Jack Shaftoe

Taverner: God, men are such boys. Standish Uh, ma'am, while I appreciate you offering to include me in your circle of sisterhood, I'll have to decline. A bit later: Standish: I know it's the other way, Roddy, but I was in dire need of a dramatic exit I sure hope we see more of the snarky side of Standish in the next seasons. I just finished watching the first season and I will be certainly be continuing. Kind of surprised that Taverner kept her job despite her boss knowing it was her dumb idea that messed things up in the first place but I am fine with keeping Kristin Scott Thomas in the show, so I will take it.

If Helaena has such convenient visions, can't she just dream the schematics of Euron's scorpions and show those pesky dragons who the boss is?

Of course women could and did have authority (which makes Rhaenyra's constant "What would have me do?" even more baffling), it's just that we have never seen Helaena exercise any authority and have had several episodes of everyone basically telling Alicent "I am sorry, do you work here?".

Are we supposed to think Alicent was being serious with her "I will open the gates for you" proposal because nothing actually shown so far that any such order coming from her or Helaena would have any chance of being obeyed, even if Aemond is not around? Why does Rhaenyra need anyone open the doors anyway - she has 6 dragons, if she shows up in force and there are zero dragons on the opposite side, you would think that the garrison would almost certainly surrender, Alicent or no Alicent. Look, I generally really like plots of women exerting influence in misogynistic societies but there needs to be some plausibility, some internal consistency. You can't show several episodes of everyone who matters in King's Landing not giving a damn about what Alicent wants and then turn around and have her make a peace offer as if she has real authority to make commitments for anyone but herself. It's kind of like Tyrion running away from King's Landing and then deciding to make peace offerings on behalf of the Lannister clan. The show doesn't want Alicent to be complicit in the atrocities of the Greens (even though she very much was in the final episodes of season 1 which the writers seem to have largely forgotten) but wants her to have enough authority to be taken seriously when she receives or makes peace proposals. Problem is that's basically wanting to have your cake and eat it too.

To be fair the writing was very much like pulled from a bad comedy (the cannibalism "joke", for example), so the acting matched it. It wasn't intentionally silly for sure but still. The more I think about it, the sillier I find Alicent and Rhaenyra's meeting. Not only was it insanely risky on the part of Alicent (and her Kingsguard protector should never have agreed to what looked like obvious treason) but realistically the entire Dragonstone should soon know that their Queen had one of her arch enemies in her grasp and inexplicably let her go. But I am sure it will never come up as legimitate criticism since the writers won't shut up about the "love story" between Alicent and Rhaenyra and much prefer to have randos accuse Rhaenyra of stuff she hasn't done, so she could look like a poor persecuted victim.

Okay, we haven't seen it but the very fact that no one has done the obvious thing - trying to burn the enemy fleet - tells me that for some arcane reason it can't be done. Especially when the people who would be tempted to try it are hotheads like Daemon and Aemond. Maybe the dragons have prophetic visions of Dany's classic "forgot about the Iron Fleet" moment and refuse to go anywhere near war fleets. :)

Well, he said that he might get hanged for ceding the Stepstones, so I assumed he didn't have the power to do that kind of thing. Then again, from the start, we have seen wooden ships somehow holding their own against dragons, so I guess we are not supposed to think how little sense it makes and just roll with it.

Come to think of it, the Triarchy came across as complete morons since Tyland clearly had no authority to cede any territory, so any such deal negotiated by him would be null and void very soon. Maybe they just want to get rid of that pirate captain because only fighting on the side of whoever can beat you in mud wrestling isn't exactly for success. 😃

The mud wrestling thing was some of the stupidest shit I have ever seen on television and I have watched so much terrible TV like Pretty Little Liars to the bitter end or season 5 of Supergirl. Alicent coming for yet another ridiculously implausible chat with Rhaenyra is a real contender for that title too. Pretty impressive to have two scenes like that in a single episode. Rhaenyra: 'I have six dragons... I will use them as deterrent". Face, meet palm. Rhaenyra literally hours later: "Fuck that, I will use them to strike at Oldtown and Lannisport. Because, you know, I care deeply about the smallfolk, so I should do anything but try to win the war quickly by doing the obvious thing and attacking the capital. Well, unless Alicent comes for our weekly chat in which case I would totally think of doing exactly that.". Rhaenyra: "Daemon is about to betray me... I better go and give him a perfect opportunity to kill him if he wants to. Then I am going to ask who these riverlords follow as if I have never heard of things like Lord Paramount or the feudal system." At least she got some clue when Alicent came to offer something which shouldn't be in her power in the first place. Quibbling aside, the show's biggest issue is that the war they are fighting is not actually a war that needs rivers of blood in order to be won. To paraphrase what was said about the head of the British Fleet during WWI - "It's a war that can be won or lost in an afternoon". Kill the enemy dragon riders and that's it. It would be one thing of the leaders were hesitant to kill their own flesh and blood but right now, they are not. They just can't be bothered to try if they have the opportunity because the show needs to last longer. But they add insult to injury by constantly having Rhaenyra go on and on how she is doing or not doing something in order to avoid innocent people's deaths - never mind that people keep dying every day because of the ongoing war and she has the means to end it quickly. I kind of hate it when commoners get to the royal court and wouldn't you know, they would do stuff like put their feet on the monarch's table and mouthing off everyone because they need to show how they don't go for weak shit like respect for nobles and stuff. Rhaenyra offering to make the dragon riders mere knights rather than, you know, lords with extensive holdings. Lucky her that none of them seems to think of seeing how much the Greens might offer for the services.

If they refuse to obey Daemon they automatically become declared, that's the cool thing about civil wars if you are itching to commit some atrocities (assuming Daemon is recognized as Rhaenyra's representative, of course). Being undeclared is no protection, otherwise most lords would have remained undeclared throughout and let those inbred idiots fight it out.

We have known that she is a moron ever since her since jaunt to King's Landing to talk to Alicent, so I would say the characterization is consistent, if probably unintentional. ;)

Unprovoked? Killing traitors is very much within the purview of feudal lords. Of course, everyone is a traitor to somebody in civil war but that's exactly why it's easier to get away with all sorts of atrocities once such a war has broken out. The Greens use the "Bend the knee or die" method, albeit without dragons and no one thinks that this is beyond the pale. If Daemon had burned "just" a few, chances are the rest would have bent the knee anyway because they were going for a power play and weren't some Green fanatics daring him to kill them. Of course, this would have required Daemon to have the first clue about politics or reading people... :) And why are the river lords more trustworthy now when they have just proven that they enjoy disobeying their king (consort) and blackmailing him to do stuff? For all Daemon knows, they might switch sides the next time they disapprove of his ideas and considering his track record in gaining followers, this will probably be pretty soon.

But at least some of the river lords should be fearing him because he is a loose canon with a WMD. Or maybe those who do fear him just didn't show up?

Well, yeah, Daemon is very much a fool but that's part of the reason why people should be scared of him. A fool with well known loose cannon tendencies should be scarier than someone who is just as brutal but in a more rational way. You don't need political skills in order to be feared. It just feels odd how not scared these lords were of the guy they claimed to be convinced was basically a higher-ranked Gregor Clegane. With an WMD at his disposal. There was no need whatsoever to test all of them at the same time, basically guaranteeing collateral damage should any of them be considered unworthy by the dragons.

Yes, that's what we are supposed to think but considering they were plenty of powerful nobles willing to fight on Tywin's side despite his far longer list of ordered atrocities this care for the little man and the rules of war seems... a little implausible. And in any event, these lords, despite this cute little Tully power play, are supposedly willing to fight on Daemon's side anyway, so he really should have called them on their "desecration" outrage and pointed out that the other side is just as brutal, so they should cut the crap. All he did was show how willing he is to throw his minions under the bus which is exactly what a vassal does not want to hear from the higher-ups. Punishing traitors is very much a line that is supposed to be crossed. And yes, a lot of innocent people also suffered but that's par for the course for (pseudo) medieval warfare, not some unheard of atrocity the show pretends it is. if the enemy is hiding in a castle, you go and burn his villages, that's medieval warfare 101. More importantly, If the River lords really consider these actions to be beyond the pale they shouldn't be willing to support Rhaenyra anyway because they haven't read the script and for all they know she is very much in support of Daemon's brutal tactics. Also, for all they know Daemon could have just had his dragon burn them all and tried again with their heirs which made their cockiness look rather suicidal. I can't either but the show seems to be leaning hard on the idea that the smallfolk inexplicably love Rhaenyra (or Rhaenys the mass murderer), so I fully expect the new dragonriders to be firmly on herside.