Girls Gone Canon Cast - House of the Dragon S2E8: The Queen Who Ever Was

Episode Date: August 7, 2024

SPOILERS: ASOIAF, F&B, KOT7K, TWOIAF, ETC All must choose. The finale is here. Be sure to check back for the final two episodes of "Unleash the D" with special guests, as well as the main ASOIAF POV Podcast. Correction - Sharp Point is Bar Emmon's house and Elinda will not pay for her crimes today  Azorahainess's Timeline Direwolf City Rhaenys the Conqueror: From Her Blood Check out our patreon where all members get early access to House of the Dragon episodes during the season @ patreon.com/girlsgonecanon Sound Effects from Pixabay "Night Vigil" "Big Drumming" by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ THANKS KEVIN!!

The The The The The Hello and welcome to Girls Gone Canon Watches House of the Dragon Season 2 Episode 8 The Queen Whoever Was. I am one of your hosts, Chloe. And I am another one of your hosts, whoever was. I am one of your hosts, Chloe. And I am another one of your hosts, Eliana. Fun, fun fact, fun fact. Chloe and I are together right now and not in a like across the

weirwood net kind of way, but in a like we're both at King's Landing and someone's trying to get someone to go to Harrenhal with them. No, not like that either. Wow. I thought it was going to be like a, I came here to Dragonstone to beg you to beg you to kill my way to kill your son. I swam here from Dragonstone for dungeon sex and I'm not leaving until we get it in this episode. I thought, I really thought there was at least gonna be a kiss. I thought there was gonna be dungeon sex. Yeah. I want what I was promised but we're gonna get into all that very soon with each other, with you. Whoa. Eliana, can you tell the folks at home what our spoiler policy is. Yes, so we are discussing everything in, I mean, that's been

published or released from this world of A Song of Ice and Fire. So that includes the main five books, anything from, you know, the history books, and that includes all of Fire and Blood. So we would be spoiling the entirety of what's going to happen during this civil war. If you don't want that, I'm sorry, but we'll see you some other time. We're also going to talk about all of Game of Thrones, I guess. That exists too. Yeah, I guess this episode does also have. It does do that.

Yeah. Yep. The history books, the old world of ice and fire, fire and blood, maybe Night of the Seven Kingdoms. We spoil all that, too. If it's published, if it's done, if it's on TV. It's not TV, it's HBO, and by that it's not HBO, it's Max. Which is why we don't have two more episodes at the end. Nyan!

But you know what does have two episodes at the end of it left? There are two more episodes left of this. Oh my gosh. Us. It's us. We have two more episodes. While this is the last episode of season two, it's not the last episode of season two of Unleash the D, the hit primer series about house of the dragon that is now not just a primer series right we're we're depriming you we're unimpriming you i don't know there's got to be something there we'll come back we're workshopping it why are you shaking i just don't i'm trying to think of like what what is the opposite of ending, right? Or posting? We're posting you. So. We're terminating.

Terminating it is. We're terminating. Listen. We could cover the Terminator series one day, I guess. I guess it's terminal. We will be back with a closer series, the finale, the penultimate and finale, with our friend Megan, Birdie D Cosplay, to discuss costuming in House of the Dragon.

And I believe our good friend, Dr. PhD Professor Joseph Magician is stopping by to talk about everything else under the sun. Anything else. Yes, our good friend Matt, a.k.a. Joe Magician, will be coming to help us terminate everything. Okay. Glossing over all that. Wow. We are going to take a two-week sabbatical.

This war. A fortnight. It's a fortnight. We are taking a fortnight. The whole city is, too. Yeah. You know, this war was heavy. There were losses on all sides yeah but not not as bad as i think like for us physically in terms of losses due to the season

yeah i didn't throw myself down the stairs down the stairs uh and hopefully i won't do that this year but jury's still out so we'll be back in two weeks. We might put a little episode out in that time for you. And we were just talking about it, tossing it back and forth. And there was a cool preview. Yeah, that actually I missed the first time around because we skipped the recaps, etc. It was not my fault. Usually we watch those because I'm a weirdo person who sometimes

enjoys previews we were rushing it was family dinner night you know we had a family night a family meal we did just like rainiera and her new relatives for those of you who don't know we do have a main podcast that we do weekly that will be coming back after Unleash the D, after our little on and off sabbatical here. So keep your eyes and ears peeled on our feeds for that or over at patreon.com slash girls gone canon. You can learn about it there as well. But we will be coming back with the epilogues in our song of ice and fire episodes we do have two really cool guests we'll announce those during unleash the d so stay tuned to that and after that we will move on to the final three povs of the currently

published pov order that we have left in the series, and all three are some pretty big ones. They're chunky. They really are. And I mean, what if George just announces wins? Then would we reassess our order? Actually, I don't know. We've never actually had that discussion. It's just never been.

This just hasn't been something that has been like a real possibility so whatever i just want to keep everyone on their toes for a second you never know i don't think we would adjust it i don't think we would right like i think we'd at least finish it as is and then maybe figure it out from there come back around for the povs i don't really know could be interesting to come back around and then have the removed povs from there right so then the next round is like doing the same order we could like tack on the whatever comes out in wins to whatever pov we're on or something right we could really mess with you all so we we honestly don't it's just never been like something that has seemed

on the horizon yet. So we were just like, we'll cross that bridge when we get there. And you know what? People were crossing bridges today. We'll get to that. So for more information about us and the whole thing, the whole shebang that we do, please check out our Patreon where we also do brunch and happy hours. Our next one is August 11th.

So take a little break before Hot D. It's coming out the same night as Industry Season 3 premiere. Yeah. Wait, yes. Same day. Exciting. Industry brappy hour. We're the only two people who watch this show as far as I know.

Yeah, but Kit Harington's going to be on it this season. I'm excited. And I will say they have their own Alicent and Rhaenyra characters. Pretty much. And it looks like there's going to be a good fight between them this year, and I'm excited to see that. Yeah, I'm excited for Industry to come back.

You got me into it, and just like, I don't know anyone who watches it that isn't you and me. So I'm excited, though, that it's still going on. Yeah, so maybe if you want, come to the brunch happy hour where our Thunder, Tyr, and above patrons will have to make do with us telling them all about this show. You could be one of them. Yeah, I don't really know what to say other than finance.

Trust fund. Six, five, six. Basically, Brienne of Tarth? No no i'm just kidding i guess so yeah we'll also some bonus episodes on patreon at some point this month too we're deciding what that'll be but before we get there before we get there let's talk about you know what's right in front of us the big thing today episode eight of season two of Hot D. Yeah, we got actually an email about episode seven, The Red Sewing. Our friend Warren was talking about our little discussion on TumbleTin.

And he mentioned that he thinks Mrs. Katniss Everdeen's dad, Hugh the Hammer's wife, Mrs. Katniss Everdeen's mom. This is a very long bit. If you're not here for this one i'm really sorry uh thanks for playing along warren we really appreciate it i do appreciate it we think that hugh the hammer's wife's father might meet hugh at humble at tumbleton meet hugh at Tumbleton and be unimpressed by his actions and being a dragon rider maybe Hugh will lash out in anger and turn cloak so I don't know that's kind of cool there's something in there I don't know if it's exactly that but I feel like there's a the element of her father maybe being at Tumbleton yeah no it's her brother who's at tumbled in right right but maybe yeah oh uh yeah

i thought my interpretation of this was like yeah will will cat and hue reunite i thought it was really interesting that like the idea that cat might be unimpressed by hue and then he lashes out because like we've we've seen him be this really upstanding guy he seems like he really knows the way that things are and he he has a set of morals but like I think losing your kid would really break you but also at the same time it's interesting if he lashes out out of rejection it's super shitty but it's a real thing that happens and also feels in line with, like, for example, the Andrew O'Farman storyline during Reina's and, like, you know, the four-headed beasts storyline as well. You know, having, like, jilted men turn violent, which, that kind of sucks. Hugh seems like a nice guy, i do think it's not not in

line so i thought this was really interesting yeah and i like what you said about the lashing out because that's a through line in this episode right of people lashing out and amen yeah amen and uh olf you know like you're starting to see those seeds being planted of him maybe being a little greedy and showing like he's a little power hungry in some ways. Because who wouldn't be if you had a beautiful giant dragon to jump upon? That and he's also just been straight up hungry, right? Like in a literal sense, these people have been hungry until recently because they were starving. And then they won i mean yeah the dragon hunger games

yeah great email warren thank you so much and thank you to everyone that sent in emails um oh it's discord it's not an email i'm so sorry i just took it from discord i was so excited uh so that was from our Discord. Thank you, Warren. Warren's been a great Patreon supporter and Discord member for a long time, always stirring up trouble himself. He does stir up trouble. I've heard

that Warren was up to some other hijinks recently. Yeah. I hear he was, uh, I hear Warren was trying his hand at ruling through others recently, but that's, uh, our little birds, but that's for, uh, the days to come, the POVs to come, if you will, the wars to come, a different era to come. Whoa.

What'd you think about the title? I understand it now seeing the vision and I think it's about Daenerys, which makes it less dumb than if it were not about Daenerys. Okay, so the queen whoever was, I could see that being like encompassing all these stories that they're referring to. Yeah. Yeah, because if it was only about Rhaenyra,

which, you know, I'm on that side, but at the same time, I'm like, it's kind of a stupid episode title if that's what it was about but if it's about daenerys and like as you were saying all of those stories then it's a better episode title even though i don't love it still how do you feel i don't know it's carrying a lot of weight there right because you have the stuff with corliss that we'll talk about his boat right changing the name of it somewhat as an homage but also it felt a little goatee in some ways to Rhaenyra I was like oh interesting that you're you're like yeah I'm doing now everything I do I do for her like okay good

finally a little smoke a little heat there uh but so encompassing you, Rhaenys, who we lost this season, and Rhaenyra and Daenerys, who we see in the vision, and even encompassing some of these other Targaryen women, right, across history and to come that maybe might perpetuate this prophecy or take place in their own ways. Yeah, yeah. And I know that we've kind of been discussing this. yeah yeah and i know that we've kind of been discussing this there's a lot of things that we felt like this confirms our rainies truth or stuff that we discussed last month on patreon so if you're interested in what we've been talking about in regards to queens whoever were yeah check that out yeah it's called rainies the conquer from Her Blood. And it is a really fun exploration, I think. Yeah. We got a little bit of new stuff in the opening sequence.

Yeah, we got a new intro piece that featured a lot of new dragons. I definitely saw Seasmoke in there. I saw maybe what looked like sheep stealer i wasn't sure but the main two that we see first and i really love this it's vermithor and silverwing right and it's representing the red sewing in the last episode but it's great because when we get to the targaryens that are in this when we get to kind of the modern day we have that Alysanne and Jaehaerys moment that then sprinkles down the lines to bring us Viserys bring us Daemon bring us Rhaenyra bring us all these characters but it's like that great moment

that you see them in the tapestry so a great mirror that then their dragons are the ones that are the first here shown in this event and then we get these other dragons we see Seasmoke it looks like um I wasn't sure on all of them though I think Sheepstealer and Cannibal maybe look like the first here shown in this event and then we get these other dragons we see sea smoke it looks like um i wasn't sure on all of them though i think sheep stealer and cannibal maybe look like they're in there i don't know unclaimed cannibal i guess it wouldn't make sense because i don't think cannibal is going to end up showing up in this at all only as a joke over in essos but i did wonder when we were re-watching the intro today i I was like, oh, do you think like, because we're seeing this through line

all the way to Daenerys and it is like showing that lineage in line, like would we see Drogon, Rhaegal and Viserion? But we didn't. It just cut off into darkness. And then the logo. Yeah, and for what it's worth, there was a black and red looking dragon. And I was like, that didn't look like any of them.

It's not them, yeah. So, I don't know. I thought that could be cool if they did eventually maybe decide to incorporate that. Or like show how, I mean, that's something that they're doing, right? Trying to show how this ties into the events of the main main storyline speaking of which well after that main storyline what's up with this storyline what's happening yeah that was so overall and i know you and i have kind of chatted we've chatted a lot about it over the last 12 hours i guess yeah i thought you were going to say the past year the past year that too years we've talked about it for a while over the years

but a couple things happened uh recently and a while ago and most recent today like right before we recorded this uh according to variety in a press conference that was being held during the finale of season two it was confirmed four seasons yeah so that bums me out especially seeing as how you and i have discussed throughout the season that i really would have loved to have those two more episodes and i think you feel the same like i think having a little more space for the story to work with would have been fun and i understand that like do we have enough to discuss and yes lysine spray please please ryan if you're listening to us please do the lysine spray please i'm i'm want to say he might we got tyrosh in full wow yeah it's interesting i think there's a lot of like you know the discovery and warner brother merger slashing prices slashing people's jobs

my dreams slashing my dreams and there's yeah uh there's something going on there obviously that it looks like they were pushed to the table. There was actually a really good breakdown today posted by Azorah Highness as well over on Reddit. I'll link that one. But a handful of interviews that we've seen kind of over the years, like Deadline from March 2023, the leadership change happened at HBO. And right then and there, the HBO spokesperson confirmed to Deadline that season two would contain eight episodes. That was kind of fast, right? Because they had already been recording their entire season.

And by recording, I mean directing and performing and production and et cetera, making all of it. So the count trim was story driven. And I don't know exactly when that cut off internally would have happened. It sounds like they wrapped up, I think, writing for that 10 episode script in January 2023. They got word that they had to cut in March 2023. But production was starting May 2023 or something like that. And so that's not enough time. No, not production sorry

the writer's strike starts around may 2023 and like while the strike obviously happens after these things they you know people kind of know that it's on the horizon so it's just like they were told to cut and dash basically and not just that but when the strike did happen and with that like warning of how much time they really had to start changing things around you can't do those rewrites in the strike and not just that but you can't further work on it so you're kind of set and not just that but then like on set the whole goal is that when you're first performing something stuff starts to you know you start to hear things that you're like, oh, that dialogue sounds weird or oh, this direction doesn't work with the story. And you need to be able to improvise that.

And when you can't have rewrites occurring on set with the writers. Yeah, you're kind of you're a little chained to what you have. And I think people are like oh but they should have been able to do it they had x amount of time i'm like but it took them nine months right to plot out the storyline of what they were going to do and write that first version of the story and then to have such a short amount of time to be able to make those edits. I think people really underestimate how difficult editing is. Editing takes longer than the initial writing. Editing something down to get it to fit into a normal time period to make the storyline

still work and be able to cut it and to fit without that amount of time that's like a lot more work than people would think and like this is not a budget thing that they wanted to do like it's a constraint that they just had to that they had to work with and like I really wish that they didn't have that constraint because you know as other people have expressed in like in that reddit thread i am a little baffled by the executive decision to slash that on their probably biggest money maker it was almost implied that it was a trade-off like if you wanted a season three you needed to find the way to cut your two episodes so it's interesting because the direction of programming too with hbo they've been it of programming too with HBO they've been

it's not the first show they've been a slash in lately so yeah it's not and it just it just doesn't make sense when you think about how this needs to go well in order to get people reinvested in this like world after the way that Game of thrones went down like you want people to feel really connected to this storyline and to feel like it's really good so that you can have all the other series that are taking place in this world that you're trying to make profit off of go well so yeah and george himself said like i'm happy they still have 10 hours every season to tell the story and that he wants them to continue to keep that up, because it will take four full seasons of 10 episodes to tell it right,

to do it the right way. And they also, in the original Deadline article, they moved at least one major battle and a portion of the plot to season two, just like A Dance with Dragons, which is what's being adapted. I mean, they got feast danced, bro, which is really funny, because they adapted feast dance. They got the energy down, right? But I do think it would have been stronger with like, with that at the end. Like, I think that I think that the way that they ended it still works really well. They did a great job with what they had. But I understand that in the way that we are

conditioned to understand the structure of western storytelling in terms of you know that like four act three act five act however you want to break it down right but regardless like that structure we expect to have that like burst of energy and then like and then the denouement but i still think it was it was strong as a as a season but it would have been nice oh my god strong it was strong that's one thing i'm really gonna be excited about retiring accidentally saying strong for a while well they could have given us more of more of that boy, too. Whoa. We'll talk about it. What are you saying? That with two more episodes, they could have given me more Jays.

Wow. Calling the heir to the throne. Oh, he knows. Oh, he knows. That's what it's about. It's okay. Bastard power. Bastard power.

Well, let's talk about where this leaves us, right? Wrapped up with season three, and we're going to come through all the plot beats soon. But there was a lot that left an open door. While I really do think, like, you're going to hear me, pretty much every plot beat go, wow, really could have used one more scene. Really could have been one more episode. Even more.

Even one. Agreed, agreed. And not even with like huge, huge beats, you know? Just like finishing some of these, because these really were a lot of setup. Agreed, agreed. a lot of setup a lot of setup to start off the next season that said man I was close like over halfway through I was like maybe we are getting it oh my god maybe we're getting maybe we're getting Kingsland and then it didn't happen so yeah if any of you remember us throughout the season being like oh my god is it gonna end with Rhaenyra triumphant and then we're like oh my god are we getting the gullet and no but we will and to be fair like i really

thought they would have even gotten into it before now i thought they were dragging it out already in a good way like i'm fine with it yeah so i think it's really gonna give the beginning of the season give her a season to rule and maybe it maybe we start that downfall and that running at the end of the season we don't know yeah but i do think it would have been pretty interesting to end with like her triumphant and then start unraveling that like the whole season the whole of next season like that act would have been a good structure and i think that is what they envisioned that's what they wanted i see the vision with 10 episodes but i didn't see the vision with eight episodes and that makes sense yeah also also with like more just more of the north i just think it would have been

fun to have more of cregan stark yeah it looked like yeah it looked like in the behind the scenes stuff in house the dragon built and in the after uh credits things it sounds like he did film something for it and maybe it just didn't work out or reshoots or who knows. I don't know. But yeah, I really do think he should have been there. And it would have been good to have more Jace as well just because I think that it makes his death hit harder. And it's coming. Yeah.

Boy, is it coming. Well, lots to look forward to. Like the Winter Wolves. I think Ben Blackwood was set up very well, right? He's coming back. The Freys coming south, as well as the Freys in Harrenhal. Your partner actually recently and I were chit-chatting about this, you know. Oh, yeah.

Yeah, he reminded me that's on the table. That's a plot beat they've set up. So we'll see how that kind of resolves and how that bleeds into Night of the seven kingdoms i'm sure uh triarchy and essos and the gullet reina taking sheep stealer and participating in some of these battles armies massing around harrenhal old town and the honey wine tessarian probably uh having her first victory l Lannisters, Daemon's armies, Criston's armies, the fall of King's Landing 1 and the build up to 2, Aegon escaping with Laery's and maybe some misdirection with Sunfire

we'll talk about. And I think that's kind of what's crazy of what's coming, right? Like that's the pacing of the main story. There's a huge build, a huge slow burn, and then it all goes at once until well the end when it stops suddenly uh sometime in season four i'd guess which will hopefully be

enough time to tell the rest of that story with renera overthrown completely her death and agans and agan three's reign yeah i did I did that. Oh, I missed it. I put it in when you were talking about the twins. Yeah. I mean, that's what it is. But unless, unless, have you considered again? The Lysian Spring. The Lysian Spring.

The Lysian Spring. George, please. Ryan. Ryan, George, somebody just give it to me. Somebody. Anyone. Sarah. Sarah. George. Somebody just give it to me. Anyone. Sarah. Sarah.

Sarah. Well, welcome back, Sarah Huss. Gita Vettel was great. Yeah. Great. Let's start off with King's Landing. Yes. Agin Larry's was an interesting scene, and I really like these slow talks with them, and that this one kind of called to action, right?

And Laery's took him off to save his life. I love that line when he says, it's best to live, I think, however you do it. Aegon doesn't want to die. He wants to survive, and he has a little fire still left in him and lares ha lares has stoked that fire yeah i think they did a great shot when he's in the little cart at the end when they're leaving and um showing that he's got that will it's a can speak had a fantastic arc i think throughout the season i think it's really funny one of the people who participate in dire wolf cities streams they said a few weeks ago they're like wow not larry's being

being the dad to agan that the series never was and then reprising that again this this week so um that was fun and also uh just just a reminder we joined direwolf city for their post episode stream so if you would like we you can check that out we hung out with our friends but yeah anyways very fun stuff in that dynamic. Yeah, there's something even almost, stay with me for this one, very Littlefinger Catelyn Sansa about how Laeries used to kind of have this power dynamic with Alicent, and he claims that for the love of Aegon's mother, he's saving Aegon's life, right?

And for the love of Aegon. But kind of's saving Aegon's life, right? And for the love of Aegon. But kind of convinces Aegon he's going to keep him safe and spirit him out of King's Landing. And there's just something interesting going on with that dynamic. Yeah. And it's not wrong. He does keep Aegon safe and does successfully spirit him out. I'm still not sure that Laerys loves love loves allison i'm not sure what's going on like maybe as a friend no covets covets yeah he covets her it's more of an ownership

thing it's more of having power through her and of her yeah i agree and not even like there is a sexual component to it but i don't think he's getting off on it sexual it's just wants control over because this is a show about power i did think that it was interesting when he was talking about moving the gold from heron hall which as we know there hasn't been very much money there simon strong told us about that and it makes me think of like the theories of how when ned gets to king's landing he's like well what the? When we conquered this place, the treasury was full. Where is all the money? And theory is that Littlefinger has actually been moving the gold out of King's Landing or into his brothels to, you know, amass that wealth for whatever his machinations are. Yeah. It's an interesting change from the book where Thailand is who does a bunch of splitting the treasury, right?

So when they get there, they're poor. There's no money. Rhaenyra's like, what the fuck? Which I think is obviously still going to happen. So I wonder, though, if that means that Laerys is going to have another reveal that he did it, right? Because Thailand is out at war right now. I'd be very curious if we get kind of a reveal that larry's is like i also sent the treasury out your treasury your grace yeah i mean it could have been both but you're right

it could have it could be just moved to larry's which does make sense aegon's punishment right one of the things that george loves to do is punishments that don't fit the crime not that punishment and you know what that don't fit the crime, not the punishment. And you know what? This isn't about abolition. We're not going to go into that right now. But anyways, punishment, punishment. Wow.

If I say it again, definitely not about abolition. Agin kind of has like one of those extreme punishments for his crimes of who he is. And he says that his cock was blown off of his body. So he's basically saying he's unable to have children. He's become probably a eunuch in just what happened with the fire, which is terrible and really rough for him, especially because he before had just such like, like, it's a very Greek tragedy. Like, ah, for all of his sexual misdeeds, he's now been punished by the gods. But obviously that's not yeah and he's he's just such a poet with it too describing his sausage sizzling i was like wow wow oh my god

they really they really series should have just cultivated his literary activities it's like a destruction of his masculinity in a lot of ways a lot of ways and we've been already seeing that affect him so i'm sure that will help to be able to goad him into attacking raniera eventually or attacking dragon stone you know wanting to do things he's probably going to be restless about what he can and cannot do. And especially because it seems they're saying Sunfire is dead, but I think that's a fake out. You don't show the most beautiful dragon once in full and then just like say she's gone. I think that maybe, and you kind of made a good point over at Dire Wolf City,

maybe when you're in that much pain and probably fucked up on medicine you don't feel your connection as much yeah actually i think that was alicia who made the point because i was wondering i was like what does it say about their connect i'm just curious you know what does it mean about the connection aegan and sunfire have i do think sunfire is alive but like for him to not be able to feel sunfire but alicia made a great point of like the pain can make it hard to feel anything else and then yeah being hopped up on opiates probably does not help with where is my dragon connection and distance right yeah john often couldn't connect with ghost when they were beyond each other or the wall

maybe that was the wall i think it was partially the wall because aria can sense tuning center vaguely dreams yeah vaguely and faintly though so maybe it's that maybe the farther away the harder the the weaker the connection especially because i think this episode is about the magic wi-fi connection a lot yeah but i do think that that's going to come back into play. I mean, there's a couple of reasons why, but it's just kind of fun. Like, who would eat Rhaenyra? I don't know. Vhagar.

The Tyroshi, apparently, with their jokes. My god. With their yolks. I like that line where Lerys was kind of gassing him up and being like, then you can come back triumphantly, you know, after we let the dust settle and you could be. He's wanted his dad's love, right? For a long time, unconditionally, his family's love and respect and never really had it, was never given any reason to go ambitiously into the world. And you think about Rhaenyra, who like in Fire and Blood, we have that line where, when Prince Daemon sent forth his call to arms, they rose up all along the rivers,

knights and men-at-arms and humble peasants, who yet remembered the realm's delight, so beloved of her father and the way she smiled and charmed them as she made her progress through the riverlands in her youth. You know, like, that's something that's like, wow, Rhaenyra's loved and Aegon just wanted love. He wanted to be loved

that's all we all do right yeah we all do and I the spiel that Laery gives him at first kind of reminds me of Illyrio telling Viserys like yeah when you come back all the people will cheer for you it's like bro I don't know if anyone remembers you and we see that the people do hate the current crown so that's interesting but i love i love that he said the realm's light i think some people didn't like that because they're like no that's renear i'm like that's the point he wants to be her he wants to be reneara who was loved by their father just like how damon wants viscerys's love through reneara like that is that is the point there's something really sad about that about that like second

family and the love you'll never have as great as that first and reneara being that extension of love like what allison says to her later about her mother about emma that he always loved emma yeah and he's using the realm as a proxy for actual connection him now now being, I guess, arguably sterile, right? Based on the fact that he said, well, my penis doesn't work. And I assume we don't have this, like, I don't know, magical IVF might have died out with Visenya, unsure. And it does create, like, I think really interesting questions in regards to the storyline and why the war was fought because in season one i want to say it's like what episode four right when when damon and reyniera go out on the town and they go see like there's that little little street

performance comedy where they're talking about like the king and how people feel about like the king and reyniera's heir and they're like well the baby has something she doesn't and then they pull out the little like rope and that's supposed to be the cock and that baby is aegon and i'm like what is happening why are we talking about baby's cocks but like people are weird they do that okay and and how that makes this baby more qualified or acceptable to be king than Rhaenyra, who at that time was much older, and so forth. But now Aegon doesn't have a cock, right? And that doesn't fit the Westerosi ideas of leadership. And by that we mean, I mean, hyper, like, sexualized, like, masculinity in that way. And it's something that we've discussed in previous episodes of, like,

like masculinity in that way and it's something that we've discussed in previous episodes of like you know without mailer there i think that makes the questions more complicated in the story that's not necessarily bad i just think it's interesting because then like if he's sterile that means his heir is jehera and so like why did we fight this war the whole time if the heir is going to be like a girl anyway? Because Aemond is not currently the heir. He's not named heir. He hasn't made everyone say he's heir. He's prince regent, which means he's ruling in the stead. And that makes sense, right?

Because he's old enough and not a child. But then if Jaehaer's the heir, why did we do all this? And like go through all this trouble not to let women rule just for it to lead to this and i i think it works really well in dialogue with like the christian colosseums of hopelessness and the meaninglessness of this war uh it's like what happened with alice and jaharis my cats uh in their second quarrel, right, like when she famously had said, a ruler needs a good head and a good heart, a true heart. A cock is not essential. If your grace

truly believes that women lack the wit to rule, plainly, you have no further need of me. And I always love that, like I love every time, I think Rainey's also said something about, ah, right, because I don't have a plump little sausage in my pants, that's why I couldn't be the queen. Yeah. Um. Now, Agen does't have a plump little sausage in my pants. That's why I couldn't be the queen. Yeah.

And now Agen does not have a plump little sausage. So what does that mean? You got too plump. Sizzled in the fire. I've made this mistake with sausages. I really don't want to say it, but, like, I am hungry, so. Oh, good. We've been discussing dinner plans.

I'm glad you're hungry. For sausage. Oh. For sausage. Okay, I didn't plan that. Hmm. Okay, we'll think about dinner plans i'm glad you're hungry for sausage oh for sausage okay i didn't plan that okay well we'll think about dinner plans more later but yeah and and i don't know one more thing like there as aegon is talking about the things that he doesn't want to be and what will happen if he stays alive and stays here and stuff one of the things is like you know he says something about being and alone and i thought that that really stood out to me because that i think is ultimately egan's biggest fear

and it's kind of what his life has been already anyways just alone yeah alone with nothing alone surrounded by people surrounded by family members who kind of hate you and like your mom obviously kind of hates you she's now like i don't don't know. I guess he could die. Your brother doesn't quite like you based on the part where he's actively like, I think you could die. Oh, your sister's cool without you too. Yeah. Your other sister would kill you. I mean.

Oh, that's true. Oh, they are siblings. He does have. Yeah. Yeah, man. Yeah. He's got it. There's no reason to want to do better or be better or have a life or live.

Like, Larry's has to give him that talk to get him out of there and really gas him up because life sucks. Yeah, life very much sucks for Agen right now. God, there really is. Yeah, that sucks. Shit's crazy. Yeah. And again, this is not absolving Agen of any of his past crimes. We're just talking about the story and the characters and their arcs. Yeah. And again, this is not absolving Agin of any of his past crimes. We're just talking about

the story and the characters and their arcs. Yeah. There was this great moment when we were watching the episode together where I was really excited because Helena and Aimin were having a conversation. And then you're like, oh no. i was like helaman is canon and then literally within moments i was like oh no helaman is over it's over i think it was what we were looking at previews or something you were like eliana check out these previews helaman is canon then the episode you're like layman's helaman i think i turned i was like so it's over helaman has been canceled um we're canceling helaman uh god i love that she has had her magical capacity triple she's really become experienced in the psychic ways in in the last few episodes that's good we're just getting a little more focus and insight i got my wish right

i've complained that there weren't more than 10 lines or words and now we have like more than 10 lines so that was crazy she had a crazy big role in this episode it brought up a lot of questions about magic that we're gonna get into when we get to the big shit in harrenhal. I think that's probably one of the biggest bits for everybody that is in love with this show, so we'll come to that. But interesting she saw Aemon burn Aegon. When she immediately recoils and says she won't burn anyone, it made me wonder if she's seen something that she has to do. Yeah. And that she sees herself burning someone or hurting someone because dreamfire is a huge dragon as reneera will mention to corliss dreamfire was born during aegon's time right when he was the king the first aegon's time when he was the king when the

conqueror was king it's an older dragon it It's a pretty good-sized dragon. And good-sized dragons are really needed right now. And it makes me wonder if that's why in the books she would choose to end her life, right? Like, as the plot point they're taking and adapting from. That she would choose to take her life instead of hurt people or do something so devastating with her dragon. And it's pretty devastating in the dragon pit when dreamfire you know hits the ceiling and gets crushed and dies after helena dies and maybe we talked about this on the stream with the ladies of direwolf city but maybe helena could get something like the dragon rider lena death right where she is trying to escape and goes to dream fire and they both go together.

Yeah. Maybe they could change it that way, but also really does make me wonder about the reasons why she jumps in King's landing. Yeah. I do wonder that. And huh. It could be also interesting in terms of like, maybe she doesn't truly, it's something that we don't understand perhaps about seeing.

Because I'm thinking of like Bran now, you will never walk, but you will fly. Random thoughts. But also something that I really love that I think Ara pointed out during that stream was that when talking about and being able to talk about the things that she's seeing in terms of prophecy and having people take her seriously she sounds so lucid she sounds confident and i thought that was a great observation yeah i thought the parts where amand is trying to force helena to fight because as you've established you know big dragon important it it continues to further some of the themes that we've been seeing in this storyline, right? Of, you know, what does it mean to have agency as a woman and over your own life? Because it's not just like, do women have power over their own bodies? But like, what are you even allowed to do with the power that you have?

Because obviously Dreamfire is powerful, right? What are you allowed to do with the power that you have because obviously dream fire is powerful right what are you allowed to do with your power as queen she's not allowed to do very much with her power as queen but at the very least can she not have power like the power to decide how her dragon is used whether or not she will be forced to do violence or does she have to do whatever her brother tells her you know like does she get to choose her own mind who she gets to hurt or not hurt and i think it's not just like women who are in part of this conversation but i think it's a scene that acts in dialogue with the scenes of reynera telling the dragon seeds like now they must fight for her and they must kill the people of king's landing whom they have lived their lives amongst yeah and there's even that like feeling of just being tossed to your next brother yeah

and she's like no i'm i will not do that yeah she whether she wants it or likes it or not aegon is her king aegon is her husband what you're asking of her is like you have no right yeah you're just my little brother yeah who are you fucking tall ass bitch yeah helena seeing amand swallowed up in the god's eye and telling him choking him the fuck up that was that was something that was crazy that she just little miss spoiler i love her she's just like me for real literally i like that uh i mean at least he believed her kind of where he's like i don't know that that was weird so they shooketh so they know they must be starting to know like oh she sees real things huh well and it increases the tragedy

too for amand and damon right who both basically see their deaths or are told their deaths in this episode by witchy woman there's something great there in that parallel especially since they're about to have such a flip in location that he's going to be taking heron hall and damon's probably going to go live in the red keep for a short while there yeah now that you've called that out it makes me wonder is amon gonna try to do the thing where he like fights against fate or twice too in the way that we see circe try to try to go around the prophecy whereas we see damon being like yep i give in that's that's my that's my path yep yeah i do think he's probably gonna fight against it and it'll only take him to his death exactly that's the that's the greek

tragedy thing to happen beautiful chef's kiss can't wait to watch it and does'll only take him to his death exactly that's the that's the greek tragedy thing to happen beautiful chef's kiss can't wait to watch it and does this mean we're gonna get more visions i think we're absolutely gonna get more visions i love that ryan condal's playing into the magic aspect of things i will briefly say in regards to visions and like prophecies doubling back quickly to the sausage thing because you and i were like oh my god oh my god when uh aegon turns out to be sterile now because it's something that we've been talking about potentially with aegon the conqueror in our rainies truthers episode shit there are a couple other things in this episode that i feel like lend credence to the idea that from rainies's blood

credence stark the princess that was promised uh so we'll we'll come to another couple of those but yeah i did feel very strongly about that one too the sterility i was like i think i just looked at each other i was just like oh my god and we're like sterile i i think i was just shouting sterility at you and our uh watching partners were like what the fuck does that mean i think they know because we forced them to listen to us tell them like at least twice already but but um there's a couple of other things i i want to quickly touch on with helena like helena saying i was happier before i was queen to allison allison doesn't say anything but she's definitely like mood right because that's absolutely how she's felt both last season and this season.

And increasing understanding that I was happier before I was queen and therefore goes and visits the person who makes her think that way. Interesting, especially up against showing all these characters and duty, right? And what they think is their duty and what they think they must do and all these things. Very cool. Yeah, absolutely. and what they think is their duty and what they think they must do and all these things very cool yeah absolutely and then lastly like again in terms of uh prophecy stuff helena saying that

aegon will be king again and that he has not yet tasted victory i think is actually really great in terms of dramatic irony which is the type of irony when the audience knows something and the characters do not and i think it would have been a little stronger had the season ended with Rhaenyra triumphant because then the audience is left knowing or anticipating, like, okay, but how might this victory come undone? And having, I think, more of that break between when it comes out as opposed to if it happens very quickly within the same season.

But I think it was good ofena to tell us that and create that sort of like i think dramatic momentum i also wanted to point out that she says on his wooden throne so they'll probably make him a wheelchair a wooden wheelchair would be my guess not like how denarius sat on the bench yeah yeah he'll have his wooden throne and it'll probably be a wooden made of wood wheelchair type of thing just like doran has etc also i love that she says that because amen just thinks she means after like he'll come back like you're you're not gonna get rid of him like you won't be the king guy forever amen like that's what he thinks that she means. These are also true. But we also know, like, no one knows he's fled yet.

Yeah, that's true. So she also knows he's fled, and she probably also realizes that Rhaenyra will take King's Landing at this point, because it seems like she's getting a lot of knowledge, a lot of sight. Yeah. There's also, I think, like, you could argue, I guess, is the cart that he's in a little bit of a wooden bench too. Not really. I don't think so at all, but it does make me think of like the series as the cart king. Oh yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. The cart king. Yeah. That man had a bad time too. Yep. Yeah. Well, boy.

Crown him is to kill him. Yeah. Literally. We've already been discussing Aemond quite a bit this, this episode, but there's a little, there's a little more to say yeah I thought starting off with him burning sharp point as retribution towards the massies and towards uh Rhaenyra that was interesting I was like girl Elinda are you in king's landing still get out of there with your red cloak and your massie sigil girlfriend you're very very obvious outfit yeah Yeah, girl run.

I'm worried for you. But yeah, so that was who he was burninating. He was wilding out this episode. I was like, amen to behave. Yeah, he was spinning out of control. And I do think, you know, there are some parallels with some of his other family members in terms of how he tries to regain that control

by exacting violence on the people around him forcefully and i mean we've seen him try to do it with his mother but finally she was like oh my god please stop please like your sister please and i did kind of like this line where he goes what you say is treason to helena when she's saying something i'm like bro amand what you fucking did was treason burning your brother the king that's the actual treason you know this right yeah there are definitely those mirrors to damon at the end of season one right in his height of um losing his shit well maybe not his height of losing his shit sorry we had season two he was he continued losing his shit losing his shit but now he but now he's got it back. He's got even more shit than ever. Yeah, I love that Alison stood up for

Helena, though. That was great. Like, to Amand, that she was unafraid to step in, or maybe still was afraid, I should say. But, you know, she stepped in for her daughter to protect her when no one ever protected her, so. People have been talking about that line of like alison asking amen have you not have the the indignities of your youth not yet been like sufficiently avenged and it's fascinating because we see that aegon all he wants is to be loved i guess amen just wants revenge and all he's been doing in order to grasp power has only made him more and more alone look at him push everyone around him away. Yeah. Even the sister he once said that he would respect like the queen she is. Oh shit, you're right. That was very not respect. So true.

Yeah, he was drinking his disrespecting women juice. Oh my gosh. And now he's gonna go get told by his new mommy next season in Harrenhal, right? Like, hopefully Alice spanks him. Yeah. And he doesn't't know but other surrogate mommy sylvie yeah has been plotting against him too betrayal betrayal betrayal well almond oh by almond oat milk only oh no in the reach we have a couple of brief miscellaneous business items. Otto. Odo Milk Hightower?

Odo Milk Hightower. Is in a cage. Like a real cage, not just a metaphorical one. I don't know. We were on stream. I forget who was saying this on stream in the chat. But somebody suggested maybe he had been kidnapped by the beesberries who come calling for their liege lord and everyone's like don't know don't know what

happened to beesberry lyman haven't seen him uh we know kristen cole you know slammed his head into his ball at the table pretty violently yeah so maybe kidnapped by beesberries that is probably my guess that's a great way to tie that together and bees it's obvious too they want to keep risa funds on a little longer instead of just sending him back to get the chop chop so we'll see if it's going to be like hobert hightower plot or what he takes on or caltrops as we mentioned before yeah from that one theory fun stuff going on there but yeah as you said he's in a cage which i mean so is agan so many people no he kind of is everyone's in cages we're gonna get into it in the metaphorical sense in a bit tessarian was beautiful she was gorgeous she was everything she was soaring uh didn't see darren maybe next

time and now it's a race to who has a darren in their show first night of the seven kingdoms who still has not cast darren or shown any sign of darren existing because they hate me personally and then uh because i love darren that's like my fave man but then we still know darren here so it's a race we'll see what happens hot d or night of the seven kingdoms i think they're absolutely gonna bring them in just because i think they've seen like people being like whoa prophecy magic so cool in house of the dragon and including in house of the even house of the dragon season one but yeah it was fun was fun seeing Tesserian. I told Chloe, I was like, I feel like Tesserian is like fruit roll-up,

flavored, colored, like very berry blast kind of color scheme. That's my insight. Oh, it was also fun seeing, you know, the other troops there too. Sure. We love troops. I don't know. It's just interesting to see all the pieces moving.

Eliana's like supporting the high tower troops. No, I'm not. I'm not. I just saying it's good to see the pieces moving and fruit rollups. Are you a team green fan? Oh my God. No.

Well, team green's over. I'm an everyone fan. I love everyone. I'm a, not only fans, all the fans. Wait, I'm working the fans wait i'm working on it i'm working on it maybe we don't advertise that eliana let's talk about ss speaking of all the fans

because there were fans recent fans there they had fans there oh They had fans there. Oh my gosh. They did have fans. What a great opening little scene. The monkey. I was so confused. It took me a moment. I was like, aha, we are somewhere else. Not normal places. The council.

The dyed hair. When I saw the dyed hair, I was like, wow, Dario's everywhere for the eyes to see. Finally, we are getting Daario Naharis. Really cool, though. Really exciting to get Tyrosh and Essos in general. Just getting an up-close look. An expansion to, you know, we got to see a little bit of Pentos in season one. Yeah, that's true.

So it gives me hope that we went to one last season. We went to another next season, or this season, and maybe next season we'll go to one last season we went to another next season or this season and maybe next season we'll go to one more so maybe we'll get mirror in and then maybe maybe for the last season we'll go to lease and get visceros back whoa and we get the last scene dream of spring uh i was confused yeah when the monkey came on i was like is this a preview for a different show has the show started yet and then everything started happening i was like oh i see i get it now i really love that they gave us the council of 32 because i just think it's fun to see the way that the bureaucracy works slash does not actually work which i think they gave us a lot of with the green council and reyniera's council this season but it was cool

to see it it must have taken them a while to gather everyone yeah it was cool to see kind of the diversity of types of different people on that council too like just like what they were wearing what they looked like everyone had a very very innate, different sense of fashion. So if you look, you can see a few background people showing some of the different areas in Essos that have come to this council, these magisters. And then also different politics, right? You can see not everyone agreed with each other. And I don't know, I'm interested to get a little bit more from there.

And I did pick up that they talked about the taxes being imposed on the goods and I do think that Rhaenyra is going to be in a kind of a weak position for negotiating right if she takes the capital and she'll need to impose further taxes on already inflated items probably if they're going to make a deal she kind of loses a kid to them she does lose a kid to them which might make her even more mad. It is interesting though, because in a way, does she have to honor it?

It's like not her deal. And part of me is just like, lol, just send Damon to go beat them up again, which would be funny, but very unlikely. Very unlikely, but definitely funny. Like again,

like, all right, you and Courtney, it's all over again. Yeah, right? I do think they might bring back Abigail Thorne as Shiroko, which we'll talk about here. So perhaps they might blend further characters together with Shiroko Lohar, and maybe they capture Viserys, or they're the ones that take Viserys to Lys. I don't know.

It's an idea. Yeah, and also, I mean, Shuraka is looking forward to seeing Daemon again, I guess. So we'll see what happens. Could be a face-off down there. Oh, but not face-off like in the Arya chapters, which I do actually, I do think those are inspired by actually an award-winning movie, Face-Off. Also, I like that they established that Essos is like this sophisticated and rich land because you saw that a little bit with like karth long long long long long time ago in game of thrones but to remind us that like they they are right versus how egan acts as though essos they're

uncivilized and backwards and it's like no they're really sophisticated they got a whole complicated maybe it takes too long governmental system here in tyrosh but interesting to pit like the mud fighting against the children pits oh true true and also pretending to be cannibals yeah and i was like was that for me cannibalism i think they did did you write that for me also sarah hess are you communicating with me blink twice if so lysine spray yes abigail thorn if you're into the youtubes that's philosophy tube but also an accomplished stage actor yeah i was playing shco Little Har, which was awesome. They kind of merged a little bit of Scirocco with Ricalio Rindoon, right?

Like the Oakenfist and Ricalio Rindoon meeting where Oakenfist treats with them and Ricalio Rindoon is like, impregnate my wives, I'm sending them to your room. And that little bit of androgynous in how they present themselves. And there was something cool, like, in the after. I thought it was nice to hear Abigail Thorne kind of talking about how she got to work with them on what she wanted with the character. Anything she wanted to add to the character.

Which was cool. And the outfits. She wanted to add lots of knives and weapons. Oh, cool. I really respect that. Yeah. So, really cool. I really respect that. Yeah. So really cool. The outfits were so amazing,

like so brightly colored pattern and all the textiles were amazing. Very inspired. Oh, this is an interview with Ryan Condal that she posted on Twitter today. Really, the idea is it comes down to this in a woman in a man's role as a fleet commander in this highly patriarchal society.

And Lohar has kind of played the David Bowie role her whole life, as sort of, it's a bit of androgyny and sort of tends one way or the other. I love that. I think what we were really trying to say is in this time, all these salty sea dogs she's surrounded with, all these men, their brains cannot process the idea, they're saluting a woman who's leading this massive fleet of ships at the end so she presents herself as a masculine character in the classic sense and then they sort of accept it and that's why they all follow her i love that it kind of implies she could be genderqueer she could be you know a female presenting as male she could be doing

whatever she wants to be doing and that's kind of a fun interpretation yeah especially because we have a lot of characters that are perceived trans in this story or all are perceived genderqueer and ricalio rindoon is totally flamboyant so i i would love to get ricalio rindoon but i think we might not i think it might become abigail thorn shirako lohar in hottie yeah yeah and um yeah thanks for saying that that Abigail Thorne was a stage actor. Cause I was like, dang, she's so talented.

What a great, I mean, she, she was really talented. She did a great job with this role, but I thought I was like, wow, she's a prodigy.

I mean, a natural. She is. I mean, maybe she is a natural, but regardless, like she did a great job, but I was about to be like,

oh my God, that's her first role. It's not. No not no no she's just a good actor yeah she's got a lot of shows on nebula and like her main show that she does her philosophy tube i know she puts it on nebula now and does some really great long form essays so you can always check those out but she does stage plays and i think it's showing we've been talking a lot about how some of these scenes are very much constructed and performed almost like a stage play in a cool way yeah like in a good way this is a positive uh perception so that's probably why we were like yeah you rocking it i think it's a difficult character to pull off as well because it is a very over the top character and you have to commit to something like that like i don't know if you watched the one piece live action at all and i think that luffy's character is hard to nail

but like the person just commits that actor just commits to that bit and therefore it works but speaking of bits oh my god the bit where shirako was not getting Tyland's... I almost fucked it up. Tyland's name right? That would just be a character, yeah. That was so funny. Tywin, Tyman, or Tyman, Tyrod, everything that she called him was so fucking funny.

Yeah, you just gotta neg people, like, neg Tyland. You know? But Tyland was a pretty good sport. I mean, we saw him also the actor playing Jason as well reminding us like these are also twins everyone there are also these twins him doing karaoke I love that uh Jefferson Hall the actor was like that was actually the worst part he's like I was not acting. What do you mean? Oh, the being miserable about having to do this? He was like, yeah, the singing's god-awful, so I'm glad it worked.

To friendship. That's me. To friendship. It did do the levity for me. That was nice because it was a tense episode. So I loved it. Also, I just love seeing Tyrosh. Yeah, absolutely.

I just love seeing the dyed beards. I was like, wow. What we could have had. We could have had it. That's what it was like. And that's what I've been saying, right? They could have dyed Dario number one's hair with like a dark blue navy and it would have looked perfect. We could have gotten Young Griff and John Connington.

Listen. And Dario, the real one. John Connington. Listen. And Dario, the real one. John Connington. Wow. My fucked up son, who's also going to die. Is this how Alison feels? Anyways. Okay, we'll take a quick trip over to the Vale where Reyna, girl, I'm so worried about you. Oh my gosh. Um, Reyna and Sheepstealer. All I could think about when she was drinking that water was daenerys in a dance with dragons the more she drank the more she shat yeah they really gave us i think uh the feeling of danny at the skahazadan being like i don't know i'm gonna chase this

dragon and i i don't know what i'm doing i I have no food. How is she living? All right. What was she eating? Like, has anyone taught Reina how to forage? Like, she's a city girl. She grew up in Pentos. I did think unlikely that the guards didn't turn around and go, Miss, excuse me, Miss, and chase her down. But yeah. Oh, well.

Oh, well. Other people have pointed that out. How did no one notice that this entire princess is missing and has gay abandoned her duties i'm sorry i'm never gonna stop making this joke she has gay abandoned the fucking children fuck those kids fuck them kids so really wanted to see a little more like her feeding a sheep maybe or something or her mounting sheep stealer that could have been a nice addition to the episode say her mounting a sheep i was like it doesn't hit the sim to ride a sheep i'm just saying but sheep stealer was beautiful i love the curly wings like the very curled in

talons and wings and i don't know everyone was calling her like ugly on the internet and i was like what she's beautiful I thought she was beautiful. She's just silly. Yeah. I think she's covered in mud too. Oh, probably. You know what would be crazy? Just like Thailand.

Rain happens and all of a sudden, all of a sudden, she's pink like morning. Wouldn't that be crazy? Oh, that'd be funny. I thought you were going to say like rain happens and then she's like it all washes off then she's fluffy like a sheep they should at least merge sheep stealer with mourning if they're gonna do this that's my demand okay let's drift over to drift mark oh man we're getting there we're getting there raniera and corliss great conversation i actually really enjoyed having them actually one-on-one talk and counsel with one another privately. It kind of felt to me like he's really recommending and pushing

more, which, I mean, you have it now. You have the stuff you need to do it, so you should be taking it. Everyone around her this episode is like, we need to we need to attack we will never be more ready than we are right now which is also true true um so definitely felt he was pushing more and she really did kind of hesitate wanted to pull back a little bit still at the beginning which is what made it so crazy with alicent right because by the end she's like no i just fucking decided like you weren't here you should have been here an hour earlier i literally just decided this faster the timing and pacing are being pushed by everyone else on her right who's ready to move forward yeah i think it's interesting to have uh all of this with with corley's and he

as you said right kind of really pushing action. The way that he suggested this, like, swift and hard, like, action slash strategy, it feels very Taiwan-esque. And I know that Coralise, you know, Stephen Tussauds has talked about how his actor, or, like, I think, was he made to read Taiwan lines? And he has described his character as being Taiwan-esque. And I'm curious to see how this develops, right? Like, what else Corlys will kind of push her to do and what maybe Rhaenyra will feel she must do in order to honor what what

Corlys has lost for her and also like you know what what are these drastic measures that he's willing to go to because as we know Fire and Blood suggests that he's the one who tells her you were a special exception which is just a really interesting thing to say considering if he's saying that he's doing this for his wife and her memory would she her memory not have wanted like all of the girlies to inherit yeah i mean she pushed him several times interesting right because you have what seems like one of the best guys on the show who had like a great relationship with her. Then you look at characters like Jaehaerys and Alysanne, right? Right. But I mean, there's also,

that's a great point, right? They feel that their wife is like the exception or perhaps, and also like not the most egalitarian guy as his son points out, which we'll get there in a second. Yeah, because it's really seeming as we get there, like that's kind of why, right? Like with Adam and with Alan, he wants to be able to legitimize them now. Like he has his out. He has his little out planned. He's like, I'm going to make them heir.

That's going to make up for everything. So yeah, that's how it works, right? Parenting is only you just do the one thing. I have really bad news too. Like their inheritance totally about to get shit canned by the triarchy. Yeah, well, it's okay. One of them's going to find romance that he's going to totally squander. Yeah.

Corliss doesn't tell Rhaenyra who Adam is still. Like had a total opportunity. Yeah. It's building. It's coming. she never forgets a slight real or imagined it's gonna happen it's gonna really feel like a betrayal that he didn't tell her he has had many opportunities i actually thought that like damon was gonna tell her at harrenhal and be like oh i know that boy i was there when corley's was off at war with his mom making that boy but uh he's now a man also I did

not know I did not realize that Adam's actor till this episode because I haven't guess I haven't listened to his behind the scenes stuff enough he's American yeah I know that accent that's American I guess the pool of Brits got too small and Irish people and Scottish people. Well, he's doing great. Yeah, he's doing good. I'm happy and I love his performance. He was kind of cracking me up, actually, in the Dragon Seeds. We'll get there.

Corliss and Alan. Wow, that he renamed his ships just to kind of apologize from the afterlife and the beforelife here. And now he's going to have his bastard sons captain it you go corliss you go you drama queen i love him i loved alan calling him the fuck out yeah that was wonderful clocked uh i love that line do you know what hunger does to a boy you can see some of those great lines of like the bastards we talk about in all of the stories hell there's a great bastard in this episode from a different story right blood raven oh yeah um you see what happens without love and for alan it's not just love it's money it's having the basic needs met right like not just needing a father to be there to be your mentor and to be your father but also

being able to live to grow to eat to be, to be healthy. He had to fight for his brother for that. We see a lot of those other bastards in this main story, right? Like Gendry or Edric with the difference there. Edric was raised like a Lord's son. Gendry was raised, well, he had to fight for his right to live and to party. Yeah. But at least he didn't know, right? That that was his dad who was just not acknowledging him right i think there's something really visceral hateful here like as he said i saw you walk by and you just didn't acknowledge us and then you know he lately touches on like the fact that his mother passed we don't really know what happened there also why are we not

naming marilda of hull i don't understand why we haven't like said her name maybe we'll get it next season or something if he like digs into like you didn't support my mom maybe like while she was sick or something like a story that kind of mirrors hughes oh yeah hammers with his daughter and i mean i became a man and a leader without you and i will lead the way that i want to yes Yes. And I also love that he kind of, when he did try to school him while he got schooled back, the old man got clapped back on, uh, I like that he told Alan, you need to be a leader. And I think that's going to lead to the Oaken fist rising here, right? Like him becoming the Oaken fist, him becoming that leader that we

see in Fire and Blood that goes on to have a lot of the rest of the story revolve around him yeah of being this really like sturdy guy and i i did like also the way that he talks about it of the way that you know you can contrast the way that you were talking about the different bastards as well some a couple of royal bastards and the way that Alan's bastardy and shame contrasts with the way that Jace describes his own, right? And Jace is really, he's really pressed right now about Hugh and Ulf and he has no idea what's going on with Adam. As Bela says, like, do you really think that the dragon is like the only thing separating you from the people in Flea Bottom? Which first of all, yeah, y'all are the same. You're just all

people, like the distinctions between everyone is all made up. But at the same time, like there is a difference as well, right? Like the luxury in which you lived, the education you got, the fact that you can read and write, that makes you different. Does it make you more qualified to rule? Does it make you more special? No, but it does make you different and also like uh growing up in the public eye it's difficult for jace whereas you have a very different pain for alan in which you're grown up ignored and then how how their hair contrasts in terms of their journey of like jace being very self-conscious about his hair being brown and Jace being very self-conscious about his hair being brown and Alan having to be self-conscious about, well, oh, oh shit, my hair's white. I gotta

hide it. And I love that that kind of leads into the dragon seeds with that, right? Like because we see Ulf and his interactions with Jace and how much they really piss Jace off. Yeah. Just how brazen that Ulf is not ashamed of who he is. Good for him. Yeah, you know, good for him. He's growing on me, even though he's an annoying fucker. I actually, especially after re-watching the episode, I do feel much more fondly of the way that he was portrayed in this episode. And I really like what Grey was saying of like, I mean, he doesn't know.

Yeah, how would he right and i love also that kind of highlight from a few episodes ago when he was in the brothel and madame sylvie and uh diana are talking very loudly about how they feast up in the castle every night and here he is he's been invited up in the castle to a feast and that's great right he's out for himself but he's looking around and realizing i'm the odd man out finally welcome into the world that's true yeah the secret world it's just the same thing as king's landing was yeah and apparently okay so i like that you called this out they were really eating yeah eating during those scenes and he ate 30 quails i'm very 30 i thought it was 20 i thought it was 20 but it could it could have been 30 it could have reached 30 by later takes yeah he kept going though he was eating two per take oh no quails aren't that big they were all eating and

usually you know you have a lot of fake food but with game of thrones you kind of can't always do that so some of the food is so ridiculous and you need the characters eating for the scene i really enjoyed learning that everyone else was just eating berries adam's actor was making fun of everyone he was like watching and he's like i just kept eating my berries i thought they were very silly but he couldn't get away without eating the birds he had to eat the birds yeah olf kind of had a point another point i'm like olf was right she hasn't knighted him yet yeah and you're holding that like the carrot for them to rise to uh when i don't know that's a pretty big thing you're asking them to do, right? Like you're asking them to go to war and potentially die and fight the biggest other dragons, as he points out. Yeah.

And while Ulf isn't necessarily quite maybe educated in how these things go and how he should act, as we'll talk about, for him playing social politics and having to follow by this set of rules that he doesn't really know how to slash care to know how to, why would that be worth it to him? All you did was give him something he has to feed. Yeah, when you put it like that, I think about it now in the context of Alicent saying, I actually hated this about you, Rhaenyra, that you were not chained to the same order of things. That you just had a disdain for how that stuff is that's Ulf he's got a disdain for like the way things are supposed to be and he doesn't need the career

track of you know you're this you become a knight you become a lord why does he he jumped the career track he has a dragon like what does he need yeah you can really start to see where those the the greediness is going to start to come in and maybe he's going to start taking what he wants with fire and blood yeah which is i mean they say like getting a dragon changes you and i'm like it's not the dragon having power changes you and like there are studies that show when people have power uh they they feel less empathy and like the brain like doesn't light up in those empathetic ways and i do like hugh explaining that olaf isn't used to the manners of court because it shows us it reminds us that hugh has had to learn how to navigate that world like the court in order to

like beg for money and for his business right he had to learn how to demur just to survive and also adam has had to learn to play by those rules as well because i mean uh you know his parentage but at the same time like the ships ships have a hierarchy to them yeah you have to like fall in line in order for it to work yeah you know last week when we were talking about this and talking about Hugh a little bit and what a different character he is right in comparison to Ulf and Tumulton and the roles they come to play uh it makes me wonder if maybe you will try to stop Ulf or maybe later at Tumulton and maybe that's how Vermithor and Silverwing go out which is oh my god horrible that they have to fight each other yeah wow and maybe that's how vermithor and silverwing go out which is oh my god horrible that they have to fight each other yeah wow and maybe with the prophecy right maybe oaf decides that he

wants to be king and he tries to raise his armies around him with his dragon there and you have that when the hammer shall fall upon the dragon a new king shall arise and none shall stand before him maybe hew his prophecy prophecy comes into play there while another king rises. Yeah, I mean, I think this one is about, this one's about Robert. Yeah, I think it's about Robert, but. But like, it is interesting to think of that.

And if he decides like, oh, prophecies, me also prophecy? Cause like, why not? Like everyone else in the story is like, prophecy, me, that's me. Gratuitous picture of yourself. but what you're saying about olf like if he tries to stop olf but like does he try to stop olf from doing whatever he's doing and then he gets blamed for and looped in because they're like i don't know y'all are both upjump bastards and he's like fuck it i'll be the villain you want

me to be tyrian Lannister style too. Ooh, yeah. Mm-hmm. And we have two whole years to think about it. Can you believe it, Bestie? I mean, that's a pretty short amount of time. I've been waiting 13 years for it. That's not true.

I've been waiting actually like, I don't know, 10 years for it because of when I finished. But anyways, I liked this comment on the Direwolf City stream from someone named melissa aloud melissa is loud 7404 this one was just kind of cute of silverwing knows his oaf and kept knocking him over if a human did that they'd be considered to be obnoxious now at the dinner and meeting jace what is olf he was obnoxious makes me wonder if silverwing saw similar temperament in olf and now the link is magnifying olf's douchebaggery we may find that silverwing is kind of an ass silly tongue out emoji i just think it's kind of funny to think that like silverwing's just mischievous up to hijinks. Especially when you consider dragons, I think, are very much like cats. Yeah, but with fire. A lot of them, yeah, but with fire.

And some of them are lazy noodles, but then some of them are playful, or some are dominant, and some are just dumb. I love that about dragons. They all have great personalities. They do. I like that we're seeing that they have different personalities. Last little thing about Ulf.

I like that he keeps talking about, we were talking about how his actor ate a bazillion birds. He keeps going, bring me more of those little birds, right? Bring me more of those little birds. And then we transition into the scene with Damon and Harrenhal and then other little birds, maybe, with how it works with Bloodraven and seeing things through the birds.

Clever, clever. If I'm remembering the order of everything right, I think it was like that. And I was like, oh. With the crows. The three-eyed crow. Yeah. I mean, I guess it's the raven in the show, but whatever. It can be what we want it to be. Ryan Condal gave me books.

He gave me a feast for crows you ryan condell jason bayla i liked this scene good queen bayla what we could have had right i just i was so sad like she really talked him off his ledge because he's getting a little out there i also want to highlight another rainies truthers unite line that we got where baila says do you believe that you are the first noble heir who was not sired by his noble father yeah that's it that was all i had for that. That's all we have. Yeah. Definitely love Bela, though, in that she kind of told him that he needs to knock it the fuck off. Yeah. I really want to see what happens with her and Alan, though. I guess Alan and Jace have a similar angst.

Yeah, there's something cute about his silence and about his silence and steadfast and guardedness and that he's not very vulnerable but that bella is bella is a very like vulnerable and sweet kind and uh brave person right so i think you get a little bit of that corliss and rainis relationship back yeah that little bit of sass that little bit of uh headstrong against the quiet introverted more headstrong yeah and i mean you know she wouldn't be the first person to get it on with their uncle my god at least it's a it's less blood shared i guess and so um yeah we've discussed this already that there should have been more jay scenes in here

and in general. And I do think like there was a sort of strategic decision to not bring Jace to Harrenhal in a way because, um, hey, you don't want to, you don't want to make him vulnerable. But at the same time, the whole like strong thing. Yeah, absolutely. You didn't want to remind people. That and I wonder like, man, he would have been so much more moody. Yeah, you don't want to give him nightmares, Jesus.

Rhaenyra and Mysaria, a quick blip. Mysaria was laying it on a little thick in her worship of what Rhaenyra was able to do. Like, wow, look what you did. Can you believe it, Queen Rhaenyra? I'm so proud. You're unstoppable now. And I think she was doing it on purpose. I mean, she's buttering her up a little bit. That really stood out to me. And I did like that line where she's like, when she asks who pays the price, which that comes back

when we talk about Alicent, right? Who pays the price? And the camera pans first to the dragons. And then Mazaria turns her neck to the scar on her neck so I thought that was really great because it just is going to show the small folk versus the dragons it's not the not the only allusion to them in this episode yeah and I think to Rainier's credit she's the one who's like whoa let's hold back a little like what who does pay the price and I do think it's interesting because as you said mizaria's laying it on a little thick with that language of like the gods have shown you their favor and things like that which does mizaria believe this or is she parroting back the language that reyniera has been using in the past few episodes about it so i it makes me again wonder like what is mizaria playing at here you know like and also for her to be like i just

care about the small folk but then being like rainiera what if we did what if we attack king's landing and then just kind of like being quiet when rainier was like but who pays the price i'm like i thought you cared about this mizaria But now do you just care about this religion that you've decided to create overnight? And I don't know. I don't know. I don't know what's going on. I mean, when Rhaenyra was up there watching from her upstairs office as they died, Misaria had that look, that very like slow look of calculated watching like, hmm, she's kind of enjoying this. I think Misariazaria said yes let's go to the side with more dragons so we can really get free yeah exactly that's kind of what i'm wondering is she just

like laying it on and the small folk and the dragons will pay the price in the end yeah exactly just just mirroring mirroring that uh more deep language as someone's as ned c stannis said last time or no ned stannis but the a is a c yes yes yes on twitter i keep i keep messing it up in my head i've like made it something else well we got another alice and reneara reunion and it's kind of interesting because I saw this one coming, not the first one, right? I really saw this as the reunion, the moment, the begging that was going to come. We talked a little bit about this with Glytis in Unleash the D this season.

This is what I thought was happening, and this is what I was ready for. But episode three threw me for a loop. I didn't know we were going to get another. So, okay. I was very into this. I didn't know we were going to get another. So, okay. I was very into this. I loved, what was it? Basically, remember with like Kristen Cole at Allison's door at her bedroom.

And she asked him like, what do you want to be absolved of your sin with me? And that was the theme here, right? Did you come here to be absolved? She's asked. I like that line, and it's kind of the recurring motif through this episode, where Rhaenyra tells her that history will paint her as a villain if she does this, for A, giving up King's Landing, or B, for having it said she fought against Rhaenyra in the books

when secretly she was brokering pieces yeah and actually now that you talk about it in the context of absolution like she does she's not here seeking that because she's like I don't care if everyone sees me as a villain I just want to be free and like what Rhaenyra warns Alicent what happened to her is what happens to Rhaenyra right that's what we see the histories paint her as this cold queen etc. It also makes me think of how Cersei is interpreted as a cold queen and then you get to her chapters and I'm like

now there's fire in there there's a lot of fire there's smoke but I love Alison talking about freeing herself she's freeing herself from the legacy it doesn't matter like if they impose those narratives on her she knows who she is

she will just be herself and that's her she gets to keep that for herself also that she chooses helena yeah right that she realizes that her sons are out of her grasp they're too far gone but helena helena still has a chance and how tragic it'll be that she can't save her daughter probably yeah yeah she probably won't you're right and at the cost of that you know she says this line of the crown will pursue war and victory at any cost and we're talking about pricing right pricing in this in this episode and i like that she says the crown and the and she's talking about the throne the iron throne right she's not talking about the actual person she's not talking about amon she's not talking about aegon she's talking about rhaenyra but all of them because that's what it means for the the crown asks it as a sacrifice if you that it demands blood it's this very like sort

of damocles sort of a theme thing that's going on throughout the series as well kiss the ring yeah kiss the ring it the crown isn't a person it is a it is a compulsion it is a curse it is its own character as well that envelops who you are and then you have also i i feel like allison agreeing to all this stuff to for ray mera it feels a little like maester pie cell so i thought that was kind of fun i love it because it's such a good twist to what we get in fire and blood of you know she did after a while when they realized there was no reprieve she threw down you know the keys and opened the gates and said it's yours but she tells her my son will come back with fire and blood and i could still see that happening if when they find that aegon's not there yeah that's

gonna be a problem i feel like that maybe rhaenyra will put her in the dungeon to have sex with her and or is there like what if if it's actually Helena who says, Agen will come back with fire and blood. It's like, girl, you should have filtered that. You should have not said that. This is, read the room. Oh my God. Yeah, I'll be curious to see what happens there.

Alicent agreeing to sacrifice her son, essentially for all this, for her freedom, for Helena's freedom and the rest of the realm. I thought it was interesting in the context of, they were joking last night on Darwulf City, they're like, you got Lady Stoneheart, she's got like, you know, she's got her hood and stuff going on. But like, it makes me think of like, is Alicent an exploration of this idea of mercy as it's portrayed in those main five books

of, you know, the gift of mercy, as well as as like this is her version of a mother's mercy in terms of like does she think i need to put aegon out of his misery and also again to save her other kid and it also even makes me think of like stannis and stannis being like what is the life of one bastard boy against the whole kingdom and eventually like oh what is the life of your child worth against a whole kingdom and this vision of peace yeah because that's what leadership is right like you're giving yourself bits of yourself away i don't think it has to be like that well in westeros i'm saying it is yeah in westeros that's what it is they give themselves away so so even though reynira was talking to mizaria a little bit before

this being like i don't know if i'm willing to pay that price like it paying that price seems bad i feel as though alice being here has only uh incensed reynira and kind of strengthened her resolve to be like yeah fine i'm gonna pay that price whatever you know when she seemed like she was questioning in front of mizaria but I think like here we're seeing that she actually is willing to do it maybe and and now her and her desires are laid bare because she can be honest in that way with Alicent I also feel like maybe even in a way taking it this way is poisoned no matter what whether it's intentional on either side right that doesn't matter that like it will

be poisoned the taking of king's landing this way that's true something about it felt like not cheapened as in like it was cheap and how they did it cheapened as in like oh you're taking it in a cheap way the easy way but it's not going to be easy to hold it yeah yeah there's going to be a price no matter what and I think it was already kind of the question of, will you be able to hold it? Right. And now, now it's just an easier shortcut and we'll see how long it takes. Yeah. I love the theme of choose, right? That's been the whole season. All must choose. What do I say? Every week, all must choose. choose so quickly it was fun because when we were watching it as soon as as reyniera told alice to choose chloe goes almost choose right next to me and on one hand i was like

lol but on the other hand i was like oh my god it was about that the whole time i didn't say that but in my head i was like wow she's so smart and pretty and, it was about that the whole time. I didn't say that, but in my head, I was like, wow, she's so smart and pretty. And like, it was about that the whole time. Oh my god, you're so clever to have seen it. All must choose. No, it was perfect because you're ending the season with their dynamic from season one, episode one, basically, like completely flipped. Allison's dutifulness to Rhaenyra's cravings for freedom, right?

Come fly with me, Rhaenyra said. Fly away with me. We'll go eat cake and pussy till we die. Versus now, come with me, with her, right? No, Rhaenyra now has the duty to her family, to her crown. Allison, eat, pray, loved her way out of, you know, having the burden anymore. She said, I just want to live.

Like what Larry said to Agen, right? You find a way to live. And here she is, even in these framed shots, you have that great closing shot with the woman vocalizing. Nyah! The great framed shot to that wonderful song from ramin where raniera has the dragonstone library closing down upon her like a crown prophecy and crown both burdening her weighing her down uh ensconcing her in prophecy right especially after the heron hall chap but chapter the heron

hall scene that was kind of a chapter. And Alicent, for the first time in her life, is having one of those great sweeping shots where she's against the sky like Rhaenyra when she watches the dragons. She's free for the first time. Maybe not for long, though. Maybe not for long. But maybe she will be free in her heart and maybe that's like what matters in a way like she's she can throw off the shackles of of having to worry about what other people think but i do like that idea of yeah yeah that desire to be free i forgot you're right that is what reyniera asked allison to do when they were just wee lasses of like let's run away and like just go eat cakes and have fun and

it's also like very robert baratheon-esque being like ned let's just leave let's go do things and like that's like i have kids in a family theoretically you have kids in a family too robert but also most importantly a kingdom the duty right the duty does chain you and allison chooses freedom, not power necessarily, even though like sometimes they can go together. It's a different kind of power. And it's maybe the first time in her life she's ever like had a choice, perhaps, or like the ability to choose. She's made choices in the past and has kind of closed them. And she talks about having always defined

herself by other people specifically they're all men right her father her husband her lover her son and i like how rainier is just like i don't care about anything you said your lover tea girl tea as uh they said last night on dire old city um versus you know as you're saying the library histories everything closing in on rainier that cageness of and her saying it was decided for me long ago that's not the voice of someone who's choosing that's the voice of someone who's had that choice made for them which is what's been happening to alicent fate and destiny are a cage the crown is a cage blood raven is in a cage of a tree no i mean that's true no it's true that's part i know i know it's just funny you're just funny sometimes okay okay and then you know versus

interestingly how destiny instead of caging damon it almost seems like it frees him that unburdens him he's like oh i'm part of something bigger i have like meaning in my life finally instead of just constantly like striving and fighting for it it really wrapped up a lot of great themes of the episode something great about those beautiful sweeping shots with them i didn't know how i feel about it as soon as it started but i liked it i liked it we'll keep it basically it was finally good luck babe being played it was and uh yeah lovely yeah the visual storytelling is strong like this season you know i told you so oh there was also a new theme theme not just good luck babe uh from ramin that beautiful piano theme it was kind of like you know uh akin to his light

of the seven i like when he goes piano on it i didn't realize that's what that note that you had in there meant but yes you're right a new theme song yeah but not opening theme song all right well now that we've talked about all that let's talk about the lover oh my god riverlands he's not a lover anymore oh sir christian cope boy he is not coping no i'm worried about him we need to get him on something you know just a little bring him back a little sarah tonin find miss sarah targaryen tonin sarah targaryen Tonin. I liked the Gwaine and Kristen confrontation, especially because Gwaine left King's Landing

in kind of a very vulnerable way with his sister, where they both faced some truths they maybe never wanted to face from one another. And he realized that, you know, his sister isn't doing so hot. Sis is bad. Yeah, but now she's thriving. Yeah, now she's thriving.

She, pray, loved her way to Dragonstone. But Sis was not doing great. So he does start a little confrontation with Christy about it. And they have been building up to this well. Gwaine's just kind of been like, fine, I'll shut my mouth. But he can't anymore. He can't possibly understand how Jamie Lannister could fuck his twin sis. I mean, how Kristen Cole could be fucking Alicent and doing

this I liked his Scottish play monologue it was basically the tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow soliloquy right that line of true honor being a mist that melts in the morning uh a gray mist like Bloodraven maybe I don't know I don't know i don't know i'm not saying ryan coddle reads theories but maybe he reads theories i did think especially with the dust and all the death he was talking about like i said the tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow soliloquy tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow creeps in this petty pace from day to day to the last syllable of recorded time and all our yesterdays have lighted fools the way to dusty death out out brief candle life's but a walking shadow a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more it is a tale told by

an idiot full of sound and fury signifying nothing it's akin to what he said right he's like give me something for the pain and die that's pretty much well this is also like i mean it's interesting because this this line comes after this is these are the lines of someone who is not okay because this is kristin cole you're this is the line that macbeth says upon learning that Lady Macbeth has killed herself, because I'm willing to say these words. And he's just like, well, that sucks. So Macbeth, not okay in that time. Kristen Cole, not okay right now.

Yeah, he's just really not okay. He calls Alice and he's like, yeah yeah she was the beacon that i followed i just love following teenage girls to the ends of the earth and then i like that he calls her that beacon because you got that wordplay that harkens back to the to the wedding right like rainiera and laner's wedding and they talk about you know the high tower as a beacon yeah when it's light screen calling everything to war and now we are here at war it's big sad man and he goes the debt the dragons dance and the men are as dust beneath their feet because you know we love talking about trampling and feet and stuff in the series for some reason but also it makes me think of tiara tolan's line in winds one of those sample chapters of they were dancing in my

dream and everywhere the dragons danced the people died and that's what's gonna happen in the dance of the dragons kristin got a great line with And again, just like drawing that visual design from dust here and talking about the dust and talking about that one skeleton that blew away to dust right back at the war really gives you that visual line to remind you at Rook's Rest of all the death and destruction. Yeah, I forgot if we already brought this up in a previous episode or not, but it makes me think we might have we might have but i'm sorry

i'm just gonna read it aloud again everyone because it's brief it's not that brief whatever the poem ozymandias by percy bish shelley uh you know i'm in a traveler from an antique land blah blah blah anyways hand and mock them in the heart that fed and on the pedestal these words appear my name is ozymandias king of kings look on my works he mighty in despair nothing beside remains round the decay of that colossal wreck boundless and bare the lone and level sand stretch far away that's what's gonna happen after the dance with the dragons and depression depression and kristen cole's kind of like the only one really seeing it right now and i mean it is very much a lot of it is his fault but it's an interesting

question as he tries to find a way to move forward despite his own sins despite like the bleakness of the rest of the world like is it possible it's a question i think george is interested in asking is it possible how do you make your own meaning and move on after making very big mistake? Right. And also witnessing horrors from your very big mistake. Right. Are you allowed to move forward after that? It very much is mirroring what Alicent is doing in Dragonstone, right?

That she's trying to find out how does she move forward from what she perceives as maybe a few mistakes. Yeah. You have one bad friend with benefits who's maybe not your friend and then what two psycho sons one and a half why why do we say one and a half because agan's predictable He's not necessarily a psycho. Yeah. It's just Eamon. He's like toxic frat boy. And I think that's the thing, right? Unfortunately, that is the rape culture that was cultivated for many people there and even in our own world.

Absolutely. All right. Before we get into the, God, the best stuff. Oh, God, I'm so excited. Before we get into Bull Heron best stuff oh god i'm so excited before we get into bull heron hall a couple of miscellaneous notes i like that caraxis likes pigs yeah it made me think of them serving the pig dread bringing out the pig for amen to ride a little bit like funny that caraxis is like i eat pigs and that's what they always taunted amand with um oh yeah i also think it means that craxies likes ribs uh pork ribs betty scorches those

puppies up every day it sounds amazing everyone has different tastes some people want mutton some people want want pork you know alfred broom the audacity in this bitch but now he's been you know put down by damon a little so he's gonna go support aegin love the weirwood whispering traitor we almost missed that but for the subtitles making us listen once more. Because we have bad hearing, and by that I mean me. We're old. I'm old. We're hundreds of years old. I know y'all Google my age.

Yeah, that's a thing people do. I'm just kidding. I'm young. And I thought it was Alice's voice, for sure, speaking through the weirwood. I thought it was like a Children of the forest, or even potentially, what if Bran? Because I did feel, even though we didn't see Bran, I did feel his presence, right? Because the crow is one and cyclical,

just like the queen who ever was the crow ever is too, right? In a way. Yeah, yeah. I really actually loved the switch from the three-eyed crow, first of all, flying off of Bloodraven's face. I can't believe I'm saying these words while speaking about a Game of Thrones spinoff TV show. Like, just because these are words I would never get to speak in Game of Thrones. Wow. So I love the switch where the three-eyed crow flies off of the wine stain, crow-shaped

mark, skin mark. I don don't know i'm so excited birthmark face birth skin the birthmark on blood raven's face when it just turns into the crow and turns into the three-eyed crow amazing so cool this is obviously pre-blackfire rebellion because he has both eyes right now which will be interesting because we're going to get some of the Blackfire Rebellion eventually. Yeah. I like that we get that eye of a dire wolf POV bounding towards the others. And I think the vision definitely confirmed

for some people that Dany is a big part of that prophecy of the prince that was promised and that the Long Night is something that can't just be conquered alone too right you still had that bit of dire wolf in that vision whether you saw it or not and that bit of the north john has presence in this vision danny does too um and while got got thrones got the the throne show while they got chair while the chair show like biffed the long night in some

aspects for fans i do think that it was cool to kind of see that come back even though i claimed we would never see the others in this show recently i think yeah yeah i didn't think i didn't think they would do it they would just hint at it and i like that they they drew that through line but i just realized that i think a part of why they didn't do the one-eyed thing on blood raven just yet is because it's too confusing with amand because it's like such a a trait that is associated strongly with this main character and we've already seen like them make amand look like matt smith at one point so i think they might have been like oh they they were worried that viewers would at one point so i think they might have been like oh they were worried that viewers would get confused and so i understand now why they didn't do it but anyways

yeah we got we got a lot of stuff in this i thought it was really fun i was like oh my gosh the comet and they just did it they did the whole thing they did the whole and like i don't know i thought it was a great end for his character and that they had the Weirwoods actually like, you know, actually do stuff and be magical. Gushing the sap. Oh my God. The blood sap just gushing down it. And it was very cool that it gets to be Damon because you have that great like quick line

of like, little is known of Damon's time in in harrenhal which suggests that her witchy ways did not work upon him or something and it's like is that what it's just yeah they worked a lot it was great seeing danny in that because we have that wonderful bit from amon in the books where he realizes that hey he and rhaegar were fools, he says, right? That they always looked for a prince that was promised, not a princess. And then he says, what fools we were who thought ourselves so wise. The error crept in from the translation. Dragons are neither male nor female. Barth saw the truth of that. But now one, and now the other, as changeable as flame, the language misled us all for a thousand years. Daenerys is the one, born amidst salt and smoke. The dragons prove it.

Daemon, I think, thinks that's Rhaenyra, or thinks it's something to do with Rhaenyra, right? It helps him believe in a way. He sees the three heads of the dragon. After seeing dragons dead, that we'll talk about, I think it makes Daemon believe in Rhaenyra, whether it's cyclical and he sees somebody from his future and doesn't quite know. But I do think he thinks it's Rhaenyra because of the way it's sandwiched with then a vision of Rhaenyra taking the throne, which does have that great quality like Game of Thrones of Dany's vision of the throne, that grittiness and darkness. Yeah, I can't tell if like he knows that that's someone else or he thinks it's Rhaenyra.

I'm torn between it because I'm also like, to an extent, do you gain a like bit of innate understanding upon holding the weirwood and knowing some of those things? Or do you only just see it and then you have to interpret it? Which we see is the case with melisandre and we see is the case with brand so you might not just like have an innate understanding i don't know how how damon interprets all that or like is he like oh the path to get to there is through putting reynira on the throne i'm not sure yet but it does it would be really funny to me if he did think it was reneara yeah but my god that we even get to discuss this yeah and i i love that as you said right like it ties in exactly with this thing that maester amon said and i think it would have hit harder if the books came out in a more timely fashion.

We wouldn't have to keep questioning, you know, like, does this mean this? Does this mean this? Like, it's there, right? And the way that we don't have to keep questioning is Jon, Rhaegar, and Lyanna's son, right? He is. And just like Dany is the princess that was promised. is the princess that was promised. And I think, you know, there are maybe other parts that matter for, like, the prophecy and for other things.

But, like, she's, this is her part in the story. Her part to play, right? Like, the rest of that overture of the episode, that were all stories. Like, Helena, which we'll talk about, telling Damon that he knew his part or raniera telling alice in history will paint her as a villain yeah oh good point good point it's all a story it's all a story there's also something really nice here too with like how it plays in

with like damon's character arc his story of like seeing that he is just part he comes to the realization that he is just part of this puzzle right as opposed to all the other people who see this prophecy and then who think that the prophecy is about them right there's a difference there between being like I am part of something bigger or the big thing is me I'm the main character and I think learning that you have a part matters, right? It's not just about one person or one hero. It's about this togetherness and how it all comes together. Yeah, he's going to play his part. And he's kind of battled that all season of whether he's supposed to play a part or be the one.

And I think it comes down to something really great that poor Quentin from the Nauticast podcast has always written about with Quentin, right? Who decided that he was the main character. He woke up and said, I could be the hero. I'm the hero on the hero's journey. I'm daddy's best boy. And he thought he could take the dragon. And he didn't. A failed dragon rider, indeed.

And then he began to scream. Damon, thankfully, is just going to learn that through all these psychic visions before doing something drastic which is good yeah yeah but he's gonna do something drastic drastic things are gonna happen to the him yeah shit's gonna mix it up shit's gonna mix it up and you know magic fundamentally changes people again uh just like we talked about with ulf right that power changes people magic changes people Damon getting a magic arc is really amazing I think it's a great transformative arc for him

and even if you don't think it's amazing it's cool as fuck because I got to see a green man on my motherfucking screen last night who can say that who can say anyone who watches Hot D yeah if you watch Hot D man the sacred order of

the green men was on the tv uh that is a sacred order that protects the isle of the faces there's some history involved there won't go into it today because someday it might happen on our screen because adam went with them adam went with them yeah they're doing i mean i love that they're they're really leaning into the magic and like the i mean the fucked upness of it right like it's it's pretty it's pretty weird and pretty metal and i think that's kind of what george's vibe is and i love that we're we're going into that and i like you know you're talking about damon and magic changing him and i i will say you know when we were on the direwolf city stream last night gray was talking about a theory that she has that daemon

becomes a greenseer who joins all of that and upon not drowning drowning but not drowning you know you know what it kind of almost mirrors beyond like patch face there's an idea of patch face right of drowning and coming back maybe a little magical um which is played within the books for lucerys also there's like a little like some say that he was brought back and basically patch faced uh but also interesting the idea of like drowning and coming back like almost stone hard ask but oh yeah then going to a sacred order on an aisle never to be seen again by others, kind of makes me think of the gravedigger plot with Sandor. Yes.

Yeah. That's someone who gets freed from constraints in the story, even if people are going to paint him as a villain because they're running around with his helm. Mm-hmm. And Daemon has a helm. Oh, I was thinking also how it ties into the Alicent stuff, too. Oh, yeah was thinking also like how it ties into the Allison stuff too. Oh, yeah, yeah. Yeah, in terms of the themes.

Not magic, but just themes. Character shit. I'm curious now that Adam flew overhead for protection there at Harrenhal when Rhaenyra descended. He's in vicinity, so I wonder if he's going to have the old magic speak to him a bit while he's here. And maybe that's why he comes back to the Isle of Faces or goes to the Isle of Faces. There is something in the books where he and Corliss,

after the gullet, have a conversation that no one knows what they speak about post the battle, which is horrible. So I wonder if he tells him something from the Isle of Faces or who knows. It would be very cool since they went this far, if Adam goes to the actual Isle of Faces or who knows. It would be very cool since they went this far, if Adam goes to the actual Isle of the Faces. I know showing a green man could just be like a big nod, but why show it unless you want to go to the Isle of Faces where there's a bunch of them.

Yeah, in the words of, I don't know, the internet, let's fucking go. Let's fucking go. Let's fucking go. Let's fucking go. When we watched this, I kind of thought we were seeing fish feed in there. I definitely think the dragon pit. We see the dragons dead. I want to look at that again on a very big screen and brightened very soon.

But I think we were seeing the dragon pit and the dying of the dragons if not tumbleton or another battle um and i thought we were seeing the fish feed maybe because everybody was in the water dead you know fish feed uh and then of course we see him drowning in the waters like the god's eye uh and i just think that was such a great quick quick quick way to show you some of those flashes of the future yeah absolutely and i i think it seems as though maybe there's a particular strength to things that relate to his future that have to do with his family specifically right like i think a bunch of other important stuff happens that he doesn't quite see. I guess some people think it's significant that John wasn't in there. And yeah, I mean, whatever. John. He was. They filmed it from that

like perspective of the dire wolf. They said so. Oh, they did? Yeah. Towards the others when you see it bounding, the camera bobbing. Oh, that's what that meant? I don't know. I thought we were just doing like shaky cam Cloverfield shit, just like when we were doing the dragon month. You were a ghost, POV. Oh, okay. Anyway. So still kind of in it. Yeah, but Daenerys, princess that was promised, Daryllaros. Hell yeah, hell yeah. Check out our Rhaenys Truthers episode. Oh my god, it's all happening for us i love that when we get helena logging into the same worldwide web as the rest of them diaper nine what was it diaper 911 diaper 911 it was interesting she was shrouded in darkness so maybe everything isn't always full color or full scene for her, right? Like, she was just seeing Damon standing within this magical web.

Maybe she can only navigate glimpses and shadows of the magic that's being intersected here. And I really, really love what this is letting us kind of explore with magic, right? Like, magic we've talked about before in a lot of our bran episodes and sam episodes that maybe it's all on the same frequency or near right like there's some sort of factor between these different types of magics dragon dreams green dreams they're all operating on a similar frequency that you can tap into maybe accidentally i think of melisandre seeing bran in the flames and bran seeing back lots to ponder lots to think about of how alice is able to guide damon to maybe these visions or into these visions and have him get with the tree and with that magic of seeing through it and that

helena is somehow also seeing it with this gift yeah absolutely and agreed i think that's something that we've been we've been mulling is it all the same magics and there is also one last thing like when helena says to damon i i don't know why like the you know your part makes me think of aria saying you know your lines and so do i and i it's all kind of playing at similar things oh i love that because the world was a stage this episode yes here's another stage the political stage when rey nira arrives to harrenhal i was so mad like i was actually personally offended that they didn't immediately kneel for her and i know that's fucked up because like that's so monarchist of me but like what what and i know that's obviously part of it right like they were not going to bow because they're daemon's men because daemon's very good at inspiring men to follow him uh they were

waiting to bow until he did they were waiting to follow his lead but i i was personally offended i was like get on your knees get down it was disrespectful and not enough people looked confused and torn about should i kneel or should i not kneel and but and i understand you know as alicia pointed out like i wouldn't risk my life like that but uh not knowing for sure but it was pretty it was very disrespectful see disrespectful. Syrax was very mad. Syrax was very mad about it. Yes. I mean, she's baffled.

She's worried. And like, it's pretty obvious that's the queen. She's got, she's got a thing. She's got blonde hair. And a dragon. And a dragon. Like, it's obvious who that is. And look at the colors she's wearing.

But I do think that there is something meaningful to be said here of like, it's heron hall and sunlight and everyone is here and finally finally finally especially because corley's reminded us of what happened with rainies being the queen who never was here in heron hall we have crowned and knelt to a queen finally finally yes what a great echo of like a great council right a great council that never chose the way they could have chosen. And here we are finally today kneeling. It's a greater council, if you will.

The greatest council. We're going to build a great council. The greatest council. The greatest council is happening to me. I love that we got like this Avengers rollout, like, I don't know, whatever suit up scene at the very end, especially to the music. I thought it was great. You had your classic armies taking off scene, right? Which is very fun. Very, very Game of Thrones having an army with a dragon flying overhead as they go to their next destination for the next season. But the music was seamless.

Total banger. Thank you, Ramin. It was moving from character theme to character theme, from house theme to house theme, right? You had the Lannisters, the Starks, Alicent, all these characters just getting featured and moments. I loved it. I can't wait to listen to it again and see what else I can pick out. Yeah, and I will say I love the superhero costumes that corley's has with the hand pin design on it versus you know kirsten cole's hand chain being designed into his armor his little choker yeah his chunky little choker uh it's all just fun it's all just fun these accessories and then also i you know you have everyone getting armored right after a scene where Rhaenys and Alicent are.

They are saying that they don't have weapons. They're not armored. They're very emotionally naked with one another, even though they haven't gotten naked with each other yet. They're season three and four. Definitely season three and four for them to get naked in the dungeon. Yeah. It's important to my interests. Recreating Catelyn and Jaime in the dungeon, but instead of Allison in Rhaenyra.

Much to think about. Much to think. Lots to think about. Lots to think about. Well, that's, I mean, that ends up being the end of the episode it's kind of the end of our episode too we've already gone up top about what we think about how it should have ended yeah I think overall a great season of some epic moments great for us book reader fans I don't have to wonder about how the other half lives I've heard it it's not for me I will just continue

being a great book fan and loving it you know yeah i'm lucky i'm lucky i'm blessed i am and i think like i think they did a lot of really great the arcs were there in terms of the journeys that characters went on internally and though as we've voiced throughout the season like there there are things where i think you know pacing could have been better and maybe it probably would have been with two episodes. And also, yeah, I think maybe I just feel more at peace with it because I know what the conflict, like what that climax that rounds out these storylines would be.

So I don't feel as jilted because I can see where it's leading to in that whole picture. But I guess I have sympathy for people who feel like they wanted something else even though it's not their fault, in my opinion. Yeah, I blame Zaslav. Me too. I'm up for a lot. I me too he really fucked it i really do really fucked it but it was still really pleasing yeah absolutely biffed it yeah really pleasing to me

though really pleasing so i was still pleased i was still happy i very much i liked it more than a lot of people probably but i'm yeah maybe i'm just Yeah, as we've been also questioning ourselves, the questions that the stories raise of, is it good or do we just love it? And whatever, I love it, and that's enough. I don't care if history paints me as the villain. I am free. I love it. No, actually, I do care if history paints me as the villain.

Let's be real, I'm not that free. I'm not like a fucking free bird spirit. I't nelly for tattooing this but also these are just our thoughts from the day after come back we might have more better thoughts later like please like we gotta marinate on this a little longer but yeah like we said we'll be back with unleash the d so we'll get to talk a lot more about some of our favorite stuff from the season or stuff that we didn't think worked or even stuff that we want to know more about. So come back for that. We'll be back in a couple of weeks.

Please make sure that you follow, subscribe, do all those things to our podcast here where you're listening to it right now. Feel free to leave us a rating as well. Give us a good old five star and a funny little blurb make eliana's day yeah yeah and of course you can check us out over at patreon.com slash girls gone canon c-a-n-o-n where patrons have tons of perks patrons did get early episodes all season all season every patron every tier for house of the dragon uh we'll hopefully bring that back in two years when we're back with the next season big wait the long night we would have we would have uh actually it would be less than that right because what are we doing we might follow something similar for a night of the seven

kingdoms yeah yeah jury's out you'll find out yeah you'll find out we'll probably also once again pause the read-through for that because you know what we're in our mental health era we're we're just eat pray love in it not going camping maybe going swimming not camping though you just never know we're eat pray love in it oh my gosh we will be back with our song of ice and fire pov series as well with the epilogues after unleash the d is over and we'll probably actually come back i'm excited about this with our hunger games read through at some point on patreon later this year as well yeah lots to look forward to lots to fill the long night with Thanks for listening during this season of House of the Dragon to Girls Gone Canon.

I've been one of your hosts, Chloe. And I have been another one of your hosts, Eliana. Wow. Wow. Wow finale. Wow finale. Girls Gone Canon. wow wow wow finale well finale girls gone canon oh man should have had dungeon sex they should have had dungeon sex i mean there's a lot of things like if they had two more episodes they could have had a lot more hours of dungeon sex goodbye