Not for the primary time, HBO needs you to know that “Home of the Dragon” is said to “Sport of Thrones.”
Season 1 of the “Thrones” prequel started with the extraordinarily clunky exposition and finally the phrases “172 years earlier than Daenerys Targaryen.” It was heavy-handed however justified; earlier than introducing an entire host of latest characters even with acquainted silvery hair and medieval armor, “Home of the Dragon” wanted to construct belief with the viewers that liked and caught with “Thrones” earlier than it (even when the ending left a nasty style of their mouths).
After which “Home of the Dragon” went on to blow up. It was HBO’s greatest collection premiere to this point, averaging 29 million viewers per episode in Season 1. Coming into Season 2, “HOTD” ought to have the ability to stand comfortably by itself, while not having to double down on the “Thrones” connection, but Season 2, Episode 1 (written by Ryan Condal and directed by Alan Taylor) opens within the North of Westeros, with Cregan Stark (Tom Taylor) narrating to Jacaerys Velaryon (Harry Collett).
It looks like one other pressured “Thrones” connection in a present that not wants them. The Starks play a small half within the Dance of Dragons, however opening the season with a secondary, nay, tertiary character is a wild selection. If nothing else, the North is a respite — a reminder of kinder, less complicated worlds inside Westeros — and shortly snatched away when Jace receives a raven from Dragonstone, carrying information of his brother’s loss of life.
In his overview of the season, IndieWire’s Ben Travers famous that “Home of the Dragon”s de facto leads, Emma D’Arcy and Olivia Cooke, are notably sidelined from the season’s motion. Episode 1 is low on motion, so the enjoying discipline is even; Alicent (Cooke) will get to strategize together with her son the king, his council, her manipulative father — and even finds time for herself by carrying on an affair with Ser Criston Cole (Fabien Frankel). Whereas their sexual relationship does proceed to drive the distinction between Alicent and Rhaenyra (D’Arcy), it’s just a little too heavyhanded in doing so. Sure these, ladies have been as soon as associates. Sure, they and their households warfare for the throne. Sure, they’ve now been intimate with the identical man. And? The newest addition to their relationship doesn’t fortify it.
For as a lot because the emotional seeds of this warfare bloomed between Rhaenyra and Alicent, the query of who sits the throne is between half-siblings Rhaenyra and Aegon (Tom Glynn-Carney). Carney joined “Home of the Dragon” towards the top of Season 1, which lined many years together with Aegon’s beginning and childhood, and the Season 2 premiere lets him really sink his tooth into the character. He’s nonetheless nasty and entitled, but additionally desirous to show himself, and unexpectedly humorous. His palling round with different younger males with wine within the throne room looks like one thing out of a teen film or a sitcom, the type of relatable notice that’s uncommon in a present like this one however makes it all of the simpler. “A Son for a Son” additionally intentionally underscores (once more, maybe an excessive amount of so) Aegon’s love for his son Jaehaerys, whom he envisions inheriting the throne at some point.
Even because it thrusts viewers again into the world of fireside and blood, “A Son for a Son” begins out gradual — admittedly for good purpose, contemplating the place it finally ends up. Revenge is ready in movement on the identical time grief should run its course, with battle methods and covert conferences intercut with gut-wrenching scenes mourning Rhaenyra’s son. D’Arcy doesn’t communicate for many of the episode, however wastes no time reminding viewers how potently they command Rhaenyra as she weeps over his garments and the wing of his useless dragon.
D’Arcy and Collett’s scene of mom and son weeping and holding one another is without doubt one of the most heartfelt scenes on this collection and “Home of the Dragon” mixed, the uncommon second of mourning that always will get misplaced iamid infinite loss of life. The identical goes for the following funeral, intercut with Alicent lighting candles for the useless; in a present that guarantees anger and violence, the Season 2 premiere has a second to breathe and to grieve, a second that others could not. By the point Rhaenyra approaches her council tear streaked and matted, her vengeance is greater than earned.
Which brings us to the ultimate harrowing sequence, a catastrophic level of return on this warfare. Sidelined or not, Rhaenyra and Alicent additionally discover themselves absolved of direct duty for the deaths of both son alluded to within the episode title. Matt Smith and Ewan Mitchell slide proper again into the slimy boots of Daemon and Aemond, respectively, those bearing extra direct duty for kinslaying and ostensibly unbothered by the prospect. Contemplating their shared blonde Targaryen disrepute, the actors handle to tell apart every character’s particular person model of odiousness, and make a case for both aspect on this warfare to worry the opposite’s wild and unpredictable proper hand.
The loss of life of Aegon’s son was foreshadowed earlier within the episode, when Helaena (Phia Saban) voiced her worry of the rats — by extension, the rat catcher who can be instrumental on this tragedy. It was even teased in Season 1, when Saban first took on the position and whispered a couple of “beast beneath the boards.” Beneath the boards and within the lowest circles of King’s Touchdown, Daemon Targaryen finds his assassins, commanding them to kill Aemond in order that each Rhaenyra and Alicent have misplaced a baby to the warfare — a son for a son.
That scene cuts after the boys ask Daemon what they need to do if they will’t discover Aemond, the ultimate shot lingering on Smith’s loaded expression. We all know they have been informed to discover a son, they usually didn’t dare kill Aegon himself within the crowded throne room, so the goal turns into younger Jaehaerys. Helaena’s actions within the second are tough to learn (Aegon does warn us earlier that “the Queen is a permanent thriller”); when requested which youngster is male, she factors at Jaehaerys, but it surely’s not clear whether or not this was meant to misdirect the assassins to his twin sister or to spare the lady attributable to her mom’s fondness — however that is the type of thriller an viewers isn’t meant to reply. Although the boy’s homicide happens offscreen, there’s little left to the creativeness, thanks in no small half to some really stunning sound mixing. Mercifully, Helaena, her daughter, and the digicam exit the room shortly, however not with out imparting the horror of what occurred.
Grade: B-
“Home of the Dragon” airs Sundays at 9 p.m. on HBO.