WatchrTina

I feel like I've seen most of the info in this behind-the-scenes video in other videos already posted but SOME of it is new (I think.)

Or . . . is Daemon the kind of sneaky/suspicious guy who figured that if he waved a flag of truce it would NOT be honored -- who knew he would be attacked instead -- which would then free his men to attack in return? I've only watched the episode once but I THINK it was the Crab Eater who first broke the rules of the flag of truce. So Daemon is both smart and a pretty good judge of character (as well as being sneaky and suspicious.)

I just watched and I'm going to pose this question/comment before I go read all the prior comments (in the hopes that one of you will have already clarified this point for me.) I genuinely do not know who rode in on a dragon to save Daemon but I'm GUESSING it's the young male Velaryon we met in an earlier episode. No, wait, that can't be right -- Velaryons have ships and are NOT dragon riders, right? Okay then back to square one. I hope one of you can clarify for me: WHO rode in on dragon-back at the end with an army behind them and saved Daemon's life? Was Daemon IN on the plan or was he in the middle of committing suicide by surrender to an insane adversary when the Targaryen army arrived? Oh is THAT what was going on? Daemon was pretending to be reckless/suicidal and defeated so that the Crab Eaters would leave the caves, leaving themselves vulnerable to the reserve troops who were waiting to swoop in. Huh. Daemon is smarter (and braver) than I gave him credit for. I totally agree. In this world marriages among the nobility are political arrangements so the idea that the Crown Princess would be permitted to make her own choice seems unlikely. I have NOT read the books but I'm betting the King's new father-in-law will soon be whispering in the King's ear about the unfortunate need to insist upon a political marriage for Rhaenyra (to a lord whose lands are conveniently far from Kings' Landing, to which she can be banished when the inevitable change in the line of succession happens.)

Here's a behind-the-scenes video on the filming the scene at Dragonstone in Ep 2.

I have to disagree. At the time of this series the Targareans are the sole dragon-lord survivors of the Doom of Valyria (at least as far as we know.) They think all the other dragons died along with their masters. As such, the Targaryen dragons give them an incredible advantage over anyone who might be thinking of invading Westeros (the land THEY invaded and seized thanks to their dragons.) Additionally, they each appear to have a deep, almost spiritual bond to the dragon they ride. Wouldn't the development or possession of any anti-dragon weapons be looked upon as treason within Westeros? I'm not saying some unhappy vassal lord wouldn't TRY to develop an anti-dragon weapon. Attempts may have been made during the initial Targarean invasion. But I'll bet even a whisper of such activities NOW would be met with stern punishment (i.e., "Spikes, heads, walls.") The anti-dragon weapons that we saw in Game of Thrones had the blessing of the Crown and -- once Tyrion approved the prototype -- lots of people were presumably involved in building them and deploying them on the ramparts. No secrecy was required and the best craftsmen could be recruited and/or ordered to aid in the effort. In HotD secrecy would be essential and yet would be very difficult to achieve.

Here's the Alt-Shift-X commentary on S1E02

Yes, he would have been "Aegon, n+1th of his name" . . . at least to his face and in the official documents. But the common folk would probably call him "The White Wolf" (if they liked him) or "The Bastard of Winterfell" (if they didn't like him and wanted to deny his claim to the throne.)

Are you sure about that paigow, first of his name? :)

Here's an interview between Caitriona and Josh Horowitz which mentions Outlander but mostly focuses on her role in "Belfast." I don't think I've seen it posted here before so, here ya go! Caitriona Balfe talks BELFAST & OUTLANDER: Happy Sad Confused

Graham McTavish did an interview with Josh Horowitz that touches on his many recent acting gigs (and the man has been BUSY) but "Outlander" and "Men in Kilts" make up the lion's share of the content. Enjoy! Graham McTavish talks HOUSE OF THE DRAGON, OUTLANDER, & MEN IN KILTS: Happy Sad Confused

I don't know the best place to post this interview of Graham McTavish by Josh Horowitz since it touches on several of Graham's gigs but since HotD is currently airing I'm going to post it here for those who might be interested. I'm also going to link it in the Outlander thread because that's the show that is discussed the most. Graham McTavish talks HOUSE OF THE DRAGON, OUTLANDER, & MEN IN KILTS: Happy Sad Confused

Here's a behind-the-scenes video for S1E01

'House of the Dragon' On What to Expect in 'Game of Thrones' Prequel | Entertainment Weekly

Here's a video from Alt-Shift-X focused on this episode. Can we all just take a moment and appreciate their new nickname for House Of The Dragon . . . "HOT D". Hee!)

Yay! Thank you SilverStormm Below is a video from the good folks at Alt-Shift-X promoting the show without revealing any plot spoilers though it DOES introduce many of the main characters and it explains the situation that exists at court when the story begins. But be forewarned that when you watch it YouTube may FIRST feed you an ad for . . . House of the Dragon . . . an ad which contains the kind of wee plot spoilers that some people (like me) work hard to avoid seeing. So, consider yourself forewarned.

I've been hoping that we would get an "Inside-the-Episode" video for each episode this season (as was done for Game of Thrones). I didn't find anything on the HBOMax website (which is where I THINK I used to find them before) but then I found this discussion (linked below) of episode 1, which was distributed via Twitter. Fingers crossed that the link works. I've struggled with posting links to tweets in the past. https://twitter.com/HouseofDragon/status/1562510162035744768?s=20&t=5JsdFJ62GW-14ZN21BkEeg

Well, well, well. Who did I spy with my little eye in the advertising for "House of the Dragon" -- the prequel to "Game of Thrones" -- but our own Graham McTavish! I don't know why I'm surprised -- Graham seems to turn up in all the fantasy shows I like -- most recently in "The Witcher." So, hooray for Graham!

Oh THANK YOU for posting that link (and curse you for ending it too soon!) And now to bring this post back around to the matter at hand . . . damn -- that episode was hard to watch. I usually watch the eps 2 or 3 times but I think I'm going to wait a while before giving this one a second viewing. I know GOT got really gory on many occasions and I stayed tuned through them all; but that "birth" scene was . . . rough. (Somebody up-thread recollected a similar scene from "I Claudius" and thanks VERY MUCH for dragging that long-forgotten, gory image out of some deep, dark, corner of my memory. Ah, PBS . . . bringing the ultra-violence to the TV-viewing public LONG before premium cable TV existed. Thanks Masterpiece Theater!) And speaking of gory . . . I had a really hard time with the Gold Cloaks running though the streets killing indiscriminately. I know it was presented as though the killings were deliberate and that this was a prescribed "cleaning" of the streets, so only "bad" guys were targeted but . . . how? I'm willing to offer up a heaping trencher full of willful suspension of disbelief for this show, but I have a hard time wrapping my brain around the idea that the people caught up in that melee in the streets were somehow the exact same "guilty" people who were responsible for the descent of King's Landing into lawlessness. At this point I'm not at all clear if we the viewers are supposed to believe that the massacre was ruthless but effective (i.e., it killed off a lot of bad guys and encouraged the rest to leave town) or if we the viewers are supposed to think that it was just an orgy of violence -- a display of wanton disregard for human life in which many innocent people were probably swept up and killed in the frenzy.

I love Neil Gaiman's work. I REALLY do. I read his books, I watch his TV shows, and I've seen him speak live twice. And I know that almost all of his work is "dark." But this episode . . . damn. The Sandman is really dragging me down some dark corridors into topics I generally avoid -- specifically children in jeopardy. So color me a bit horrified at attending a "cereal" killers convention where a child is running around unprotected. (I disliked the abused-foster-children storyline in earlier episodes as well even though I know that storyline was -- alas -- more realistic.) Can we please get back to the more fantastical story lines? On a separate topic. . . I assume the fat guy ("Fun Land") was wearing a hat that is supposed to remind us of the mouse-ear hats you get at Disneyland. I'll bet that costume choice got vetted thoroughly by the legal department.

Saturn Award nominations are out and the show, Sam, Caitriona, and Sophie were all nominated for awards. https://deadline.com/2022/08/saturn-awards-2022-nominations-list-movies-tv-1235089636/

Sam & Cait did a mini Q&A after a day of filming and posted an edited version of it on Twitter. I'm never sure if links to Twitter work but I'll try. (Actually this may be old news. They did this 100 days ago? Well, it's new to me and I enjoyed it so, it you are interested, here ya go.) https://publish.twitter.com/?query=https%3A%2F%2Ftwitter.com%2Fdisplaceintime%2Fstatus%2F1557498154898968576&widget=Tweet

I, too, struggled with the "Inspector Morse" series at first. I had very much enjoyed "Lewis" as part of the Masterpiece Mystery series (here in the USA) and so when I learned that "Lewis" was actually a sequel to a venerable British show that was available via streaming, I went looking for it. But the difference between the two shows is significant and the original Morse can feel really clunky when you compare it to the slick detective shows of the past decade. Everything from the production values (no high-def imagery, old-style aspect ratio) to the occasions of casual sexism can make the original series feel really dated. But I girded my loins and stuck with it and I'm glad I did. I ultimately enjoyed the ride through the original series and I think my appreciation of "old" Morse added to my later enjoyment of young Endeavour.

I hold the opposite view. It seems clear to me that Endeavour's whole raison d'être is to explain how the Inspector Morse character we know and (sometimes) love evolved into that man after starting out as the fresh-faced young detective we met in the original episode of Endeavour (which, if I'm not mistaken, was intended as a stand-alone, one-off story.) Once the decision was made to turn Endeavour into a series I would argue that they really could not ignore the challenge of connecting the two versions of the character. If they had done that, there really would have been no point to the show. They could have just served up a detective show set in Oxford in the late 60s, focused on DI Fred Thursday and some clever-but-too-big-for-his-britches newbie detective. (Actually, they sort-of already did their version of that scenario with the earlier Morse spin-off/sequel "Lewis.") To my mind the whole point of the new show was to construct a plausible backstory for Morse -- one that addressed the lingering question of WHY Morse dropped out of Oxford. I think viewers of the original series came to understand that Morse had to drop out due to money woes but I don't recall if the whole story of his romantic disappointment, which led to his flunking out, which led to his losing his scholarship was ever fully explained in the original series (though I DO recall that extraordinary episode in the original series where Morse has to investigate a crime involving the family that would have been his in-laws had the relationship not broken down.) I also think that setting themselves that challenge of creating a plausible back-story was a key driver of the show. It's not like they spent a LOT of time delving into it. I feel like 95% of the episodes were wholly focused on Endeavour's efforts to investigate the crime-of-the-week (subject to the constraints of work-place conflict exacerbated by Morse's prickly personality and his off-putting, sometimes condescending manner with his co-workers.) But I very much appreciate the 5% of screen time they spent on delving into Morse's "origin story." That, for me, was a vital part of what made the show compelling.

Amen! As for this latest season . . . meh!. I binged my way through the three new eps yesterday and today and I feel let down. For example I could not summarize the latest episode, which I JUST watched, to save my life. I spent the whole time watching it thinking "Oh no, not a people-trapped-in-a-house-with-a-killer-during-a-storm thriller." I feel like I've seen that so many times (isn't that the plot of Agatha Christie's "Ten Little Indians". Or am I thinking of "And Then There Were None?" Whatever . . . it's a well-worn thriller/mystery trope.) "Thriller/Mystery" . . . maybe that's why I hated that episode. I love me a good British police procedural (e.g., Vera, Shetland, Midsomer Murders) but I don't care for thrillers. That's why I loved the earlier season finale with the "O. K. Corral shootout" described in the quote above but just couldn't stay focused on the third episode of this season. As for the first two episodes -- I've already forgotten them. I know a sports figure was involved (soccer? rugby?) and Endeavour was the world's worst choice of bodyguard. No wait, I do recall having this early thought during that episode . . . that Endeavour was actually a GOOD choice for a body guard because he wasn't star-struck by the players and he would stay where he was stationed during the game rather than sneak up into the stadium to watch the game. That's all I can recall from that episode . . . that and the fact that the body he was guarding gets whacked. (Or was it a different player? Sheesh I've already forgotten.) Oh well. This commentary isn't very insightful. I guess the good news is that I can re-watch the whole season a few months from now and it will be like new to me since I obviously retained NOTHING. That contrasts markedly with the "O. K. Corral" episode and the related "adulterated concrete / building collapse / corrupt cops" plot line which STILL sticks in my mind all these years later.

Ditto! I had to fast-forward through the Liddy-goes-crazy-in-prison scenes. But as much as I enjoyed the series (and Julia Roberts' performance in particular) I now feel the need to re-acquaint myself with how Watergate played out because the "facts" as depicted in this version do not line up exactly with what I THINK I recall from the recent CNN Special --"Watergate: Blueprint for a Scandal". I watched that show first and now -- having just finished "Gaslit" -- I think I have to go back and watch the CNN Special again. I wonder if it will feel different? A grey-haired John Dean is essentially the "narrator" of the CNN Special. It's interesting to realize that he's evolved from "fall guy" for the scandal to "historical figure" reminiscing about his Watergate-related activities for the sake of posterity.