Spoiler alert: this recap is for people watching House of the Dragon. Do not read on unless you have watched season two, episode two.
‘I still love you, brother’
In Westeros, everyone from nobility to smallfolk loves a good story. Tales of adventure, of epic battles, and particularly true tales from history, recounting the exploits of great heroes like the first Targaryen king, Aegon the Conqueror, or Queen Rhaenyra’s childhood heroine, Nymeria, who burned her own fleet of ships. By the time of A Song of Ice and Fire, two centuries after the events depicted in House of the Dragon, one of the most beloved stories will be the tale of the Cargyll twins, Ser Erryk and Ser Arryk: two brave knights raised jointly to the Kingsguard, who found themselves on opposite sides when war broke out. In the stories learned by Bran and Sansa Stark, and in songs like the tragic ballad Farewell, My Brother, the Cargyll boys have become legendary – so anyone who has been paying attention will know from about halfway through where this week’s episode will end.
It begins, of course, in the aftermath of gruesome tragedy, as the staff of the Red Keep are rounded up for questioning and King Aegon (Tom Glynn-Carney) declares war on the world at large, smashing apart the model of King’s Landing that his father spent half his life building. It doesn’t take long to track down at least one of the culprits, the Gold Cloak known as Blood (Sam C Wilson) – and the swift discovery of the assassin helps Larys Strong (Matthew Needham) climb yet another rung on the ladder of power. But the one pulling the strings remains Ser Otto Hightower (Rhys Ifans), who time and again rides roughshod over Aegon’s protests to see that his own wishes are carried out. It’s a prickly relationship, similar to that between Tywin Lannister and his grandson, King Joffrey, in Game of Thrones – and look how that turned out.
‘Those who have declared for Rhaenyra, will they still support her when they hear of her depravity?’
For Queen Rhaenyra (Emma D’Arcy), the death of young Jaehaerys is nothing short of catastrophic. Any hopes she might have had to claim the high moral ground, to depict the Greens as snakes and usurpers, have now been crushed thanks to the rash actions of her husband, Prince Daemon (Matt Smith). The question of exactly what instructions Daemon gave to the two would-be assassins remains unclear, but it doesn’t much matter. Rhaenyra’s name has become synonymous with the murder of children, and even her own councillors – a jowly band of lordly grumblers, plus Phil Daniels – suspect her of having a hand in it. Finally, and most importantly, she knows once and for all that she, like her father, can never trust Daemon again.
After a heated row – and a sneering, devastating “you’re pathetic” – Daemon storms away, taking his dragon and vanishing into the clouds. For Lord Corlys Velaryon (Steve Toussaint), this is a worrying development. He’s always trusted Daemon more than Rhaenyra, unlike his wife, Rhaenys (Eve Best). If things fall apart with the queen and her consort, could it bode ill for the seemingly happy union of Corlys and Rhaenys as well? Elsewhere on Driftmark, we’re introduced properly to a pair of new characters: Velaryon sailor Alyn of Hull (Abubakar Salim, glimpsed briefly last week) and his shipwright brother Addam (Clinton Liberty). We’re not given an awful lot to go on – the brothers trade fond jibes, and discuss work, ships and stew – but it’s clear they are being set up for bigger things later in the season.
‘You have brought disgrace upon our ranks, and now you must restore it’
Back in King’s Landing, the mood is one of rage, gloom and guilt: Aegon has rounded up and hanged all the ratcatchers, but both Dowager Queen Alicent (Olivia Cooke) and Ser Criston Cole (Fabien Frankel) know they also bear some of the blame, for being in flagrante as the child was being murdered. But while Alicent attempts to atone by offering emotional support to her grieving daughter Helaena (Phia Saban), Cole reacts by thrusting the guilt on to someone else, accusing Ser Arryk of shirking his duties and sending him on a one-man, death-or-glory mission to murder Rhaenyra in her bed. Hotheaded, ambitious and entirely un-self aware, there are times when it seems like Ser Criston may just be the most dangerous character in the entire show. Aegon’s decision to make him Hand of the King in place of Ser Otto could prove disastrous for all concerned.
The final scenes are all about the Cargyll twins, as Ser Arryk makes his not-exactly-surreptitious way into the castle on Dragonstone, somehow evading the gaze of everyone except the eagle-eyed Mysaria (Sonoya Mizuno). In the histories of Westeros, the final confrontation between Ser Erryk and Ser Arryk is told a multitude of different ways – in some versions, the twins die in each other’s arms, with tears on their cheeks and words of love on their lips; in others, they curse one another and die raging. In the end, neither was true: Ser Erryk proved the stronger, at least in battle, defeating his brother only to take his own life in horror at what he had done.
Additional notes
You’re dead right, Ironrod – no one wants a serpent nestled close to their bosoms.
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Continuing the trend towards class consciousness begun in the first season, we’re definitely spending more time in the company of smallfolk this time: not just sailors and craftsmen like Alyn and Addam, but disgruntled blacksmith Hugh Hammer (Kieran Bew) and random King’s Landing resident Ulf White (Tom Bennett), the significance of whom will presumably become clearer in coming episodes. That scene of mothers weeping over their dead ratcatcher sons was quietly moving, too.
Hands up who had forgotten the existence of Alicent and Viserys’s youngest son, Daeron, until Otto brought him up?
“I have sinned.” “I do not wish to hear of it.” As a father myself, totally fair enough.
Nudity count
Aemond’s visit to the brothel offered a brief flash of flesh, but overall it seems the lessons of later Game of Thrones seasons have been well and truly learned: we saw a lot more of the young prince’s pale torso and lanky legs than we did of his companion, Madame Sylvi (Michelle Bonnard), the woman who deflowered him and remains his regular bedmate.
Violence count
The final battle was suitably thunderous, all clashing swords and crashing armour as the bearded twins lumbered their way around the queen’s bedchamber, and Rhaenyra and Ser Lorent Marbrand (Max Wrottesley) struggled to figure out which was which. It was played dead straight, though – anyone hoping for a rerun of the classic Shatner-on-Shatner scene from Star Trek VI might have been mildly disappointed.
Random Brit of the week
Making his House of the Dragon debut, British Nigerian actor Abubakar Salim hails from the leafy environs of Welwyn Garden City and has a solid on-screen record, appearing in Sky’s New World drama Jamestown and as the android father in Ridley Scott’s disappointingly short-lived Raised By Wolves.