S01.E10: The Black Queen

[PatsyandEddie]

Maybe Rhaenyra’s youngest children? They are very close in age but not twins afaik. One is Aegon and the other is Viserys. 

[FozzyBear]

2 hours ago, PatsyandEddie said:

Maybe Rhaenyra’s youngest children? They are very close in age but not twins afaik. One is Aegon and the other is Viserys. 

I did mean them! I thought they were twins.

[magdalene]

33 minutes ago, FozzyBear said:

I did mean them! I thought they were twins.

Rhaenyra has two toddler age sons with Daemon her second husband.  Aegon the Younger, so called to differentiate him from the current usurper king. And her youngest, Viserys, named after his grandfather. 

[proserpina65]

I've just started a rewatch of the first season on dvd (otherwise known as forcing a GOT-fan friend to watch it even though she wasn't particularly interested).  I was perversely please when, after finishing the first episode, she said "I don't mean to be rude, but that was kinda boring" since that was exactly how I felt until about halfway through We Light The Way on first viewing.  Heck, if I could've skipped directly to episode 6, which is when the show actually became good, I would've but the amount of exposition that would've required on my part was too daunting.  I've promised her it will get better and also swore I won't torture her with season 2 if she doesn't end up liking season 1.

[snickers]

On 1/9/2023 at 11:05 AM, proserpina65 said:

"I don't mean to be rude, but that was kinda boring" since that was exactly how I felt until about halfway through We Light The Way on first viewing.  Heck, if I could've skipped directly to episode 6, which is when the show actually became good,

I take this person didn't watch the Rings of Power? 😆

I still haven't finished that show...

I felt the only "slow" part was perhaps Episode 3 during the "hunt"...that part was a little slow moving, and perhaps Episode 9, but the rest of it...so good

though they could have had more battle scenes, i'm assuming they are saving the budget, even GOT season 1 didn't really have crazy battle scenes, not like the later seasons....

[proserpina65]

On 1/14/2023 at 8:58 PM, snickers said:

I take this person didn't watch the Rings of Power? 😆

I still haven't finished that show...

I felt the only "slow" part was perhaps Episode 3 during the "hunt"...that part was a little slow moving, and perhaps Episode 9, but the rest of it...so good

Definitely not.  Me neither, for that matter, even though I have Amazon.

I found the first 4 episodes varying degrees of boring, episode 3 that least.  The season picked up for me in episode 5 and was great from 6 on.

She's finding the first half of the season to be way to talky.  She wasn't sure she really wanted to watch to begin with.  I keep promising her it will get better but also that she doesn't have to watch season 2 if she doesn't like season 1.

[snickers]

Yeah it’s talking show, but so was GOT

 I’m thinking season 2 will have more action, but maybe not. But I don’t recommend Rings of Power if you and your friend thought this was boring 😆

[proserpina65]

On 1/21/2023 at 10:14 AM, snickers said:

Yeah it’s talking show, but so was GOT

 I’m thinking season 2 will have more action, but maybe not. But I don’t recommend Rings of Power if you and your friend thought this was boring 😆

I think with GOT, though, it mixed the talky with the non-talky better so that there was some of each in every episode.  Or maybe it was just what they were talking about varied more?  Either way, she definitely thought HOTD picked up with episode 5 & 6.  Can't wait to show her Driftmark and Lord of the Tides.

[proserpina65]

Just wanted to add that after 6 episodes, my friend is inclined to be more sympathetic towards Alicent and to not think very highly of Rhaenyra.  We'll see if that changes.

[CountryGirl]

11 hours ago, proserpina65 said:

Just wanted to add that after 6 episodes, my friend is inclined to be more sympathetic towards Alicent and to not think very highly of Rhaenyra.  We'll see if that changes.

I’m really interested in your friend’s take and if it changes. 

[proserpina65]

On 1/26/2023 at 10:23 PM, CountryGirl said:

I’m really interested in your friend’s take and if it changes. 

As of ep 7, she still leans more towards Alicent. She did think Alicent took it to far in Driftmark, but that Rhaenyra was completely in the wrong.  And she doesn't like Daemon at all, although she thought he was better with Laena.

[KBrownie]

1 hour ago, proserpina65 said:

As of ep 7, she still leans more towards Alicent. She did think Alicent took it to far in Driftmark, but that Rhaenyra was completely in the wrong.  And she doesn't like Daemon at all, although she thought he was better with Laena.

I would love to know what exactly, in regards to Alicent, Rhaenyra was ever “completely in the wrong for.”  
 

Whatever problems Alicent had with Rhaenyra and the way Rhaenyra chose to live her life were hers alone. Rhaenyra owed Alicent, who conveniently never owns up to the fact that it was SHE who started the lies and deception in that friendship, nothing. Yeah, yeah Alicent couldn’t defy her father, but she betrayed Rhaenyra. Rhaenyra owed her nothing after that. Or Alicent’s father. Alicent should have just accepted that and moved on. She did what she had to do in service of herself and her family’s position but that meant the friendship with Rhaenyra was done. Rhaenyra was never wrong to do the same for herself. What she chose to do with her vagina, which let’s face it, was always Alicent’s real sore spot, was her business. Alicent never had any right to patrol and police it the way she did or be upset that Rhaenyra chose to make her own decisions (if Alicent felt she couldn’t do the same it’s not Rhaenyra’s problem)within the complexities of her situation regarding her sexuality and all that came with it. The only person(s) Rhaenyra owed any explanation to were her father the King and later Harwin and Laenor.  
 

Rhaenyra never did anything to Alicent to warrant all that Alicent ends up doing to her.  Lying about being with Daemon in a brothel, which was none of her business and Rhaenyra was under no obligation to share if she didn’t want to, does not justify all of Alicent’s later aggressions and overreactions. It’s so funny how Otto and Alicent and a lot of their supporters love to justify themselves by talking about Rhaenyra’s sons as threats to the realm (like they genuinely cared) because they are bastards and how Rhaenyra would kill Alicent’s kids, but ignore that Alicent was big mad and jealous BEFORE Rhaenyra even had any kids.  It was ALICENT, who spends a decade plus trying to hurt RHAENYRA’s children by deliberately spreading rumors about them, sowing seeds that she knew could risk their lives. And tries to put all the responsibility for the war they start in usurping Rhaenyra’s throne by sending bullshit letters about how she hasn’t forgotten the love they have for one another to manipulate her into just accepting them stealing what is rightfully hers. But it’s Rhaenyra that’s “completely in the wrong” and Alicent only goes too far at Driftmark. Yeah. Sure.

[proserpina65]

Both my friend and I are of the opinion that all Rhaenyra had to do after the fight was to keep her mouth shut and head back to Dragonstone.  Viserys wasn't going to punish her son for what happened to Aemond and everything would have settled down.  She brought up the bastard accusation, not Alicent, so the rest of the altercation was on her.  Alicent's attacking her was unhinged, but at least somewhat understandable under the circumstances. Her son had just lost an eye and no one was going to be punished in any way. 

Personally I think Rhaenyra is a lying hypocritical bitch and Alicent is only marginally better.  There aren't a lot of decent people in this show. 

I'm editing my post to note that I haven't expressed my opinion to my friend before we watch each episode. I've waited until she's said what she thinks about the events in the episode first and then either agreed or disagreed with her thoughts.

She does know that Aemond is my favorite character, though. 

Edited January 29, 2023 by proserpina65

[izabella]

On 1/23/2023 at 11:17 AM, proserpina65 said:

I think with GOT, though, it mixed the talky with the non-talky better so that there was some of each in every episode.  Or maybe it was just what they were talking about varied more?  Either way, she definitely thought HOTD picked up with episode 5 & 6.  Can't wait to show her Driftmark and Lord of the Tides.

GoT had a far more expansive cast with all kinds of things - talky and otherwise - happening all across Westeros and in Essos.  Here, I think it's too insular and confined.  We get no sense of context at all, who they are ruling and how that even matters.  It's just infighting among the Targaryans, and they aren't very interesting other than having dragons.  If we hadn't watched GoT, we would literally have zero understanding of Westeros from this show.  It's like it barely exists.

[proserpina65]

Just now, izabella said:

GoT had a far more expansive cast with all kinds of things - talky and otherwise - happening all across Westeros and in Essos.  Here, I think it's too insular and confined.  We get no sense of context at all, who they are ruling and how that even matters.  It's just infighting among the Targaryans, and they aren't very interesting other than having dragons.  If we hadn't watched GoT, we would literally have zero understanding of Westeros from this show.  It's like it barely exists.

That's a good point.  I'm enjoying the show now, but it definitely is more insular than GOT and that's probably why I struggled with the early episodes. 

[proserpina65]

After watching the relevant episodes multiple times, I've decided that Jace is a bit of a bully himself.  Not as bad as Aegon, but not so nice either.

Even setting aside his involvement in the pig prank, which was very cruel but surely Aegon's idea, when Jace was given the okay to order Vermax to toast his dinner goat, he turned and looked directly at Aemond, the one boy there without a dragon.  Then he was clearly involved in the pig prank and certainly found it quite funny.

For me, however, the most notable moment was in The Black Queen, when Jace and Luke were sparring on the beach.  Jace treated his brother exactly the same way Aegon had treated him in the training yard years earlier, to the point that the King's Guard with them had to admonish him for it.

Admittedly none of this makes Jace anywhere near as horrible as Aegon, but it does keep him from being the squeaky clean nice boy I think I'm supposed to believe he is.  Does make him slightly more interesting than he'd be otherwise, though, which is a good thing since overall he's boring as hell.  Even Luke had more personality.

[proserpina65]

So I finished inflicting House of the Dragon on my best friend this past weekend.  She ended up liking it well enough once we got past the midway point of the season but probably won't continue with the next season.  Primarily because her general feeling is that are really aren't any decent characters for whom to root, unlike GOT (which she did enjoy) where you had actual good people like Davos and Brienne.  I get that - most of the characters on HOTD are some shade of dark grey, other than ones like Aegon and Larys who are out and out vile, or Helaena, Baela and Rhaena who are inoffensive but sort of just there.

She still was more sympathetic to Alicent than to Rhaenyra whom she thought remained a spoiled, entitled brat throughout.  Not that she had all that much sympathy for Alicent either.  She just felt Alicent was trapped in her situation to a greater extent whereas Rhaenyra had more agency but made some really bad decisions and mostly refused to own them.

She did get into the scene at Storm's End and the resulting dragon chase, though.  It was rather like being at the movies and having someone yell "Oh no!" and "Don't go in there!" at the screen.  And she actually jumped when Vhagar appeared out of the clouds and chomped Arrax into pieces.  I was kind of the same when I first watched it so it was pretty entertaining seeing her reaction.

So there you go, some opinions from a viewer who was not obsessed with the show like us.  For whatever that's worth.

[millennium]

On 1/26/2023 at 11:02 AM, proserpina65 said:

my friend is inclined to be more sympathetic towards Alicent and to not think very highly of Rhaenyra

On rewatch I see Alicent as a tragic figure.  She was a good person who never sought any of this.  She was a pawn of her father.  Regardless, she did her best to serve as queen while quietly mourning the loss of her friend Rhaenyra.   It appears that over the years she performed noble servitude in her caring for Viserys, especially in the very disgusting last phases of his illness (all I could think of is how the breath issuing from that rotting mouth must reek).   I think her maternal protectiveness  was her undoing, though God knows why she's so driven given the two assholes she has for sons.   Maybe her eagerness to get Aegon on the throne is a way of absolving herself for the imbecile (Alicent's word) he turned out to be.    

On 1/17/2023 at 1:09 PM, proserpina65 said:

I keep promising her it will get better but also that she doesn't have to watch season 2 if she doesn't like season 1.

The showrunners have said that Season 2 will be faster-paced.

[proserpina65]

6 hours ago, millennium said:

The showrunners have said that Season 2 will be faster-paced.

True.  She ended up agreeing that the show got much better halfway through, but still said she was kinda over the whole Westeros thing.  Did say she might change her mind during the very long wait for season 2, though.

 

On 1/28/2023 at 8:08 PM, KBrownie said:

I would love to know what exactly, in regards to Alicent, Rhaenyra was ever “completely in the wrong for.”  

The "completely in the wrong" referred to Rhaenyra's behavior at Driftmark.  She could've kept her mouth shut and gone back to Dragonstone but she's the one who brought up the bastard accusation and demanded that Aemond be "sharply questioned" about it while he was sitting there having his face sewn up after losing an eye.  She fully deserved the "bitch, please" look she got from Aemond at that moment.

Edited September 6, 2023 by proserpina65