower and then the kid. It's the mom friend. I don't know the mom friend.

[01:06:11] The mom friend is the one who makes sure that you don't drive drunk and make sure

[01:06:15] that you drink water and make sure that you have a ride home. You know what I mean? This is the mom

[01:06:21] friend. I'm thinking of it in the terms of kids who enjoy challenging, finding the boundaries

[01:06:30] and challenging the boundaries, and then kids who want to find the boundary and then stay with

[01:06:34] inside them and be a rule follower as opposed to a rule challenger. Renea is clearly somebody

[01:06:43] in her younger age who likes to challenge. Yeah. Renea, I'm going to move her up a little bit

[01:06:50] because I think it kind of dovetails well here to compare them. She's charming, but she's really cocky.

[01:06:57] Yep. I will say Millie Alcock does an amazing job of playing her. Remember the hue and cry

[01:07:02] when they switched out when they did the age or they changed the... I'll be honest. I don't

[01:07:08] love the change in actor. I don't think Emma Darcy is quite as good at playing Renea as Millie Alcock

[01:07:14] was, but I also... I was saying this to my wife last night. With what Renea goes through with

[01:07:20] the season, I can see why they chose someone like Emma Darcy who's a lot better at playing serious

[01:07:27] because Renea has to become a more serious person. She gets boiled and baked in a way

[01:07:35] from a person from that crucible standpoint of going through really hard stuff and then

[01:07:41] that tempers you in different ways. Yeah, she's traumatized. Yeah. We don't know how we're going

[01:07:45] to come out on the other side of those things. I think Emma Darcy really knows and understands

[01:07:55] that point of view of carrying that tension in her body and in her face and in the

[01:08:01] tension in her face. So you... I will again have it watched ahead from episode one and two for where

[01:08:07] we are right now, but my recollection from the first watch through was that there was just a palpable

[01:08:16] sense that she is aged and she's carrying burden and stress and trauma and Emma does that well,

[01:08:25] I think. I think she knows how to unlock that in Renea. Yeah, I just... I really like

[01:08:33] Billy Aukrox for Trail because there was always like smugness. Yes, totally. That felt right for

[01:08:41] the character and I'd never got that from Emma Darcy and maybe we'll see that more in season two,

[01:08:46] but I think that part of the character might just be behind us and that's a shame. Well,

[01:08:51] I think it works in the sense of youth into adulthood, right? Yeah, but I kind of want her to

[01:08:57] still have that same fire within her. You know what I mean? I just want that fire. So I'm not going

[01:09:03] to complain about Emma Darcy all season. Don't worry. I'm just lamenting that they recast Renea.

[01:09:11] Yeah, and it was a tough decision because we all loved Billy Aukrox. I think she's...

[01:09:16] I really hope she has a great career. Also, she's not actually 15 guys. She's in her 20s.

[01:09:20] Like the same age Renea is supposed to be. She's only supposed to be 25 by the end of the season.

[01:09:26] That's true. That's a good point. So anyway...

[01:09:30] Or maybe she's supposed to be 28, but still. Not like 40.

[01:09:34] Yeah. I think you've got a note here about her answer to Everything Is Dragons,

[01:09:40] which goes back to what we were talking about with Stepstones. I look forward to recapping

[01:09:45] our conversation about that when we get there. But it makes sense for her being a person who's

[01:09:52] cocky like that with the youth, hey, I'm the daughter of the king. What are you going to

[01:09:57] tell me? And I got a dragon, like double-double, right? It makes sense. The world's a nail

[01:10:04] and she's got a giant hammer. So she wants to use the tools that she has at her disposal.

[01:10:12] Yeah. It makes sense.

[01:10:13] Yeah. I hear what you're saying. I just think that she has a similar syndrome to the

[01:10:20] Turney Knights, right? Where she's never seen a real dragon battle and she's not really prepared

[01:10:27] for one. She's great at riding them, but what happens when a dragon tries to eat you? That's

[01:10:35] a little scarier. Well, and that's what... If you're going to raise kids who are going to be

[01:10:41] the masters of the universe, so to speak, you need to be doing stuff to train them.

[01:10:48] Yeah. And this is another thing that Viserys brings up in his song of us in Fire Talk, which

[01:10:52] I really liked, which was like, we do not control these beasts. We are just here along for the

[01:10:58] ride and you need to be aware of that, dude. And I totally agree with that. And I really

[01:11:04] like that. I really like that they put this in there because it shows that Viserys

[01:11:09] does actually have a self-awareness and he does have some kind of wisdom, even if it's not the

[01:11:15] right wisdom to be king. I think you're right on that. He has some sense, and even with

[01:11:23] when it comes to making decisions about the stepstones, when he comes back around later

[01:11:27] and he says, look, we've got some things going on. We're trying to balance it. We

[01:11:31] don't want to come in too strong, you know, da-da-da. So like just go with me a little

[01:11:35] bit. It's not that he doesn't have a good head to see the things. It's just somehow he doesn't

[01:11:42] have the ability to execute and implement them. He doesn't really have the fire within him,

[01:11:46] right? Yeah. Yeah. He doesn't even want to really be there. He just wants to hang out with

[01:11:49] everybody and have a good time. I know. I know. And but I will say, like he does have a modesty

[01:11:55] about him that keeps him from being like, he's an ineffective king, but he's not an evil king

[01:12:00] because he has that level of modesty. Yes, right. Yeah. He's not a wanton and gratuitous king.

[01:12:07] Right. Another king who really likes partying all day might raise all the taxes on the commoners

[01:12:14] and make sure that everybody's brought to him to be used. But no, this guy is just like,

[01:12:21] I'm going to do the bare minimum with this job. I'm going to coast. I'm on a government salary.

[01:12:26] Got a small council make them do the work. Yeah. Yeah.

[01:12:31] Well, anyway, speaking of small councils, I want to talk about the small council.

[01:12:36] Okay. We've got Coralus Valerian. Yes. Introduced and the Valerians are really cool

[01:12:41] faction because we didn't really see them much. We did see them a little bit in the Game of

[01:12:45] Throne story, but they were just sort of Bannerman to Stannis. Right.

[01:12:52] But they're not like all their glory like they are here. This is like the Valerians in all their glory.

[01:12:59] And Steve to St., I believe, is how to pronounce his last name, who's the actor.

[01:13:05] He's just such a marvelous character and he has that sort of worry, brow,

[01:13:14] sort of forehead. He's always thinking and he's always working,

[01:13:19] but yet he just looks so damn cool and so damn well composed and his hair is beautiful.

[01:13:26] Yeah. He's just an awesome character. I don't know if I'm always

[01:13:30] vibing with him in the sense of being, what's the line in episode two about having to make

[01:13:38] ourselves? We're both second sons. We have to... We'll talk about that. Don't you worry.

[01:13:46] We've got to make... And I think he carries that really well and it's a great character and I think

[01:13:51] it opens up the world really nicely too. Yeah, so the Valerians are super interesting and

[01:14:00] you know, I got to say introducing a second Valerian, by the way, again, George,

[01:14:05] stop making so similar sounding words. Valerian being the heritage and Valerian being the name.

[01:14:11] Anyway, so having a second Valerian house here with blonde hair, the wig budget for this show

[01:14:19] is just off the charts. And they look good too. Yeah, they do.

[01:14:25] You can go wrong with the wig and they do not go wrong. I know. They all look good.

[01:14:31] But yeah, I mean, the Valerians are fascinating to me. What's really interesting though is that

[01:14:35] the Valerians weren't really dragon lords in their own right, even though they are Valerian,

[01:14:42] but the marriage between Renice and Corliss gives Corliss both a fleet and dragons.

[01:14:50] And that's something that he never had or the Valerians never had before.

[01:14:55] And you're going throughout this whole thing like, oh, Viserys is absolutely screwed if

[01:15:00] Corliss decides to turn on him. Yeah, he's very, he's very dangerous, which is the council was

[01:15:06] bringing him in close and keep him close. Right? He is going to be an incredibly useful ally

[01:15:17] in so many ways. He's going to watch your back. He's got the ship strapped. Yeah, all of it.

[01:15:21] It's a real, so when he leaves the council meeting in disgust, that's going to be,

[01:15:30] that really should give you, Otto should have been really worried about that, I think,

[01:15:36] as Hand of the King and sort of being responsible for these kinds of decisions.

[01:15:41] I think it's really short-sighted to, because Otto knew, right? That's why

[01:15:46] Allison was there. Like why was Allison in that small council meeting?

[01:15:51] I think Otto probably knew at that point, because I think that,

[01:15:55] I think Allison knew by then, right? That's the implication is that he had asked her and she agreed.

[01:16:00] That's a, yeah, I don't, I don't write or not. Maybe she's learning about it there and she's

[01:16:05] like, oh man, I've got to pick my fingers more. But then it would,

[01:16:12] it's a question of why she was there, because she wouldn't, why would she normally be,

[01:16:16] unless he said, hey, I want everybody here. Well, they did say they needed a new cup bearer,

[01:16:20] right? Oh, but I guess Renea is still there. Yeah. So I'm sure somebody will know they can write in

[01:16:25] and just know. Yeah. Anyway, where were we? Coraless. So the small council, we did Coraless

[01:16:32] briefly. We're going to talk more about the Valerians a little later when we talk about

[01:16:35] the marriage stuff. Right. But Coraless, you know, very interesting character. Otto

[01:16:42] Hightower is just a schemie mofo. And we've already discussed him a lot, but I think we kind of got

[01:16:47] to the heart of it, right? Like he doesn't ever ask the Saras for anything. And I wonder if he's

[01:16:52] going to be the same way with the future crown holder, the future ruler, right next season.

[01:17:00] Well, great. And this is where the show does a good job of giving us the

[01:17:08] right kinds of Game of Thrones vibes without sticking us into the Game of Thrones world,

[01:17:15] which that he's very much a Taiwan gives us, he's Taiwan, but he's not Taiwan, right?

[01:17:24] See, I don't know if I agree that I think Coraless is closer to Taiwan.

[01:17:28] In this sense that here are two men who see strategically really wide, have they really

[01:17:38] wide strategic vision? But where Taiwan is not above doing pulling dirty tricks and setting

[01:17:47] things up and being very active, having a very active hand in what his schemes are,

[01:17:53] Otto is more, he nudges things and draws little hints.

[01:17:57] Otto has dirty tricks too.

[01:17:59] He does, that's true. We do find out a little later on.

[01:18:01] Later on, he gets real dirty.

[01:18:02] That's true. I forgot about that.

[01:18:03] I mean, once we bring in Mr. Feet, then we are totally into dirty territory.

[01:18:08] This season, it's like, okay, I don't remember everything from episode to episode,

[01:18:13] but there are certain things that we remember.

[01:18:15] Yeah. I mean, I-

[01:18:17] Serians, feet, dragons, crabs.

[01:18:19] I didn't remember a lot of it and then I did the show guide.

[01:18:22] Now I remember it all, but even knowing the main plot points,

[01:18:26] rewatching this is so nice because it's so rich with different little moments that

[01:18:31] aren't necessarily in a recap. So anyway-

[01:18:35] I think we can all agree that Otto is just gross though, right?

[01:18:38] He's a villain. Absolutely a villain.

[01:18:40] No matter whose side you're on, I don't think that he's good for anybody.

[01:18:43] Great villain. Very good villain.

[01:18:46] And by the way, do you know he was in Little Nicky?

[01:18:48] I don't know what that is.

[01:18:50] It's the Adam Sandler movie where he's the son of the devil and he wants to inherit the throne.

[01:18:56] Not a big fan.

[01:18:57] You got to look up- okay, so what's his name? Let's go to the show guide.

[01:19:01] You got to look this up. I'm pausing the whole podcast for this.

[01:19:05] Otto Hightower is played by Reese Yfons.

[01:19:07] So Reese Yfons, Little Nicky.

[01:19:11] Get this. Get this.

[01:19:13] I'm going to link. I've been doing this in the background while we've been working.

[01:19:17] I'm linking all of the actors to their IMDb pages.

[01:19:21] Okay, I just want you to see what he looked like in this stupid movie.

[01:19:25] So the link is active now for Reese Yfons.

[01:19:28] Delightful. I'm going to send you- unless you already looked it up.

[01:19:32] For which movie?

[01:19:33] I'm going to send you- I'm just going to send you the image in Discord because

[01:19:36] you got to see- and I hope that you'll look up Little Nicky, Reese Yfons

[01:19:41] if you're listening here.

[01:19:43] He looked absolutely ridiculous. He was this blonde, demonic guy and-

[01:19:50] So funny. So funny.

[01:19:53] And I didn't recognize him at all and then finally-

[01:19:55] He doesn't look- no, there's no- I get no vibe.

[01:19:58] No, but you see it's him.

[01:19:59] This is totally different.

[01:20:01] That's wild. That's good acting.

[01:20:02] That is good acting.

[01:20:03] Yeah. He was a villain in that too.

[01:20:07] Anyway, anyway, he's a really great actor.

[01:20:10] Why is he always disheveled?

[01:20:11] Why is his beard always looking like he hasn't shaded in a week?

[01:20:15] He's always looking a little bit- just a little bit.

[01:20:17] Like he just woke up.

[01:20:18] Like he just got out.

[01:20:19] I kind of think it's similar to Laris, right?

[01:20:21] Like he wants to look pathetic.

[01:20:23] He wants to look a little poor me.

[01:20:25] My wife just died and I'm-

[01:20:27] A little awesome.

[01:20:28] Yeah. Yeah.

[01:20:31] All right, more small counsel.

[01:20:32] I just want to- I'm not going to do everybody on it but major players.

[01:20:35] Lionel Sturrong.

[01:20:36] Pretty balanced and level headed.

[01:20:37] He's like- you know, if you need to ride from the airport, you call Lionel.

[01:20:42] That's a good point.

[01:20:44] But you also get the sense, at least I get the sense and I don't remember

[01:20:48] what else happens with him, but you get the sense that he's also

[01:20:53] not fully on the up and up.

[01:20:55] Like he's got his own things going.

[01:20:57] Yeah, yeah. Totally.

[01:20:58] Okay.

[01:20:59] He's got stuff going on.

[01:21:00] I think he's pretty leal.

[01:21:02] I do totally, but I don't put him above, you know, just creaming a little bit.

[01:21:09] Not enough taking off the top that it's noticeable, but he's got some deals going on.

[01:21:14] That's my opinion.

[01:21:15] All right. Fair enough.

[01:21:18] They all hate Damon, right? Everybody hates Damon.

[01:21:23] It's like everybody loves Raymond.

[01:21:27] That's a good show.

[01:21:28] Everybody hates Damon.

[01:21:29] Get a laugh track going and everything.

[01:21:31] Yep. Yep.

[01:21:34] They keep moving around in different positions.

[01:21:36] I really like that.

[01:21:37] Yeah.

[01:21:38] I really like the aesthetic that they add to the small council,

[01:21:41] like the balls that they have to put the orbs that they have to put down.

[01:21:43] Yeah. What is that? Are you into that?

[01:21:47] I think they added that in the show.

[01:21:48] I don't think that's part of the books at all.

[01:21:50] I don't remember.

[01:21:51] I think it, do they talk about it in the show notes in the,

[01:21:54] like the official material?

[01:21:57] I don't think so, but I'll check.

[01:21:59] But yeah.

[01:22:01] Yeah.

[01:22:02] They do a lot of that stuff too.

[01:22:03] When Reneira is reviewing new nights for the applicants for the open position,

[01:22:12] they have a little thing where they move the little sigil on the little map thing.

[01:22:18] Sure.

[01:22:18] It's all part of that.

[01:22:19] I don't forget about the map table later.

[01:22:21] Yeah.

[01:22:21] Like there's a lot of really cool visuals that they added.

[01:22:23] Right.

[01:22:23] And it's interesting because you're going back in time,

[01:22:26] you're the same universe, the same screen universe even,

[01:22:29] because this is all HBO.

[01:22:31] And they are adding new visual language to things we've already seen.

[01:22:34] Right.

[01:22:35] Which is nice.

[01:22:36] And we want the show to be the show, not,

[01:22:40] it's, we want it to be its own show and not the previous show.

[01:22:46] All right.

[01:22:46] So to Damon, I want to turn.

[01:22:50] What an introduction.

[01:22:52] He's, he comes in, he's speaking Valyrian.

[01:22:55] I don't speak Valyrian.

[01:22:56] I speak pig Valyrian.

[01:22:57] It's, it goes like R dragon, U dragon, okay, dragon.

[01:23:03] Okay.

[01:23:04] I'll take your word for it.

[01:23:05] That's pig Valyrian.

[01:23:07] But yeah.

[01:23:08] I never learned Pig Latin when I was a kid.

[01:23:11] You never learned Pig Latin?

[01:23:13] Not really.

[01:23:13] No.

[01:23:13] My grandpa insisted I learned it.

[01:23:15] Really?

[01:23:16] Yeah.

[01:23:16] He was like, you just got to learn.

[01:23:19] So anyway, so he turns her around and you're just immediately like,

[01:23:25] okay, why is there so much sexual attention with her uncle?

[01:23:28] Yeah.

[01:23:29] Creepy from the get go, right?

[01:23:31] The whole putting on the little necklace and stuff.

[01:23:34] Yeah.

[01:23:34] Was this your first go around with Matt Smith?

[01:23:38] I mean, I've seen Matt Smith in other stuff.

[01:23:40] I like Matt Smith.

[01:23:41] I thought it's a great casting decision.

[01:23:45] Really, really good.

[01:23:46] He's got the, he's got it all to play this part, right?

[01:23:50] And this is a very tricky part to play,

[01:23:53] to being so bravura at the same time of being impotent,

[01:23:57] literally from one extreme to the other.

[01:24:00] The guy is so manic, it's wild.

[01:24:02] So it's kind of like Scott Pilgrim, right?

[01:24:05] So Scott Pilgrim you say, we need to cast somebody

[01:24:09] who can be a complete asshole,

[01:24:11] but the audience will still sympathize with.

[01:24:13] Yes.

[01:24:14] And that's what they did with Michael Sarah.

[01:24:16] Here you have kind of the same thing as like Damon does some evil, evil stuff.

[01:24:21] But at the same time, you're like, oh, this is my guy.

[01:24:25] Right.

[01:24:25] Right.

[01:24:26] But is he going to take me down to the brothel?

[01:24:27] Anyway.

[01:24:30] But yeah, no, he's charming.

[01:24:32] He's charming.

[01:24:32] He has a great relationship with his niece.

[01:24:38] And then of course that night he's just like,

[01:24:41] yeah, let's go kill a bunch of people.

[01:24:43] And of course he is cutting off penises and killing people.

[01:24:49] He's got, it's brutal.

[01:24:50] God, I forgot about that.

[01:24:52] That's another thing from this first episode where it just really...

[01:24:56] I thought that one was funny.

[01:24:58] Shocked the conscious.

[01:24:59] They really did try to shock the conscious.

[01:25:01] Yeah.

[01:25:01] I don't know why they needed to do that, but if that were the limit of it,

[01:25:05] I would have been fine with it.

[01:25:06] I think the other parts were way worse.

[01:25:08] Just it adds all up.

[01:25:10] But then again, they go away from it.

[01:25:11] So anyway, I think they did, at least in episode one,

[01:25:18] they did a really good job of painting the complexity of this character as well.

[01:25:22] That's a lot of work that they had to do.

[01:25:24] And I think Matt Smith did it well,

[01:25:26] and I think the writers did it well at the same time of going,

[01:25:33] God, this guy is really terrible.

[01:25:35] I can't wait to see what he does next.

[01:25:37] And then later on, like, oh yeah, I'm actually rooting for him.

[01:25:41] He feels like such a wild card at this point in the season.

[01:25:44] I think later he feels less like a wild card.

[01:25:47] But early in the season, my God, is he a wild card.

[01:25:52] And yeah, he's scary.

[01:25:54] And the second episode all about him, the rogue prince.

[01:25:57] Right.

[01:25:58] Right.

[01:25:58] And he's the one just causing problems all around.

[01:26:01] Can we just say that the scene on the Dragonstone battlement wall there, that was so good.

[01:26:09] It was.

[01:26:10] Just the whole thing, Otto trying to flex,

[01:26:13] and he would have just had his ass handed to him.

[01:26:16] And then Renea showing up.

[01:26:18] It was just, it was a perfect scene.

[01:26:22] And then even with Damon the way that he tosses the egg back,

[01:26:26] it really just told us everything we needed to know.

[01:26:29] Yep.

[01:26:29] Yep.

[01:26:31] Renea daring him, that was so good.

[01:26:34] Yep.

[01:26:35] And she's like, oh, this is my play.

[01:26:36] This is actually my castle.

[01:26:39] But you know that if Damon weren't attracted to her,

[01:26:43] he probably would have killed her there.

[01:26:45] You think?

[01:26:46] I don't know.

[01:26:47] You think?

[01:26:47] See, that's a question I want to ask you actually.

[01:26:51] I can't tell if he really wants the throne at this point in the season.

[01:26:53] Do you think he does?

[01:26:55] He, it's the idea of the throne.

[01:26:58] It's the idea, it's not even the idea of the throne.

[01:27:00] He must be considered.

[01:27:01] It's the idea of being respected and given his fair due.

[01:27:07] Right.

[01:27:07] Being honored and respected as if he were the king.

[01:27:12] Yeah.

[01:27:13] I could see that.

[01:27:14] Actually ruling like it's, well, here we go, Shogun.

[01:27:18] It's like Ishido.

[01:27:20] He's like, oh, I really want to be the taiko.

[01:27:23] But doing all that and there's a scene in early on in one of the early episodes

[01:27:27] where he's stamping papers, right?

[01:27:29] And he's like, God, this bureaucratic administrative stuff really is a drag.

[01:27:34] They don't want the actual job.

[01:27:35] No, I don't think Damon, I think Damon, if he got the actual job,

[01:27:39] he's good at being the gold cloak, you know, in charge of the gold cloaks.

[01:27:44] Because it's so full of bravado and men being men and, you know, all that kind of stuff.

[01:27:51] But, you know, if he were just bringing the force up

[01:27:53] and then managing them at a steady state for years on in,

[01:27:57] I think he would find it very boring.

[01:27:59] It's exciting for him because it's new and fresh and we're building something up.

[01:28:03] And new is always better.

[01:28:05] Exactly.

[01:28:06] That's the short way of saying that.

[01:28:09] That's how I might write the reference, but yeah, they say new is always better.

[01:28:13] So his friend orders him the newest whiskey they have.

[01:28:16] There you go.

[01:28:18] Anyway, he absolutely has the hots for Renea.

[01:28:23] I already said that.

[01:28:24] But he I think he also has just a love for his brother as much as he hates.

[01:28:28] He does.

[01:28:28] Like I think he does respect and love Viserys.

[01:28:32] I think he would he's very critical of his rule,

[01:28:36] but he also knows his place and does respect his brother.

[01:28:41] He does.

[01:28:42] And I don't know that he would do a good job serving his brother.

[01:28:45] I think if his brother,

[01:28:48] if Viserys would at least even pretend every once in a while to bring him,

[01:28:53] hey, you know, why don't you come over and let's talk about a couple,

[01:28:55] talk through a couple of things or whatever.

[01:28:57] I mean, that's what Damon wants is just acknowledgement.

[01:29:00] Yeah.

[01:29:01] And if and to be taken seriously.

[01:29:03] And so if he takes him seriously 50 percent of the time or 25 percent of the time,

[01:29:08] I think you have a lot less strife in this family.

[01:29:12] It's a vicious cycle.

[01:29:12] And we've all known people like this,

[01:29:14] which is you don't take them seriously because they're not serious,

[01:29:17] but because you're not taking them seriously, they get less serious.

[01:29:20] And it's a bit.

[01:29:20] It's just exactly.

[01:29:22] It just keeps getting worse until you just got to cut your losses.

[01:29:26] Right.

[01:29:28] So great.

[01:29:29] Great for drama though.

[01:29:30] Great for dramatic storytelling.

[01:29:32] Right.

[01:29:32] Right.

[01:29:33] It's fun to watch.

[01:29:33] Yes.

[01:29:34] Second Sons.

[01:29:35] You brought this up before,

[01:29:37] but I'm ready to talk about it now.

[01:29:39] Okay.

[01:29:39] Coralus and the Valerians.

[01:29:43] You know, this idea of the Valerians as the second son house,

[01:29:46] because you got to remember the Targaryens were not high ranking dragon lords.

[01:29:52] They were not high up in Valeria.

[01:29:54] I think I think I could be wrong.

[01:29:56] Somebody could write incorrect me.

[01:29:57] I think the Valerians were technically like higher ranked nobles.

[01:30:01] Interesting.

[01:30:02] Valeria.

[01:30:03] OK.

[01:30:04] And so the Targaryens came over,

[01:30:06] then they were the only ones with dragons.

[01:30:08] Right.

[01:30:08] And then they take over Westeros.

[01:30:10] So now you have the Valerians sitting over here like,

[01:30:12] well, we got these ships, but nobody cares about us.

[01:30:15] Wow.

[01:30:15] Wow.

[01:30:16] Wow.

[01:30:16] And so now they're the second sons, right?

[01:30:19] Now they're the second place Valerians.

[01:30:20] They're kind of forgotten about.

[01:30:22] Right.

[01:30:23] And that's very much he's saying Coralus is pitching that to Daemon as like,

[01:30:27] we are kindred.

[01:30:28] You were the second son you're forgotten about.

[01:30:30] And he has to, I think Coralus has to angle for increasing power.

[01:30:41] Because if he doesn't, if he's not always doing something to increase his relative power,

[01:30:48] the moment he starts to backslide it sort of will come apart.

[01:30:52] I think it's tactic.

[01:30:53] Right.

[01:30:53] Just like so he's always got to be maneuvering themselves into that position.

[01:30:58] Because just for the reasons that you laid out.

[01:31:01] And if they're not leaning into it, then they're going to get swept away.

[01:31:05] Yeah.

[01:31:07] Yeah.

[01:31:09] So I want to talk about the relationship that the throne has with the Valerians in general.

[01:31:16] Mm-hmm.

[01:31:18] Rainies married to Coralus.

[01:31:20] Yeah.

[01:31:21] Is there still bad blood from the Great Council?

[01:31:24] Talk me through your thought here a little bit more.

[01:31:28] Between Viserys and Rainies.

[01:31:29] Oh, sure.

[01:31:30] Sure.

[01:31:31] I think there is.

[01:31:32] I don't think that Rainies is quite let it go.

[01:31:36] I think she's, maybe, I don't know that she's mad at Viserys himself.

[01:31:42] But she's mad at the realm.

[01:31:43] For sure.

[01:31:44] For sure.

[01:31:45] And she's got a chip on her shoulder, let's say.

[01:31:48] She's walking around with a chip on her shoulder.

[01:31:50] Mm-hmm.

[01:31:51] I do have to say that one of the things I really liked about the way that they played Rainies

[01:31:56] and the way that Eva best plays her with their hairstyle, she looks like a dragon.

[01:32:03] She has a...

[01:32:03] She's tough.

[01:32:04] ...dragonic look to her.

[01:32:06] And I just love that.

[01:32:07] I love the way that they styled her hair.

[01:32:10] Yeah.

[01:32:10] Right away, she's just like, do not mess with me.

[01:32:13] Fire eyes, man.

[01:32:15] She's got you.

[01:32:16] I would never mess with her.

[01:32:17] I mean, I don't know.

[01:32:20] I would never...

[01:32:21] She's got high school principal vibes.

[01:32:24] I'm just not messing with her.

[01:32:26] The conversation with Rainies and Raniera, when Raniera is walking away from looking at her

[01:32:37] dad talking to Lena.

[01:32:42] And Raniece is like, let me tell you some real truths about this world.

[01:32:47] I just thought it was such a great conversation and just some great lines of dialogue.

[01:32:51] Mm-hmm.

[01:32:52] Yeah, I agree.

[01:32:53] And they're natural allies yet you can feel the sparkle of resentment and anger between them.

[01:33:02] They're static electricity between them.

[01:33:06] But they should be...

[01:33:08] Raniece should be in Raniera's corner.

[01:33:12] Goddamn it, Martin.

[01:33:13] I keep telling these names.

[01:33:15] Oh, wait till we get to multiple people with the same name.

[01:33:18] That's happening soon within a few episodes.

[01:33:21] Anyway, she should be coaching her, supporting her, propping her up, making way for her,

[01:33:30] pulling stuff together just from a family and sister standpoint.

[01:33:36] But you can feel that the tension between them, just like static electricity when they're in this conversation.

[01:33:44] Yeah.

[01:33:45] Yep.

[01:33:47] The marriage spurn.

[01:33:48] I want to talk about this whole thing.

[01:33:50] My God, Lena.

[01:33:52] It's funny because they really do fool you as the audience because you don't see her right away.

[01:33:58] They're just talking about it like,

[01:34:00] you know, it'd be really great to join our houses.

[01:34:02] It would be a really great, you know, alliance.

[01:34:05] It would heal the wounds of the Great Council.

[01:34:08] Everyone's talking this thing up.

[01:34:10] And all of a sudden somebody says, I don't remember who it was, but somebody goes,

[01:34:14] she's young.

[01:34:16] And then you see her and I remember seeing that shot.

[01:34:20] Shot.

[01:34:21] I see that and I start laughing.

[01:34:23] I'm like, he can't marry her.

[01:34:25] That's a baby.

[01:34:27] And he's so old.

[01:34:31] I just started laughing.

[01:34:32] I was like, there's no way this is going to go through.

[01:34:34] Yeah.

[01:34:35] Yeah.

[01:34:35] You could you could tell from a from one standpoint that yeah,

[01:34:38] it was going to just be weird and awkward.

[01:34:41] And I think it was a great moment and it had a comic moment,

[01:34:45] even though in its grossness, which I think makes it land even better.

[01:34:49] Right?

[01:34:50] You know, you really get the impact of it because like, oh,

[01:34:53] this is kind of funny, but it's really kind of gross at the same time.

[01:34:56] And now it's lodged in your head.

[01:34:58] But you know what's also interesting is later when,

[01:35:02] when Viserys tells us to auto auto says,

[01:35:06] your grace Lord Coralus has overreached.

[01:35:11] Well, that's auto playing auto games, right?

[01:35:15] Right.

[01:35:15] But I'm saying he never asked him to marry Allison.

[01:35:19] He just sent her there to charm him.

[01:35:21] Whereas Coralus is taking the explicit route,

[01:35:25] therefore insulting the king and making him like it's kind of like when you

[01:35:33] should do something and you're going to do it and somebody tells you to do it.

[01:35:37] Mm-hmm.

[01:35:38] Your body just like clenches and you're at least this is what happens to me.

[01:35:42] I'm just like, I don't want to do that anymore.

[01:35:47] I think, well, this is what I was saying before.

[01:35:50] Coralus has to be making plays like this all the time.

[01:35:54] He has to be securing his family's position.

[01:35:56] He's got to be securing his own position.

[01:35:58] And I think it was the, it was, I thought it was pitched well and at the right time.

[01:36:05] It's just unfortunate that their daughter is 12.

[01:36:08] Right?

[01:36:08] That's like a, just a trick of the fates.

[01:36:11] But I don't fault him for making the proposal.

[01:36:16] It's, you know, Otto who's the one who is, he's like, oh wait,

[01:36:19] that's going to mess up my plans.

[01:36:21] So now I have to, I have to yuck the yum here.

[01:36:24] I have to like pour vinegar in this wine.

[01:36:27] With Coralus, you know what you're getting.

[01:36:29] Like he is straightforward.

[01:36:30] He played it straight, right?

[01:36:32] Right.

[01:36:33] And he talked up to the upsides.

[01:36:35] Renees even says like, hey, you're weak right now.

[01:36:38] You've got the stepstones deal.

[01:36:40] You've got dragonstone with Damon.

[01:36:42] You need to show strength here.

[01:36:43] Yeah.

[01:36:45] And this unites the house lines and then we can get the quiz as Haderak and well, I'll be fine.

[01:36:50] Right.

[01:36:51] So I had to throw some dune over there.

[01:36:52] Oh my God, dune over there.

[01:36:54] Over there.

[01:36:54] I want to gloat that I have not made a single token reference this whole podcast.

[01:36:59] Oh, but here I am, making drop in dune all over the place and

[01:37:02] now you're going to give it to me.

[01:37:05] No, no, no.

[01:37:06] No, no, no.

[01:37:07] I'm recording another token podcast later in the week.

[01:37:09] So I got to hold it from that.

[01:37:11] Hold it together.

[01:37:13] Save it for the podcast.

[01:37:14] Just a few more things I want to talk about.

[01:37:15] So the question is, can the crown defend itself without Coralus's fleet?

[01:37:21] Which is a question we may need answered later.

[01:37:24] I don't defend itself to what degree it's they are severely hit.

[01:37:30] From Coralus's fleet.

[01:37:32] Without Coralus, against Coralus's fleet, you're in a certain amount of trouble.

[01:37:39] And without it, yes, you are severely handicapped.

[01:37:43] I just don't know all the threats in the world.

[01:37:45] Right?

[01:37:45] But it's a you need sea power.

[01:37:47] If you're going to be the dominant force, you've got dragons,

[01:37:50] you've got soldiers.

[01:37:52] You definitely need some ships on the water.

[01:37:57] Right.

[01:37:59] And lastly, I want to point out, the Valyrians have dragons now.

[01:38:02] Which is, I think, from my understanding, is a power shift based on this merits to Rhaenys.

[01:38:09] Okay.

[01:38:10] I don't think they had dragons before this.

[01:38:12] Now I'm going to do a little bit more research before our next podcast.

[01:38:14] But I'm pretty sure the Valyrians did not have dragons prior to the merits to Rhaenys.

[01:38:19] Okay.

[01:38:20] That's interesting.

[01:38:21] Because Coralus doesn't have a dragon.

[01:38:23] Rhaenys has a dragon and her children have dragons.

[01:38:26] Okay.

[01:38:27] Well, I'm going to defer to you here on this because you just did the show guide.

[01:38:31] So.

[01:38:32] Yeah.

[01:38:32] Yeah.

[01:38:33] And I also want to just point out, I really love the talk of Vagar in this conversation.

[01:38:41] She's like, do you know where Vagar is?

[01:38:45] And the seraph's like, ah, there's rumors that he's over there or she's over there rather.

[01:38:49] And then that's the end of it for a while.

[01:38:52] Chekhov's dragon.

[01:38:53] Yeah, Chekhov's dragon.

[01:38:55] Yeah.

[01:38:56] We've got, we have the dragon beast theory in the show guide.

[01:38:59] Yeah.

[01:38:59] We've got a few unaccounted four dragons in there.

[01:39:02] That is.

[01:39:02] Some dragons that have been mentioned in the show.

[01:39:04] Okay.

[01:39:05] And that are not claimed yet.

[01:39:08] I'm excited to see where that goes.

[01:39:09] And I know that there's other dragons that haven't even been named in the show.

[01:39:12] I just haven't put them in the show guide because we are keeping it to the show.

[01:39:15] Okay, got it.

[01:39:17] We've got Black, Green, Deceased and No Faction.

[01:39:23] Yeah.

[01:39:23] So No Faction would be.

[01:39:26] Sea smoke.

[01:39:26] You know, you're around but you're not.

[01:39:29] Right.

[01:39:29] You don't have a writer.

[01:39:30] I'm counting for it now.

[01:39:31] Okay.

[01:39:32] Vermithor.

[01:39:34] We did see him last season.

[01:39:36] Right.

[01:39:37] In the last episode.

[01:39:38] So exciting, exciting stuff.

[01:39:42] All right.

[01:39:44] Those are the episodes folks.

[01:39:46] We did it.

[01:39:47] And we're going to do a similar for three and four, right?

[01:39:51] Mm-hmm.

[01:39:52] We'll do it all the way through.

[01:39:53] Two by two.

[01:39:54] Two episodes at a time for the first season.

[01:39:56] And then we will go with scene by scene recap for season two.

[01:39:59] Perfect.

[01:40:01] All right.

[01:40:02] Sounds good.

[01:40:02] I'm excited.

[01:40:03] I'm actually, I might even just go watch episode three right now.

[01:40:08] Me too.

[01:40:10] I actually started it last night and I cheated but it's fine.

[01:40:13] Oh, shame on you.

[01:40:14] All right.

[01:40:15] So H-O-T-D hot D at thelawhounds.com is the feedback.

[01:40:23] We are going to have siloed channels.

[01:40:27] Is that the right way to say it?

[01:40:28] We're going to have a channel for season two discussion.

[01:40:32] And each episode is going to have its own thread on the discord so that those things are

[01:40:38] protected from each other from spoilers.

[01:40:40] So you won't get accidentally spoiled if you're playing catch up.

[01:40:43] But I'm sure we're going to have a vibrant and active conversation going on there.

[01:40:47] So definitely join us.

[01:40:48] And again, if you're interested in supporting the community and supporting all the work that we do

[01:40:55] and the show guide and getting access to the show guide, consider the season's pass on

[01:41:03] Supercast.

[01:41:03] There's a link in the show notes below.

[01:41:06] Or if you just want to subscribe and hang with the crew, join us on Patreon as well.

[01:41:10] You can do that on Supercast as well.

[01:41:12] I'll just say the value is if you subscribe recurring because you get all our podcasts.

[01:41:17] But we're not here to make your decisions for you.

[01:41:22] If you just won House of the Dragon, we got that for you too.

[01:41:24] We're happy to have you no matter how you are listening.

[01:41:30] What else do we want to talk about?

[01:41:31] We talked about the discord.

[01:41:32] We talked about the things, our affiliates, our friends who are podcasting alongside of us.

[01:41:39] Big kudos to Aaron and Chase for finishing their first season of their first podcast,

[01:41:46] Radioactive Ramblings.

[01:41:47] They covered Fallout.

[01:41:48] I was looking at some of the statistics the other day, their downloads.

[01:41:52] They did really well.

[01:41:52] They did.

[01:41:53] I'm really impressed.

[01:41:54] They did?

[01:41:54] So it's all, you know, they did a good job on a show that a lot of people watched.

[01:41:59] So double plots.

[01:42:02] And I think a show too that a lot of people skipped coverage of because it was an unknown quantity.

[01:42:06] And a binge.

[01:42:08] Yeah.

[01:42:09] So that's true.

[01:42:10] They did a great job though.

[01:42:11] And just today, the day that we're recording this rings and rituals, another episode dropped,

[01:42:16] I believe?

[01:42:17] Yesterday.

[01:42:18] Episode four.

[01:42:18] Yesterday.

[01:42:19] That's right.

[01:42:19] That's all right.

[01:42:20] It's out.

[01:42:20] You can listen to it.

[01:42:22] Marilyn Arpaquilla, our favorite Tolkien scholar and her colleague and friend, Dr. Sarah Brown

[01:42:29] of Signum University.

[01:42:31] They are talking about ritual in the world of Tolkien and the and the legendarium.

[01:42:37] And they're using rings and rings of power season one as a sort of lens to examine

[01:42:45] this question of ritual.

[01:42:46] So they're taking all the rituals that we see on screen, pulling them out, discussing them,

[01:42:50] looking at Tolkien's larger legendarium and looking at ritual in our real lives and

[01:42:55] our, you know, Tolkien himself was a man of ritual.

[01:42:59] And so there's a lot of richness there.

[01:43:01] So it's a really fascinating conversation.

[01:43:03] So definitely go check that out.

[01:43:06] Alicia on Walshift Dust, they're covering Beacon 23 season two.

[01:43:11] That's already in progress.

[01:43:13] And she's working on her Star Wars complete timeline project, which is going to be

[01:43:19] launching very soon.

[01:43:21] So we will have yet another podcast in the family that we'll have to make space for

[01:43:26] in these ever expanding affiliate.

[01:43:29] We'll need to do like a whole podcast just to talk about all the podcasts.

[01:43:32] I know.

[01:43:32] My goodness.

[01:43:33] That's how you end up with a weekly what's going on here.

[01:43:36] That's true.

[01:43:38] We may end up there yet.

[01:43:39] Properly Howard Movie Review is running their current season of felonies and fugazies.

[01:43:46] It is hilarious, a lot of fun.

[01:43:49] They have covered a point break and a really, a really interesting movie called

[01:43:54] Shakedown from I think 88.

[01:43:57] And then Tango and Cash was the most recent one.

[01:44:00] And then next up is Pulp Fiction.

[01:44:02] And then after that is Gross Point Blank.

[01:44:05] And we have a whole notion document set up for them as well that you don't have to be

[01:44:11] a patron for.

[01:44:12] But if you go over to their feed and look at the show notes for one of their episodes,

[01:44:17] there'll be a link to the felonies and fugazies season guide.

[01:44:22] And you can see what movies are on the docket.

[01:44:26] And then for us, what else are we doing?

[01:44:29] We've just finished Shogun.

[01:44:31] We're doing Hot D.

[01:44:32] Hot D, indeed.

[01:44:35] I know Alicia and Jean were wanting to talk about X-Men 97.

[01:44:38] That's supposed to be pretty good.

[01:44:40] We had a great one shot on Civil War, the movie Civil War.

[01:44:45] And Marilyn and I at some point are going to get scheduled and we're going to talk

[01:44:48] about Dick Turpin, which was on Apple TV.

[01:44:51] That was a lot of fun.

[01:44:53] You have some Silmarillion stories stuff going on.

[01:44:56] Yeah, if you're a fan of Tolkien, we have T with Tolkien

[01:45:00] coming on to talk about the next chapter, which I think is of the Return of the Noldor,

[01:45:06] which is a very exciting time.

[01:45:07] So we're going to have a great time.

[01:45:10] And yeah, so we're recording that next week.

[01:45:12] So that should be out sometime in the next week.

[01:45:15] Going to do some Doctor Who?

[01:45:16] Is that what the...

[01:45:17] We are going to do some Doctor Who.

[01:45:19] We are.

[01:45:20] I think we'll probably just...

[01:45:21] I haven't even talked about scheduling,

[01:45:22] but we're actually going to talk about that tomorrow.

[01:45:24] So we'll see.

[01:45:25] Okay, cool.

[01:45:26] Yeah, so we are going to do something with Doctor Who.

[01:45:28] I'm not sure the formatting yet.

[01:45:30] Oh, speaking of tomorrow too, we're also recording our season wrap up for Shogun,

[01:45:34] the season wrap.

[01:45:35] And we're going to have Nate Ledbetter on, who's a historian,

[01:45:37] a Japanese historian on.

[01:45:39] So that'll be a really great conversation.

[01:45:41] And we've got the Acolyte coming up on June 5th.

[01:45:43] So we're going to be covering that at the same time.

[01:45:46] Chase and Aaron at Radioactive Fallout are going to be covering the boys,

[01:45:50] and we'll do some crossover pod stuff with them as well.

[01:45:54] And I think that's enough for right now.

[01:45:56] They're doing Invincible too, by the way.

[01:45:58] Oh, fun.

[01:45:59] They're doing a season wrap of Invincible.

[01:46:01] I think the people who are into that stuff have...

[01:46:04] I heard that people enjoyed the Invincible series.

[01:46:07] Yeah, that'll just be out in a few days.

[01:46:08] So they're working on that right now.

[01:46:10] Okay, right on.

[01:46:11] That's great.

[01:46:12] Well, should we give some shout outs?

[01:46:14] Let's do the shout outs.

[01:46:17] Our Discord server boosters.

[01:46:18] You've talked enough.

[01:46:20] Our Discord server boosters.

[01:46:21] Opus and the Machine.

[01:46:22] Narls, Aaron Kaye, Tiller the Thriller, Dork of the Ninjas,

[01:46:26] Dube71.

[01:46:27] Thank you all so much for helping us unlock some new features.

[01:46:30] And our board masters.

[01:46:31] Go ahead.

[01:46:32] About the Discord too.

[01:46:33] We're about to launch into a big reorganization.

[01:46:37] So current Discord users, stay tuned.

[01:46:40] But I think we're going to get things straightened out pretty well.

[01:46:42] Very tight here.

[01:46:43] A tighty here.

[01:46:44] Much tight here.

[01:46:45] All right.

[01:46:46] So our lore masters or our Patreon and Supercast subscribers

[01:46:49] that are our top tier,

[01:46:50] and they get a shout out every single podcast,

[01:46:52] are Samaritan, Mark H. Michael G. Michele, David W.

[01:46:56] Brian P. Nick WSC, Peter OH.

[01:46:59] Bettina W. Adam S. Nancy M.

[01:47:01] Dube71, Brian 8063, Frederick H. Sarah L.

[01:47:06] Garth C. Eric F. Matthew M.

[01:47:08] Sarah M. DJ Miwa, Andre B.

[01:47:11] Kwon Yu, Dead Eye Jedi Bob, Nathan T.

[01:47:14] Alex V. Aaron T. Sub-Zero, Aaron Kaye,

[01:47:18] Dali V. 21, Mothership 61, Narls and Adrian.

[01:47:25] Thank you all so much,

[01:47:26] and thank you to all our patrons and Supercast subscribers.

[01:47:29] And to everyone who listens.

[01:47:30] Thanks for being here.

[01:47:32] All right, David.

[01:47:33] I'll see you on the next episode of House of the Dragon.

[01:47:37] Looking forward to it.

[01:47:49] Hey, listeners. If you've been listening to our show, Chances Are,

[01:48:07] you've heard the wonderful contributions of our favorite Tolkien scholar,

[01:48:11] Marilyn R. Pukila. Marilyn just launched her own podcast on our network called Rings and Rituals.

[01:48:17] Join me and Dr. Sarah Brown on our journey through the Lord of the Rings,

[01:48:20] The Rings of Power, through the Lens of Ritual.

[01:48:23] Episodes drop every other Wednesday on the Rings and Rituals feed linked in the show notes.

[01:48:28] See you there.