House of the Dragon - S01E07-08 - Driftmark & The Lord of the Tides

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[00:01:18] Welcome to the House of the Hounds. We're The Lorehounds, your guides to the dance of the dragons. I'm Jon.

[00:01:23] And I'm David, and this is our coverage for season one, episodes seven and eight titled Driftmark

[00:01:30] and The Lord of the Tides of the HBO Max original series, House of the Dragon.

[00:01:37] Today we'll be giving our hot takes before diving into a deeper discussion of the episodes,

[00:01:41] and then we will take some ravens from our listeners and answer them.

[00:01:44] Please do send us your ravens. We love to hear your thoughts and reactions.

[00:01:49] Send those to hotd at the lorehounds.com, hotd at the lorehounds.com, or head over to our contact page on our website.

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[00:02:05] Just send us a message on the contact form or record us a voicemail like Dork of the Ninjas did today,

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[00:02:15] Support the community on Supercast or Patreon. Join the Discord to have a lovely conversation with everyone,

[00:02:22] or take a listen to our affiliate podcast. You can find links to all of that in the show notes.

[00:02:26] Now we have a new link tree, so you click one link, it takes you everywhere. It's very exciting.

[00:02:31] It's very fancy. Jon, we've spent a lot of time the last few episodes pitching the show guide

[00:02:36] and the season's pass. They are great things. The show guide is an extensive online encyclopedia that

[00:02:43] is spoiler free for season two, where you get like- It's current with the show. Yeah, exactly.

[00:02:50] And the season pass is where you can pay a one-time flat fee, have access to not only the

[00:02:57] show guide, which the patron and some Supercast subscribers already get, but you do a one-time fee,

[00:03:03] you get access to all of our season one pre-coverage or post coverage or recap coverage,

[00:03:09] and all of our season two podcasts. Just $10. You get all that good stuff. You have it forever.

[00:03:16] And free early, all that jazz. Exactly. And that way, if you're not into the,

[00:03:20] I don't want to do another Patreon thing, boom, flat box $10, and you're done for

[00:03:26] all of season one and season two with the auxiliary information. I even got a message today

[00:03:32] from 2kids2dogs on our Discord, and Nancy M., who's one of our lore masters, and she was like,

[00:03:37] oh, I just finished reading this big book on all of the stuff, and I want to write this article.

[00:03:42] I've got a bunch of stuff I want to say. And I was like, boom, yeah, that definitely put something in

[00:03:46] the show guide for that kind of user-generated material. So there's going to be a lot of

[00:03:51] really cool stuff that's available for subscribers this season.

[00:03:54] I'm even updating the show guide right now because there is an insane spelling of deceased

[00:03:59] in one of the guides. See, there you go. Real time. Hot fixes. Hot fixes with your hot takes.

[00:04:06] All right. So enough salesmanship. Enough salesmanship.

[00:04:09] I think that we can move on here. Everywhere you go, someone's trying to convince you to be

[00:04:13] lord of the tides. Nicklin Dining.

[00:04:16] Who knows if you'll be able to take them up on it? Who knows if you'll be able to keep your head

[00:04:20] through those negotiations? It's true. So speaking of these negotiations and whatnot,

[00:04:26] again, we're going to, I think, talk spoilers for the full first season, but nothing beyond that.

[00:04:30] Nothing with the book spoilers or anything like that. What did you think of these episodes, David?

[00:04:36] I think episode seven is probably one of the best episodes of television that I've ever watched.

[00:04:48] And I've watched a lot of television. And that episode, just the tone, the pacing,

[00:04:57] the construction. Yeah, I know there's some cinematography issues with the darkness and

[00:05:03] you can really see how they were trying to crank it up in post-production when we're on

[00:05:07] the beach and stuff. But just what that episode does to develop all of this tension and animosity

[00:05:16] and friction and character complexities. I was just enraptured. I was on the edge of my, well,

[00:05:28] I don't know. I was on the edge of my seat. I was in bed watching on my laptop, but I was just

[00:05:34] gripped and completely focused. I didn't think about my phone. I didn't think about second screen.

[00:05:39] Nothing. I was just in the story the entire time. Nice.

[00:05:45] It's just really phenomenal. And I enjoyed how it made me start to think about the overall

[00:05:54] arc of season one, how they constructed it. And I find it really interesting the way that we've,

[00:06:02] we just did a natural progression, one and two, three and four, five and six, right? Just to

[00:06:07] divvy it up evenly in a preseason. But they all really work together as a brace of episodes for

[00:06:14] each one. And then that made me think, God, how did they do that? Because seven and eight really go

[00:06:19] together. Nine and 10 really go together, right? They created some intentionally or unintentionally

[00:06:26] some sort of internal harmonics with the episodes so that they just resonate with each other. It's

[00:06:34] sympathetic vibration, right? You ding this one over here and then they all ring through.

[00:06:39] And I'm just really impressed at how they built that particular episode and pushed the characters

[00:06:46] and stories. Really exquisite. What'd you think? Enough gushing from me.

[00:06:51] Well, it's funny because I think that I feel the same way about the second episode.

[00:06:55] Number two.

[00:06:56] Because I'm watching it and I... Right, exactly. Episode eight, that has...

[00:06:59] Oh, oh, oh, episode eight, not episode two. Right. Okay.

[00:07:03] We're talking about episodes seven and eight. So the second episode we watched,

[00:07:06] a second copy of The Second Will. If you Ross the Grand Budapest Hotel, you'll get that joke.

[00:07:11] The point is I really liked the episode where the whole legitimacy of Raniere's children

[00:07:19] are questioned. You have this whole thing with Veymond. But really, I think the scene that

[00:07:24] really sold it for me, just God bless Patty Considine.

[00:07:28] Oh man.

[00:07:29] Him coming in...

[00:07:30] Performance.

[00:07:31] Him coming in. I couldn't believe how riveted I was by a man walking slowly across a room.

[00:07:41] Painfully, slowly, ever so painful. Yeah.

[00:07:44] It's moving. It's so moving. And I couldn't believe how good that was. The dinner scene,

[00:07:52] the side eyeing was just incredible.

[00:07:55] Right.

[00:07:55] Everything felt so believable. Everything felt so tragic in the end.

[00:07:59] Very tragic.

[00:08:00] It felt like everybody wanted... It's almost like if everybody just said their feelings,

[00:08:06] they would all get along. But instead they have to resort to insults and this back talking and

[00:08:14] speaking out of both sides of their mouth. And they only behave in front of Grandpa Viserys.

[00:08:20] It's just a big shame, but they sell it so well. And they also really sell this comedy of errors

[00:08:26] idea of this whole thing. And it's more than the book. The book doesn't have a lot of this stuff,

[00:08:32] but they do this whole thing with Alicent and misunderstanding the prophecy where you're like,

[00:08:38] man, if people would have just spoken more clearly earlier on, this could have all been avoided.

[00:08:45] Right. Told the truth a little bit more.

[00:08:47] Yeah.

[00:08:47] Yeah.

[00:08:48] And they do such a great job of seeding it to you. You have Viserys early in that episode saying,

[00:08:52] I need to set things right. And then so later when he's like, Aegon, she's like, oh, setting

[00:08:59] things right by making Aegon air? Great. It just makes sense. It all makes sense. It's believable.

[00:09:06] It's absolutely believable. And it makes it for such a compelling conflict leading into season two.

[00:09:12] Right. It's interesting because I was catching myself second screening a little bit more in

[00:09:20] nine and I couldn't figure out why. And I still don't know why, because I see everything you're

[00:09:26] saying about nine. I'm nodding my head. I'm like, yeah, that's true. Yeah. Right. But for some

[00:09:32] reason, eight just grabbed me more than nine. And maybe that's just a personal preference thing

[00:09:38] because nine is as packed, it's more packed than eight. It has more resolution and outcome,

[00:09:46] more set up and resolution where eight is really just a constant tension building.

[00:09:53] And there's very little resolution where, or sorry, seven and eight is a lot of resolution

[00:10:00] where there's a lot of outcomes that we get to. So it's interesting, but yeah, really an amazing

[00:10:05] pair of episodes and Paddy Constantine, man, did he ever get nominated for any awards for this?

[00:10:13] Good question. Let's find out. Yeah. So I checked and he did not get any awards or even nominations

[00:10:21] for this season. And it's kind of shocking. He has plenty of other awards. It's just not for this.

[00:10:27] And Matt Smith got nominations, Millie Alcock, a bunch of other people. I don't understand why

[00:10:31] he didn't because to me, he was the standout of this whole season. Completely. And given that

[00:10:38] he's not carrying forward in any future seasons, right? Right. You know why? Okay. Matt Damon did

[00:10:43] a great job. Amazing. I don't think it was a word. Sorry. Who is he? Not in this. How do you like

[00:10:52] dragons? Well, how do you like them? Dragons? Dragons. My brain's a little scrambled today.

[00:10:58] Day. What is his name? Matt Smith. Thank you, God. Matt Smith. It wasn't an award-winning

[00:11:08] performance. It was an amazing performance, a great performance, but I don't think it came.

[00:11:13] It comes near to what Patty Constantine did. Yeah. I think they're different, but yeah,

[00:11:18] Patty Constantine wins it out for me. Millie Alcock, I'll say breakout role. I think she

[00:11:22] deserved a bunch of awards too. Sure. The one person I was going to shout out,

[00:11:28] especially during episode eight was Eve Best. Oh yeah. Yeah. She, there was just some incredible

[00:11:37] scenes with her and the gravity and the control, the outer display of kind of world weariness

[00:11:52] and I've seen this before. And look, I've had my hopes and dreams crushed and I'm fine with that.

[00:11:58] But yet with this inner steel, this inner resolve and a very deadly political player,

[00:12:04] that's a really complex package and she just carries it off without effort. She's a real

[00:12:11] giant of an actor. And she never shows her cards to anyone, even the audience, which is great,

[00:12:17] but not in a boring way. Not in a, I'm not emoting way in a, in a mysterious way,

[00:12:21] in a way that makes me go, I don't know your next move. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Especially with eight

[00:12:27] and the negotiations of, for, before the petitions happen, you're like, huh, which way are you going

[00:12:34] to go? And then she changes up again even during the, the audience hall scene. Yeah, she does.

[00:12:44] She does. Although did she even change? Because the question is, did she come there to advocate

[00:12:49] for Raniera or not? Well, we'll have to wait until we get to that scene and to talk about it.

[00:12:57] I don't know if she ever actually changed her mind. I think she might've just kept silent long enough

[00:13:01] to make Raniera negotiate against herself. I don't know about that. I don't know. Let's talk

[00:13:05] about it later. Let's talk about it later. All right. Well, why don't we get into the full episode

[00:13:09] then? I will tell you, David, before we go into the full episode, I got a little addicted to hot

[00:13:15] tea over the last week and I did read the entire. I don't know if you want to be admitting that on

[00:13:21] the podcast. You know what I mean? House of the dragon. Yeah. Clip that soundbite. Anyway,

[00:13:29] I read pretty much the whole story in the book. So I will be our book reader for this season.

[00:13:34] I will not spoil anything. All I can say is I am very hype for season two because I think

[00:13:40] most of the big moments are ahead of us. Okay. Which is crazy because this season felt so great.

[00:13:47] And monumental. Yeah. Yeah. But like this whole season was basically the prequel to all the

[00:13:53] big stuff. Right, right, right, right. And I think I remember people talking about that. This was

[00:13:58] just a giant season of table setting, which even though it had monumental stuff going on in it,

[00:14:07] this is this is the amuse bouche to the to the actual meal that's coming to us. Yeah. Agreed.

[00:14:15] Agreed. All right. Let's go into the episode. Episode seven titled Driftmark. We've got Lena

[00:14:21] Valerian has died and the extended royal family has come together to mourn her on Driftmark.

[00:14:28] All of this to just this entire scene, I think it's I was trying to to mark the amount of time.

[00:14:38] But at least 10 to 12 minutes of this episode, there's barely a word spoken. There is some

[00:14:45] dialogue here and there, but it's very in a plot way. It's very mechanical. It's just kind of

[00:14:52] getting certain people and it would be weird for somebody to not to say something to somebody else

[00:14:56] in this right. But most of the beginning of this episode is without dialogue. And that is

[00:15:05] incredible. And you just feel every side. You feel every positioning like I'm on this side of the

[00:15:12] room looking over there and I'm clocking that person talking to this person. And now I'm over

[00:15:17] here and then this person's looking at me and now I'm like side eyeing them back. It was just

[00:15:22] absolutely a master class in filming and editing. Yeah, it's a little bit dark, whatever.

[00:15:32] The way that the characters are expressed. And I think that's why I was so high on this episode

[00:15:37] is this first 10 minutes or so. Do you know, I was trying to search on the discourse of what it was,

[00:15:44] what people were saying about this episode, the visuals when it came from back when?

[00:15:48] Yeah, yeah. When it came out and the max help line, the HBO help line at the time had to tweet

[00:15:55] out, Hey there, we appreciate you reaching out about a night scene in house of the dragon. Episode

[00:16:00] seven appearing dark on your screen. The dim lighting of this scene was an intentional creative

[00:16:04] decision. Thanks. That's hilarious. They had enough people reaching out. Like I think something's

[00:16:09] broken with your streamer. Right? Right. That's great. And I do think I, this is several levels

[00:16:15] too dark for me. And there's some bizarre stuff like, because you know, they shot this in the day

[00:16:22] and use lenses. And so you have people squinting at the sun, but it's nighttime in the show. It's,

[00:16:28] I just think it was a really weird decision. They just should have done a few night shoots.

[00:16:32] Right. I don't understand why they did that. They did it this way because it's not like they got

[00:16:35] a clearer picture with the, with the lighting. Right now I'm going to make this a big complaint.

[00:16:40] This is a big complaint about this episode for me because it really does. It really does

[00:16:45] reduce my ability to see facial expressions. It makes me a little confused when I see

[00:16:51] a sky that's clearly like clouds and sunny, but it's dimly colored. It's just awful.

[00:16:56] To do that in the old days, they would just slap a bunch of gel on the front.

[00:16:59] Well, we're not in the old days, David. We have 22 at the time.

[00:17:04] We have cameras that are smarter than the computers that they use to land the lunar module,

[00:17:10] you know, back in the early space race days, you know, the cameras are more

[00:17:13] smarter than those computers. So I agree with you. I think, you know,

[00:17:18] who knows what happened with production? It's interesting though, because did you watch,

[00:17:22] did you do a rewatch on a television or on a laptop? I watched on my laptop.

[00:17:27] I did it on an iPad actually. Okay. Interesting. Cause I was on my

[00:17:30] laptop and I was fine. The only time I had problem were, was when, um, Raniera and Damon were,

[00:17:38] um, at the end of the scene where they were in that, whatever that driftwood structure that,

[00:17:43] that, you know, um, Hulk of an old ship or whatever that they were in.

[00:17:47] Well, but even before that it was when they were on the beach talking and I could really see them

[00:17:51] cranking up the exposure on Raniera and it was like, anyway, it wasn't a thing to me.

[00:17:57] I watched it originally when I watched it as it came out on an OLED screen in complete darkness.

[00:18:05] If there was ever a time that this would have worked, it would have been on that.

[00:18:09] And it did not, it did not work for me. So I'm not going to complain about the darkness anymore.

[00:18:13] It's going to be exhausting if I bring it up all night, but I need to say up front,

[00:18:16] that was a stupid decision. They shouldn't do it again.

[00:18:18] Fair enough. All right. Something that breaks my heart in this whole scene

[00:18:24] is Luceris being approached by Corliss. Corliss goes, Oh, you're going to be the,

[00:18:29] the Lord of the tides one day. You're going to be the air to drift Mark.

[00:18:33] And he's like, if I'm Lord of drift Mark, everyone's dead.

[00:18:38] And it's something you don't really consider with being an air, right?

[00:18:42] Raniera wants to be air so badly, but that means that everyone else is dead.

[00:18:48] And it goes to the sensitivity of Luceris and Joffrey that they just have a different

[00:18:59] temperament to them. Where.

[00:19:02] One might say they're strong.

[00:19:04] One might say they're strong. Certainly someone does comment about that a little bit later,

[00:19:11] but that they are different from their uncles and from, from Amond and, and what's his brother's

[00:19:22] name? Amond and Agen.

[00:19:24] Yes. Agen. Thank you. And, and what is it about the essential nature of people and children where

[00:19:32] we just have this tone or a vibe that's just with us? And that's part of where did it come from?

[00:19:39] And how does it evolve over time? That's a lot of thought and debate about that, but the kids are

[00:19:44] just, these are just different sets of kids and Amond and Agen are, they just have a different

[00:19:52] kind of nastiness to them, you know?

[00:19:54] Well, I think quite honestly, what something I would pin it on is

[00:20:00] Amond and Agen did not have a present father. Like their father was sick at times and really

[00:20:06] just kind of aloof. Like he wasn't a great dad to Rhaenyra either. He just kind of, and, and

[00:20:11] Agen also has this thing where he would have been air, but for his dad changing precedent and giving

[00:20:16] it to his sister. Then you have the Valerians who have two dads and a mother who seems to spend a

[00:20:24] lot of time with them, right? Like she clearly has a good relationship with them. Right. Yeah.

[00:20:29] Yeah. And then they're going to have a stepdad and that's so different from, you know, the kids

[00:20:34] who just have like, imagine having Alison as a mom. That sounds fucking terrible. It just,

[00:20:39] it just sounds like you will do anything to escape the rules at that point. You know what I mean?

[00:20:45] Like she probably held them on such a tight leash that she didn't know what to do it that they

[00:20:49] didn't know what to do with themselves. That's why they became such monsters. Yeah. That's interesting,

[00:20:56] but I can't even blame her because she's at least there and Viserys is just fucking off to drink

[00:21:02] wine and pretend to be King. Yeah. So this is where the show, I think does a lot of great work

[00:21:11] in the fact that there's no way I can understand what it would be like to be a

[00:21:20] major noble of the seven kingdoms and of planet toast, right? Like I have no idea what it would

[00:21:27] be like to be that, but I can understand a parent child relationship and I can understand it,

[00:21:33] you know, in all these different permutations and all these different parenting styles and

[00:21:39] forms of communication. It's, I can see the truth of the relationships regardless of the

[00:21:46] circumstances, the fact that these are, you know, noble houses with long lineages.

[00:21:52] There's a great scene, I think is it an eight where they're at the end of dinner and Rhaenyra

[00:21:59] turns to her kids and she's just like, okay, kids, you know, bedtime, everybody off you go.

[00:22:03] And it's like, wait a minute, these are the princes of the realm and you're literally

[00:22:07] telling him to go to bed. And I was like, as a parent, as a parent with, you know,

[00:22:13] and within groups of other parents and with family who have, you know, are also parents.

[00:22:18] And when we, as a collective adults go, right, it's over everybody time to go.

[00:22:26] That rings so true. And I think that's where this show shines a lot is because it's dealing

[00:22:33] with the essentials of human nature. It's dealing with the essentials of, well, you know,

[00:22:39] I'm born gay and my world says I can't be that. So I've got to live this semi lie

[00:22:48] and not be out about it. And then like my kids are not my biological kids, but I'm their legal,

[00:22:54] like these are all very real situations that we are dealing with today. And I think that's what

[00:23:01] the show carries so much resonance because they're just dealing with people.

[00:23:05] Right. Well, let's move on to another conversation during the, oh, go ahead.

[00:23:10] Yes. I guess, are we still talking about the wake situation here?

[00:23:16] Yeah. Okay.

[00:23:16] I'm going to bring in another element though.

[00:23:19] Okay. Because I did want to say, yeah, there was one thing about when, I guess it was Raina when,

[00:23:24] who is it? When Lucerys walks up to his cousins, Raina and who's the other?

[00:23:32] Bela.

[00:23:33] Is it Bela? Okay. And she takes his hand and there's this like tender moment

[00:23:39] and you can see that there's real genuine affection there. And just watching these

[00:23:44] kids struggling with this pain and this loss and like all of this stuff going on.

[00:23:48] It was another really tender and very human moment.

[00:23:52] Yeah. Yeah. I think the Valerians, you're right. They have a really high EQ compared to their

[00:24:00] uncles. I keep forgetting that they're not cousins, they're uncles.

[00:24:02] Right. Right. I know. I almost made that mistake too.

[00:24:07] So just to bring in another lovely conversation, Viserys extends an olive branch to Damon.

[00:24:13] Damon then extends his olive branch for Rhaenyra.

[00:24:17] I'm trying to remember, say a little bit more about this scene because there's so many

[00:24:22] in this scene. This is when Viserys tells him to come home.

[00:24:28] Yeah. He's like, come on, let's set it aside. Come back.

[00:24:32] Oh, that's right. And he says my home is in Pentos now.

[00:24:34] Yeah. He denies it. And then you've totally missed my second joke or you didn't care.

[00:24:39] Damon extends his olive branch for Rhaenyra.

[00:24:44] I got it now. I was being very serious about the topic and your humor was just

[00:24:51] too subtle for me. Well, well, well.

[00:24:54] It's like the picture of Damon that you have on the show tracker.

[00:25:01] Oh yeah. The show tracker. You just saw that?

[00:25:06] No, I saw it a while ago, but I just thought it was a good point to bring it up now because

[00:25:10] of your subtle humor. There's a few little jokes hidden in the show tracker.

[00:25:18] Yes, as you will. As you are wont to.

[00:25:21] If you click on the picture of Vaman Valerian, you'll see the cover photo is him with his head

[00:25:25] half chopped off. Yeah. It's pretty funny.

[00:25:29] Anyway, a lot of fun stuff like that. I think I put one of Kristen Cole's other aliases as

[00:25:36] Crispin too. There's some fun times in there. Anyway, point is Viserys is trying to get Damon

[00:25:42] back in court and Damon's like, no, no, no, no, no. But then of course, guess who lures him in?

[00:25:47] Rhaenyra. What do you think about them getting together? Finally? I need you, uncle. What a

[00:25:53] weird thing to propose marriage to your uncle by calling him uncle. I mean, the whole thing's weird,

[00:25:59] but she's like, come on, I need you, uncle. What? Yep. But you know, that's what they're doing.

[00:26:07] And it seems to be the one relationship that she has that works in all aspects.

[00:26:14] You know, they have respect for each other. They can trust each other implicitly.

[00:26:20] There's some chemistry. There's some physical attraction between them, obviously.

[00:26:25] Well, for now, as of this episode, I guess she can trust him. But remember,

[00:26:31] there's some stuff in episode 10. I do not remember. That makes you go, don't spoil me.

[00:26:35] That's fine. That's fine. I don't want to praise Damon to the high heavens here.

[00:26:40] No, no, no. But certainly up until whatever that point is, which I can't remember. The only thing

[00:26:45] I can really remember about the 10 is the big dramatic scene at the Sept and then like the

[00:26:51] twins. I just remember the two Kingsguard twins. Everybody was like, that was like a really big

[00:26:57] point of conversation throughout the last two episodes. Yeah. I only have them separated

[00:27:03] because I did the show guide. Like, that's it. That's it. So let's go on to Rainese and Corliss.

[00:27:13] They have a frank conversation. Rainese suggests that they pass Driftmark's title through Lena's

[00:27:18] line to Bela due to the lack of Valyrian blood in Lucerys. Corliss emphasizes that history

[00:27:24] remembers names, not blood. And I just want to say. Yes, this is one of your big lines.

[00:27:29] Steve Toussaint, I think that's how you say his name. He is like such a good speaker. His voice

[00:27:38] is an earworm for me. He has such a great voice. And he's just such a commanding presence and with

[00:27:45] that stock of hair and yeah, he really does. You really do feel like the natural leadership that

[00:27:53] he has and this fire and this drive as a second son to always be striving. And I love, and I

[00:28:01] remember, what was it? A couple of podcasts ago or maybe it was the last one where you were like,

[00:28:06] this is the line. Yeah. This is his whole driving mission. Yeah. And Rainese is like, dude, I'm over

[00:28:18] it. He's like, but I'm trying to be your man. And she's like, no, you're not. I'm over it. It's

[00:28:23] clearly just your ego that's driving this. Cause I do not feel in any way like you're upholding me

[00:28:29] or, or trying to forward my claims. Right. And it was all you buddy. It was very tense moment

[00:28:36] in this very fraught situation all, all in all because they are in a very precarious position.

[00:28:43] You know, as far as much powers they have, it's also very precarious in a lot of ways.

[00:28:48] Yeah. But I, I mean, I see both of their points, right? Like for, I mean, I don't think that

[00:28:56] necessarily by a lot of biological parentage matters much to who you're, who your kids are,

[00:29:02] you know, there's plenty of ways to make a family, but in this world, obviously that matters for

[00:29:07] in terms of inheritance and whatnot. So, and, and really Corliss is keeping the peace by

[00:29:14] not rejecting Lucerius as his grandson. But at the same time, Rainese has a good point.

[00:29:20] This is a great opportunity. He could absolutely just be like, you know, in honor of Lena,

[00:29:24] we want this to pass to Bela and Rayna too many rain.

[00:29:32] Man, I really do need to show guide to keep track of all of these people.

[00:29:36] Yeah. Yeah. But anyway, I, it's, it was the opportunity. That was the moment where you

[00:29:41] could plausibly, you know, with plausible deniability do it without calling into

[00:29:46] question the legitimacy of the Valerian kids, of Lenore's kids.

[00:29:50] Right. There's this point that Luke just hasn't had any experience being in charge of a naval

[00:30:00] fleet. You know, he's just not, you know, why isn't he spending time on drift? Mark? I looked

[00:30:07] at a map after a couple of podcasts ago. You were like, no, they're right next to each other.

[00:30:11] I had no idea that drift mark was right next to Dragonstone. They're like literally across

[00:30:16] a small straight for me. They could like wave to each other. They really Russia and Alaska.

[00:30:21] So why the hell, why the hell is it Luke? I could see drift mark from my porch. All right.

[00:30:28] Why is it Luke there all the time learning what he needs to learn to become, you know, the,

[00:30:35] the, the head of that household. It just boggles my mind. I don't know what they're doing sometimes,

[00:30:42] you know, you, you, there is a lot of responsibility in these kids on these kids

[00:30:47] placed on them. And just like Egon says at one point in eight, I didn't ask for this,

[00:30:52] you know? And it's like, no, you didn't, but this is, this is what you got to deal with.

[00:30:56] Right. Also, can I add Luke is a dragon writer. He absolutely could just fly right over there

[00:31:02] anytime. Exactly. Right. Hey mom, I'm going to go play with my cousins and shipwright stuff,

[00:31:09] you know, and now they're going to be betrothed. So they better be going back and forth.

[00:31:13] Exactly. All right. Amen decides to claim Vigar as his own. When the Valerian see him writing her,

[00:31:20] they get into a physical art altercation. Lucerys slashes Amon's eye, making him permanently blind

[00:31:27] in that eye. In the aftermath, Viserys learns that the cause of the attack was Amon calling

[00:31:32] the Valerians bastards. And the King decrees that any utterance of this lie will cause the owner

[00:31:40] of the lie to lose their tongue. Alicent is unsatisfied with this outcome and attempts to

[00:31:45] take Lucerys's eye. She has stopped by Rhaenyra who she injures. This is just a, an amazing

[00:31:53] culmination of tension and drama all the way from Amon deciding to, you know, uh, screw up his

[00:32:02] courage to go and climb on the back of Vigar. And I have to say it was, it was pretty good.

[00:32:10] They pretty, did a pretty good job with the CGI and the practical effects and everything.

[00:32:14] Mm-hmm. I can't, I don't, I don't understand the dragon rider saddle. Like why aren't you

[00:32:23] strapped in by a whole other, like he's like hanging free. Well, okay. So I know, I know he

[00:32:30] just hopped up and it took off. Yeah. This is a conversation I had with my wife last night when

[00:32:34] we were watching this together. And this, I think the idea is that you're supposed to be strapped in.

[00:32:40] He's just getting on. And then Vigar is like, I'm going, I'm going.

[00:32:45] And you gotta hold on at that point. You cannot let go to try to get a strap on or anything.

[00:32:49] Cause it's a thing that like, you can get really injured if you're not strapped in. And so they,

[00:32:54] they want to be. Yeah. Especially those high G, you know, like a quick turn. Yeah. You get

[00:32:58] slammed around and the show, I got a really good sense of vertigo when Vigar is diving. And I was

[00:33:07] like, Oh man, this is like any kind of roller coaster that I've ever been on in my life.

[00:33:13] This is that time is a hundred. Right? Right. Yeah. And I, um, I do know that in the books,

[00:33:20] they specifically mentioned people being strapped in. Yeah. So they, it is not,

[00:33:25] you're not supposed to be like a game in here, but I will compliment the show that they made me

[00:33:30] root for amen. Cause I didn't know what was going to happen with him. You know, he gets bullied

[00:33:34] about the pig and he doesn't have a dragon and this and that. And it really made me root for

[00:33:39] Vegas for amen to really, you know, claim this dragon and become a dragon rider. I think that

[00:33:44] was something that he needed to do for his development. Of course, later he becomes kind

[00:33:48] of the worst, but it takes a while for him to get there. Yeah. And it takes a lot of courage

[00:33:55] at that age to get on the, is this the biggest dragon in the realm? I think. Right. Yeah. So

[00:34:01] Balearian was bigger, but Balearian's dead. So this is now the biggest dragon alive. It's also

[00:34:05] the last dragon to have seen old Valeria. Right? Right. And I think they do a really great job with

[00:34:10] the CGI, just giving that sense of age and size and, you know, running the running takeoff and

[00:34:17] everything. It was, it was a really great scene. Uh, and then to go from that scale down to

[00:34:24] a group of children fighting in the caves and, you know, it, it didn't feel, even though we

[00:34:33] went down in size, the stakes felt as high as they were when Egon was writing the, the, the dragon.

[00:34:43] Oh yeah. The knives come out. You're it's not great. It's not great. Everyone. Sorry. Did I say

[00:34:49] Egon? I meant, uh, see, Amen is the one who gets, who gets slashed. Yeah. Yeah. Don't worry.

[00:34:55] There's another Egon coming next episode. That's right. So, so going into this smaller scale and

[00:35:03] the stakes are just as high and, um, yeah, it's, it's just intense. And then we roll into this,

[00:35:10] the scene where all these parents and the parents are pissed, right. They're rolling up. They're

[00:35:15] what did you not do to call me the moment, you know, you rousted my child, you know, my use.

[00:35:21] Once you laid hands on my child, if I wasn't, if you didn't tell me within five seconds,

[00:35:26] like this is a problem I have my words for you, uh, let alone for my child and whatever else

[00:35:32] is going on. Um, it, it, it just felt very real, uh, in terms of family school, in terms of a family

[00:35:38] squabble. But also nobody really takes a minute to be like, okay, what happened here until Viserys

[00:35:44] finally puts his foot down. Right. And this was actually for a minute, I'm like, is he actually

[00:35:49] going to do something? It's actually going to resolve a conflict. And of course he goes,

[00:35:52] he doesn't. Okay. The solution is nobody ever talk about this again. Right. Which has always

[00:35:57] been super effective at resolving family conflicts. And what does he like basically make your peace

[00:36:03] and then we don't talk about it. Yeah. We're done. Just to make up. Yeah. Alison is not having it.

[00:36:09] And, uh, I remember when first watching season one and then even now when she grabs the cat's paw

[00:36:19] and that sound of the knife coming out of the scabbard, it was, it's just so distinctive.

[00:36:24] And I felt like in that moment, anything could have happened. And, um, and then the whole thing

[00:36:33] with Kristen Cole stepping up and then the other Kings guards restrain him and the whole thing,

[00:36:38] like you just. Well, Kristen doesn't, Kristen refuses to attack Lucerys. Right. But then at

[00:36:45] some point as he refuses to attack Lucerys, but then when Alison pulls the dagger, he goes in,

[00:36:53] he he's going into defend her and then they grab him. So he's restrained while Alison is,

[00:37:01] you know, menacing, uh, Raniera. Hmm. Yeah. So it's like the point is, is that the whole

[00:37:10] situation is just a pot ready to boil over and it, in one little thing, you know, and it happened,

[00:37:18] right? She, she cut her arm, which seems to have released the tension, um, because something

[00:37:26] actually happened, but I mean, she could have easily stabbed her or anybody else in the,

[00:37:30] in the struggle. And well, I don't know if it relieved the tension, but it embarrassed her

[00:37:35] enough for her to be like, oh fuck. What did I do? Yeah. Right. It's sobered her up. Exactly.

[00:37:42] That's what I mean by the fact that she was like, Oh, whoa, what am I actually doing here? What,

[00:37:46] what am I actually doing here? And of course, because Raniera rubs it in and says, now they

[00:37:50] see you as you are. That was such a juicy line, right? Just dripping. I think that's right though.

[00:37:57] There's a lot of violence in the way that Alison, like Alison does the poor me thing.

[00:38:01] And in a lot of ways she has been really tossed around. Right. I mean, Viserys,

[00:38:07] she was basically groomed to, you know, seduce the King at a very young age. Her friend really

[00:38:13] wasn't very good to her. Her dad is very weird to her and groomy and manipulative.

[00:38:20] And she's just never really had a friend, which is why, you know, Lenore and not Lenore,

[00:38:26] Laris is able to sneak his way in at the end of this episode. Right. Right. But she has a very,

[00:38:36] what's I still can't find the word that I was thinking of the other week.

[00:38:40] Just her, her arrogance is just so it's so much and, and the conversation, well,

[00:38:47] we'll get to it in a minute, I guess with the conversation between her and her dad, her father.

[00:38:53] But yeah, just the, just the, these three scenes together, the dragon riding, the kids fighting,

[00:38:58] and then this family squabble, just so much drama and so much character development and the hurts

[00:39:08] and the, the, the, the insults and the, I can't believe you would have or said,

[00:39:15] you know, that you did this and like, oh my God, it really packs so much gunpowder into the,

[00:39:22] into the keg that is going to explode. Yeah. Yeah. And of course the, the Franz

[00:39:29] Ferdinand incident will happen in, I guess there's two friends for an incident kind of

[00:39:35] it's Viserys dying and then it's something else at the end of the season. Right? Right.

[00:39:41] All right. Let's move on to Lanor. Lanor tells Raniera his lover,

[00:39:45] Carl Corey is going back to the stepstones and Lenore will be recommitting himself to Raniera.

[00:39:51] He laments his sexuality, but Raniera reassures him that he's a good man.

[00:39:56] Damon orchestrates the staged killing of Lenore by Carl Corey,

[00:40:00] allowing the couple to escape to SOS for anonymity.

[00:40:05] There you go. I forgot until the end of the scene or till the end of the episode when

[00:40:11] Lenore is rowing out, I had forgotten that this how it was, how this resolved. So I was delightful.

[00:40:16] I was delighted and surprised. I was like, oh yeah, that's right. You know, happy ever after

[00:40:21] happy. But then the beauty of it is, is that Raniera and Raniese who should be natural allies

[00:40:30] in so many ways have one more, uh, hurt, uh, one more place of, of angst and anger and frustration

[00:40:41] and you know, and suspicious suspicion and all of this stuff between them. Right. That's keeping

[00:40:48] them apart even though they should be, because if those two ever teamed up, damn right. They,

[00:40:54] they, they could take on the entire realm. I mean, they do team up this season.

[00:40:58] Right. I'm, I'm, you know, but I, if they were actually in sympathy,

[00:41:06] in full alignment, okay. Yeah. And, and I really love this Lenore change because,

[00:41:15] you know, this was not in the book. This was something added for the show in the book

[00:41:19] because it's an internal history and it's supposed to be the maestros retelling. They're like, oh yeah.

[00:41:22] So Lenore died under, I think basically under mysterious circumstances, everyone thought

[00:41:27] Damon did it, something like that. Uh, there's no mention of his escape, which means it worked.

[00:41:33] You're right. Right. Like he, the realm thought he died.

[00:41:38] And it's a, it's a great setup. They, uh, and I think this really shows Damon's cunning in these

[00:41:44] kinds of, uh, subs. He's certainly done it enough that he has experienced. He has the experience

[00:41:50] and skill enough to be able to pull something like this off. Right. And of course he puts on

[00:41:54] his murder cloak. Yes. I always loved everyone was talking about his murder cloak in season one.

[00:42:02] Why does he wear the same cloak every time he does something murder?

[00:42:06] Signaling to us and something we didn't, we didn't talk about too was

[00:42:12] not only the scene on the beach with, um, Damon and Raniera and how they edited and cut all of

[00:42:20] that together. But then when they're plotting the scheme and he proposes this idea, when Damon

[00:42:26] proposes this to idea to her, she's like, oh, then they'll fear what else we are potentially

[00:42:36] capable of. And this is like the game of shadows that's playing being played out. Right. And she

[00:42:41] gets it. And Damon's like, and it's kind of a wonder twin powers unite moment where

[00:42:49] they really begin to operate as a couple. And they really that's, this is their first caper.

[00:42:55] This is their first little thing that they pull off as a, as a team and it's effective. And, um,

[00:43:02] and she's willing to suffer or to, to, uh, have to deal with Rani's anger and resentment. That's

[00:43:13] going to occur towards her, but she's like, oh, well that's the game that we're playing.

[00:43:18] And so I'll just have to manage that for what it is. Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's really sad what

[00:43:26] happens in this whole thing because you do see the devastation of both parents here completely,

[00:43:31] right? There's, this is not a victimless crime, even though there's no actual, right. Except for

[00:43:38] there is a death. We, we were glossing over it, but David did straight up murder another guy.

[00:43:44] Just cause he happened to kind of a little bit resemble and I thought he was just like,

[00:43:50] it was down at least. I thought he was like the guard that he was clearing the way for,

[00:43:55] you know, for Carl to get in. But Nope. This was the by random servant, random dude.

[00:44:00] Nobody's going to miss him. Right. It's really weird that Gerald didn't show up for work today.

[00:44:04] Isn't it? The same day. Yeah. Oh, it's silly. It's silly, but it's sad.

[00:44:10] It's been, I think you make a really good point, which is

[00:44:14] Rainier as a parent. So she can sympathize and Renee's is like, or Renee is like,

[00:44:23] that's my last kid. It is rainies by the way before somebody writes in. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:44:27] Uh, um, that's my last kid. Right. And, and if you, if I even suspect that you had a hint of an idea

[00:44:36] of a half of a thought that you were involved F U right. The biggest FU is at you. So it's,

[00:44:44] it's brutal and, and Renee can't ever tell her the truth of, you know, the, the truth of what

[00:44:51] this was. It will forever be a division with her and uh, we'll see how that shakes out. I guess

[00:44:58] I do want to pour one out for laying over Larian because it's a lovely conversation he has with

[00:45:05] Renee, uh, where he's like, you know, I just, I want you to have what you deserve. And, and it

[00:45:11] just feels like we couldn't ever find happiness while we were doing our duty. So I'm going to

[00:45:15] choose duty for you. And Renee is like, you know what? And I love when he goes, you deserve a

[00:45:20] husband because they really do sell that she's going to have him killed, but she's sad about it.

[00:45:24] But of course later that's, that's a subverted. See that you've subverted my expectations.

[00:45:29] The, um, what she says to him is really beautiful when he's like, I, I hate the gods. I curse the

[00:45:35] gods for making me this way. And she's like, I don't, I think that you're a good man. I forgot

[00:45:40] what else she says, but it's, it's just really nice. And it, you get the feeling that, and you

[00:45:45] see this in married couples in the real world, right? Like maybe they fell out of love, but they

[00:45:51] are best friends and they are really, really good friends. And I guess they were never in love.

[00:45:59] These people, although I think she loves him in her own way, but they, they love each other as,

[00:46:03] as best friends. They did not love each other romantically and that's okay, but that doesn't

[00:46:07] make it, it doesn't mean that she didn't care about them at all. Right? Right. Yeah. And they,

[00:46:14] they found a, they found a place where they could, um, be loving with each other and love each other.

[00:46:22] Yeah. In their own ways, even though it's interesting because the hedonism, I guess

[00:46:28] you could argue that it was the hedonism that was their, their downfall in, in this pursuit of

[00:46:34] happiness when they're in the great game, they're in the game of Thrones, right? And you play or you

[00:46:39] die. Uh, and they chose to try to pursue happiness. And that ultimately didn't work out very well. It

[00:46:48] doesn't work out for anyone very well in this, in this set of families. But of course, at the same

[00:46:53] time, you have a gone who's being way worse than Raniera ever was and, and way less honorable

[00:47:02] than Raniera ever was with her virtue or whatever you want to call it. Right. Oh yes. And yet,

[00:47:07] and yet he gets a free pass from Alison. So the, these episodes do also emphasize Alison's

[00:47:13] hypocrisy and the realm's hypocrisy of judging Raniera for having an extramarital affair.

[00:47:18] Meanwhile, Agon, if you'll recall from the last couple episodes has a fighting pit of his own

[00:47:23] bastards. Right. I don't, yes, I think I, doesn't that come, is that next episode? I think it's

[00:47:29] next episode. It's episode nine. So we'll talk about it when we get there, but my God is, is

[00:47:34] Alison a hypocrite? Yeah. And, and she, even before that, she knows that he's a rapist. She knows that

[00:47:39] he's raping servants. Yep. And this isn't the first time, right? Yeah. Right. This is multiple

[00:47:46] incidents and she's yet, she's powerless to change it. And as a parent, she just doesn't

[00:47:54] have the skills. She, she, and, and, you know, I mean, we can examine this from our modern lens.

[00:48:01] Yeah. She wasn't parented. So she's trying to figure out, she has no modeling by which to

[00:48:07] parent her own children. So, and so, so, and a lot of times when you hit that frustration wall,

[00:48:14] it comes out as violence. And when she smacks him in the next episode, right?

[00:48:20] Let's close out the episode. Otto assures Alison that they have a shot at winning. Now,

[00:48:26] Alison laments her poor behavior, but Otto admires her fight. Laris strong offers his services to

[00:48:34] Alison and Alison says there may come a time when I require such a friend, Damon and Raniera,

[00:48:41] Raniera, Damon and Raniera are married in a small ceremony in front of their children.

[00:48:49] So this scene with Otto, the, um, it, I don't want to say that it gave me chills, but it was,

[00:48:59] it was really affecting because the way that, uh, Reese if ends the actor, is that how you

[00:49:08] pronounce his name? He maybe he fawns, but whatever.

[00:49:12] He's so subdued most of the time and he has this sort of weird detached affect, um, for Otto

[00:49:19] Hightower. And he's got more schemes than he has stray beard hair. He's really looking like

[00:49:25] he just woke up from a nap, right? But when he's talking to Alison in the scene, he's enlivened

[00:49:33] and he's, you could, you can feel and see the fire in his eyes. And he's, he's actually emoting

[00:49:40] in a way that we never see him emote. And it's just such a great scene when he has all this

[00:49:47] really fucked up fatherly pride, right? It's like, he's proud of his daughter for all the

[00:49:53] wrong reasons, but damn, is he proud. And, uh, it's, it's yeah, it was a, it's a really

[00:50:01] amazing turn for both of these characters, right? So now that they're going to turn, um,

[00:50:07] their well where she was always sort of sailing a different course to him. Now they're,

[00:50:11] they're on the same track except in episode nine, which we'll see, but we'll get there.

[00:50:17] They do have literally a competition, but yeah, I, I agree with you though. She's much more in

[00:50:24] line with him than she ever was. And I think he's more supportive of her than she, than he ever was.

[00:50:30] I want to ask you, why do you think Laris is so keen to help Alison?

[00:50:36] He likes the cut of her feet. Uh, he, he likes her, her fashion sense with, uh, when it comes

[00:50:43] to shoes, Yikes, uh, Yikes is right. I, you know, it's the second son thing. Didn't we talk about

[00:50:51] this a little bit? Is it last episode or the one before we talked about second sons? Yeah. And he

[00:50:56] really has that second son thing. And however he comes to his perversion, you know, uh, he comes to

[00:51:05] his perversion honestly, I guess, uh, he sees the angles, right? He's he's, he's had to probably

[00:51:13] play a lot of games in his life because he can't do the physical thing. Right. So he's got to

[00:51:18] constantly be working the angles and the relationships and working in the margins.

[00:51:24] And he's got a taste for power where that taste came comes from, you know, who knows, but he sees

[00:51:29] an angle and he's gonna, he's going to play it for all it's worth. To me, I see Laris as someone who

[00:51:38] wants to find the person he can most easily manipulate. And for him, Alison is much easier

[00:51:44] to manipulate than Raniera would be. Sure. Or auto or a lot of people. So yeah, he's, he's able to

[00:51:53] prey on Alison's, um, I don't want to say character flaws is in the right word, but he, you know,

[00:51:59] he's insecurities, right? There you go. That's the way to say it. Yeah. And he's able to make

[00:52:04] her feel like she's trapped in the situation with him, you know, baking her hands dirty with the

[00:52:09] whole hair and all business and whatnot. So then she sees the power that he can offer her and she

[00:52:16] takes advantage of that. Right. Well, I think he has her even more, right? I think the turn to me,

[00:52:22] you know, um, you know, to me, my X-Men. Yeah. Yes. Well, okay. Well, he just watched X-Men.

[00:52:28] I was thinking more palpy and, uh, and, uh, oh, okay. I'm, I'm, I'm in my X-Men move to me,

[00:52:33] my X-Men to me, my high towers. Uh, I think Alison really felt powerless in that situation

[00:52:39] with Raniera and she's like, well, everyone sees me as a monster. Now maybe I'll go ahead and outline

[00:52:45] a little bit with a monster. Yeah, exactly. All right. One last thing I want to touch on the

[00:52:51] Valerian marriage ceremony. This is the first time we've seen that. What'd you think of that?

[00:52:55] I thought that was very cool. I, um, I it'd be interesting to get Maryland's take on just

[00:53:02] that scene. So Maryland, if you're listening to the pod, I would love some ritual, uh, you know,

[00:53:07] some analysis of, of these rituals because it's very not seven kingdoms. This is definitely not

[00:53:14] a marriage ceremony of the seven, right? This is the father and the, you know, the stranger and the

[00:53:19] mother, none, they, none of them were invited. This is old gods. These are old, uh, Valerian

[00:53:25] gods. And it felt very true to what Damon and, and, uh, Raniera are, you know, what they're,

[00:53:36] what they're bringing about with this marriage. It would have been weird if they didn't have this

[00:53:41] more ancient ceremony. Right. Right. For sure. But yeah, the whole thing with the blood and

[00:53:47] the lips, I was like, Oh, don't cut my lip. Yeah. I hate that idea. I just, a lip cut is the worst.

[00:53:53] It's the worst. And I'm sorry, but the palm of your hand is a very sensitive place and to just

[00:53:58] select, you know, no. And that's, it's, it's, that's, that's a thing that the,

[00:54:02] it's a very movie thing. So, but yeah, it was, it was affecting.

[00:54:07] Remember the hangover when Zach Galifianakis does it and everyone's like, what the hell are you

[00:54:11] doing? Uh, no, because we actually had that as a blood brother motif, like from our kid day,

[00:54:20] from my kid days. Oh yeah. I've seen it in plenty of other places, but I, I appreciate that.

[00:54:23] In the hangover. Yeah. All his friends were like, what the hell are you doing? Yeah. That's crazy.

[00:54:28] Don't do that. Uh, okay. Let's take a quick break. When we get back, we'll get back into the episode.

[00:54:36] We'll be right back with more hot tea and we're back with more house of the dragon.

[00:54:49] We're at episode eight now, six years later, a lot of time jumps. Six years later,

[00:54:54] Raniera is pregnant with her third child by Damon. Her father has been getting progressively

[00:54:59] sicker causing Otto and Alison to rule in his stead. The onboarding in these time skips is so

[00:55:07] good, right? It's so good. I immediately know where we are. I immediately understand how the

[00:55:14] power dynamics have shifted. It's impressive. Yeah. Yep. And they don't have, um, you know,

[00:55:22] Mary or John, uh, exposition coming along and going, Oh, Hey, you know, here's this

[00:55:29] completely ridiculous statement that I'm making that I would never say, but I'm, I'm really

[00:55:34] speaking sideways to the camera. They, they don't treat us that way. They, they expect us to be

[00:55:40] sophisticated and to make the assumptions, but they don't try to hide the assumptions that we

[00:55:45] need to make. They put everything on screen so we can easily deduce what we need, what we're supposed

[00:55:50] to. Agreed. Yeah. Corliss Valerian was badly wounded in his battle with the resurgent triarchy

[00:55:58] and the stepstones with his survival in doubt. Vamond goes to King's Landing to petition for

[00:56:04] himself as heir to Driftmark. Vamond, he's such an interesting character. I don't know

[00:56:11] how I emotionally feel about him because there's so much of what he's saying and advocating for.

[00:56:18] Selfish. He's selfish and self-interested. And I think he's very similar to Corliss in

[00:56:25] that he's interested in his own legacy. I think whoever parented these two, I don't know their

[00:56:31] parents' name, but mom and dad Valerian were very into like, be really sure about your legacy.

[00:56:38] That's the most important thing because these two are very obsessed with it.

[00:56:42] But he's able to couch it in such a ways. His delivery is very,

[00:56:50] it does make you really feel the selfishness, but the actual words he's just saying,

[00:56:56] I kind of don't disagree in a lot of ways. When he's talking to Renise earlier on, when he's like,

[00:57:03] look, this is our family, this is our blood, this is, are we really doing this?

[00:57:10] I can't disagree with the intellectual ideas in terms of the man. Yeah. It's like, okay. Yeah.

[00:57:17] This guy is hungry for power. Another second son, right?

[00:57:22] Mm-hmm.

[00:57:23] So.

[00:57:24] Yeah, he is. He is. And I think Viserys even calls him out on it at some point. He's like,

[00:57:30] you're a second son.

[00:57:32] So you have, Tyland Lannister is his father? That's what you have in the show guide here.

[00:57:39] Huh? Where's this?

[00:57:41] Yeah. This is on Veymond.

[00:57:43] In Veymond? We'll delete that because that's wrong.

[00:57:45] Yeah. It says parents, Tyland Lannister. Oops. Real time correction.

[00:57:49] It must've accidentally hit that at some point.

[00:57:52] Yeah. All right. Okay. Delete it.

[00:57:52] Anyway, so delete that one.

[00:57:53] Yeah.

[00:57:54] No, that is not his father, just to be clear. Tyland Lannister is on the council of the

[00:58:01] small council.

[00:58:02] Accidental. Yeah. And he's got no children? That's interesting. Or we don't know.

[00:58:06] Yeah, we don't know. I just, so if you ever see like blank on the children or parents

[00:58:11] or something like that, it's just that it's unknown or they might have none, but it's just.

[00:58:16] Right. We don't have that. And it's not necessarily important except for like super lore.

[00:58:23] Right. So anyway.

[00:58:25] Yeah.

[00:58:27] He's looking for trouble, let's say. I think he's really looking for trouble.

[00:58:32] And I don't know what he thought he was going to get out of later, but I want to get there later.

[00:58:37] Let's get to that.

[00:58:39] Right.

[00:58:40] Raniera arrives at King's Landing to find her father almost unresponsive on Melchor the

[00:58:44] Poppy. She laments the division caused by her being named heir and asks her father if he

[00:58:50] believes in Aegon's dream and if it was true.

[00:58:54] So this dream conversation, this is the crux of the.

[00:58:58] Yes.

[00:58:58] Of the final, I guess, what did you call it? The Franz Ferdinand moment.

[00:59:07] The death of Franz Ferdinand.

[00:59:09] Exactly. That if, you know, in his dream, in this fever state that he is in,

[00:59:17] he triggers Alicent with the wrong, it's the right information at the wrong time to the wrong person.

[00:59:25] Yep.

[00:59:25] Literally the wrong person at the wrong time.

[00:59:29] And yeah, I just loved this scene of Daemon and Raniera confronting Alicent when she comes in.

[00:59:42] You just feel the royalty and this fact, like they didn't get up and bow to their queen or

[00:59:49] anything like that. They're just like, yo, what are you doing to my dad and to my

[00:59:55] brother? You know, it's just, again, another one of those human moments that rings really true

[01:00:01] because this is just siblings dealing with aging parents.

[01:00:08] Yes. And I also think that if Alicent had not been sidetracked,

[01:00:14] then she would have not let them see Viserys without her presence.

[01:00:18] True.

[01:00:19] You know, unsupervised. And that's something that she was probably hoping to avoid.

[01:00:24] All the more reason to have given them a proper greeting befitting their station when they showed

[01:00:29] up because then you could have corralled them where you wanted them to go and manage the

[01:00:34] situation as you wanted to manage it. Instead, you just left them free to do what they want.

[01:00:40] And this is their home as much as it is anybody's. And so of course they're going to go.

[01:00:45] One of the things I was really struck by too in earlier episodes, the Red Keep is just

[01:00:51] bustling with life. There's servants running around, there's petitioners, people in court.

[01:00:56] There's just life. There's life happening under Viserys' kingship. But now with Alicent

[01:01:07] and her move to the Seven and putting up all these different symbols, when Rhaenyra and Daemon are

[01:01:14] walking through the Keep, they're looking around. They're like, where is everybody? This is weird.

[01:01:20] What is that symbol of the Seven doing up there? The Red Keep is now dead under Otto and Alicent's

[01:01:28] hand. And it really, again, a great show don't tell moment in the show.

[01:01:37] It's rough. It's a rough time. And yeah, I think, doesn't Viserys say in an earlier one,

[01:01:46] the Red Keep lost its warmth without Aema? I don't remember that line, but that is a good line.

[01:01:53] And we didn't talk about it, but he does call Alicent Aema last episode.

[01:01:57] So she's on the line. Was it last episode?

[01:01:59] Okay. Yeah. I remember it happened.

[01:02:00] On episode seven. Okay. Yeah. And she's just like, uh.

[01:02:05] Yeah. Yeah.

[01:02:08] But I love how the Lord Commander of the Kingsguard, who I'm going to find the name of

[01:02:14] right now, Lord. Oh God, who is it? It is Harold Westerling. He goes, yeah,

[01:02:22] Queen Alicent is really like he makes sure to say her name for Viserys so that he's not embarrassed

[01:02:29] afterwards. He corrects himself. Anyway, anyway, it's this is all heartbreaking.

[01:02:37] And I just want to talk about Damon pushing forward with everything like you need to go

[01:02:43] reaffirm Lucerys. And Rhaenyra is like, this is my dad, dude. Right. This is sad.

[01:02:49] Oh, right, right. When she's talking to him and he comes up and he's just like, yeah, we got to

[01:02:53] deal with this. And he's not. Yeah. Damon does eventually get the memo once they get to the

[01:02:57] throne room. But man, is he kind of callous at first? Yeah. Well, he's recognizing the late hour,

[01:03:05] right? The urgency of the situation. We don't have a lot of time to diddle about. And I think that's

[01:03:13] hard when there are real world decisions that need to be made. And the child is trying to deal with

[01:03:26] the elderly or dying parents. And they're trapped in the emotion of that, not trapped in the emotion,

[01:03:32] but that's what's happening for them right then. It's like, gosh, my parent is dying.

[01:03:39] The spouse is like, OK, we got to call the lawyer. We got to deal with this and then that.

[01:03:46] Nobody ever wants to do the paperwork. No, it's always a problem. Exactly.

[01:03:52] Allison, of course, is delayed, as we mentioned in greeting Rhaenyra's family when Sir Eric

[01:03:56] informs her that her son Aegon has raped a servant. Allison swears the serving girl Diana to

[01:04:04] silence and gives her gold and moon tea. She then kicks Aegon's ass. Not enough. Not enough

[01:04:13] indeed. This guy, if he were out on the town when Daemon was in charge of the Kingsguard,

[01:04:21] he'd be short a few parts. So this was definitely Eric. That was Eric. Yes, not Eric. Correct. Yes.

[01:04:29] Eric is the one who eventually goes with Rhaenyra. And he's got a darker complexion, I think.

[01:04:35] So think about motivations here. He's the one who learns about the rape.

[01:04:40] Right.

[01:04:41] So that lowers his estimation of Aegon right there and would make him more likely to back Rhaenyra.

[01:04:47] Right.

[01:04:49] Good setup.

[01:04:50] And they're starting to dole this stuff out. Oh, and then was it Caswell greets

[01:04:56] Rhaenyra and Daemon as they come in, right? And you had called that out earlier. He was the one

[01:05:01] who paused on the steps to offer her any support that she might need.

[01:05:07] And he is the one who's going to go down for it later.

[01:05:09] Yeah. So great little things that they're seeding earlier on, which is always fun on a rewatch to go,

[01:05:16] oh, that's where they popped that thing in. Yeah.

[01:05:19] I wonder what we're going to miss next season.

[01:05:21] Well, I guess we're just going to have to keep doing this.

[01:05:24] We're going to have to do our best here.

[01:05:26] So the moon tea thing, boy, that is a great call back to Rhaenyra and her father and Crispin

[01:05:40] Cookies Cole. And just that setup is so good. And the fact that she has to do that for her son,

[01:05:49] like you said, the hypocrisy.

[01:05:51] Yeah. The hypocrisy is almost unbearable because he's like, at least Rhaenyra's

[01:05:58] consenting with everybody, right? Like she's getting consent from everyone.

[01:06:05] The horrific acts of Aegon should obviously have been a disqualifier for him being king. He's not

[01:06:10] fit to do it. He doesn't even want to do it. Why are we doing this? Why are we doing this?

[01:06:16] Because of some silly belief that the firstborn male child has to be the, you know, the lineage.

[01:06:23] Yeah. It really gives me, go ahead. And this idea that Alicent has been seated by her father,

[01:06:30] which is if Rhaenyra takes power, she'll have to cut off all competing claims and therefore

[01:06:35] kill your kids. Which doesn't have to be. Right. And I don't think Rhaenyra would ever do that.

[01:06:40] I don't think so. I don't think she would. I don't think she would have, she would do that.

[01:06:45] She might banish them to some far castle keeper or something like that, but I don't think she would.

[01:06:50] Yeah. I don't think she would have given them places at her court. I really do.

[01:06:54] Well, and she proposed the marriage, right? So.

[01:06:56] Right. Right. Helena could have been queen anyway.

[01:06:59] Yeah. Well, it is what it is, I guess. Rhaenyra accuses Rhaenys of coming to King's Landing

[01:07:09] on her own behalf and offers a marriage alliance to win her support.

[01:07:13] The Lords gather in court to hear the petition of Vaemon Valerian.

[01:07:17] When Rhaenyra begins her response, Viserys enters to sit the throne for the first time in years.

[01:07:24] He reaffirms Lucerys as his heir to Driftmark on the advice of Rhaenys,

[01:07:29] who publicly accepts Rhaenyra's proposal for marriages between their lines.

[01:07:34] Vaemon shouts that Rhaenyra's children are bastards and that she is a whore.

[01:07:40] His delivery was great. It was so good.

[01:07:43] Viserys rises to cut out Vaemon's tongue, but Daemon partially decapitates Vaemon,

[01:07:48] killing him and letting him keep his tongue.

[01:07:50] Dark Sister is sharp.

[01:07:52] It sure is. I do love the line, he can keep his tongue and it's sticking out like venom in Spider-Man.

[01:07:58] Pretty gross. And then what Otto says, sees him or disarm him or something like that and

[01:08:07] Daemon's just like, come on, you fools. Like you may, you know, all of you might get me,

[01:08:13] but a number of you are going to be extremely wounded if not dead. So don't even think it.

[01:08:18] Also, I'm the King's brother. You might want to back off for a minute.

[01:08:21] Exactly. Which is great because-

[01:08:23] And he's future King Consort.

[01:08:25] Further divides, you know, further setting up even more divisions within the King's Guard

[01:08:30] because Harold Westerling versus Kristen Cole versus Eric, you know, like all of this stuff.

[01:08:36] Like when somebody gives you an order, do you recognize the legitimacy of that order?

[01:08:45] You know, based on who gives it to you. So this idea that they're all like conflicted.

[01:08:50] When the King's Guard should be pure and clean and straightforward about

[01:08:55] who they serve, the King, right? So it's great fodder for this crazy succession story.

[01:09:03] So let's talk about this Renee's business because this was something you brought up before.

[01:09:08] Yeah.

[01:09:09] To me, I mean, her priority, I think, was making sure it went to her actual grandkids.

[01:09:17] I guess this was the way she does it, right? Because now it will go to Bela and

[01:09:23] Reyna and their kids, and it'll, there will continue to be Valyrian blood at Driftmark.

[01:09:29] So I think what was interesting was when she, when they leave that conversation,

[01:09:38] she says, I stand alone, right? I don't want to get caught up between the Hightowers

[01:09:46] and the Targaryens. And so, you know, as cool as your offer for marriage is,

[01:09:53] if I'm staring down at Alicent and Otto, I'm not going to win. That's going to,

[01:09:59] I'm going to get caught up in your, you know, in what they're trying to do to you.

[01:10:06] So I'm going to try and stay out of it. But then when Viserys shows up,

[01:10:10] it changes the power dynamic. And so she accepts the marriage proposal in the moment.

[01:10:17] Yep.

[01:10:18] So, and that surprises Rhaenyra. She's like, oh, okay. I guess we're allies now. Even though,

[01:10:27] you know, Rhaenys is not, she doesn't really have a lot of love for Rhaenyra and Daemon,

[01:10:34] given that she thinks that they killed his son, her son.

[01:10:37] Mm-hmm.

[01:10:37] So yeah, just amazing. But yeah, the fact that she changed in that moment because Viserys showed up,

[01:10:43] I think that's really interesting.

[01:10:47] Yes. And this whole situation was really tricky because they do mention at one point that

[01:10:53] Corlys never did the paperwork, right? He never officially named Lucerys as his heir.

[01:10:58] Did you get that stamped in the carbon copies with the notary public stamp?

[01:11:04] The notary public stamp.

[01:11:06] Right, right. It was just known that he wanted Lucerys to be his heir to Driftmark.

[01:11:12] And the only reason that Lucerys would get it instead of Jacerys by default

[01:11:16] would be because Jacerys is supposed to be king. So he's skipping a line.

[01:11:22] Right, right.

[01:11:24] But that's not happening until, I mean, like, I guess it would eventually,

[01:11:29] but it's not happening until Corlys makes that official.

[01:11:33] But those were obviously his wishes. Like, everybody knew this. He was super,

[01:11:36] but he was like, Lucerys, one day this will all be yours.

[01:11:39] Right. In public.

[01:11:40] And he takes him up into the great glass elevator and he shows him all of the Wonka factory.

[01:11:45] And he says, my boy, you've won.

[01:11:49] The golden ticket.

[01:11:50] You've won this really gray island where we have nighttime suns.

[01:11:54] Yep. And yeah, it's that she had to vouch and validate that.

[01:11:59] And then I love that Lucerys is like, well, okay, I guess I've, you know,

[01:12:04] I reaffirm my original decision because y'all obviously were not listening. So.

[01:12:09] Did I stutter? He says.

[01:12:10] Did I stutter?

[01:12:12] The Phantom of the Opera has some bite to him.

[01:12:16] He does. He really does. That mask boy, the whole, and just, yeah,

[01:12:20] like we were saying before his performance of being

[01:12:23] not only older, but crippled by this wasting disease that he has.

[01:12:30] Mm-hmm.

[01:12:31] He, it doesn't, it would be so easy to fail in act, you know, for the actor.

[01:12:40] This is a very hard role for an actor to achieve and he does it.

[01:12:46] It feels flawless. It feels easy for him what he's doing.

[01:12:50] It feels easy for him what he's doing, but it's not in any way, shape or form.

[01:12:56] It's really a masterful performance.

[01:12:59] Absolutely.

[01:13:00] Viserys hosts a feast for his extended family,

[01:13:03] revealing his decomposing face and pleading with the family to unite

[01:13:07] and stop dividing the house of the dragon.

[01:13:09] Rhaenyra toasts Alison and apologizes,

[01:13:12] leading many at the table to exchange similar sentiments.

[01:13:16] I separated out the good from the bad in this outline.

[01:13:18] Okay.

[01:13:18] Because once the kids get involved, it gets ugly fast.

[01:13:26] Yeah.

[01:13:27] And so Viserys' speech, while it hits the first generation pretty well,

[01:13:36] it's the second generation, right?

[01:13:38] The grandkids are just like, whatever old man.

[01:13:42] And you just feel the, but then you look at Rhaenyra or Alison

[01:13:48] and you can see that they're like, yeah, he's right.

[01:13:51] And we really should. And wouldn't it be nice if,

[01:13:55] and then the snot nose kids get involved and blow it all up.

[01:13:59] Yep. Yep.

[01:14:01] Those kids just can't stop arguing, huh?

[01:14:03] No. And it was, do you think it, I mean, Aegon was really egging on Jaehaerys,

[01:14:12] but it was when the pig showed up, when Luke gave the stink eye,

[01:14:19] when the pig showed up. I think that's really when, you know, at Aemond,

[01:14:24] I think that's really when it boils over.

[01:14:29] Yes. I agree with that. And Luke didn't need to do that.

[01:14:33] No, it was too late though. That thing has been in the oven all day, right?

[01:14:37] It's coming.

[01:14:38] But do you, I mean, but I got the sense that Luke or one of the Valyrians said

[01:14:43] to the servants, like put that right in front of Aemond.

[01:14:45] Yeah. Oh, absolutely. They were under orders. They were,

[01:14:48] they knew exactly where, where that was going.

[01:14:51] So it's a funny little gag too. Like if, if it were not for the bad blood,

[01:14:56] if that was just like, Hey, uncle, aha. And then, oh, that's funny.

[01:14:59] And if you, especially cause now he has a dragon, like now he has the dragon

[01:15:02] that everybody wanted. Yeah.

[01:15:05] Guys just insecure. Aemond is just so insecure. And

[01:15:08] the actor for Aemond, now I got to go to my son and figure out who the actor is,

[01:15:14] but the actor for Aemond, who is Ewan Mitchell.

[01:15:19] Yep.

[01:15:20] Has this smirk, this perpetual smirk that just makes you want to punch him in the

[01:15:25] face all the time. He's so good at it. So, so, so good at it. And he's a deadly

[01:15:32] fighter, right? He's, he's not somebody to be trifled with.

[01:15:37] Except when Damon stares him down, which is a great scene. He's just like,

[01:15:42] don't try it kid. I, you, you know, you, you don't, you're tough,

[01:15:47] but you're not that tough. You're not that guy.

[01:15:49] Right? Right. I'm still Damon Targaryen. I'm still the guy who just sliced

[01:15:53] somebody's head open in open court.

[01:15:56] Right. I'm the one who took down the, the crab, the crab feeder.

[01:16:00] Yeah. So, so just one more thing on the good before we dive.

[01:16:04] Sorry, we've already slid into the bad, right? We couldn't help it.

[01:16:06] I really love Raniera's toast. It felt so genuine and they really sold me like

[01:16:13] Alison and, and Raniera really sold me on these were supposed to be best

[01:16:18] friends for life. Yeah. Yeah. And they screwed it up, but you know what?

[01:16:23] Maybe we could get back to something good and it makes you wonder what could

[01:16:26] have been right. Had circumstances been just a little bit different. Had one

[01:16:31] misstep, not stepped, had one miss, not stepped, had one step, not missed.

[01:16:37] If, if she hadn't been in so insistent and getting the kids back to

[01:16:41] Dragonstone, if they just stayed, maybe kept the kids separate, but like, yeah.

[01:16:45] Oh, I think that would have been bad. You think so? Okay. I don't know.

[01:16:48] Because what's going to happen is we'll think about what happens next episode.

[01:16:51] They imprison everybody who's not in their cause and Alison still would have

[01:16:54] gotten first word. But that's after the dragon incident.

[01:16:57] Right. But, but Alison, I don't know what happened to that. I can't remember

[01:17:01] what happens at nine. So I, I get, I don't think we should litigate it.

[01:17:04] What I'm saying is Alison in this episode is the first one to find out that

[01:17:09] this Harris is dead. If Raniera and her kids slept over, they're sleeping and

[01:17:14] also has time to orchestrate everyone getting captured. Yeah. And Alison would

[01:17:19] have gotten that like first word. Yeah. And then she's like, I'm going to get

[01:17:23] And Alison would have gotten that like fake naming of Agon as the air too.

[01:17:30] So I think it would have been even worse for Raniera. I think they would have

[01:17:33] ended the claim before it began. Which is fair given the circumstances,

[01:17:37] cause I didn't have all the circumstances lined up. I was just thinking of like,

[01:17:41] if these two women could just have a moment of peace without auto and without

[01:17:48] Agon and you know, yeah, I hear that. You know, all, if they, if these two could just

[01:17:53] go on a retreat, get a, get a VRBO, go to the Kingswood something, get a few bottles and then

[01:18:00] hash it all out. You know, we could, they could really take control of the situation, but instead

[01:18:06] all the other actors and players are, are spinning it, you know, spinning things out

[01:18:10] of control faster than they can, you know, regain that old trust and love for each other.

[01:18:18] Yeah. It's sad, but I, the problem is this is too little too late.

[01:18:22] Exactly. That's true. That's a very good point.

[01:18:24] And at this point, even if they drank all night and had a great time, Alison goes to the Sarah's

[01:18:30] room here's Oh, Agon, Agon, Agon. And all of a sudden they're separate again because she has

[01:18:36] a goal that's incompatible with being friends with Vernier.

[01:18:38] And Amen, Luke are still going to have their beef no matter what. And yeah, everybody's going to have,

[01:18:44] you know, thoughts about Damon. Yeah. Like nothing else would have changed. So I was just,

[01:18:49] you know, wistfully, you know, hoping that these two could try to do Marvel's what if, but yes,

[01:18:55] exactly. Game of Thrones. What if, Hey, Marvel call us. I would do a, what if Ragar survived

[01:19:02] the, what if Ragar won in the battle with Robert?

[01:19:07] I do. I know enough about that. I don't know if I know that the details of that

[01:19:10] Robert's rebellion and right. And Ragar was the heir to the throne after Aris, the mad King.

[01:19:16] Anyway, anyway, right in, if you want to hear something like that too,

[01:19:20] as the night goes on, the younger Targaryens and Valerians get annoyed with each other.

[01:19:26] Agon disrespects Bela and Jace responds by dancing with Helena, which is after. Yeah.

[01:19:32] After a Viserys goes to bed, Amen toasts his strong nephews inciting a fight.

[01:19:38] Rhaenyra decides to take the kids to Dragonstone and return soon on dragon.

[01:19:45] What a great little, the strong, Oh, my strong nephews.

[01:19:51] So I'm complimenting that. And then dancing with Helena. That was a really good. And they were

[01:19:58] actually really having a fun time. Like I've kind of got a vibe that they would enjoy each other's

[01:20:03] company. Not in a deserves better. She does. And the line she gives of like marriage isn't so bad.

[01:20:09] He doesn't really pay much attention to you except when he's drunk. Oh God. So cringe. That's

[01:20:16] awful. Oh, she does not know how to read the room. And like Otto's chuckling at this and I'm like,

[01:20:22] that's your granddaughter. Yeah. Just. And then he's while he's watching Alison and Rhaenyra

[01:20:30] try to reforge their bonds. He must be like, Oh shit. Oh shit. Oh shit. Oh shit. Like right.

[01:20:34] I don't want this to be happening. Something's going wrong here. Yeah. Cause they're finding

[01:20:37] their old friendship. So don't let them sit too close to each other. Alison returns to Viserys

[01:20:47] aside where he mumbles about Aegon's dream mistakenly believing Alison to be Rhaenyra.

[01:20:52] She misunderstands and thinks he's expressing a desire for their son, Aegon to be King.

[01:20:58] Viserys dies that night seeing his love. So sad. And I think they ended this episode really well.

[01:21:09] Just a simple fade to black and just seeing Patty Considine just in this epic role. It was just a

[01:21:20] really nice way to bring Viserys to an end and to bring, you know, Patty Considine to an end. It

[01:21:29] was yeah. Really sublime. And of course he's seeing Amon at the end. Yeah. Yeah. And she's

[01:21:34] like, you did what to me? You let them cut me open. Yeah. Bastard. And of course, Alison has

[01:21:44] the fuel she needs for her fire. Yeah. So this is something else I wanted to bring up because

[01:21:49] I was remembering it as he's like, Aegon is the answer, blah, blah, blah. But then I'm rewatching

[01:21:54] it and I'm like, it's pretty clear that she he's not talking about Aegon. He says Aegon the conqueror.

[01:22:02] Yeah. Yeah. He says that he doesn't say Aegon our son. He doesn't say, you know, our Aegon or

[01:22:09] anything like that. I think really Alison is massaging it in her head to be what she wants

[01:22:17] Completely. Completely. She's, she's very much bending the, um, the facts to, to hear what she

[01:22:24] was. She's like, she's trying to make it out. She's trying to get clarity, but she's less

[01:22:31] concerned with the truth than what she, um, what her impulses are driving her towards.

[01:22:40] Right. She, she uses truth and honor as these excuses, but you know, I think Raniere has a

[01:22:49] point where she goes, now they see you as you are is like really they're just excuses to do violence

[01:22:54] undercover. It hurt people, hurt people, right? Is that what we say? Very sad. Very sad. Anyway,

[01:23:05] plenty of conversation to have for season two. We're here for the tragedy. We're here for the

[01:23:11] tragedy. I'm so excited for season two. I think it's going to be insane. I think I'm going to cry

[01:23:16] a lot and it's going to be great. Yeah, it's going to be great. Uh, so let's go into our feedback.

[01:23:24] Of course you can write into hot D H O T D at the lower hounds.com or you can head to the contact

[01:23:31] page on our website. You could go on our discord and tag us whatever you want to do. Anyway,

[01:23:35] you can get it to us. You can tweet at us. We're back on Twitter. Uh, we only had one piece of

[01:23:41] feedback this week, which is surprising because we were getting a decent amount going before this,

[01:23:46] but dork of the ninjas, Michael, he's always, he's always here with us on his voicemails and he's,

[01:23:51] he's called in to be on the pot again. Here we go. And he's going to call me out too. I listened to

[01:23:56] it already. Okay. Hey guys, just want to get started with a couple of corrections as well

[01:24:00] as also some thoughts on the episodes seven and eight of hassle dragon season one. I hate to be

[01:24:07] that guy with the corrections, but Hey, um, John, just a quick note. You said that Balerion,

[01:24:13] the dragon that Sarah had wrote before that he was a constant writer. He wasn't actually,

[01:24:19] he wrote him once. Basically it was, Balerion was an old, old dragon to the point where

[01:24:25] he was not really wanting to be written by anybody. What the Sarah's wrote him one time,

[01:24:30] basically did like a 30 minute flight. If that landed back down and never wrote a dragon again,

[01:24:37] a day in his life. And also Balerion was the biggest dragon that the Targaryens had at that

[01:24:43] time and was until its death. And then at that point, um, Balerion took over that title. So

[01:24:52] just a little bit on that. But my big thing when I want to talk about, of course was the episode

[01:24:57] seven and eight is, I think these are two of the best episodes of the series in my opinion so far,

[01:25:02] if not the best period, because we of course had the episode. I agree that episode four was kind

[01:25:09] of like the, Hey, this is the point of no return. The war is going to happen. We just, this is just

[01:25:13] the kicking off point. This is the episode, the two episodes that set up the biggest consequences

[01:25:22] of course, with, uh, the dragon being stolen as soon from the mother as soon as she's dead,

[01:25:30] basically at the funeral and well, not stolen, but you know, um, and then after that, of course,

[01:25:37] that the whole war, I think the last key point of the possibility of the war being stopped was ended

[01:25:44] the second that Viserys at that moment had the miscommunication with Alicent and she was

[01:25:49] convinced, Oh, he wants his son on the throne, not his daughter. It's one of the best type of

[01:25:57] minority understandings that doesn't feel like, Oh, she just wants war period. It feels like

[01:26:05] she genuinely thought, okay, maybe this is how it's going to be. And in that moment, I heard

[01:26:10] this conviction and I agree with John's statement of she is a hall monitor. She has to go by the

[01:26:16] rules. His lap her, his quote rules were the last thing he was told her that he wanted his son on

[01:26:23] the throne. I got on the throne. It's a very interesting thing of like, that is the thing

[01:26:29] that's completely added for the show. That's not in the original book, but it is just, I think the

[01:26:33] perfect detail of like, sometimes just the wrong said thing at the wrong time can change world

[01:26:39] history. And I think that's a perfect example of that. Love the show, like looking forward to

[01:26:43] your coverage of season two and can't wait to hear from y'all. I think he's, I totally agree

[01:26:51] with you, Michael on, on this, that this, um, the, that she has to, you know, she's taking this

[01:27:01] information and she's like, well, that's what the King said. And she's bending it so hard that way.

[01:27:06] And it just really points to her hypocrisy. But yet if she had stopped and checked in with reality,

[01:27:16] never once ever in all of this time that she's been married to him, has he ever said anything

[01:27:23] other than Raniera is the heir and affirmed multiple times. And it's like what you're,

[01:27:30] Oh, the, the dying ramblings of, um, uh, you know, the, the, the, the ramblings of a, of a dying man.

[01:27:37] This is what you're going to use as your evidence. But she does, she takes it and runs with it.

[01:27:43] Right. But next episode, when she tells her dad about it, he's like, Oh, I'm going to use this

[01:27:47] so bad. This is going to be so good. He's he's ready for it. He's like, well, then you have to

[01:27:53] honor that wish. But to be kind to, to be generous to Alison,

[01:28:00] a gone, not a gone. Viserys was talking all day about setting things right, setting things right.

[01:28:05] I want my mind clear. And so I kind of see why she would think he would be making a big change.

[01:28:13] Obviously this was incorrect, but we have more information as the viewers and she has.

[01:28:18] Right. Right. But, and she has the, her, the lens at which she views things and,

[01:28:25] and her own, right. She's, she's biased in a lot of ways. So she uses it.

[01:28:30] Yeah. Well, thanks Michael. And thanks for the corrections. I did look up Balerian stuff after

[01:28:34] the podcast and I was like, well, that's wrong, but I'm sure somebody will write in and, and

[01:28:39] write, write in writing you did or call in. You did Michael.

[01:28:43] Well, we always appreciate the corrections too, because it's such a vast world that it's so hard

[01:28:47] to hold it all into place. We're not like the comic book nerd in the Simpsons show, right? Where

[01:28:54] I forget his name. Anyway, the.

[01:28:57] You can't expect me to keep JRR and GRR together in my head.

[01:29:01] That's right. And.

[01:29:02] All the time. Yeah. And the X-Men.

[01:29:04] And the X-Men. I'm doing Dr. Who right now. I just, there's a lot of worlds in my head right now.

[01:29:11] There was the, the thing about the dragon tune and about

[01:29:15] Viserys writing it. I thought I remembered that he said when he was talking with her down in the

[01:29:22] crypt, like, you know, he wrote it once and then it was like, that's enough for me. Thanks y'all.

[01:29:28] Yeah. So, and so, and I think that goes into his sense of using dragons and the power of dragons,

[01:29:35] because he was never really a dragon writer as such. Like I've skied. I am not a skier, right?

[01:29:43] So yeah, he wrote a dragon, but he's not a dragon writer.

[01:29:47] Right. Well, thanks again for calling in Michael. This has been a fun couple episodes. This,

[01:29:52] this, these episodes got me really hyped for season two because the writing here is just

[01:29:57] A plus plus. This was, this was the best writing they did all season, I think.

[01:30:01] Yeah. And then the next two episodes are just a spectacle and feast for

[01:30:08] turning up the heat for next season.

[01:30:10] Yeah. I'm honestly, I'm almost surprised that they didn't do these as a double feature,

[01:30:14] like all in one night and make it like a two hour finale, but it's cool that they divided it too.

[01:30:19] Was it, I think episode eight was an hour 15 or something like that?

[01:30:24] Yeah. It was longer. It was extra long, but you know, Patty needed it, right? I think we needed

[01:30:28] it. It took three minutes for him just to walk up to the throne. So runtime.

[01:30:35] Well, give yourself a Patty on the back. We've gotten through the entire Viserys run.

[01:30:42] Good thing we're at the outro.

[01:30:45] All right. Speaking of outros, I'm going to give you our weekly show notes because

[01:30:49] I've decided to limit things so that you all don't tune out after 30 seconds.

[01:30:53] Otherwise we just talk for another 20 minutes.

[01:30:55] We're not talking about every project we've ever done or will do anymore.

[01:30:59] Here we go. Weekly show notes on this feed. You're going to have, you already have an episode

[01:31:04] of doctor who season one episode four boom. It was a lot of fun. Stephen Moffat's back on the

[01:31:09] show writing under showrunner Russell T Davies. It's the dream team they're back and shoot.

[01:31:13] He got was doing an amazing job. You'll also get, if you're a patron, you'll get second breakfast.

[01:31:19] We're going to talk about not having breakfast, skipping breakfast. And if we have time,

[01:31:24] we're going to do eternal sunshine of the spotless mind. But we also, we have plans.

[01:31:28] We have plans. We're going to cover the movie, but we got to see what we're doing with it. So

[01:31:32] stay tuned for that on second breakfast. It's our first one with Alicia. So definitely tune in

[01:31:38] rings and rituals is going to be back next week with chapter six on episode six Udun from the

[01:31:45] rings of power, a fan favorite. I think that's our, I think that podcast David on Udun was our top

[01:31:52] download podcast ever, which is funny. Uh, the complete star Wars canon timeline podcast,

[01:31:59] which is a mouthful, uh, with Alicia is doing two podcasts this week on the high Republic era

[01:32:06] and the star Wars eclipse game preview. A lot of fun stuff over there. You got to listen to

[01:32:11] the higher public stuff to get the context for the acolyte, which I'm going to be covering with

[01:32:16] Alicia over on that feed. Radioactive ramblings is doing their fallout lore series errands back

[01:32:23] with a new co-host. They're covering the rise and the rise of the new California Republic

[01:32:29] in to this week's episode and properly Howard movie review is back on their felonies and

[01:32:34] fugazis train with gross point blank. Have you listened to this yet, David?

[01:32:38] Yeah, it was a really good episode. And I, um, I wish my watching schedule wasn't so full because

[01:32:44] I really want to go watch the movie now, but Steve was hilarious. He was on point. He had this,

[01:32:51] a great line. What was it? Something about, uh, algebra to being the worst sequel ever.

[01:32:56] You know, we're talking about math class in high school. That's pretty cool. Yeah. It was a really

[01:33:01] good episode and strong episode. Nice. We'll shift dust is off this week, but we'll be back next week

[01:33:07] with beacon 23 episodes seven and eight of season two, which is the finale. All right, David.

[01:33:14] We've got one more thing to do. We've got to talk about our Patreon and supercasts,

[01:33:19] and then we've got to do our thank you. So tell me about Patreon supercast.

[01:33:23] Supercast is like Patreon, but it's better built for podcasters. So if you're thinking

[01:33:27] about subscribing and, um, supporting the community, uh, check in on supercast first,

[01:33:33] it's exactly the same as Patreon in terms of tiers and levels, same thing in terms of, uh,

[01:33:40] you know, getting an annual membership, which would give you a nice discount on or doing a

[01:33:44] monthly subscription. So if you're considering, uh, supporting, uh, what we do and how we do it

[01:33:50] head to supercast. If you're already in the Patreon ecosystem and it's just easier

[01:33:55] than do it there, but they're, they're functionally the same. Uh, but we just get a

[01:33:59] better, um, we get a little bit better performance out of supercast. It's more built for, for

[01:34:04] podcasters. So, um, I guess that's that. Also I'll add, if you're on Patreon and you're supercast

[01:34:12] curious, yes, there is a tool that will migrate your Patreon subscriptions, which means you will

[01:34:17] get credited for the remaining remainder on your subscription. So if you're in a partial month or

[01:34:22] a partial year subscription, you can change the supercast without like a financial hit.

[01:34:26] Exactly. And if you need any help with that, just let us know and we'll be happy to,

[01:34:30] to hold your hand doing that. Yep. What else we got? The discord, the discord is, um,

[01:34:36] a great place to hang out. You know, I was reading and there's a, this idea that's out

[01:34:42] and around right now. There's a lot of conversation about algorithms and, uh, you know, algorithmic,

[01:34:48] algorithmic driven content. And, you know, Facebook is sort of becoming dead internet

[01:34:53] because it's just bots talking to bots at some stage. And this idea that, um, when we want to

[01:35:03] connect with other movie and TV fans, and we want to kind of a fun water cooler place. I don't talk

[01:35:09] about house of the dragon with my spouse. Uh, you know, I come onto the discord to talk about it.

[01:35:14] Um, and the discord is, is a place where you can meet up with other members of the community and

[01:35:19] we can just chat nerd out, tell each other about other, the shows that we're watching,

[01:35:23] because there's so much content out there. It's hard to keep track of it. So it's great. We have

[01:35:27] a whole community of people who are like, Oh, did you see this show? Did you see that show? Oh yeah,

[01:35:31] it was really good. You should check it out. Okay, cool. Right. So we actually have a human

[01:35:34] living community and the place to, to interact with that is on the discord. So join us over there.

[01:35:41] Um, we've got a great moderator team. We have projects, we have all kinds of different projects.

[01:35:45] We have different channels for all of those different things. Um, and, uh, so big shout

[01:35:50] out to the mod team too. We just did a big server reorganization. I hope people are enjoying it.

[01:35:55] I can't quite tell yet, but, um, yeah, it's a cool place. All right. Very cool. I'm going to do

[01:36:01] our thank yous because I never get to do them anymore. You and Alicia have been doing them for

[01:36:05] me. Oh, well please. By all means discord server boosters, NARLS, Aaron Kay, Taylor, the thriller

[01:36:12] dork of the ninjas do 71 captain Gingy 56, who's also co-hosting with Aaron on fallout lore.

[01:36:20] Yeah. I'm not sure. I think he might be go by Richard W as well. I couldn't tell his,

[01:36:24] his name kept changing, but anyway, thank you. He's elusive. Yes. The elusive captain Gingy.

[01:36:31] Some Martian is our first lore master because I didn't say what I'm about to introduce a lore

[01:36:36] masters are some Martian Michael G uh, Michelle E David W Brian P Nick W S C Peter O H Bettina W

[01:36:46] Adam S Nancy M do 71 Brian, 80 63 Frederick H Sarah L Gareth C Eric F Matthew M Sarah M DJ Miwa

[01:36:56] Andre B Kwang you dead. I Jedi Bob Nathan T Alex V Aaron T subzero Aaron K Dali V mothership 61

[01:37:06] NARLS and Adrian. Thank you everyone for all of your support. It really does help us

[01:37:14] keep doing these rewatch podcasts. This is our first rewatch podcast we've done, I think.

[01:37:19] Is it? Yeah, I think, I think you're right. So thank you. Thank you. It's a, it's a big help.

[01:37:24] Everyone. I also want to add, it's a joy getting to hear Alicia do this list because

[01:37:29] I've, it was getting a little old just you and me doing NARLS and now I get, I get to hear her

[01:37:34] different NARLS impressions. It's great. All right, everyone. It's been fun. Let's talk game

[01:37:41] of thrones house of the dragon next week. See you then. The lore hounds podcast is produced and

[01:37:46] published by the lore hounds. You can send questions and feedback and voicemails at

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