Welcome back to the blog readers. House of the Dragon cannot find a bad episode, and I am officially dubbing this series as having the "Last of Us effect," where I am running out of good things to say over how fucking good this series is. Five episodes in and we are off to the races in the second half of the season, and everything has been turned on its head so far. What would be in store for us in this episode, titled "Smallfolk," written by Eileen Shim and directed by Andrij Parikh? Stick around to find out.
NOTE: I will be using spoilers for my thoughts, so DO NOT read ahead if you have not seen the episode.
I have been blown away over how damn good this show is, and how it has managed to maintain its consistency over these 16 episodes we have gotten so far. While I do lament the fact that we only have two episodes left of this wonderful show, I do appreciate that the quality level of this show is still there. This episode had me at the edge of my seat the entire time. There is introspection, there are dragons, and there is just overall brilliance. Matt Smith kills it again, as does Emma D'Arcy.
I want to talk first about how fucking good Matt Smith has been in this season. We have been talking about his journey at Harrenhal and how it has completely unlayered his character Daemon. This episode does it even further as he begins to realize what exactly he has gotten himself into. I think Smith honestly gives his best performance of the season so far in this episode. We see genuine emotion from Daemon, and Matt Smith allows us to see into his pain and his brokenness in a beautiful way. I cannot continue here without talking about the brilliant return of Paddy Considine as my king Viserys, and I had a big smile on my face seeing him back in this role. And how he was used in this episode was brilliant, just as using Milly Alcock for two episodes was. Clearly Daemon has had some insecurities about his brother and those insecurities were addressed in these hallucinations, as we learn Daemon is regretful about not being there for his brother and wishes he could have. As for his mission, it seems to be going not great. The people of the Riverlands see him as a tyrant and now he learns the old Tully he asked the young boy to kill has finally died, and with the trailer releasing for next week's episode, the young Tully will seem to find himself in the middle of a conflict that is not of his own making.
Emma D'Arcy continues to shine as Rhaenyra, and this week we see a different side to not only actor, but character as well. D'Arcy delivers a vulnerability in this episode that we have not seen from them before. And now those pent-up emotions are finally coming out, and it may just be what Rhaenyra needs to help her win the war. Ever since her spat with Daemon in the second episode, we have been seeing Rhaenyra as vulnerable as ever, but now with Lord Corlys as Hand, I think the ship will be settled a bit, at least for now. We learned that she feels insecure in this position when there is nothing she can do to fight in last week's episode, and those insecurities are on full display again in this episode. After a brief argument with her son Jacaerys in which he expresses a need for Daemon, she feels as if nobody wants to see her succeed, and as a woman it hurts her to feel so helpless. I feel like having Mysaria as not only a guide but a helping hand is definitely beneficial to Rhaenyra, as she is providing to her what Daemon is not (both literally and romantically, it seems). I also greatly appreciated Sonoya Mizumo's performance in this episode as well, as we saw a more vulnerable side to her as well.
There are major story implications in this episode as well. I already spoke on the escapades of Daemon at Harrenhal, but now we must go to King's Landing. The first thing I want to talk about is that of the saga of Aegon, Aemond, and Alicent (so many names that start with A, jeez). Aegon has begun to regain consciousness but will never be the same after what Aemond did to him, and now Aemond sees his brother as a threat to him, something that was teased as early as the Battle of Rook's Rest. Now that Aegon is awake, I am curious to see what lengths Aemond will go to keep his brother silent, and we already got a taste of what is to come as he is willing to go so far as to drug his brother to "dull his mind." Sounds like milk of the poppy to me. Larys also withholds the milk of the poppy to get Aegon a clear head, and it seems like he knows his life is in danger. This power struggle is going to be very, very interesting over these last two episodes.
Also at King's Landing, Aemond has begun the process of grabbing power for himself, and he decides to make the power move to take his mother Alicent off the small council, something that she does not like at all. I especially loved the line that she tells him. "Have the indignities of your childhood not yet sufficiently been avenged?" she says in a badass moment that will come back to haunt Aemond in later episodes. He also requests for Otto Hightower to be reinstated as his Hand, which can only lead to good things, right? I hope?Combined with the unrest going on in King's Landing, these events at the castle are greatly hurting the image of the Greens and showing them as unworthy rulers. Mysaria and Rhaenyra decide to take advantage of this and send food to King's Landing, with this leading to a riot that almost kills Alicent and Halaena. Also a man's hand gets cut off for touching Alicent and that was crazy in of itself.
Now we shift our focus to events that happened at Dragonstone. We spoke a few days ago about Rhaenyra's attempts to find dragon riders by looking at the bloodline and seeing who had married into other Houses, and that the idea was too crazy to work but was a good one nonetheless. That plan was set into motion this week as Rhaenyra found a potential rider in Ser Steffon Darklyn, who willingly participated in the ceremony. That plan literally goes up in flames as the dragon Seasmoke decides to give our friend here a little roast. Oh, did I say give him a roast? I meant make him a roast. No, literally. He burned him alive. And then he had the literal balls to go out and find himself a rider, it is almost like this dragon has a mind of his own.
The rider he has found appears to be Addam, the brother of Alyn, who was the one who rescued Lord Corlys in the Stepstones leading up to the eighth episode of last season. He in this episode was named the first mate on Alyn's crew in a story that has not gotten that much attention from me (and clearly from the showrunners since now there appears to be a payoff to it). This news interrupts Rhaenyra and Mysaria's little romantic moment, leading the former to hastily ride away on her dragon to see who is riding Seasmoke. I saw the preview for next week, and it teases a standoff between her and Addam to determine why Seasmoke chose him to be his rider. I cannot wait to see that shit.
House of the Dragon is really heating up, and it looks like we are in for an insane final two episodes where so much is on the line. Thank you all for reading, and I will see you for the next post.
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