Of all the fantasy worlds in film, television, and literature, none are more brutal than Westeros. Life is cheap, words are wind, sons murder their fathers with no remorse, and anyone who believes something as abstract as honor tends to get killed on the business end of a sword — or a dragon.
But in its second season, HBO’s House of the Dragon dared to ask if it has to be this way. Is it possible to win the game of thrones without slaughtering your enemies wholesale? What happens when some of the biggest power players in the Seven Kingdoms try on soft power for size?
Set 200 years before the events of Game of Thrones, Season One of Ryan J. Condal and George R.R. Martin’s prequel series established a growing rift within the all-powerful, all-blond, all-incestuous Targaryen clan. Without a male heir, King Viserys I named his daughter, Rhaenyra, as his successor to the Iron Throne. But things got thorny when he and his second wife, Alicent Hightower, gave birth to a son, Aegon. Further complicating matters is the fact that Rhaenyra and Alicent were childhood besties before her marriage to Viserys.
By the end of that first season, Viserys was dead and Aegon was sitting the Iron Throne thanks to a lot of scheming and a major miscommunication. With her striving uncle/husband, Daemon, and their children in tow, Rhaenyra fled to Dragonstone to plot their next move. The finale culminated in the murder of Rhaenyra’s son Lucerys at the hands and claws of Alicent’s son Aemond and his mega-dragon. With the two sides set against each other, Westeros stood poised on the brink of a brutal civil war.
HBO
Season Two was in some ways a quieter affair, but it set the stakes sky-high for Season Three, which kicks off on June 21. Considering it’s been two years since we last caught up with Targaryens, you’d be forgiven for being a little hazy on the details. We’ve got you covered with this rundown of where the major players stand.
Rhaenyra Targaryen
The Season Two premiere found the exiled queen (Emma D’Arcy) quietly mourning her son’s death. Unlike a certain Mother of Dragons, Rhaenyra isn’t the type to transmute grief into slaughter. But she winds up villainized all the same after she’s blamed for the brutal murder of Aegon’s young son, Jaehaerys — which is actually Daemon’s (Matt Smith) fault. Determined to prevent more deaths, Rhaenyra sneaks into King’s Landing to confer with Alicent (Olivia Cooke); but they both acknowledge that it’s too late to un-ring the bells of war.
Next, Rhaenyra turns to the pressing task of finding more dragonriders to join her cause. But when the death lizards fricassee every nobleman sent their way, the queen realizes that the only people her scaly kids will accept are those with the blood of the dragon. After mounting a search for every Targaryen bastard in the Southron, she winds up with a trio of rough ’n’ ready smallfolk who may or may not make reliable allies. But since she needs those dragon WMDs on her side, beggars can’t be choosers.
Season Three burning question: With both sides’ armies on the march and dragons on the wing, can Rhaenyra stick to her commitment to minimize bloodshed? With so much firepower and such high stakes at play, mass casualties seem all but unavoidable.
Daemon Targaryen
Viserys’ younger brother doesn’t have a legitimate claim to the Iron Throne, but when has that ever stopped a Targaryen? Miffed at Rhaenyra and ravenous for power, Daemon flies off to Harrenhal to secure the loyalty of the Rivermen — nominally for his wife, but really for himself. He quickly learns that when you set up shop in a cursed, haunted castle, things don’t go as planned. Each night, he’s plagued by visions of himself doing very normal stuff like beheading Rhaenyra, sleeping with his mother, and being visited by Viserys’ ghost (Paddy Considine).
Matt Smith looking chill as Daemon Targaryen.
HBO
The Prince Consort is also having a hard time winning the Rivermen to his side; turns out that no one wants to pledge fealty to the guy who murdered his own grandson. But with the reluctant help of Oscar Tully (Archie Barns), the tween lord of the Riverlands, he gets his army. On the brink of his march to King’s Landing, the Three-Eyed Raven pulls him into a vision of things to come—fire, blood, White Walkers, Daenerys Targaryen. It’s just the ego death he needs to realize that he’s a tiny part of a much bigger story. And when Rhaenyra arrives to chew him out, he doesn’t hesitate to bend the knee.
Season Three burning question: As anyone who’s tripped on shrooms knows, psychedelic epiphanies only take you so far. If Daemon makes it into the Red Keep first, will he truly be able to hold himself back from parking his keester on the Iron Throne?
Alicent Hightower
The Dowager Queen may have been responsible for setting the war in motion, but she’s the least interested in fighting it. Unlike her best frenemy Rhaenyra, Alicent never wanted to play the game of thrones. And over the course of Season Two, she realizes that it’s actually the game that’s been playing her, ever since her scheming father, Otto (Rhys Ifans), forced her to marry a man twice her age.
Once Aegon (Tom Glynn-Carney) becomes king, she finds herself with even less power than she already had: Her eldest son is a childish, selfish cad with no interest in overseeing the realm. And when Aemond (Ewan Mitchell) violently maims his brother, it’s the last straw for Alicent. All she wants is to disappear into the forest and never think about the line of succession again.
With nothing left to lose, she shows up at Rhaenyra’s doorstep and offers to orchestrate a bloodless coup in exchange for her freedom. The two share a bittersweet exchange that lays bare both the ways they’ve hurt each other and the ways they’ll always love each other. Alicent asks Rhaenyra to run away with her, but this is where their paths diverge: For one, sovereignty is a cage; for the other, it’s a duty. When Rhaenyra says that her ascension to the throne will mean Aegon’s execution, Alicent reluctantly agrees. It’s the last resort of a desperate woman, but it’s also a signal that perhaps this friendship runs thicker than blood.
Season Three burning question: When Alicent confesses her wish to disappear into obscurity, Rhaenyra tells her, “You speak as if from a distant dream.” If Rhaenyra ascends to power, will it actually be feasible for her to let her old friend go free, or will the new queen’s bannermen demand retribution?
Aegon, Aemond, and Helaena Targaryen
Aegon may be a drunken, misogynistic fool, but Aemond is a straight-up monster. During a skirmish with Rhaenyra’s forces, Aemond takes advantage of the fog of war to take his brother down, killing his dragon and leaving Aegon severely disabled. Back in the Red Keep, Aemond convinces the Small Council to name him Prince Regent and begins laying waste to the countryside astride the largest dragon in Westeros.
Meanwhile, Aegon is bedridden and in agony. With his mother fled and his brother poised to murder him in his sleep, Aegon’s only ally is his conniving Master of Whisperers, Larys Strong (Matthew Needham). The king is borderline suicidal, but Larys argues that his story isn’t over yet: All he has to do is cool his heels in Braavos while Rhaenyra and Aemond rip each other to pieces. Then, once the smoke clears, he can return as a savior and retake his crown.
As ever, Alicent’s strange, gentle daughter, Helaena (Phia Saban), wants no part of the drama. The impossible choice she’s forced to make early in the season — which of her two children will die — has set her even further adrift from reality. But that only heightens her ability to peer into the future. And like Cassandra, no one wants to hear about it — least of all when she tells Aemond that he’s doomed to die and Aegon will ultimately retake the throne. There’s also the matter of her dragon, Dreamfyre, whom she refuses to ride into battle no matter how much Aemond threatens her life.
Season Three burning questions: Despite his ruthless determination, Aemond is a hard sell as king. Even if he defeats Rhaenyra’s forces, how long will the citizens of the Realm put up with his wanton cruelty? Though Aegon successfully escaped Westeros, with his despair running so deep, can he really hold on long enough to wait out the war? Finally, Helaena doesn’t seem long for this world. Alicent begs her daughter to join her in exile, but Helaena doesn’t seem to be particularly concerned whether she lives or dies. Will she make it through the war to come?
Corlys Velaryon
The Sea Snake (Steve Toussaint) has been Rhaenyra’s staunchest ally since the very beginning; but he’s knocked sideways by the untimely death of his beloved wife, Rhaenys (Eve Best). In honor of her sacrifice, he agrees to become Hand of the Queen, backing up Rhaenyra whenever her bannermen question her judgment. When lowborn shipwright Addam of Hull (Clinton Liberty) becomes a dragonrider, Corlys must contend with the reality that Addam and his brother, Alyn (Abubakar Salim), are his bastard sons. When Corlys makes the latter his first mate, Alyn takes his father to task for leaving him and his brother to suffer in poverty.
Season Three burning question: Over the last two seasons, the Sea Snake has lost his two children and his wife. With only his granddaughters left to call family, will he accept Addam and Alyn as his true sons?
Jacaerys Velaryon
Rhaenyra’s eldest son (Harry Collett) spends most of Season Two in a sulk, but it’s kind of hard to blame him. Not only is his brother dead, but his mom is bringing Targaryen bastards into the fold while refusing to grapple with the fact that he himself is a Targaryen bastard. Rhaenyra assures him that her newly minted dragonriders won’t try to usurp his place as her heir, but he isn’t convinced. But after a talking-to from his wife/cousin/half-sister Baela (Bethany Antonia), Jace falls in line and helps to ensure that his mom’s “army of bastards” fall in line.
Season Three burning question: Jace’s fear of what the upstart dragonriders might do with their newfound power — particularly the boorish, disrespectful Ulf (Tom Bennett) — isn’t unfounded. Will Ulf turn on Rhaenyra, proving Jace’s misgivings true?
Tyland Lannister
One of House of the Dragon’s biggest shortcomings is that, unlike Game of Thrones, the show’s got zero sense of humor. Enter Master of Ships Tyland (Jefferson Hall), who finds himself thrust into an action-comedy after Aemond dispatches him to Tyrosh to recruit the fearsome Triarchy. But being an ambassador to Essos comes with his own set of rules — which is how Tyland winds up wrestling in a mud pit with Sharako Lohar (Abigail Thorn), the female commander of the Triarchy fleet who will only agree to his terms if he pins her in a fight. He may or may not have agreed to make babies with Lohar’s wives, but either way, the Greens have a brand new fleet.
Season Three burning question: Under Lohar’s chaotic sway, will Tyland abandon his staunch Casterly Rock–bred values and go full native? We sure hope so.
Westeros
By the end of Season Two, all the pieces are laid out on the Cyvasse board: the Blacks’ three new dragonriders; Daemon and the Rivermen; the Sea Snake’s ships; Tyland and the Triarchy fleet; assorted Lannisters, Starks, and Hightowers; and Aegon and Larys bound for Essos. The finale also throws in a couple of wildcards: Baela’s sister Rhaena (Phoebe Campbell), who finally finds a dragon of her own after days of searching; and Otto Hightower, exiled and imprisoned. The score crescendos on twin shots of Rhaenyra and Alicent, dwarfed by the vastness of their tasks as they gaze off into the uncertain future.
Season Three burning question: What will the Seven Kingdoms look like once the dust has settled? Only the Three-Eyed Raven knows.
