8: "Driftmark" (S1E7)

[00:00:00] Hey everybody, I'm Kristen. I'm Reema. And this is Dragon Cast, podcast dedicated to the House of the Dragon. Very dedicated. Very dedicated. This week we are covering season 1, episode Driftmark. Yes, we are. Yeah, I needed to really emphasize the dedicated this week. If we just

[00:00:39] finished book talk and book talk is long and it's awesome. I highly recommend book talk this week. Absolutely. If you don't mind spoilers and want to hear all the things, highly recommend. We

[00:00:51] had a really great chat with Renny. That will be at the end, however, just in case for those of those that don't want to listen or don't want to be spoiled, it'll be at the end. But we would

[00:01:02] love it if you do. And we do for those of you that don't know, we do do book talk in two different sections now. So we do give you a warning when we move into future book spoilers. So if you

[00:01:15] want to know what is adhering to the actual book of what is going on in the story, then you're free to listen up until we give this sound literally. And we move into future book

[00:01:35] talk, whole book talk before, after. Sometimes we reach into Game of Thrones as well. So I just I highly recommend book talk if you haven't listened to it yet for fear of spoilers because

[00:01:47] we do give a hard warning now. And we've been doing that for a couple of weeks now. Yes, love to have you have you join us. And, you know, since we're talking book talk and book

[00:02:00] spoilers, I just want to say I think we've had I'm not going to call out any names. But I think I've seen a couple of folks join us for for being a book reader,

[00:02:12] a couple of folks have like, look, I bought the book. Thanks, guys. You know, I'm loving it. So welcome to the club. We're happy that you're here. Unite. Yes, I love it. I love hearing

[00:02:24] that. So if you haven't yet picked up the book Fire and Blood to read the resource material for this show and for so much of the Targaryen history, highly recommend it. We I know I'm loving

[00:02:35] the shit out of it. And it sounds like all the new folks that have picked it up are enjoying it as well. So if you do let us know, we love to hear it. And if you want if you don't read but

[00:02:45] you like to listen, there's a really good audio book for it. If you have the Libby app, we sound like a commercial. If you have, if you have I just really like this stuff. If you have the Libby

[00:02:56] app, you can actually borrow it for free using your library card on audio file and you can listen to it. And if you really want to know kind of like what chapters to read, you don't

[00:03:05] want to read all 1500 pages of it, I get it. We'll give you the chapters to start. And once you start there and especially knowing the show like you'll have like kind of the set pieces in

[00:03:17] the back of your brain, you will you will fly through it. I've reread these chapters, especially of what we're covering several times over already just to see like what I've missed

[00:03:31] or what I what I didn't miss. And as usual, like we have a wealth of knowledge. You know, Rima has read the entire book and she's phenomenal. Renny has read everything that George R.R. Martin

[00:03:44] has ever written and she's like an a walking encyclopedia. So I highly recommend you reaching out asking us what chapters to read if that's what you want. Check it out on Libby,

[00:03:56] check it out wherever you want. So that was not an ad, by the way. We are not sponsored, but I wouldn't be mad if we were. We just really we're just we're just book nerds. And we enjoy

[00:04:09] this content. So and we we love to have you know, we're trying to sound like a cult now we're trying to recruit us. If you get to level five, we'll give you a free book. We don't

[00:04:22] know how to get to level five, but we'll figure it out. Yeah. I just I want to just share share with everyone you know when I'm enjoying something I want to tell everyone about it and

[00:04:36] include everyone in on the fun. Honestly, that's that's 100%. So speaking of this great content, this was a phenomenal I'll just jump in with my opinion. I thought a phenomenal episode

[00:04:49] this week. So I'm I can't wait to get into our points. I thought it was great. I know there were some complaints in general just about I think the how dark it was.

[00:05:02] Literally, you know, and I get that I'm not gonna like judge anyone's perception of the show and how dark it was. Honestly, it wasn't on my TV that bad. And I actually didn't mind it.

[00:05:15] I saw some folks online sharing like a like a pretty much blacked out screen compared to what was actually on the screen. I thought, wow, it was definitely not like that for me. So I don't know if

[00:05:26] folks were either watching on their phone or maybe their laptop or something that might have made a difference in how it appeared. But I do get the complaints. I didn't experience that it

[00:05:37] was dark. Yes. But it was I could see what was happening. But I thought it was phenomenal episode. So I watched, I agree. I watched on a television and then I watched my second watch

[00:05:50] on an iPad in the car in the dark. And I'll tell you that on the iPad in the car in the dark, I had a lot of trouble, a lot of trouble. Okay. But last night, we watched it in a dark house,

[00:06:03] right? We I think we had like one lamp on and the television and I had no trouble. So I think it really, I think like you said, it had to do with what medium that you are watching it

[00:06:15] on. So I'd be interested to know like who had trouble and what device were you using, you know? Maybe did you have to adjust your settings or whatever? Because I do remember watching Winterfell in season eight, which was also the dark episode in season eight.

[00:06:34] Miguel Sapochnick directed and he directed this one as well, this episode. Right. That was incredibly dark. And we did have to adjust our settings on the television. So, you know, I guess it just depends on what you're watching it. And honestly,

[00:06:50] we're all watching from all sorts of different ways, right? All sorts of different devices, different ways. You know, it could be who knows what your problems are. So I have no doubt that it was really dark for some people. It was probably fine for others.

[00:07:08] Like you just never know. So but I agree. This was my favorite episode of the season. Like by a lot. Especially since I wasn't really a fan of last week's episode. Oh man, I loved this episode. It had everything that you want in it.

[00:07:31] Like everything, everything that you would ever ask for in a Game of Thrones or Westeros or House of the Dragon episode. It was there. It was fantastic. Miguel Sapochnick, because I know you're listening. You did a great job friend.

[00:07:46] I concur. Yeah. It was great. So many great things to talk about. And I think just I think they're standard that they've had so far. I know we're only in the first season,

[00:07:59] but man, it just for me keeps getting better and better. So I hope that it stays true for the length of the series. I don't know how many series or sorry, seasons that we're going to get

[00:08:11] or anything. So I really hope that they keep it up because I'm loving it so far. If it stays at this quality, I want 10 seasons. If it stays at this quality. Yeah. Yeah. Well, there's plenty of content. You know, we were just talking about the

[00:08:27] books. There's resource material to, you know, even branch off and keep going. There's 300 years of Targaryen history just in Westeros that doesn't include if we ever got anything from Ovelaria,

[00:08:41] which who the heck knows? But at least it is called House of the Dragon. There's lots of stories to tell. Well, absolutely. So okay, so let's go into the episode. So a brief synopsis of episode of the

[00:09:01] episode from HBO as usual, kind of cryptic and not at all, not at all what we were expecting, right? As the families gather on Driftmark for a funeral, the series calls for an end to infighting and Allicent demands justice. That's super mildly. Yeah.

[00:09:25] Putting it very mildly. I have a lot of fun with the HBO show, you know, remarks or whatever because I'm like, wow, like you're not even going to say a little bit. You're exactly. No. Which is good because I really dislike some shows that we

[00:09:43] covered on my other podcast, Strange Indeed. I would go to like IMDB or something for description just to kind of, well, here's the description for that next step and it was like for the next episode

[00:09:53] and I would look at them like, oh, that's kind of, that's kind of spoilery, you know, they're kind of given too much. So I think if I had to go either way, I'd prefer a very, like you said,

[00:10:03] vanilla. I love that term, the ease versus spoiling me on it. So right versus like rainbow sherbert with unicorns. Right. Or dragons. Right. Rainbow sherbert with dragons. I forgot where it was. Oh, well, do you want to go first this week? Because I have no idea who

[00:10:33] went first last week. I'm not keeping tabs or a tally or anything like that. But why don't you kick us off this week? So I will. I feel like there were a lot of thematic elements of the

[00:10:49] entire season that we've seen so far and this episode really played on the theme of grief. And if you've ever listened to The Game of Thrones' House Podcast, you know that I've been through a lot of grief myself in my life and I've done,

[00:11:12] I've been through too much. So I really like a lot of this episode hit me like right in the heart. And what was interesting to me was that and whether it was on purpose or not, you know, people say that everybody grieves differently. And it's just something that

[00:11:36] you hear everybody grieves differently. And in this episode I really feel like we saw that. Yes. So you look at Damon because it's kind of the first person that we saw kind of taking a weird, weird avenue to grief. You know, while Vaiman is doing

[00:11:57] Lena's eulogy and he's taking this opportunity to kind of stick it to Reneera because why not be petty at a funeral? You know, Damon picks up on it and he starts giggling,

[00:12:12] you know? And I know that a lot of people are probably like really confused by that. But I am somebody that if something gets really serious and I know that it's really serious, like I laugh inappropriately. It's a coping mechanism. It's just something because I'm

[00:12:27] just like, I don't know what else to do with myself. And I'll just start laughing. And I feel like that's something that we see with Damon. Now, you know, I know that there are deleted scenes

[00:12:37] of this episode, which I really would have liked to have seen. One of the deleted scenes is Damon, you know, just grieving and desperate for Lena. And I think he's in the sea and he's

[00:12:47] trying to kind of like connect to her. You know, he sleeps with a sex on the beach with Reneera. He, you know, last week we saw him not really going to his daughters, but there's a deleted

[00:13:03] scene of Damon actually talking to his daughters about his mother and hugging his daughters and kind of being like having like a real paternal instinct that probably would have humanized him a

[00:13:15] little bit more. So I think that Damon is having those, you know, ups and downs of losing your wife, right? As much as he can. I mean, I know that he's a bit of a sociopath. We all know this,

[00:13:27] but he really, he really did love Lena. I know that it's not really alluded to in this episode, but I really feel like he did. They had this mutual respect and love for each other as much as Damon can.

[00:13:45] You see Coralus, who is, he's all about just forward movement. He doesn't, you know, and I think a lot of men are like that in grief is that they're just like, we need to keep going,

[00:13:59] we need to go further, we need to keep at the task at hand. You know, I have a sister who passed away and when my sister died, my dad was very much like that. He kept to, you know, he was very task

[00:14:15] oriented and he didn't allow himself to stop and really take in what was happening. Whereas Lenor completely broke apart and you saw him breaking. You saw how devastating, you know, his

[00:14:33] sister's death was to him and, you know, kind of for the good because, you know, he wanted to recommit himself to Reneera. He wanted to do better. He wanted to be better. You know,

[00:14:46] and he went through that kind of quick, but I understand that we had to do it for the stories. Story of sake, you know, we can't watch him completely fall apart and stay that way for,

[00:14:53] you know, three seasons. Then you saw Luke and Jace and Luke and Jace, they're still mourning Harwen Strong, Jace especially. Jace knows that that was his father. Jace feels that he needs

[00:15:10] to be back at Heron Hall and he keeps confronting his mom on his parentage, on who his father is and he won't let it go. And I think it's because he needs closure. He needs something in his brain.

[00:15:22] So you see, he's very reluctant to go over to, you know, Rhea and, no, Bela, Bela and Rhea and Rhea. You see him go over there and he's very, he doesn't know really what to do because

[00:15:38] he is grieving in his own way as well. And I think that when Bela reaches out her hand, I think that that's really great for both of them, you know, because the girls are kind of lost as well.

[00:15:50] You know, these girls are lost. They don't know what to do. They've got their grandmother, but their father is nowhere to be seen and they don't really know what to do. And then they see

[00:15:59] Vagar being claimed by somebody else and that just throws them into desperation. And that, you know, so everybody is just in this horrible state of grief. And then you have Reneera and Reneera is still grieving Harwin. She's grieving Harwin. She's grieving the loss still of her best friend.

[00:16:19] She's grieving, you know, this disconnect she has with her father. She's struggling with the abandonment that she feels by Damon and by everybody around her that has essentially abandoned her and put her in this isolation that she probably never thought that she would,

[00:16:37] you know, have to face. And so I feel like Reneera is this constant. She's in constant grief all the time just at varying levels. And I find her to be a really sympathetic character as a result

[00:16:52] because she acts on however she's feeling. But and then you have Renees. Renees I don't know the name of the actress. It's it's gone to me, I think she was captivating this week.

[00:17:20] And I have more to say about her later, but her her grief was palpable. Like you felt it coming through the screen. And you know, you just you see all these characters, you see that they're

[00:17:34] all reacting differently at Lena's funeral for past difference, differences and reason of reason. And it's just it's it's wonderful to be able to really say like, yes, I think that that is an actual like really good representation of grief as a whole because we all grieve differently.

[00:17:59] And that was very, that was very well done this week. So that was that was something that I really picked up on and I felt very deeply. That's that was lovely. The funeral episode, I'll just tag

[00:18:19] on to what you said, because it was it was very well done. It was very interesting. It was uncomfortable. Kind of uncomfortable setting. There was not a lot of conversation. It was all about the eyes. There was charged tension there with where everyone was gathered, the whispers,

[00:18:44] you know, going around. You mentioned Vaman and his speech that he was giving in High Valerian where he is shaming his nephew and Rhaenyra. And you mentioned Damon laughing, and I had a different take on this because I don't think that you're wrong, but just my perception.

[00:19:14] And again, I'll say for everyone, I feel like there aren't really any wrong. I feel like everyone's probably going to have some different perspectives. It's all about how our own experiences and perceptions. So I feel like any and all are valid. My perception, I have two different ones

[00:19:29] on Damon's reaction. I think he laughed for either one or two reasons. And I really think too. One, he was amused because Vaman is committing high treason by what he's saying. And my dear Damon, lover of all things chaos and is amused by just in general comments

[00:19:56] in something like that. He finds amusing. It was like when Kristen Cole kind of insulted him at Dragonstone. It was very early on. This was when Rhaenyra came back or went to go retrieve

[00:20:06] the egg from Damon that he stole and Kristen Cole made a snide remark about beating him at the tournament or whatever. And Damon just laughs at him and he's like, good on you. That was a good

[00:20:16] one. I think so. He was kind of amused that Vaman is in High Valerian insulting, you know, Rhaenyra, her son's future queen, the future queen, the heir to the throne and also shaming his own nephew, Lenore. Everybody knows is gay. Yeah. Everyone knows and doesn't talk about it.

[00:20:40] Right. So I think that's one side of why I think Damon laughed because he was just amused by what he was by the content, not really what he was saying because I think the other reason

[00:20:54] why he laughed when this is happening again, I was saying that a lot of what was happening there at this funeral scene was about the eyes. So it wasn't a lot of conversation. There was a

[00:21:05] lot of looking across the way at different people and the reactions and such. Vaman is staring at Rhaenyra when he's saying those words. She gets this look on her face and she kind of squeak,

[00:21:20] you can, it's very subtle, but she kind of gets this look on her face like he is talking about us. And then she kind of squeezes her boys a little bit because they're standing right

[00:21:31] there next to her in like this protective motherly way and she looks very uncomfortable. Damon sees that. He looks at Rhaenyra, sees she's uncomfortable and then he laughs. And I think it might have been a way to draw the attention away from Rhaenyra to himself.

[00:21:51] Because I love that. It's my way of thinking because I think that he does care for Rhaenyra probably more than he's cared for anyone that he's capable of anyway in Damon's own way

[00:22:04] because he is his own special kind of character. But I think it was a way, he saw how it made Rhaenyra feel the words that Vaman was saying and so he laughed as a distraction like, oh,

[00:22:17] let's take that off of her and put it on me and let her kind of forget that. That's my interpretation, one of them anyway. But I really love that. Thanks. But I thought

[00:22:29] the whole funeral scene was really great and how they made it. It felt kind of real because funerals can kind of be uncomfortable, especially when you have family that hasn't seen each other. The girl twins, Damon's daughters and Laina's daughters have been away, living away in like

[00:22:46] Pentos for many years. Rhaenyra and Damon haven't seen each other in a long time. There's a lot of folks that haven't seen each other in many, many years. Time has passed. It's awkward.

[00:22:57] It's uncomfortable and a lot of people hate each other in this little area too. So that just adds to it. There's tension. Right. So it felt very real. Yeah, I saw a piece of trivia about

[00:23:10] that, this particular scene after the funeral and like the wake area. That was the first scene that they shot. Yeah. Did you hear that? I did hear that, that that was the first

[00:23:23] scene and I think that's genius. I saw that on IMDB. Yes. Because they all looked really uncomfortable to be there. I think it was smart because I think it's a way that they don't have to act too hard

[00:23:37] to be uncomfortable, that the directors are going to use that, them feeling that kind of uncomfortable, unsure we haven't all really worked together yet and have that like complacency and that I guess level of being comfortable. I think that was really well done. So yeah,

[00:23:59] I did see that. Yeah, Emma Darcy I think was particularly excellent in this entire kind of sequence because they had that subtle like body language shift. Yes. You know, like they would just kind of look over and see that, you know, that they're being stared at or whatever

[00:24:29] and then there was that slight shift. You know, that was that shife slight posture movement or something like that and just those subtleties just made Emma Darcy's performance to me stand out. Yes. I agree. They are doing a great job with who's playing, who's playing Allicent?

[00:24:55] Oh boy. You know, I suck with names. Me too. Olivia Cook. Olivia Cook. Okay. Olivia Cook. I love her. I think she's doing a fantastic job as Allicent. I really, really do. But that entire scene, I swear it looked like she was smelling a fart.

[00:25:21] You know, whatever it takes to get in that like mood. Right. I mean, she looked thoroughly disgusted, which is kind of where it is when you're at a public function and you smell somebody else's fart. Someone's contested near you. Yeah. Like I thought it was spot on.

[00:25:39] That is so accurate. I hadn't even thought of that, but yes, that is what she looked like and you know, if that's what it takes. Yeah. That's hilarious. Every time I saw her, I was like, I'm smelling a fart again. I said, Cole's lighting it up.

[00:26:01] How about you? What stuck out to you as your first point? Goodness. Well, I wanted to start with my, I think my favorite scene of this whole episode and that was the claiming of Vagar. Wow. That scene. And if I, I'm, ugh, I can feel it. I'm getting

[00:26:26] emotional just thinking about it because you know, everyone knows how I feel about the dragons. And this was such a beautiful moment that we've not seen before in Game of Thrones or on the show yet.

[00:26:42] I'm not even sure, gosh, I'd have to go back in the reading and I don't have time for that at the moment if it's ever really been talked about, but at least visually we've not seen this before.

[00:26:52] And I have waited so long to see Vagar in action. Vagar was Visenya's dragon. She has battle hardened. She was one of the original dragons that was a part of, when Westeros was conquered by Aegon and his sister wives. She is beautiful. She is magnificent.

[00:27:12] She is absolutely incredible. The size of her, you really got a good visual of that when you saw Aemond there on the beach standing in front of Vagar. Yes. I mean, can we just have a moment

[00:27:25] and show her the proper respect because she was glorious. And thinking of the size of her as a side note, Beleriand, the black dread who before Vagar was the oldest dragon that had lived

[00:27:43] was bigger than her. So that is wild. Imagine how large he was when you see how how great of a size she is. She is beautiful. I spoke a lot about her in the last episode that

[00:27:58] we covered because of what happened with her and Laina, but she's beautiful. So let's talk about Aemond claiming her. He did have the right to claim her. His timing was terrible.

[00:28:16] Yeah, it stunk and I totally sympathize with Rhaena. I really do. It's not easy for me to say that. That's all I'm going to say. We talk a lot about this in book talk, which we've already

[00:28:32] recorded. You guys don't know that yet. You haven't heard it yet. We're not there yet, but we've already recorded it and had this conversation. Kristen and I and Renny. So it pains me to say that, but he had the right to claim her. And I do sympathize with

[00:28:46] Rhaena. The timing stunk. This poor girl is fresh off the funeral of her mother and is in mourning and is in pain. She wanted to claim Vagar, but dragons don't get passed down to family members. That's not how it works. You either claim a dragon or you don't.

[00:29:09] And Aemond did and he had the right to. So let me ask you a question. Knowing what we know so far about Bayla, do you think she could have done it? When I see, and we haven't got enough,

[00:29:27] but just based on what I've seen in the show, I think Bayla could have because I do, I don't think this is too spoiler to say. We did talk a little bit about it more in book talk.

[00:29:39] I won't, I'll try and go too deep, but I do feel that dragons are drawn to certain personality types based on their own. Like dragons are smart. They're, they are, they have their own,

[00:29:58] I think personalities and agencies are very smart creatures. And I think that when a dragon rider claims them, they allow themselves to be claimed for one because what did we learn from Danny?

[00:30:13] Dragons are not property. You know, you don't own a dragon. So they accept you as their dragon rider. They have agency. They have a say in that. And I do think that they are drawn to certain

[00:30:29] personalities and certain characters. So Lena was bold, I think she went after, I think what she wanted. And I think her daughter Bayla, if she didn't already have a dragon, which she does. We learned that I think in the last episode when Lena was having

[00:30:47] that conversation, there was mention of that. So she has her own dragon. I think if she didn't, she is, I think very much like her mother and would have been bold enough to claim her.

[00:30:56] Reina, I don't know, has the same or similar personality. I don't know that even if, even if Aamon hadn't stepped up and went ahead and claimed Bagar, if Reina would have been the right personality that Bagar would be attracted to, if that makes sense.

[00:31:12] Now, I'm correct me if I'm wrong because I'm going to get it mixed up. Bayla is the older one, correct? Well, they're twins. Ah, ha, ha. One of them looks a little bit smaller than the other.

[00:31:24] I know. And yeah, well, I mean, there's got to be one of them came first. So technically, one of them is older. But I don't know. Honestly, I don't even know if that's in the book.

[00:31:38] I'm older than you. Isn't that a twin thing though? I'm not a twin, but I've been best friends with twins and I've known a couple of sets of twins. And I feel like I've heard that I don't know how many

[00:31:49] times like I'm the older one. I'm five minutes older than you. My children are Irish twins. And that is a whole other level of crazy. So totally get it. There's always that one upmanship when it comes to siblings and especially with twins. Honestly, you know, I

[00:32:07] my younger child is bigger than my older child. So that creates problems. Indeed, it does. Well, and they are twins. And yes, they one does look to be older just because

[00:32:19] I guess she's taller. But yeah, we know with twins that, you know, that you can be fraternal and look different and not, you know, be exact twins. It's interesting how many twins run in the

[00:32:32] Targaryen family. I mean, that's all I'm going to say about books or whatever. But it's interesting because you look at that tree and there are a lot of twins. There are. There are. Yeah. And I'm not sure which one. I don't and I don't even know if

[00:32:49] it is in the book, which which twin was born first. But so last week, Bela was the one that was talking to Lena, right? About blaming the dragon as your own. I think it was Reina.

[00:33:04] Was it? I'm going to see this whole time. I thought it was Bela, which is why I thought it was Bela that was more upset because I could be mistaken. Where's Rennie? Yeah, I was gonna say a guy get Rennie back on.

[00:33:19] Um, but I know one of one of her children, one of the twins has a dragon. We learned the other did not. I just don't. I think she was of a different personality type that Vagar would not have been

[00:33:35] attracted to. But I think either way, both girls are probably their their children. Can we play? We're going to talk more. I know about the about the children. I have a lot more to say, but their children and they just lost their mother. They're in mourning.

[00:33:51] They're very emotional and Vagar should be grew up with Vagar, you know, so they're attached, I'm sure to her. And look, they also the twins and Aymond and a gone, they didn't grow up together. It's like they're like strangers. So I think maybe had they been raised together,

[00:34:17] maybe it wouldn't have hurt as much to be like because they know and maybe would have been more accepting. Maybe I don't know. So maybe them not really, them more being more like strangers

[00:34:28] played into that. And also just being emotional from their mother's funeral. And I'm not saying that they're wrong for their feelings either. There's really just no wrongs. No one's wrong here. But my point wild. Yeah, absolutely. And Aymond had every right. I don't like what came after,

[00:34:48] but he had every right to claim Vagar because this is how you claim a dragon. And it was amazing to see. It was super cool. I think how he quietly approached her. He spoke

[00:35:00] old Valerian to her to like try to calm her. He said, I'm going to butcher this lick, Kiri, which means calm down. Yeah, he said, thank you. Dojeras, which means obey and so vace,

[00:35:18] which means fly. Simple commands for an older dragon, which Vagar is. Vagar is I think 180 years old at this point. She's been around the block. So it was super cool to see how

[00:35:30] he spoke to her. He was using, we saw the kids before in the dragon pit getting some of that training, learning to bond. Aymond doesn't have a dragon yet. So this is his first time,

[00:35:41] but he's obviously been observing and picking up on that. Watching him struggle with her reins. It was like a how to train your dragon moment. Awesome. Wasn't it great? Pick up in toothless

[00:35:52] all over again. So good. And then to even see him struggle with this rope type contraption to even just climb on top of her because she's so massive. And that's the answer from last week.

[00:36:07] Remember, I said what is on her neck? Yes, I think so. It was just part of this reign, the her reins that strapped around her with the saddle for the dragon rider to be able to

[00:36:22] climb on her and mount and ride her. She's so big. Oh my goodness. She's, she's glorious. She's beautiful. Yeah, she is beautiful. So to see him struggle with the reins and then when she

[00:36:36] takes off and he's nearly falling off, all of that was great. And it didn't surprise me at all that Vagar accepted him because look, she doesn't have to. People have either been thrown off,

[00:36:52] tossed off of dragons or burned if you, right? So he was very brave and bold. And he's a, he's a little warrior. So it didn't surprise me that Vagar accepted Amond at all. So it fit and there's been a lot of conversation about that he shouldn't have done

[00:37:11] that or something like that. He had the right to. That's, you know, unfortunately, you're absolutely right. One of my favorite parts was when the first time that Vagar looks at him and then like, it's back down and you see his face. And I remember thinking

[00:37:33] his pants are full of poop right now. No kidding. Especially when she opens her mouth and you can see the fire in the back. I'm like, dude, you know, he's, he's approaching a sleeping

[00:37:49] dragon. She is old. She is tired. Let that poor girl sleep. But he's waking her up. She just killed her, her dragonrider. She's mourning. Yeah. Grief. Yes. Grief not only from the people and the characters, but I 100% believe

[00:38:10] Vagar is grieving, not just for the loss of her dragonrider, but because she's the one that did it. Yeah. Well, and as you said last week, she was so lonely. And she was lonely for so long before

[00:38:25] Laina claimed her. And now she's been forced, as you said just a minute ago to kill Laina. Now she's lonely again and she's having to deal with that. And as you said, they are dragons are very smart creatures. They're probably very empathetic to their people, you know?

[00:38:49] So this is a huge moment for both of them, both dragon and amund for sure. Yeah. And I think Vagar, I mean, it may not have really played into a part of it, but maybe it helped her in

[00:39:05] her mourning and in her grief of losing her dragonrider and the fact that she's the one that did that to Laina because she asked her to, that this was a way for her to

[00:39:19] move on and get over that in a healing process is to have a new dragonrider to bond with. You know? Maybe. I don't know. Look, I don't pretend to know or understand the psyche of

[00:39:31] a dragon, you know, but I'm just, you know, kind of throwing that out there because the bonds with dragonriders and their dragons are so strong. I mean, they know when, or at least according to what I've read anyway, they know when their dragonrider dies. Like even

[00:39:49] if they're not there, they feel that they know that they have this bond. It's like a psychic magical thing. So, you know, I wholeheartedly believe that she was feeling that loss of Laina and

[00:40:02] you know, so, and it's worked out for Amund because again, waking a sleep and drag. He came back from that ride very confident. He like he was, I believe, and one of my points

[00:40:20] was Amund. So, I'm just going to kind of like go ahead and let's move on. Yeah. Be with you, right? Was he was so introverted, but he was confidently introverted. You know what I mean?

[00:40:35] He knows what a mess Aegon is. He knows that there is this rift between him and Jace, but I really truly believe he wanted to talk to him in that moment when they were at the wake.

[00:40:50] They were standing across from each other and they both looked like they wanted to talk to each other, but they knew that there's like this line that's been drawn in the sand and they couldn't.

[00:41:01] Like you said, he knew the commands for Vhagar because he hasn't had a dragon, but he goes to training. He goes to the dragon pit. He goes there and he watches his cousins and his brother or nephews and his brother go through the motions and do the training.

[00:41:23] This kid has observed and absorbed everything. Yeah. And so, he's able to be confident when he goes up to Vhagar as a result. Yeah. And I think that that was key with Vhagar, right?

[00:41:40] You had to be confident. You had to be a certain personality as we've discussed a couple of times, but have you seen the movie Avatar? No. I tried. Oh, okay. I tried. It didn't look like it turned

[00:41:58] it off. So for those of you who have seen Avatar, there's this scene or those of you who haven't, there's this scene and I apologize if I spoil anybody because I know that the new

[00:42:09] Avatars about to come out and the original is out in theaters right now, but my kids are obsessed with it right now. So we've seen that a few times. There's this scene where you have to bond with

[00:42:22] the dragon or the flying pterodactyl looking thing on Pandora. And once you bond with the thing, then the first flight is important for the bond. And what you do is you take your tape,

[00:42:37] your little avatar tail thing that grows out of your head and you attach it to their tail or their mane or something. I don't know. But that creates this bond, this psychic bond between

[00:42:53] the rider and the creature. The name is escaping me for right now. But the first flight that is taken with the main character and his, I'm going to say dragon because I don't remember what it is.

[00:43:13] It's very reminiscent of what happened between Amon and Vagar, like almost falling off and trying to figure out how to do it. And like, you know, so I had these like these real not only how to

[00:43:28] train your dragon but avatar vibes that was going through it. And I thought, wow, you know, what's really great is that there's this consistency that the bond between human and creature, human and

[00:43:40] whatever, I mean a dog, a cat, a horse, whatever. You know, it's so important to really seal that bond by riding the horse, riding the dragon, spending time with your dog, you know, there is that weird because we don't speak the same language animal and human. And so

[00:44:00] we have to create some sort of a bond. And I think that that's awesome that it's kind of consistent across the field, no matter what you're looking at. And that first flight was really wonderful, really wonderful. But when he got off that dragon and

[00:44:22] he comes into, for lack of a better word, the stable area. That was a confident boy that walked in. It was a very different boy than the boy we were introduced to

[00:44:36] in the last episode and in the first half of this episode. I think there's a couple of reasons for that. I think one, I mean, who honestly speaking for myself, I think I'd

[00:44:50] be walking in with some big old balls too if I had just claimed and ridden the largest living dragon. If I was writing, if I had just claimed Queen Visenya's dragon, one of the original

[00:45:06] dragons that had conquered Westeros and had just done that. Oh hell yeah. And I'm going to let everyone know that I just did that. So I see that, but I also think there's a part, there's

[00:45:18] kind of a theory also that not just about the bond between dragon and dragonrider, but also once you've bonded with a dragon, your personality kind of changes. That kind of the personality a little bit of the dragon, how the demeanor or personality of the

[00:45:37] dragon kind of changes you too because of that bond. So there's, that's a possibility. Again, I'm not saying that that's factual. I think it's a possibility. I think it's a theory.

[00:45:52] So I wonder if that plays a part in it too. But I do think a big part of it is just like, hell yeah, I just claimed Vagar. I am the man right now is what he's thinking and that

[00:46:04] I think is part of that attitude. You know he does grow up in this episode. I mean, there is that arrogance that he walks in with like he's like, yeah it's me and I have a dragon now,

[00:46:18] you know, and it's Vagar. What are you going to do about it? Right? But you fast forward to he's lost an eye. He's been stitched up. There's this huge fight over it that we'll

[00:46:30] talk about later. But he stands up and he starts being the adult in the room. Yeah. Which was very interesting, you know, he took command of that room and he's like,

[00:46:42] you know what? Yeah, I lost an eye but I gained a dragon. This is a fair deal. Like everybody shut up. Yeah, right. There's a more of a mature perspective from him. Yeah. And he starts to comfort his mother and instead of his mother comforting him because he

[00:47:01] knows his mother has gone insane. She lost it. Oh my gosh, she's gone insane. But it's a very interesting shift that you see with Aimen from beginning to end of this episode and he has

[00:47:19] become character that is in the gray. Yes. And there's not a lot of characters that you can say in this show so far that are in the gray. And I think that Aimen has really put himself in

[00:47:35] this situation where he is obviously complete ass. I mean the way that he treats his nephews and his cousins, he's an asshole. But yes, the way he commands a room, the way that he

[00:47:55] took that dragon, the way that he seems to be a very much, excuse my grammar, a much more capable leader than his brother. It's just interesting to me. It's the second sons,

[00:48:14] the second sons that just absorb everything. I love that you said that. I love that you said that. That's actually in my notes. Oh good. So you go on. No, I just add what you're saying

[00:48:27] because I just have to laugh. Second son syndrome on this show. Damon, Aimen. It's real. Auto and Laris. I mean, Luke. Look at Luke. Yeah. Luke, he took out the eye. Yeah. I mean you are exactly right. I'm glad that you noticed that too. I just,

[00:48:47] I laugh because I'm like, I hope someone else catches that. Yeah. And you did. I get that. So yeah, Aimen took me by surprise this week. I'm not going to lie. He's an interesting character for sure and definitely gosh, and I'm sitting here as we're

[00:49:09] talking and you're talking about Aimen. I'm thinking of like five other things that I wish I had talked about with Randy while we were in book talk concerning Aimen. But I'll say this, he's a different character. There was a shift that happened there from the time

[00:49:25] that he claimed Vager to the scene with the kids. 100%. I'm looking forward to what happens next week. I know that we're doing another time jump next week, spoiler alert. I'll be interested this week. So please, can it be? Please? Just if that makes

[00:49:51] sick of it. It brings a little comfort to anyone. It should be our last one. If anybody is wondering, I am also sick of it. I would like it if they would not keep doing time

[00:50:03] jump. I know it's a little fast. I know it's a little fast and I don't disagree. We're missing some character development. There's some things I think we're missing. And I know some people

[00:50:14] still miss the younger characters or the younger actors sorry that we've come to know and love and did such a fantastic job. I do however think it's probably, I'll just say this without spoiling anything because I want to be careful, but it's probably for the best that

[00:50:34] we're maybe not or some aren't maybe connecting. Yeah. And that's all I'll say. Did you have anything else you want to say about? No, no, no. Well, I mean, I'm sure it'll be spattered throughout the rest of

[00:50:49] this episode because this was an Aamond episode, but I really wanted, yeah, I really wanted, especially with the scene that you were talking about with your favorite scene with Beggar and Aamond. That was such a pivotal point in that character

[00:51:02] that you just had to bring them up right after. Absolutely. It's important for what comes next. Yes. And for his character, well, why don't we just roll into my next point, which was essentially

[00:51:21] the kids and what happens after when, because we talked about the twins are distraught. They see what's happening outside their window. They don't know who is out there. They don't know that it's Aamond. I don't know that it would have mattered if they knew. They see someone,

[00:51:39] and I'm going to say in quotes, stealing their mother's dragon. Again, you can't steal a dragon. So let's throw that out. They're distraught. What's going on? Something's happening with Beggar. They get their cousins. They run to find out who and what was going on. They run into Aamond.

[00:52:02] And that was rough. That whole scene with those children was rough to watch. Aamond was ambushed. So let's break it down. Yeah. Well, let's break it down here for a second. Yeah, let's talk about it. Aamond might have been ambushed, but he technically started it.

[00:52:29] He definitely started it with words. Yes. And the girls attacked him first. The girls physically attacked him first. Yes. I'm just repeating what you're saying, sorry. But yeah, I know. And he punched one of them really hard. Yes. I don't know which one.

[00:52:51] Yeah. And that was just one of the many reasons why it was hard to watch the physical violence, the physical violence in general with all the kids, but watching him punch a girl. Goodness gracious. That was tough. They were all pretty vicious with each other,

[00:53:13] but he did start the unkindness with his words. He insulted the boys and called them bastards. Yes, he did. And he was going to kill them with that rock. He was going to kill Jace.

[00:53:31] I think so. Now, I do see, gosh, there's a lot of perspectives and opinions on this scene and who was in the right, who was in the wrong. And I'm going to say this, everyone was in the

[00:53:44] wrong. I think everyone was in the wrong. What happened here was a result of a lot of tension that has been building up for quite some time. And this was the result of the seeds that the

[00:54:00] parents had been planting in their children, seeds of hatred, I think. And we have seen what Allison has said to her children about Reneira's sons, and it led to this moment. And that sucks. I'm sure we see that. I mean, there's examples of that happening today. It's

[00:54:27] happened in all generations. But yes, so he starts it with words and it was harsh what he said, but it was true what he said. He's like, well, your mother's dead. You know, when they're like, well, you know, I was going to claim her for myself. You know,

[00:54:44] that's my mother's dragon. He's like, well, your mother's dead. Definitely wrong thing to say, probably in that moment, but he did speak the truth. He got hit for it. He did pick up

[00:54:56] the rock and I think he was going to definitely pummel Jace. And the knife did not come out until the rock came out and he was on top. Wasn't he already like on top of Jace?

[00:55:07] He did say, now he was threatening them too because he said you'll, and I'm paraphrasing, but what did he say? You'll die in a fire like your father or something to that effect. So he's again insinuating them being bastards and also threatening them in that way.

[00:55:26] So I think now that I think about it, he had the rock over loot and Jace pulled out the knife but then lost the knife and then he was going to attack Jace again and Luke picked up the knife

[00:55:40] and that's when he slashed his eye. So maybe it didn't come out. I'd have to watch it again. It happened. It was the rock, it was the rock, then the knife came out, then the knife was lost,

[00:55:53] then the knife came out again after one of them put the sand in the eyes, whatever it was, it was awesome. Yeah. Yeah. And you know, I think he probably had it coming but all the kids were in

[00:56:13] the wrong. All the kids were in the wrong. I don't condone anything that was either said or done by either side even though I have said many times I'm definitely team black. I've, you know,

[00:56:26] I see where all the kids, it just went downhill for all of them. And it was a little bit of their fault. No, they're all kids and they wouldn't know any of this. Like, I know we'll talk about the scene

[00:56:41] in the Great Hall about, you know, where all of this stems from but like I said, this has been coming for a while. We saw in the last episode, you know, things that Allison says to her

[00:56:52] children about Reneara's sons and basically saying you're going to be king. You have to be ready. And she makes no secret her feelings at all. So she definitely did not help the situation at all.

[00:57:07] You know, you can see with your eyes maybe that the boys are not Lenore's sons but to perpetuate all of that to your kids and to, you know, get to this point. She's definitely responsible.

[00:57:27] And I don't know, we haven't seen anything that Reneara has specifically said to her boys in conversation about her sons or technically her brothers. Those are her half brothers, Aegon and Amond and Helena, her sister. But we've seen it from Allison.

[00:57:47] So it was rough and definitely kicks things off moving forward. Yeah, absolutely. You can see where we're going with the story. And that's all that I have to say about that. I don't know if you have more or

[00:58:03] want to move on to your next one but I'm trying to be so careful. I know it's so hard. It's so hard. Please listen to book talk. Book talk, book talk, book talk. Okay, so my next one is...

[00:58:23] So it's titled because I have my little points right here. Rene's is done pretending. Yeah. Rene's and Corliss had to me just the best, most honest conversation so far. So Rene's finally calling Corliss out for his ambition and not for her justice was everything. Indeed.

[00:58:59] Number one, it speaks to really the equality that they feel for each other because this is not a conversation that Viserys and Allison would have. This is a conversation that two people that

[00:59:14] actually have a lot of love for each other and that have respect for each other can have. Right? So he's sitting there and he's like, this was stolen from you and I want... And she's like, no, you know what? Today of all days, can we just set aside?

[00:59:33] Let's just set this aside and just let's talk cleanly. And she told him exactly who he is to his face and I thought that that was just fantastic. She's like, no, this isn't about legacy for you. This is about your ambition.

[00:59:50] This is about you wanting to see your line up on the Iron Throne. It is nothing other than that. That, you know, he put his son directly in danger by putting Lenor and Rene's Rene era together.

[01:00:13] And he still refuses to see that that's something that he's done. You know, Lena is dead because they were off living in Pentos, you know? And she wanted to come home. I truly believe that, you know, Rene's was cut. She was right in this situation because we know

[01:00:32] that because we saw the episode last week. Lena wanted to come home. She wanted to come home. She wanted her baby to be born at Driftmark and Damon was like, no, I like it here. It's

[01:00:45] fine. You know, would it have changed anything? I don't know. You don't know, right? Yeah, you don't. However, it wouldn't hang over your head so heavily if Rene's were able to see what had really happened. Right. And that's a mother with their child. That's not

[01:01:09] anything other than that. Right? You know, you want to believe that if you had control of the situation, you could have done something about it. It could have changed the outcome.

[01:01:19] Yeah. Correct. And she may not have. I mean, I think Corleis had a good point that like they're, I know that they're not maesters in Pentos, but I don't know if he called them surgeons or

[01:01:29] whatever he called them, the equivalent essentially are just a skilled and know the same things. Right. And nothing could have been done here at Driftmark with our maesters versus what they tried to do for her there. Maybe it wouldn't have changed the outcome, but like you

[01:01:46] said, it would have, she would have been there to maybe see it for herself and maybe try to be there to be there either for her daughter, for the twins, you know, whatever. But yeah,

[01:02:00] she'll never find peace with that just because simply, and again, like you said, it's coming from a place, you know, I'm speaking from a mother's perspective. Right. If they've been my daughter, that she'll never have any type of peace over that because she wasn't there or present and

[01:02:15] witnessed that for herself to see that nothing else could have been done to save her. Yeah. I thought it was interesting that the last thing that was said, because Rainey's doesn't care about legacy. She wants Lena's line to carry on

[01:02:31] on Driftmark, you know, she says, please let's just do it this way. And Horliss is just like, no, like we would be sliding these boys and, you know, that that conversation takes place.

[01:02:45] And Rainey's is worried, is wants the bloodline to be, be intact. However, Horliss has that has that line at the end where he says, history does not remember blood, it remembers names. And isn't that true? Yes. I mean, I'm somebody who studied, who has studied history extensively.

[01:03:11] You don't care about blood. You care, you are just concerned with the names and who goes where and where it goes and why he's kind of right. I hate to say it, but he's kind of right. So I think so.

[01:03:28] It's a weird impasse that they find themselves on at the end of this argument, but it was a very real argument between the two of them. And I really appreciated for the scene and how it went because Rainey's is just overcome with grief. And Horliss is just like,

[01:03:49] what's next? What are we going to do? What's the next task? You know, and it's very apparent in the scene. I just thought it was fantastic. I 100% agree. I loved that scene. I love watching them on the screen. I love their

[01:04:03] relationship. I love Rainey's. She's a fascinating character in her so many reasons. And I think the actress is doing fantastic. There's acting just so on par with everyone, honestly. But yeah, yeah, I agree with everything that you said. Great scene and important, I think.

[01:04:30] Well, I want to talk about your next. Yeah. Yeah. Just going to get into it. Reynira and Allison. Yes, let's do it. Feel free to totally jump in at any time because I know that I'm sure you have 100 thoughts as well.

[01:04:47] So after the incident with the children, and I mean, and it's this is not funny by any means, but you know, anytime you've got, you know, how many times have you been at like a family

[01:05:01] event and you've got all the kids and the kids get into a scuffle and they're all yelling at each other and pointing fingers and you're like, shut up. You know, who's who's telling the truth here?

[01:05:10] What really happened? And you know, it was in a way relatable. I'll say that. I'm like, I feel like I've lived this a little bit. Nobody lost an eye. Oh, that's all fun and games to someone loses an eye.

[01:05:23] But anyway, sorry, I digress. So all of this is happening and they're trying to get to the bottom of it. What really happened? I'm a little frustrated that someone's not looking at these two beautiful

[01:05:40] twin baby girls. And like who what happened to you guys, you guys are bleeding. I didn't hear anyone say, Hey, he hit her, you know, and this happened or that, you know, I feel like it was

[01:05:53] mostly the boys kind of talking and I don't remember anyone mentioning what happened to the girls. I know Rainey's came in finally, I was kind of staggering in a different times. And she's, you know, what the hell happened? You guys, what's going on trying to catch up?

[01:06:08] So all this is going on and they're trying to find out what really happened. And the moment when Allison has had enough, because Viserys is like, we're moving on. We're not talking about this because they're all saying what everyone knows. And she,

[01:06:32] she grabs that dagger and goes after Reneira. And I fully believe, and again, my opinion, that her lashing out at Reneira had nothing to do with Amond and his eye. This was about Reneira. And I think maybe some little bit of auto too, because auto is back.

[01:06:58] We haven't mentioned auto, but auto is back as hand of the king. That was just kind of slid under the radar there in the episode. But here's, here's why I think it was more about Reneira,

[01:07:09] not so much about Amond. Allison lives by the rules. Reneira breaks them. This is probably one reason why I identify so much with Reneira and her character. She's a little bit of a rebel,

[01:07:23] a little bit of a rule breaker. And I tried to say this last week when we were talking about it, but I had some clarity in whenever I was talking about Allison last week.

[01:07:38] So Allison was raised by her father, Otto. She was raised, I think in a very pious way. She was always told that you have to follow the rules. She has always thought that doing right, doing the right thing, following the rules meant you would have a happy life,

[01:07:57] that this is what you're supposed to do. And that not doing the right thing and not following rules, you're not entitled to or you shouldn't get to have such a happy carefree life,

[01:08:11] which Reneira does. Reneira gets to be heir to throne. She gets to have these bastard children and try to pass them off as true born and legitimate sons of her husband. She gets to

[01:08:28] do all these things while breaking the rules. And she, that just doesn't match with her world view at all. And when, and she won't change how she views the world. Like this is how she's been

[01:08:43] raised to view the world. Reneira is kind of showing the opposite out here. She can't marry that up in her head. She can't change how she views the world so she rages on Reneira. She can't rage at Otto because she's not supposed to question authority. That's not

[01:08:58] the right thing. That's not what you're supposed to do is question in the authority and Otto has always been her authority. So she can't rage at him. She rages at Reneira. And because Allison isn't happy and Reneira is, you know, she's done doing all the right things.

[01:09:14] Reneira is doing all the wrong things that she's being rewarded for. Everyone's looking over her behavior and the things that she's doing. And really I think that between Allison and Reneira neither one of them are wrong or right in what's happening here. But I just thought that was,

[01:09:36] thought it was kind of interesting that moment and I loved when Reneira, you know, and she's holding that dagger back from Allison coming at her and she's like, and now they see for who you are. And I think she intentionally let her hand go so she could,

[01:09:53] so Allison could slice, slice at her that way and let everyone see that. It was very calculated. I agree. So very charged in electric scene. What a scene. Yeah. It was a great scene. I, you know, and while that's happening,

[01:10:13] I love the fact that that's when Damon finally got involved and he made sure that Chris and Cole couldn't get involved. That piece of shit. Kristen, not Damon. No, I knew what you meant. Whole thing if you're really looking at that entire scene what everybody's doing,

[01:10:28] it was masterfully done. It was really top notch from everybody. Everybody brought their A game to that scene. It was fantastic. Absolutely. Yeah. Damon was definitely more of a, just to go back to kind of talking about Damon. He was definitely an observer a lot in the

[01:10:46] episode. Him and his leaning, he's leaning. He's a good leaner. Yeah. He's a very good leaner. Okay. So I just wanted to touch on one more thing before we got to notes.

[01:11:00] And that is Reiner's escape. Yay. I mean, listen, I am a book reader. Rima, you are a book reader. Yeah. That got me completely by surprise. Was very unexpected. Yes. And I won't get into

[01:11:27] any of that, but I was so happy and so I loved just that entire sequence I thought was just so well done. So, you know, Reneera and Lenore have this really honest conversation with each other.

[01:11:47] I think probably for the first time in probably many years. And he's really honest with himself. You know, he sits there and he's like, I have failed you. We promised that we were going to do

[01:12:02] our duty and I couldn't even do that. We promised that we were going to take care of each other. I couldn't do that. And what did he say? He said, I should have been there and she said,

[01:12:13] that should be our house words. This is the best line of the whole show. Best line. I left out loud. I thought that was fantastic. I did too. Yeah. That was great. You know, and so I think when he starts talking about the fact that she deserves a

[01:12:35] husband and she deserves somebody that's going to be there and she deserves somebody that's going to strengthen her and encourage her and hold her up. He knew in that moment, it's not you, bro.

[01:12:49] You're not, you're not it. I know. But she loves him. You know, I think that that is truly her best friend. Yes. And you want the best for your best friend. And she with Damon's help

[01:13:06] really gave him the best out that he possibly could have hoped for. Yes. And wow, did they trick me? Did they trick you? Yes. I was shocked when her and Damon were having

[01:13:26] this conversation and I'm like, excuse me, what? My queen, Reneira, what are we doing? I love you. Why are you saying these things because I love you and I don't want to dislike you for,

[01:13:40] you know, orchestrating your husband's death to do this. So yeah, they got me. So it was a nice surprise. It was a great surprise because I thought it was not going that way.

[01:13:55] No, especially when, you know, and I love the way they did it because it was like he's recommitting himself. He wants to be a good father. He wants to be there for her. You're like, oh, I get the warm and fuzzies. Everything's wonderful. You know,

[01:14:09] then she's like, she goes next seat is her day when she's like, you need to be my husband. But then she says the sea offers an escape, right? And fire, fire is a prison. I think she

[01:14:26] she knew that she was holding him in that prison, that half of him that is fire, but he's also half sea sea. Yep. And he has been trying to escape for years. And she wants to give that to him while also keeping his integrity intact,

[01:14:48] her integrity kind of intact, but she doesn't really care. And I think that they did a masterful job at it. I think so. And what was it? The sailor, I'm going to, I'm going to butcher this. The sailor

[01:15:04] knows when to flee before the storm, something like that. A little bit of foreshadowing maybe. Yes. From the last episode and that's kind of what he did here. Yeah. It was masterfully done.

[01:15:18] Yeah. So what I want to know is when do you think that this was decided? Do you think that this was Lenore and Raniera planning this out? And then they went to go like

[01:15:33] play on the rest of it out with their perspective people. Do you think that this was something that caught Lenore by surprise? Think that Damon and Raniera planned it? I don't know.

[01:15:46] I don't know either. So this is just based on what I saw in the show. It's my opinion, and I'm, could be wrong. I think it was something that Damon and Raniera cooked up. And I think

[01:16:04] Damon got Carl involved. Now from there, I'm not sure how Lenore was looped in. That sword fight Lenore would have killed him. Lenore would have run him through. I think so. Yes. And so maybe, maybe there was the conversation we didn't see between

[01:16:37] Raniera and Lenore because they did have a beautiful scene. Maybe we only saw part of that. And there was something to that. I don't know if she was like, you know, those are all beautiful words. Thank you for, you know, this recommitment to me and the children.

[01:16:59] But here's what I'm thinking. But you're a liar. Let me tell you what I'm thinking. I'm going to give you an out. Yeah. Let me throw something at you. See if it sticks.

[01:17:15] I don't know. It's, I think it could have went down a couple of ways. But you know, but you're right. I think they, I mean, they played it off really well as far as when the

[01:17:25] sword fight started that Lenore certainly seemed to be surprised like, what the hell are you doing? That's his friend, his lover, you know, and you want to, where's this coming from? And it

[01:17:38] might have been, you know, genuine surprise. He might have been in on it and he just played it off really well because it has to be somewhat public, right? They, someone kind of has to see

[01:17:51] this happen, but it had to kind of almost not be seen because they had to switch that body, that poor and suspecting person that Damon snapped the neck of the person on the stairs

[01:18:06] that he snuck up and snuck, snapped his neck and used him as this double or whatever for Lenore in the, in the fireplace. So, so it was kind of seen but not seen. Yeah. In a way. I'm not sure. I don't know.

[01:18:30] I like that it's ambiguous. Me too. But I genuinely love being surprised and thought that was a great, not only a great twist, it was a great surprise. I mean, whether you are a book reader or you are not a book reader,

[01:18:52] that, that one, that twist was for everybody. That was for everybody and look, the books are an unreliable narrator. It's a collection of stories that a fictional maester is trying to put into one solid book. This story can go any which way it possibly

[01:19:11] wants to. It's open for a lot of interpretation and this interpretation I thought was really fantastic. I think so too. They did a good job. But and as pleased as what I was that Lenore survived,

[01:19:31] I had did have some conflicting thoughts about it for a couple of reasons. And one was he did just recommit himself to Reneira and their children. So he's leaving Reneira after he said he wouldn't. And I mean, obviously he's agreed to this somehow

[01:19:53] because in the end he does leave. But you know, he's, he's recommitted himself. He's leaving his children and his parents just lost their daughter and he's now causing them even more pain. I mean, my goodness, Reneira, or Rene's when she comes upon that scene,

[01:20:15] she's just lost her, her daughter and she's grieving and now her son. So he's putting unimaginable pain on his parents. His children are now going to think they've lost their father. They're going to be grieving. And can we talk about sea smoke? What? I know

[01:20:41] that beautiful silver dragon who's probably one of the cutest damn dragons I've ever seen, at least at this point, who's so damn adorable. And I swear was smiling in that scene from the stepstones as he's laying waste to all those soldiers. You know, what about sea smoke? He's

[01:21:00] just going to go off and leave sea smoke. You know, that's not a little thing to leave your dragon whom you're bonded with for life. You know, I'm not gonna... I think this goes to his, his core selfishness though. Yeah, that's true.

[01:21:18] I mean, when you really look, Lenore is great. We love Lenore. He's, you know, he's really kind of been there the whole time, kind of a little bit, but Kind of there, but He not as present.

[01:21:30] He's a dude that has gone after what Lenore wants to go after. You know, he didn't do his duty that he said he was going to do and he wasn't very secretive about his, you know, second life.

[01:21:46] And he wasn't even there when this whole thing went down with all the kids in the hall of nine. So when you, when you add all of those together to me, it makes sense that he's okay with leaving

[01:22:03] his kids and leaving his recommitment to his wife and leaving his dragon and leaving his parents even though they're grieving because Lenore loves Lenore first. Yeah, we definitely got some insight to that in the previous episode after their third son,

[01:22:21] Joffrey was born. There was a bit of a conversation there, so we did get the hint of that. So I guess it makes sense. It's just not, We don't have to like it.

[01:22:32] I don't like it because yeah, I mean, look without going into too much because we do talk about it in book talk and I don't want to say too much, but dragons could only have one

[01:22:43] writer and if, if Lenore isn't dead, then I'm not sure what happens to Seasmoak and they can only be claimed by another writer once their first or current dragon writer dies. You know, there isn't anything in the history or the text that I've read

[01:23:02] that implies that any dragon has ever had two writers at the same time. So does Seasmoak just remain writerless, you know, for the remainder of his days, which is okay because there are dragons that don't have dragon writers. It, you know,

[01:23:19] that it doesn't have to be that way. But you know, it's just like, well, the bond is so strong that I don't think Seasmoak will assume that Lenore is dead. He might know that he's gone, but he like, I feel like dragons know when they're dragon

[01:23:37] writers die. So I don't think Seasmoak's buying what they're putting out. So, you know, I feel like he would know that. Right? No, I dragons know. So I don't know where

[01:23:50] that leads him. To me it's like the best name for a dragon to Seasmoak. Oh my gosh. I should love the name. I love the dragon. I totally agree with you. So yeah, I'm just, you know,

[01:23:59] and I know I'm probably showing a slightly more concern about the dragon than I am the children and his wife and his parents. And that's where I'm at. You know, I'm like animals

[01:24:08] a lot more than we like people. Let's just say that right now. The more I'm around, the more I do like animals more than people because people walking dogs and I'm like, I need to pet

[01:24:22] your dog and they try talking to me and I'm like, no, I'm not here for you. I'm not here for you. I don't want to. I'm so sorry. I don't want to be your friend. I just want to be this

[01:24:31] animal. I want to be the puppy's friend. I'm just going to vibe with your animal. You guys just go about your business. It'll be fine. 100%. But yeah, that's just my contributing thoughts to your point. Yeah. It'd be interesting to see what happens next because I don't know.

[01:24:54] Yeah. Well, what about you? Do you have a final point? Mostly notes. Okay. Let's get into them. All right. Let's just mention this beautiful. So after that event, we get this beautiful Targaryen wedding. Beautiful. It was a blood wedding.

[01:25:16] And awesome. I thought it was so beautiful and magnificent. I'm sad that it was so short that we didn't get more of it. But I believe that it needed to be quick because the series

[01:25:27] would have stopped it had he known that it was happening. I mean, this happened so fast. And I don't think he would have, there's still mourning. There's like a proper period of mourning.

[01:25:37] Right? Like I know that when Emma died, the series was like, when they were trying to push him to make you like, yeah, you got to marry again. You got to keep the line going. You got to

[01:25:48] produce some more airs and stuff. And he's like, my wife just died. You know, there's like a proper period of mourning. So I don't think he would have probably allowed this to happen.

[01:26:00] So it had to be quick. It had to be kind of secretive because I don't think he would have been okay with it. I mean, we saw when Daemon proposed like several episodes ago, like give

[01:26:13] Renear to me, you know, and he's like, are you f and kidding me? That's not going to happen. So I don't think he would have been agreeable to this at all. So it had to be quick.

[01:26:21] So I'm kind of sad that we didn't get more of it, but it was, I thought just absolutely beautiful. I loved their, their, I don't want to call them costumes, their dresses, their her dress or whatever they're called, thought they were beautiful, the blood, bloodletting with

[01:26:39] the dragon glass. I loved it. I loved it. The markings that they put on their foreheads that this was. So we don't know a lot about the ceremony because, you know, that's, there really

[01:26:53] aren't any spoilers here because they're, this really isn't in the books as far as like, like what is a Targaryen or old Valyrian? I should say, maybe it's not specifically Targaryen, like an old Valyrian wedding, which is where the Targaryens come from. But they are significant.

[01:27:11] They, you know, have this ritual that's involve involving blood. And I think it helps. I think that keeps in line with the Targaryen legacy of being wed by blood and fire, which I think was represented here. In the runes. Yes. Yes. The runes on their forehead. Thank

[01:27:30] you. You want to know more about that? Go to book talk. Book talk, book talk. I'm going to keep putting that out there. I'm just going to infuse everyone's brains. But also because Targaryens do encourage incestuous relationships and weddings to keep that Valyrian

[01:27:49] blood pure, I think that played a part, the blood part. And I think it also signified that they're both bound to one another, one flesh, one heart, one soul now and forever because they, they did the bloodletting on their lips and they kissed. They had the,

[01:28:04] they drew the runes on their foreheads and then they sliced their hands and put them together and they were bound together by the cloth. It was a very deep cut. Yes. That was a lot of blood.

[01:28:19] I loved it. I thought it was great. I, okay. If no one, my medical, my medical background husband, when he saw that scene, he goes, that was too deep. He hadn't said anything in a really

[01:28:32] long time. That's all I hear. That was too deep. That's going to need some stitches. The four awkward kids in the background that are like, okay, here we are. Our dad just died

[01:28:48] and Bayla and Reina is like, our mom just died and you guys are getting married and we don't know what to think about this. We don't know how to think or feel. Family. Yeah, what's going on here? They don't even have time to probably process anything that's,

[01:29:01] that's happening. I'm curious what conversation happened prior to this to like tell the kids what's going on. It just seemed, you know, they weren't quite sure what, how, what their feelings were

[01:29:11] on it yet, but I, I, I loved it. I've, I've got a thing for blood. That sounds really weird, but I've, you know, I, it's a, like, I love vampires and the Lord, like none of that like

[01:29:25] grosses me out or anything like that. So it doesn't like, ew, it makes sense to me that this would be a part of their ceremony. You know, blood and fire or fire and blood. So I thought it was

[01:29:38] beautiful. I wish we had more of it. Wish we knew a little bit more about it, but Alas, it was a beautiful ceremony. It was beautiful. Her headdress. Yes. Give me, give me. I love the dresses.

[01:29:51] I love the dress and his little frock. I mean, it was all perfect. Yes. That, that color and like lined in the red. It was beautiful. Agreed. Agreed. I thought it was beautiful. You know

[01:30:05] what though? I mean, and this is another note that I have. Their, their sex scene was beautiful. The first time, the first time that he like was messing around with her or whatever in

[01:30:20] Flea Bottom or wherever they were. It was, it was a power struggle. It was very juvenile. And this was, this was actually an act of love. This was careful. This was soft. Yes, it was incest. Let's

[01:30:40] just get away from that. Okay? Yes. It's gross. This is how the Targaryens are. So we're just always going to talk about this. Yeah. I mean, we can't, it's just, it's just a part and a fact of

[01:30:55] the show. So the only way I can do it is just kind of eliminate that. It doesn't ignore it. Yeah, you just have to let it go. Right. But it was beautiful. I mean, the music that was with it,

[01:31:10] the way it was shot, there wasn't like any like, there wasn't, you know, objective nudity or, you know, kind of soft horn elements of it. It was, it was hastfully done. It was very

[01:31:22] adult. It was, there was just something very natural and beautiful about it. And I really, I enjoyed the fact they took it from that perspective rather than like a, I must have you and I'm going to tear your clothes apart and take you from behind or

[01:31:38] something, you know? Yeah. I agree. It was a beautiful moment between the two. And it's interesting to see apparently Matt Smith has chemistry with everyone. Because he, you know, him and Millie Alcock definitely had chemistry

[01:31:56] together. And I think he does with Emma Darcy as well. Yes. Yes, I hope they get together in real life. Please, whatever. Yeah. How about you? Other notes? What have I got? What have I got?

[01:32:21] Oh, I definitely know that Damon or I get the vibe anyway that he knows what's up about Alison Otto possibly being responsible for Harwin's demise. Yes. Nothing gets by him when they're having, when he and Renea are having the conversation on the beach and she's like, oh,

[01:32:41] well yes, it's, it's cursed of a place as what it was since the conquest. And he's like, oh, ghost stories, you know? And he knows what's up. Damon knows people. He knows, because he is of that same mind. He's Damon. Yeah. And that's, that's probably what he

[01:33:00] would do. So he knows. It made me sad that Renea was unable to mourn Harwin Strong. Yes. And that the boys were also unable to mourn. They were very sad, especially Jase being the oldest.

[01:33:12] He knows what's going, he knows, but he's not able to and Renea has to have a very, without explicitly saying it, but telling him that's not your family, you know, and looking at him like, do you understand? Because she cannot have him saying things

[01:33:32] like that around other people. Like she has to impose upon him and his brothers. And of course, Joffrey's a baby, but has to always impose on them that you can't say things like that.

[01:33:45] You have to believe that you are your father, Lenore's children for, right? It's for their protection. They're in danger. Right. So that made me sad though, that they're unable to mourn for them. We didn't talk too much about Larris, but holy crap, he's over there in every scene.

[01:34:06] Like can I kill anyone today for you, my queen? The way he's like, dude, dude's a psychopath. I love that Coralus showed love to the boys even though he knows they're not his or his grandsons, that they're not Lainer's sons. He's still loving towards them.

[01:34:28] I liked how Jace comforted Bela. I think we mentioned that. Coralus comforting Reneira after Allicent had sliced her with the blade. He's on her side. I love, I kind of laughed out loud when Allicent looked to, or sorry, no, it was something

[01:34:50] different that someone made a comment about the boys as they're all in the great hall. God, freaking Kristen Cole. I hate him so freaking much. He smirked. He was laughing at something someone had said and I'm, God, I totally just left my brain.

[01:35:09] And Sir Harold looks at him like, dude, that's inappropriate. And I thought that was interesting. Oh, it was when Aegon said everybody knows. Thank you. Yes, that's it. Yes. So yeah, he's over there and he's just laughing and Sir Harold's like, dude, that's inappropriate. I

[01:35:29] thought that was kind of interesting that he's because, I can't say that because it's a book thing, but it was interesting that he, I was like, yeah, you tell him to straighten the fuck up

[01:35:42] because smack that guy. You know what? You can be mad at what's stupid that he's mad at Raniara, but fine. She's an adult, but to take his hatred and I know we talked about the last episode bullying children, innocent children. They didn't have any say in their circumstances.

[01:36:01] That's Kristen and Allison. Like they're both just like instilling this hatred in their children and Raniara, I really truly believe is not. We haven't seen it so we have to.

[01:36:15] And that goes to the motherly instinct of both of these women, right? One of them has it and one of them doesn't. They are different parents. You made some really good points in last week's episode about the differences between the differences in their mothering, right Allison and Raniara.

[01:36:34] Thank you. It was nice of you. Yeah, that was really good. But yeah, screw that guy. It was so satisfying too when he did start charging after Raniara after that happened in Damon.

[01:36:48] That's when Damon decides to step in and I hope everyone paid attention as all of that was playing out in the great hall. There were some really great visuals and you can see a divide and I

[01:37:02] hope everyone was paying attention to that. It's important. Yeah, so agreed. That's all my notes. So I just have a few others in you. One of them is that this series looks very healthy

[01:37:16] when he's outdoors. The air is doing him well, I guess. Yeah, he looked good at the wake. I was like, oh, this is the best I've seen him in a few weeks. It's nice. Well, it's interesting

[01:37:29] because yeah, he looks healthier and almost healthier in this episode than what he did in the last episode. I'm like, well, I don't think that much time has passed. I guess however long it

[01:37:40] took to get Lena from Pentos to Driftmark for this funeral. I'm guessing a couple of weeks or whatever, but I'm like, the fresh air does you good man. Yeah, man. Just live outside. I love the

[01:37:53] visual and the music of Lena's coffin splashing down to the bottom. I thought that it was just a gorgeous sequence with the music, the high valerian, the coffin that splashed down and then it settled down. You can see the other coffins that are there. It was beautiful. Heartbreakingly

[01:38:17] beautiful. Beautifully done. Yeah. I thought that was wonderful. I also, we haven't talked about it. We talk about a book talk, but I just want to say it real quick for those of you who aren't going to listen to book talk. Helena gives another prophecy this week.

[01:38:41] Hands turn looms, school of greens, school of black, dragons of flesh weaving dragons of threat. We are foreshadowing here, people. We've got greens and blacks. We've got dragons on dragons. I'm not going to go too much further into that, but do with that what you will.

[01:39:04] Listen to Helena when she's talking. Take notes because she is, she's the one that's foreshadowing events. She's already foreshadowed. I'm losing an eye for a dragon. Now we're getting another prophecy from her and she's a fascinating character. She's a fascinating

[01:39:25] character and I'm really excited. I hope that they'd really dig into her character. So, Renea and Rainey's very chilly towards each other. Yeah. That was hard. I didn't like it, but I didn't like it either. Coralus talks to Lucerys about being the Lord of Driftmark.

[01:39:47] He doesn't see that everyone is grieving and he's focused on legacy and it's kind of like he's surprised when Lucerys is like, I don't want it because that means everybody's dead. Like I feel like Coralus forgot that he was talking to a little boy,

[01:40:05] little boy who has a lot of big feelings right now. So, he kind of seemed taken aback in that moment. One of my favorite lines of the entire episode was Otto and Damon. They're like

[01:40:21] very quick interaction and Damon says, no matter how far the leech grows, it always wants for another meal. I think that that is so accurate of Otto as a character because he's the son of a bit

[01:40:39] and I hate him and I just want him to die by dragon fire. And I mean, Damon, I feel, has always been able to see Otto's true ambitions. He told Lucerys very early on.

[01:40:55] He's like, you can't see it but this is how it is. And even knowing all of that and even knowing after he's dismissed him, he's brought him back. We didn't see it on screen but

[01:41:04] he's back since Lionel Strong was lost at Heron Hall in the last episode. He's without a hand of the king and brought him back and yeah, Damon doesn't suffer any fools. I really hate Otto. I do too.

[01:41:21] The kids fighting in the aftermath was very joffrey-esque from season one. Got a lot of joffrey, Sansa, Aria vibes there. That was painful and the dire wolf tight just... Yes. Lady. Oh, lady. I was really excited to finally see some emotion from Viserys.

[01:41:43] He was really in the best way that he could have because he's not very good at it. He commanded that room for a few minutes. He commanded that room and it was nice that he saw that his wife was the treasonous one in this moment and that his

[01:42:04] sons were treasonous as well. He can't do anything about it because he has no spine as a leader but he knows. When Viserys knows to me that's okay. Well, and that's kind of a big point of all of this is that he's the king and it really matters

[01:42:27] what he says but because he's been weak and ineffectual as a king and as a leader of the seven kingdoms and of his own freaking family, that's how it got to this level to begin with.

[01:42:44] He's doing a lot of yelling while he's in the hall like he's grumbling and yelling about and but no one I think is still respecting him at all and I think that's what you said is key

[01:42:57] because it proves that his wife doesn't listen to him or respect him and we saw how she just flitted him away. Well, you can do what you want when I'm dead in the grave and I'm like, your queen consort, you're queen by marriage. He is the king.

[01:43:13] Like you're not the queen. You're not the queen. You're a dumb idiot. And even his own children are comfortable enough to say what they said in front of him and like, I mean, what can he do? I mean, it's his wife and it's his children. He can't

[01:43:32] like cut their heads off for treason, you know, or, you know, what's that be something if only. But so what is he going to do? But what does he do in this episode with everyone and what

[01:43:47] he's done since we've met the series is forgives them. Like you can say all of these rotten things and I'm not going to do a damn thing about it. Even Allison has even taught her

[01:43:58] children to even like lie to their father because Agon or sorry, Amond did it when he's like, who, who did you hear this from? Where did you get this from whenever he was talking about the

[01:44:10] boys? What did he do? He looked at his mother. That's where he heard it from. The series new in that moment. Yeah. But he got to give credit to Agon. You got to give credit to Agon. He's like,

[01:44:22] everyone knows what he's like. He's like, where did you hear this? And he goes, Agon and Agon's like, uh, he just comes in like drunk from, you know, like whatever. Yeah. What's going on? He just threw his brother under the bus. But then he's like,

[01:44:38] Hey, everyone knows it. So I mean, the fact that his kids are even daring enough to say that just because if he was, if he was a better king, I don't think they would have dared utter anything.

[01:44:51] No. Yeah. So if that was Robert Baratheon, they'd be like, I don't know. I'm sorry. Way different. Right. And the last thing, the last real note that I have is, is Otto and Allison really, you know,

[01:45:14] Otto is very excited about gaining Vagar as an ally. And he's very excited about the fact that Allison apparently, you know, is finally living up to her high tower name. I wish that he wasn't the hand of the king right now because I just want him to,

[01:45:39] I want him to die by a dragon fire as well quickly because I hate him. Same, but I think it's important for any, you know, just for everyone to pay attention to what Otto said about the fact that they have Vagar that Amy Raymond claimed Vagar. That's important.

[01:46:11] Okay. I agree with you. I just hate it. How's that? But I did like Allison's outfit, like I loved her dress with the fur. Yeah. The costume is so on point. It's amazing. So I was in Salem, Massachusetts earlier today, like I told you, Rima, and there

[01:46:33] was this outfit. It's October in Salem, so it's just like Halloween times a hundred. All witchy, yep. And Halloween. So great. And I passed by this window and there was this green cloak

[01:46:47] and this green like bold medallion and stuff like that. I stopped and I looked at Dave and I said, that's Allison right there. And he looks at it goes, oh my gosh, that's Allison. I should

[01:46:59] have taken a picture and sent it to you because it was amazing. But it was Allison Hightower, like just in the window. And I wonder if that was like a nod to House of the Dragon.

[01:47:09] Maybe. Could be, right? Could be. Yep. But that's all I have for notes. Again, this was one of my favorite episodes. This was my favorite episode of the season. It was so good. Great. Yeah. Happy to hear that. So you want to go into listener feedback?

[01:47:31] Let's get to it. I know we probably have a lot because our listeners do not let us down. And I will tell you that I see a lot of new names here and I'm really excited about that. So

[01:47:44] if you listen and you haven't given us feedback and you want to give feedback, please do it because I love seeing a new name. I love our old names. I love the names from the Game of Thrones

[01:47:57] rewatch that we did. I'm looking at you, Lindsay Schlitt. But I also love the new names too. So like let your voice be heard please. Absolutely. Why don't you start us off?

[01:48:12] I would love to. Gabby Jade says episode was dark and not plot wise. I could barely see what was on the screen. I'm sorry, Gabby. I know lots of people experienced that. She goes on.

[01:48:26] Kids were fantastic in this episode. So I'm assuming Allison didn't take up the offer of marrying her daughter to Jace, right? Since Amond mentioned that his sister would be Aegon's Queen, when was this decided? And the side eye look Allison and Sir Kristen Gay-Vernier really

[01:48:43] gives off high school Mean Girl vibes. Yes, it does. Yesterday was October 3rd. Yeah. For Mean Girl people. Yeah, we know what October 3rd. Lindsay Schlitt. Hello Lindsay. Another mixed bag for me. Funeral was long, boring and awkward.

[01:49:08] Why the hell did Damon laugh? The strange darkness of the next scenes was so irritating. I felt like I couldn't see anyone's faces. I loved seeing Old Vagar for so long,

[01:49:20] but I wanted that little shit to stay with. I guess I always felt the dragons had a choice in who rode them. But did Vagar have a choice here? Would she not be able to sense his evil

[01:49:35] little heart? Much like Rima, all I see is a sweet senior dragon that I want to protect. I can't stand to think of what is to come of her. Oh, Lindsay, it'll be okay. It won't, but you know, whatever. It's Game of Thrones. Yep, we are in Whistrose.

[01:49:58] Oh, that's, I have more. Sorry. Love the confrontation scene. Finally felt like a Game of Thrones scene, level scene to me. Like we finally got to where I've been waiting for. This scene shows Allison is even worse than Cersei. Cersei made them kill a wolf for

[01:50:17] Joffrey's wounds, but this crazy bitch wants me to cut it out of kids eye? I'm with you girl. I am glad Lainor's death was faked and they actually did trick me. The question now is,

[01:50:28] were Damien and Rhaenyra in on the trick or do they think Lainor is truly dead and this could come back to haunt them? Ooh, interesting. A lot of interesting theories out there about that whole ruse and how it went down and who knows what and when. Right.

[01:50:47] Thanks, Lindsay. That was great. I think we've talked a little bit about what you have there in your feedback. So hopefully that helps a little and if not, come back and let us know. We'll try to help clear some things up if we can. Karyn Stoll Medeiros says,

[01:51:05] I didn't love this episode only because there are so many characters I dislike. That being said, the scene with Aemond and Vagar was incredible and I was so happy to see Lainor on the boat at

[01:51:16] the end and I have to admit I enjoyed watching the kids attacking Aemond. One thing in my notes is the pause they took when Allison held up the cat's pod or Rhaenyra with the

[01:51:25] fire in the background. On second watch, I zoned in on this because Rhaenyra looks at the dagger and it seems like it really empowers her to take control of the situation reminding her that from

[01:51:37] her my blood came or come the prince that was promised. Then she drops one of the most amazing lines in House of the Dragons so far. Exhausting isn't it? Hiding beneath the cloak of your own righteousness. Yes, that was magnificent. Allison was accusing Rhaenyra of not understanding

[01:51:54] duty but she doesn't understand the responsibility that Rhaenyra feels to take over the throne. That is exactly right. I think that's really important. I think it was really important because Allison doesn't get it and she and Rhaenyra has made a lot of sacrifices so that's a really,

[01:52:12] really good point. Thank you so much, Karyn. Very, Evits says OMG! What an amazing episode and did anyone else get Cersei vibes from Allison this episode? Her demand of an eye for an eye was

[01:52:28] so reminiscent of Cersei and her demand for a direwolf death after Jophrud was bitten. I am here for Deneera. This show just gets better and better each week. I totally agree. Very nice. Thank you. That's great. Mae Almardini says, Interesting how differently they filmed the scene with Daemon

[01:52:49] and Rhaenyra getting together. It was much more loving and romantic versus lustful as it was with the young Rhaenyra. I love Emma Darcy. They are portraying the character so well and I love their chemistry with Matt Smith. The relationship has matured so much and there's so much affection

[01:53:04] versus being cheeky and playful with the young Rhaenyra. Agreed. Alicia Stout, hey Alicia. Says I think my absolute favorite part was with Aemon bonding with Vhagar. It was a get your shit and pants on kind of moment. But so good and all of that dragon is absolutely massive.

[01:53:28] What's thinking of you, Rima? So he lost and I deserved it the little shit. Oh, Alicia Stout, I love you. That was great. Thanks, Alicia. That was really nice. Megan Dolores Rickleman says, I hate Aemon now and really didn't want to. That was one hell of a

[01:53:48] dragon scene though. Rhaenyra was so badass in that dagger scene with Allison. She said what needed to be said and looked so stoic with that fiery backdrop and the close up of her face in the

[01:54:00] blade. Love her. My stomach was in knots as I watched her and Daemon's scheme unfold and was thrilled by the reveal of Lenore set free with Carl. The sea provides an escape. I'm really

[01:54:14] interested in getting to know Helena more as it seems she's a lot more that meets the eye. Poor girl has to marry Aegon though. Yeah, I hear you. Yeah, it's terrible. Kara or Cara, Rick says, I didn't realize I was holding my breath during that whole

[01:54:33] scene following Aemon losing his eye until my husband reminded me to take a breath. Also, I couldn't stop yelling at Allison and her prick of a father and her godawful son

[01:54:44] from my couch. Kara, I love you so far. I find them all so insufferable. The clear visual divide of blacks versus green at the end of that scene was so well done. I'm really loving this show

[01:54:56] and can't wait until next week. So she saw it too. Yay. Renee Murray says Daemon is back and he's ready to rumble. I loved when he stopped Kristen Cole from going to Allison's when she was holding

[01:55:10] the knife to Rhaenyra. I kept rewatching that scene. Allison, Kristen and Sir Harwin's psycho brother is on my bad list and I really hope Daemon is not going to show them any mercy.

[01:55:20] I'm happy Lenore got to live his life the way he wanted but I felt sad for his parents because they lost their children. At least they have their granddaughters. Yeah. Lucy Hini who hello

[01:55:34] Lucy she is a frequent podcaster on The Walking Dead and she guests on a whole bunch of other ones if you don't know her. She sent an email and she says, this week all I can say is that I am so

[01:55:49] so happy that just for once the queers prevailed and sailed off into an uncertain sunset. Yes girl. I know Daemon's version of Allyship involved the stone cold murder of a random for some barbecue

[01:56:03] trickery but damn if it didn't make me like Rhaenyra and her uncle husband just a little bit more. After the disappointing death of Lainer's lover in We Like the Way seeing this happy ending

[01:56:14] albeit a warped West Orocy happy ending it made me happy. See there are happy endings in Westeros after all. There are. All right so we have one voicemail and it is of course

[01:56:32] our live steving so here we go. A shoulder check that's what we call it when we bump into the other guy's shoulder little kids do it and some men do it too. Here we go Dragoncast episode seven

[01:56:45] oh this is Steve oh so Otto Hightower is back being the hand of the king oh yeah this kid has figured out who his father really was and now he's just as distraught as

[01:56:55] his cousins okay right these are Allysant's sons now the ones with the white hair and they're talking about Rhaenyra's daughter right the one who's C's or whatever oh that's kind of sweet she could

[01:57:04] have his hand wow that's a very insightful statement for a little kid if I'm Lord of all Driftmark that means everyone else is dead did Daemon just call Otto Hightower a leech

[01:57:13] I think he did oh that's Graham McTavish I saw his name in the credits have we seen him before I think Laura really likes that actor and I know you're gonna explain all this political stuff that

[01:57:23] Coralus and the Queen who wasn't it's conversation because I'm not following it conversation regarding Bela whose Bela and the other the line is succession so Rhaenyra reveals that she and Lainar did try to have a child well okay so much for Uncle Daemon not

[01:57:40] being able to perform which one of Allysant's sons is this and what's he doing oh Vagar the dragon oh the kid that doesn't have a dragon is getting himself the biggest dragon

[01:57:51] who know and now the girl thinks that someone stole Vagar oh this kid fight is like it's pretty brutal oh now the knives are out how does that work when the current king's son who's a prince

[01:58:05] is struck by the heir's son oh and he's gonna have a wicked scar and no eye oh Allysant may him for may him you want one of the other boys eyes who those are Kristen as as the queen's protector

[01:58:19] not her butcher oh now the queen has shed the blood of the heir what a cold line I may have lost an eye but I gained a dragon no he doesn't still look the same but I just look at Otto

[01:58:30] Hightower I want to just once say I'm watery same dagger that will eventually become Arias the one that just cut Rhaenyra's oh I don't know if the king is gonna survive this voyage Allysant has

[01:58:42] learned to choose her words very wisely around this guy what's his name Laris oh she had her own husband killed all right can't wait to hear you guys talk about this one did he watch the

[01:58:54] rest of it does he know that he wasn't killed I don't know Steve Steve watch the end of it please maybe it was too dark it's like I don't know what I give up

[01:59:15] oh thank you so much to everybody that gave us feedback again we just ask give us your feedback good bad indifferent you know we love hearing it definitely I do greetings everyone we are back

[01:59:33] again this week with our edition of book talk I am so happy to say that Archmacer Rennie has joined us once again wouldn't be book talk without without Rennie calling us from the Citadel welcome

[01:59:49] Rennie how are you this week well thank you I am very happy to be back from my sojourn in Middle Earth and now I'm back in my homeland of Westeros well we're happy that you made it safely

[02:00:04] from your travels from Middle Earth that's awesome yeah for those of the for those of you who may not know Rennie was just telling me that she had guested on a cast of rings this week

[02:00:17] which is the podcastica podcast for the new I mean Amazon Prime show rings of power so that's awesome Rennie is definitely in her element with both shows so that's wonderful you should everyone

[02:00:35] should check that out because I bet that was great well a lot to talk about in this week for book talk a lot of things happened in the show that we're going to talk about so

[02:00:48] I just want to for everyone's awareness if this is your first time listening to us how we structure book talk we are first going to talk about the book versus the episode and differences and then after that we will move into some heavy book spoilers and potential

[02:01:08] show spoilers too you know I mean we don't know what they're going to do it's definitely their decisions what they add subtract or whatever from the resource material but it could be show

[02:01:19] spoilers so beware we will give an indicator when we are ready to move on to the heavy spoilers so if you don't want to listen to both sections you will be warned so consider this your warning

[02:01:34] if you don't want to listen to book talk at all then please skip ahead to the end okay so Rennie I we were just chatting right before we started to record and we were both

[02:01:46] very excited to talk about this episode and so many things having to do with the book so starting with just book versus episode where would you like to start this week

[02:01:58] well I had heard that there was a major change from the book in this episode but luckily I didn't get spoiled about what the change was so yeah I was I was glad that I did not get spoiled because

[02:02:16] my jaw just dropped when we saw that last scene of Lenor alive and rowing off to find his freedom and that is a major change from the book and although it happens you get the full

[02:02:33] playing out of it at the end of the episode that's that's where I'd like to start good place to start because it's a major departure um and I'm anxious to talk about it so please in the book

[02:02:46] he is most definitely killed there is no doubt that he is killed and one of the reasons why I'm so glad that they did not follow the book in this is because it couldn't help but be seen as

[02:02:59] part of the long-standing trope of kill all your gays right uh because we had Jaffy Lawnmouth killed in an earlier episode there was no way around that as far as the plot is concerned

[02:03:14] but if then they had then gone off and killed uh Lenor as well and potentially um Carl Corey I'll get to that in a minute might not have survived it either so they would have just

[02:03:29] wiped out all the gay characters and because particularly on tv shows there is in science fiction and fantasy this ongoing critique of that trope that tendency in tv shows I

[02:03:47] was just so happy to see them not go there I agree they they just did something else entirely um so in the book uh the lord of the tides and his lady were still in mourning for their beloved daughter

[02:04:06] when the stranger came again to carry off their son and Lenor was killed at a fair in Spicetown Spicetown is the town down by the beach I don't think we've really seen it in the show on the island

[02:04:19] of Driftmark and he was killed by Carl Corey uh in front of many witnesses there were merchants at the fair who told Corleis later that Carl and Lenor had been quarreling loudly before they drew

[02:04:38] their swords and Carl killed Lenor Carl fled and he wounded several at uh at this fair who tried to stop him um and uh the tech says that some claim to ship had been waiting for him offshore

[02:04:56] he was never seen again and once again the text gives us multiple versions of what was behind this attack um but the the conclusion is that the circumstances remain a mystery there's no definitive explanation uh one version says only that Lenor was killed by one of his household

[02:05:20] knights with no explanation given Septin Eustis names Carl Corey as the killer and says the motive was jealousy since Lenor had grown enamored of a handsome 16 year old squire and as as always mushroom has the most sinister theory little mushroom and and the most believable theory

[02:05:43] which is that Damon paid Carl to kill Lenor arranged for the ship and then cut Lenor or sorry cut Carl Corey's throat and threw him overboard in order to keep it hushed up so so in again in

[02:05:59] that version that's right getting the negative of the truth from each side a little there that that's right uh and the archmaster gilding the fictional author of the fictional history fire and blood says that because Carl had a lord's tastes and a peasant's purse which is something

[02:06:21] that Damon alludes to when he's paying Carl uh gilding says that the explanation that Damon bribed him is credible but there's no proof even though Corleis offered a reward of 10,000

[02:06:38] golden dragons for anyone who could bring him Carl Corey um so um there's also no hint in the book that reina re ne sorry reneera all those uh same and yeah and in this episode I have to talk about

[02:06:55] reneera reneese and reina so I expect me to stumble on those we're all going to we have and we will continue as the ship continues yes it's forgivable um so there's no hint in the book that

[02:07:10] reneera could have been involved so I was very alarmed when it seemed that she was plotting Damon to kill lanor me too um as usual I believe that mushroom has it right and so I think in the

[02:07:29] book Damon probably did have uh uh lanor killed but involving reneera in the murder in the show would have made the audience just turn too much against her oh it you know I before we got to the end

[02:07:43] when we saw lanor uh getting on the boat and that he had lived uh I thought oh no I could almost feel myself slipping from team black just I know no no reneera um especially after the scene where uh

[02:08:03] lanor comes to her and says I haven't I haven't kept it up my end of the bargain I'm going to do better I'm going to be a husband to you yes and I had such empathy for him in that scene

[02:08:15] and then the next thing reneera appears to be plotting to kill him and I thought no no no no no yeah that was too much I'm so glad that wasn't yes the route that they took and I thought there are problems there are problems with this change

[02:08:37] and there are some plot problems for things that come which we can talk about in the spoiler section but there's there's a couple of problems that it just poses like okay um he just wrote off

[02:08:49] and left his parents grieving for him which is a little problematic well and his children too and his two daughters are no no sorry his uh his three sons I was confusing his kids with

[02:09:04] lanus kids yeah his yeah he he left his his sons after he had just not like you said recommitted to reneera but was also recommending himself as a father you know he he had expressed

[02:09:18] he was feeling bad about not having been there and I did love that moment between those two and the smile like you said when when we got that moment and then we get to the end and I'm thinking oh my

[02:09:27] god you guys just had this beautiful moment and you're plotting against him um but yeah he's doing that to his parents who just lost lana uh his his his boys which you know that's

[02:09:39] a sticky situation because I think at least jays knows that lanor wasn't his true father but it's who the boys knew is their father he's he's been there and I mean he looked like he was

[02:09:52] involved at least from the little that we've seen of their interactions you know he was joking with them and you know taking them back to the dragon pit things like that so he's had some interactions

[02:10:00] with them but it's like wow you know those you're the only father these boys know whether you're their biological father or not but you're leaving them you're you're putting your parents through this on just the same like day week whatever it was that everyone was there

[02:10:16] um that's brutal it is and one other thing although I'm really glad they didn't kill lanor Damon did kill that guard on the stairs in order to provide the substitute body to throw into the

[02:10:32] fire so that poor guy was minding his own business and he got murdered for the sake of this royal plotting yeah but that that fits in very well with the themes of the whole a song of ice and fire

[02:10:45] series that the royals play their game of thrones and the commoners suffer for it yep you're absolutely right common common theme yeah good point um so there is no mention of lana's funeral

[02:11:06] in the book it is actually lanor's funeral that the events with the kids takes take place so they've changed that a little bit in a way that I think works really well in order to have this scene

[02:11:25] that doesn't really happen in the same way at all in the book where everybody is gathered and you have veyman giving his eulogy which you know it's written for the show not in

[02:11:38] the book but I thought it worked um brilliantly I think so yeah and yeah um and uh it's interesting the they have created this valerian burial tradition of the stone sarcophagi going into the water for the show there's no mention of anything like that in the book um

[02:12:02] I don't think it's a spoiler to say there is a point in the future because everybody dies right if you carry a story on long enough all the characters are going to die because there is

[02:12:14] happily ever after only lasts the human lifetime so I don't think it's a spoiler to say that Corleis eventually at some point in the future dies and his um his funeral he's buried at sea

[02:12:25] but that's because he was a sailor um at lanor's funeral it it's just mentioned that he has a funeral pyre so he's burned and he is half-targaryen through his mother right uh but he's also a

[02:12:41] valerian because the valerians are from valeria and I'm not going to say that three times fast no matter how nicely you dare me to I would never never um and uh so it makes sense and he was a

[02:13:01] dragon rider so it makes sense that he would have a funeral pyre because we know that the Targaryens even after there are no more dragons the Targaryens uh cremate they're dead um

[02:13:14] and uh so the events that we see taking place at lanus funeral actually in the book take place at lanor's funeral and um when the king and the court go to drift mark for lanor's funeral

[02:13:31] many of them uh go on the backs of their dragons and so many dragons were present on drift mark that septin eustis wrote that drift mark had become the new valeria yeah and I think I think

[02:13:48] they tried to show that a little bit in the beginning because we definitely have I think seen more dragons kind of flying above and kind of around drift mark yes kind of set the tone a

[02:13:58] little bit which was glorious glorious uh because I'm like y'all are just standing around there's all these dragons around what you know yeah yeah like it just you guys just take it for granted um but

[02:14:11] yeah I think I tried to fit that tone a little bit yes um I understand why we didn't see more of the dragons it's because they they spent all the CGI budget on the vagar vagar scene so that was

[02:14:24] okay but 100% worth it yeah here are the dragons I think that we at least caught a glimpse of um I think we saw coraxies flying I think we saw cyrax flying in and landing we saw dream fire on

[02:14:39] the ground he's helena's dragon and he's kind of a dark purple black um and we got a a glimpse of sunfire on the ground although we didn't see much of him he's agon's dragon and he is uh said to have

[02:14:56] been the most beautiful dragon who ever appeared on earth he's golden I cannot wait to see sunfire and then I think there was one other dragon that we saw flying that could have been maelies

[02:15:13] uh who is reyneese's dragon or it could have been sea smoke uh it was hard to tell yeah and then of course we then we saw vagar so this is the largest um number of dragons we have ever seen in an episode

[02:15:31] and it was glorious it was the best well a lot of a lot of good good moments but yeah it was it was great just to see them so just freely you know uh probably about um edit such a it was a sad

[02:15:45] occasion that they all kind of like anything right you always say oh it's so sad this is how we all gather right at a funeral but it was right you know right I enjoyed it because we got the dragons

[02:15:55] selfishly yeah it was awesome to see it was awesome to see the size difference between um vagar and the other dragons that was the best part to me was just the magnitude of vagar against

[02:16:10] the other dragons yes and you kind of get a full range of dragon sizes because you've got um um sunfire who's the youngest of all of these dragons because he hatched from the egg that

[02:16:30] was in agon's cradle right and then we've got dreamfire who is a smaller dragon but also older helena's dragon because dreamfire had a right a rider before helena and then syrax and caraxies

[02:16:44] who are a similar size um and then of course vagar the biggest of them all yeah because before that it was just syrax who was no syraxies excuse me syraxies that is the oldest dragon

[02:17:02] besides vagar yes yes yes that's right right yeah daemon's dragon that's right and vagar is the oldest the oldest living dragon vagar was not born in valeria vagar was born on dragon stone

[02:17:17] but she was the dragon of queen visenia visenia's dragon the sister wife of agon the conqueror and that's one of the reasons why i think it's so wretched that aamond had to claim vagar because

[02:17:32] i was totally 100 fine with lana having visenia's dragon but i don't like aamond having visenia's dragon i for so many reasons do not as well yeah but uh but yeah i loved that lana claimed vagar i thought

[02:17:48] that was a perfect match and that's you know i was really bummed i think i talked about it last week you know bummed that we didn't get more of lana and vagar and getting to see yeah lana bond

[02:17:59] find and bond with yeah vagar i know we got a bonding scene in this episode but it's not the one i wanted it wasn't the dragon rider i know i know but anyway yeah i think that that was a mistake

[02:18:14] there i i think that that was definitely a mistake there that just because of how tiny that the young young version of lana was to see that scene because you know again i don't know

[02:18:28] how much you guys have talked about yet but just to see aamond um against the sheer magnitude vagar in this in this uh episode to see that against the youngest version of lana and to

[02:18:42] see her actually take vagar the way that you know she was intended to i think would have been so much more striking and it really would have been a more impactful um scene when vagar actually kills her by lana's request yeah yeah yes yes since they did that

[02:19:05] which differs from the books we never see we never actually see it um any of the folks that we've meant so far claiming a dragon um if they just have them uh but uh and lana went to try

[02:19:23] to ride vagar one last time it didn't make it didn't ask vagar to burn her in the book but since they made that choice in the show to have vagar um burn her i think you're absolutely right christin it would

[02:19:35] have been super impactful if we had seen little lana claiming vagar and then see vagar at lana's request burning adult lana yeah right kind of the book yeah relationship yeah um so aamond

[02:19:57] can i just say i really don't like aamond you can't um don't like him in the book don't like him in the show although i think that young actor is doing a great job he's doing a really good job

[02:20:10] my god what an incredible talent nothing against the actor at all the all the actors you know that are gonna as their characters are playing are going to do terrible things not against them but

[02:20:22] yeah his oh his character but you know the show i think and you might be this is my maybe where you're going ready um i think they're doing we're trying to give us a little sympathy

[02:20:34] for aamon just a little but i like what they're doing you know i i agree and i think that one of the ways that they're doing it is trying to make us see a gone as totally unredeemable and aamond

[02:20:48] is trying to clean up a gond's act a little bit it's aamond i think who um goes and gets grandpa auto to come and drag agon out when he's drunk and get him to go to bed and i think i think

[02:21:07] you know agon is is despicable i have a little bit more to say about him later but i'm aamond first yes so um of allicin's children only aamond lacked a dragon and visceri suggested to

[02:21:24] do aalicin and aamond that after the funeral the court might go off to dragon stone where a wealth of dragon eggs might be found beneath the dragonmont and several young hatchlings as well so that aamond

[02:21:39] could have his choice if the lad is bold enough visceri said if the lad is bold enough key i say key i just reread that yeah this afternoon yes so aamond resolved not to wait quote what did he want with some puny hatchling or some stupid egg

[02:22:00] and quote when vagar was right there so that's what motivated him to go after vagar and his taking of vagar plays out a bit differently although it's very similar so that again the

[02:22:14] ages and the time has been changed a little bit um bella and rena uh lena and uh daemon starters are only two years old at this point and they appear to be i don't know eight ish or so in

[02:22:26] the show and joffrey the youngest of rena's kids is three instead of uh an infant yes a little baby and so um bella and rena weren't involved and joffrey jace and luke were i really love this

[02:22:48] change because it gives us more attachment to bella and rena uh which i think is great and since joffrey's too young to be involved having them involved made it great for for the um

[02:23:03] the ganging up on on aamond which he well deserved so um aamond knew that his mother and his father would never allow him to approach vagar because she was far too dangerous so he snuck out into the yard

[02:23:21] where the dragons were kept um the vagar is on the beach in the show and i think that that may be because it's easier cgi that way i'm not sure it doesn't it doesn't matter really where she is

[02:23:32] but she's in the outer yard where all the dragons were fed and stabled imagine stabling a dragon i want to be able to imagine the dragon stables i love the way that the whole i love the way that the

[02:23:49] whole season they've really treated the dragons as horses for the targaryens you know with the stabling and the feeding and everything i just think that that's been so well done so i'm so

[02:23:59] glad that you said it's tabled just now because it's it's fantastic um so aamond was creeping up on vagar when joffrey three-year-old joffrey um it calls out you stay away from her and uh

[02:24:18] because he's out there to visit his own young dragon um and aamond tells him to be quiet and he shoves him into a pile of dragon droppings does drag that's something we haven't seen in

[02:24:31] the show yet we have not seen dragon poop you know i feel like you could probably get a pretty good idea because we saw that in drassic park in the first one yeah exactly to your imagination he's like that is one big pile of shit

[02:24:50] so right after he shoves aamond into the dragon poop he just runs straight to vagar and clambers up onto her back and later he says that he was so afraid of being caught

[02:25:02] that he forgot to be afraid of being burned and eaten so when he's on her back vagar roars lurches to her feet breaks her chains and flies they did a fantastic job yeah i i like the giving her commands in valerian and facing

[02:25:24] her down when she opens her mouth with the flame down her gullet and uh so i like the way that they did it in the show i think it works equally well both ways i agree they they they kept it

[02:25:39] true enough but also made it a little different so i was yeah i was fine with that too i thought they did a really great job and even though i very much dislike aamond uh it was definitely one

[02:25:53] of my favorite scenes um yeah of the episode well what's interesting to me is that anybody that doesn't know who aamond is going are we in book we're no we're in no spoilers yeah we're

[02:26:08] gonna i have a lot to say for spoilers right we're not there to sit so i'll just say this i'm glad that he in this episode is um a more sympathetic character or is perceived as a

[02:26:24] more sympathetic character at least for the first half let's let's say that yeah yeah so when he lands um all three of renira's sons are waiting for him uh because joffrey ran to get his older brothers

[02:26:39] and in in this in the show version um baila and reyna go to get jason luke so same thing just different people uh but uh jason luke bring wooden swords with them from the training yard

[02:26:55] and aamond breaks luke's nose punches him same same as in the show and he grabs the wooden sword from joffrey uh and he hits jace across the back of the head with it then he mocks them

[02:27:11] as the the strongs um calling them bastards jace understands the insult and goes after aamond who pummel's jace savvah savagely until luke draws his dagger and slashes aamond um and aamond howls

[02:27:29] and so does vagar and i i don't think that we heard vagar howling when aamond gets slashed in the show oh you know i don't think so but now i want to go back and and and watch it again

[02:27:45] mm that's good detail it is a good detail they they must have kept that in i want to believe i don't know very that's very scully of you thank you yes it is um yeah i when i watched it the

[02:28:03] second time i i didn't i didn't hear it but aamond is howling very loudly at that point so true it could be that vagar is howling softly in the background not sure um so uh i i said like i said

[02:28:24] i like it that they have substituted bala and reina since joff isn't old enough uh and it makes sense although reina's claim that she should have had vagar since vagar was her mother's dragon

[02:28:42] doesn't really bear out dragons can't be inherited right and and they pass from rider to rider and the dragons have choice in who they accept and you can't will your dragon to someone

[02:28:59] and oftentimes it's not your your parent or your grandparents dragon that you get it although of course the Targaryens are all interrelated but it isn't that direct a connection well oh sorry

[02:29:20] talking about that um i don't and if this is spoilery tell me and i'll i'll cut this out and or we can talk about it in the spoiler section dragons don't they usually or typically when you look at

[02:29:36] all the Targaryen dragons and the dragon riders sometimes they have a type the dragons right like they like it kind of makes sense when you see this dragon paired up with this dragon rider

[02:29:50] i think vagar has a little bit of a type too um you know vissenya balon leina amond we'll talk too much about amen further and i was gonna say i'm yeah amen maybe something like

[02:30:04] vissenya but leina doesn't leina's not warlike well but she's she isn't yeah she's bold yes there was that conversation between her and bala last week where she said if you want something you

[02:30:18] need to take it and claim it for yourself and that is something that it's almost like amen heard it there's something like that because you could see him kind of that energy when he went to go

[02:30:32] take vagar for himself i think that's what ryan remote was trying to get at yes probably yes just it's mostly the the bold because leina was bold right uh and and i think

[02:30:44] balzi and i think yes this move from amond he was definitely definitely bold and balzi and even more so when he gets back from his track right after he's i think they got a lot bigger uh after that

[02:30:59] but i think the sinew is also very bold too so i think it kind of matches with maybe the type of dragon rider that vagar would connect with and i think that that that kind of pairs with other

[02:31:12] dragons too they they seem to like certain personalities you know and maybe bala one of the daughters maybe could have but i think you know she already had um she already has a dragon

[02:31:27] and i think reina was i think maybe a little too meek for vagar personally um bala has a dragon because her egg hatched the egg that was in her cradle hatched but reina's egg didn't hatch

[02:31:41] which is why reina doesn't have a dragon that's also why amand doesn't have a dragon he had an egg in his cradle and it didn't hatch yep it happens yes so the aftermath in the book plays out very much

[02:31:56] the same way that it does in the show uh with the addition of allicent directly ordering christine col to take luke's eye she does not do that in the book she just demands his eye and doesn't

[02:32:11] direct that to demand that demand to anyone in particular um and she doesn't grab visceri's dagger and threaten to do it herself and i think both of those additions the way that they have written allicent's part in this uh were great additions for the show

[02:32:34] but she definitely does demand an eye for an eye in the book as well she sure does and then visceri's commands reina and allicent to kiss and exchange vows of love and affection which they do but nobody believes their lies and false smiles except for visceris himself

[02:33:01] because he wants to i think visceris has proved that he will believe anything yeah and aamon saying that he lost an eye but gained a dragon and counted it a fair exchange that's right

[02:33:16] out of the book he says that in the book as well i love that they kept that yes yes um and then we don't hear anything more about that but then in the book but then later auto in the show

[02:33:32] says you know it was worth a thousand such sacrifices and it you know makes you think something that isn't really pointed out in the book but um a child has just acquired a b-52 yes it's a good reminder

[02:33:49] that these dragons are basically weapons of mass destruction that's right huge huge deal that this family this side of the family has not just another dragon but vagar big deal he has the most dangerous weapon on the planet at the moment yeah vagars very powerful

[02:34:16] she's battle hardened very experienced um i don't have in front of me but they've talked about the the roar vagars roar and how strong it is and how it could just even alone bring bring down buildings

[02:34:29] even without her fire it's such a powerful roar that's right one of the things uh dragon lore that i don't think we've heard in the show yet is that dragons never stop growing during their lifetimes

[02:34:43] and that is why vagar is so big it's because she is oldest and that is why belarian was the belarian the black dread egg and the conquerors dragon that's why he was so large because he

[02:34:56] it was before he he died early in visaries his life he was the oldest and the largest dragon and so we have all these younger dragons who are still small the the way that we saw

[02:35:09] denaris's dragons grow in game of thrones and these dragons are in various growth stages but vagar is the biggest because she's the oldest and she's the most experienced in battle because she was visemious yes can you imagine looking at vagar and how gloriously beautiful she

[02:35:29] is and how big she is can you imagine belarian knowing that he is bigger than her wow i still have some hope that you know someday we'll see some version of agon and his sister wives and

[02:35:44] their dragons you know and and not to divert but since you mentioned that i read a quote gosh i've got it in front of me i was going to give it to to christin for news and maybe she has it

[02:35:55] and i haven't seen it yet there was a quote from ryan condol one of the co-show runners and they were asking him about the show and the direction and well what what happens when this

[02:36:05] piece of the story like when this story is told right where we're going to go and he's like well you know that the show is called house of the dragon you know it's about

[02:36:15] targaryen history it's not just about this part so it he's like there's a lot of stories of the targaryens to explore and i mean i about lost my shit because you know he was he

[02:36:27] mentioned um i won't talk about everything because this is this one piece is a little ahead so i won't mention that but you know there's another piece of uh targaryen history that he mentioned agon and the conquering of westeros and i just thought oh my god if there's

[02:36:42] anything in this world yeah please give us that if i can't get belarian in this um part of the show can we please get you know um agon and reyna and vasenya and the conquering of westeros

[02:36:56] oh it would make sense since this show has grabbed the audience yeah uh that it would make sense then to go back i i'm not sure that the conquest would have been a good place to start

[02:37:10] with this successor show i think this is a great place i agree to start but now that we know that there are you know 12 million people out there who want to watch anything with dragons

[02:37:25] and targaryens that they could go back and do i agree agon vasenya and reyna i'm already casting the first the roles yeah images in my head of who i think are perfect to play so i say bring it on hbo

[02:37:38] but anyway i i totally digress and got us off track so please so um after visceris makes allicent and reniera kiss and make up he decrees that allicent and her children will go back

[02:37:54] to king's landing with him and reniera will confine herself to dragon stone so in the show she'd already moved to dragon stone but this is the point in the book at which she is sent to

[02:38:05] dragon stone and uh that ser ser eric eric with an e cargill of the king's guard will be her sworn shield um there's twins eric and aric and it's eric who is her sworn shield and that harwin

[02:38:22] strong will go back to heron hall so that's what they time swapped in the last episode which i totally think makes sense to do because the way that they have played this episode you couldn't fit

[02:38:34] that in as well and it would be i yeah i don't know where they would have put it in this episode so i'm i'm glad that they made that swap uh but it's only at that point then that auto returns

[02:38:51] so he has not it's still been lionel strong who's been hand through um lane is death and then lanor's death and funeral and then auto comes back as hand and right after auto returns to the red keep in order to take up being hand again word reaches

[02:39:10] court that reniera and daemon had wed less than half a year after their spouse's death so like not the next day but a few months later um at that point reniera was 23 and daemon was 39

[02:39:25] visceris is furious about the wedding and septon used to says that the marriage was performed in secret because reniera knew visceris wouldn't approve mushroom has a different explanation and that is that reniera was pregnant and did not want to have a bastard child so

[02:39:44] we shall see she could be pregnant maybe from the from the night on the beach uh here's a public service announcement don't don't ever really have sex on the beach there's a lot of sand it's

[02:39:58] it's very gritty that's all i could think about everywhere it's not as romantic or as fun as it says as it sounds to be and and as they make it in tvs and shows yeah it gets everywhere

[02:40:13] don't recommend especially with all those clothes i mean i don't know how they would have gotten enough sand off themselves to be able to walk in without everybody going oh you were having sex on the

[02:40:23] beach but it's all over your clothes oh gosh then i have a few small notes um uh corleys says to luke that he'll be the lord of driftmark um and in the book it's actually reniera who asks

[02:40:43] corleys to make luke her second son his heir since jace would be heir to the iron throne and here it corleys is um confirming that luke is his heir it's a sweet moment it is um and then uh when

[02:41:03] viscerus calls alicent emma um nothing like that happens in the book but remember alicent used to read to king jaharis before he died and king jaharis used to call her sarah which was the name

[02:41:21] of his estranged daughter who was living in the city of lees oh yeah he thought that that was her he mistook alice for her towards the end yes yes um you know i watched this episode twice and i

[02:41:38] didn't catch him calling uh alicent emma both times i even i thought i looked for it that time too apparently i didn't i think it was right after his conversation with daemon i believe and then he said he was going to go to bed yeah that's right

[02:41:58] and then herald westerling says um shall i escort the lady alicent to bed and like he's you know gently correct pointing out that that's alicent and not emma which is my next small note which

[02:42:11] is that herald westerling is still lord commander of the kingsguard rather than christin coal in the book he's been lord commander herald westerling died years ago and and christin has been lord commander but they're still keeping um herald the lord commander interesting

[02:42:31] and i think one of the most interesting differences between the show and the book is that the show openly confirms for us that harwin is renier's children's father both in the conversation between daemon and reniera on the beach and um the conversation

[02:42:50] between lanor and reniera uh where you know she says um i really had intended to have your children but it just didn't work out um the book never confirms outright that renier's children

[02:43:08] are harwins it leaves that i mean yeah it hints it so strongly that that uh it's obvious that that's the case but it doesn't it doesn't confirm it like the show does so um i guess the show was just

[02:43:25] telling us in case anybody had any doubts either doubts or just wanting to confirm you know and that it's it's an issue yeah just in case so do either of you have anything else you want to break

[02:43:40] and bring up before we um move into the spoiler section i do not christin no i'm good it sounds like you guys have covered it yeah yeah non-spoiler stuff i know right right right so many things

[02:43:56] um okay great well i think then we are ready to move on um to the book spoiler section and potential as i mentioned when we started book talk that it could be potential show spoilers we don't know

[02:44:10] what they're gonna show what they're not gonna show so this could potentially spoil the show for you it's definitely gonna spoil the book and future events to come uh so this is your final

[02:44:21] warning i need a little alarm or something a little warning we need a dragon roar thank you i was hoping you would do that i need to put in my little dragon roar i put it at the end

[02:44:36] of the podcast put that in there for the little countdown or something warning for everyone so anyway if you don't want to hear any spoilers potential show spoilers please please jump ahead

[02:44:48] to the end of the podcast because we are diving into it right now right now right now all right i have so many questions and uh notes but reny i know i know um we were chatting before

[02:45:08] we started to record and we just talked about how many things we have to talk about in this section so i'm really yeah really anxious to hear what you have to say well when we were talking about what

[02:45:18] laynor leaves behind his parents and his children what about sea smoke can can you actually leave a dragon that i'm so ahead you said that that's actually my very first point for the spoiler

[02:45:32] what about sea smoke and adam adam of the hull yeah so um i you know there's nothing in any any of the published material about anybody who ever leaves a dragon um it's and so sea smoke has

[02:45:53] to be available later in the timeline uh for his new writer who is adam of hull who is i believe laynor's half brother he's either he's either core leece's son illegitimate son or um

[02:46:10] um uh laynor's bastard son because core leece claims that the two boys adam and alan are uh laynor's bastards he doesn't own up to the fact that they're actually his bastards but i think

[02:46:26] there's no way they're layners baskets they're his yeah and he's just saving face by saying they're laynor's well and i think a little bit out of respect to to reyne's uh as well maybe

[02:46:39] yeah yes i think so um but um when the black faction reyneer's faction ends up having more dragons than they have dragon riders they go looking for people who um might uh be able to

[02:47:02] ride a dragon and one of those who steps up is adam of hull um and he claims sea smoke and rides sea smoke yeah because so he's dead in the book right yeah so sea

[02:47:24] sea smoke goes without a rider for several years until this happens a dragon cannot bond with a new rider while their rider still lives but i think there's two possibilities either laynor is so far away and gone for so long that sea smoke believes that he's dead

[02:47:43] or maybe laynor dies somewhere off screen on his adventures in esos or in the stepstones or wherever he's gonna go yeah i or and i'm i'm okay with either of those possibilities the

[02:48:00] possibility i'm not okay with is that we don't get adam and alan we have to have them i feel like we have to have them they're key key characters i've heard a couple of different theories

[02:48:16] and i i'm not sure what i like or which way it's gonna go or how they're gonna play it out because like you said there's nowhere in text nowhere in the lore that a dragon can have

[02:48:28] two dragon riders they bond for at least the dragon riders life or maybe even the dragon if it's an older dragon um they bond for life and but a dragon can be riderless

[02:48:45] mm-hmm and that's okay we know that dragons can just not have a dragon rider for a while so there could be that but i've i've heard of what if and i'm not saying i subscribe to this because

[02:49:00] i don't know how i feel about it i don't think i like it what if they try to have laynor come back under the name of adam okay that would be weird wouldn't it though because adam is like

[02:49:12] 20 years younger than laynor yes um and then what about alan would yeah but then would he no longer be a brother would he maybe be a cousin or something they've they've i don't know again i'm

[02:49:23] not i don't like this at all but that's how some are trying to figure out this formula like what happens to see smoke so so if i can interject really quick yes um in game of thrones um the show

[02:49:41] version left out a huge gaping hole in young griff and it was never addressed and that was the game changing element of that story so that's right could be just saying maybe we don't have to deal

[02:49:57] with this um maybe they can write a different story i'm not sure i'm not sure right i could be they could have a total plan for this um but you know one of the most glaring uh

[02:50:11] oversights just didn't sell me and what happened with him in the show and young griff yeah um i hope that's not the case i i have faith that it's it's not the case because i think ryan condol is very

[02:50:28] different than benny often wise yes and i'm just gonna hang on to that hope right yeah no i totally understand and i agree i just wanted to throw that out there yeah just because that was a big oversight

[02:50:41] on that show yeah it was well and it i think that that was the cause of some of the plot elements that people really hated in season eight mm-hmm uh such as uh denaris burning king's landing

[02:50:55] i actually think in the books it's gonna be young griff who does that it would at least make sense yeah but we're again we're getting yeah we're off topic sorry no that's okay it's all

[02:51:09] relevant i'm good yeah uh it's all happening yeah well so what here's what i would feel okay about happening uh and that would be because like i said sea smoke can just not have a dragon rider yeah i

[02:51:27] think for me how i would feel okay about things and this is what matters show runners is make rima feel good i'm totally kidding i think now i would be sad about this because i think the

[02:51:41] better solution would be to say goodbye to sea smoke i don't want to see see smoke leave but what if he goes west somewhere maybe goes back home to valeria maybe um and just leaves and he gets to survive

[02:52:00] the dance because he doesn't we he does not we we lose him he's very he's key to the story but and i know that that then say okay well about adam of the hull or adam of larian as he will

[02:52:17] be known yeah what about him there's another dragon that's unclaimed i think and which one well this goes into another part and it's it's kind of related but it goes off into something else

[02:52:34] that i wanted to ask about because you know who we haven't seen in the show yet uh darin the daring or day day ron i'm not sure yeah yeah darin darin yeah yes yes we haven't even heard

[02:52:54] you know um i think i said before that uh he may exist he may be a page in old town with his high tower relatives um but yeah uh allicent and visceris are missing a son yeah they have

[02:53:08] four children and we only have seen and heard of three they haven't even mentioned him like it's fine to not see him uh but why haven't they even mentioned him no no worry even in passing like

[02:53:23] oh he's in old town he's being fostered or uh he's he's squiring for someone um so yeah if they choose and i'm not sure like the hbo family tree um i know that there's like an official

[02:53:38] targaryen family tree but hbo um published um the targaryen family tree and he's not in it oh wow i wonder if they're simplifying by removing him maybe but there's a lot of names for people

[02:53:53] that are not familiar with the targaryens or the book but go go on rima oh sorry um no no i'm sorry well he had a dragon to sarion to sarion again i don't know the pronunciation but if they don't include day ron but they have his dragon

[02:54:19] mm-hmm would that be a dragon that adam of the whole adam valarian could claim hmm well they can always invent an extra dragon too i suppose totally fine with that too all the

[02:54:35] dragons it's again i have no idea what they're gonna do but it it leaves for me a problem i don't want them to change to me that's a big part of the lore of the dragons is that they

[02:54:49] have one dragon rider they're bonded for the life either of the dragon or the the dragon rider and you can't have two and to me that's too huge of a point to change so i hope that they don't

[02:55:02] do that i i would not be happy i've been happy with the things that they've done so far that have been the differences but i i just wouldn't like that and that's just me in my opinion yeah yeah well it that is the big the big question that

[02:55:23] oh we're about to go through another time jump so who knows what they're actually going to that's true have set up for the next episode well i don't think the time jump's gonna happen

[02:55:33] in the next episode i think it's gonna happen in episode nine no the trailer for next episode had the older actors playing amond and agon oh okay yeah i didn't watch the trailer um

[02:55:50] i only know this because i watched it literally as i was running in the door okay so they are doing the time jump next episode um okay that makes sense i was wondering how they

[02:56:04] were gonna chunk that out yeah um yeah so i you know i think i don't think we're gonna hear anything about sea smoke until uh a future season like season three yeah um when or i don't know season four

[02:56:30] when we have the dragon seeds trying to claim the unclaimed dragons and then maybe somebody'll just say oh sea smoke's available and they just they just won't say anything they're gonna go into

[02:56:41] the stable and be like how long have you been here forgot all about you yeah i think they could just ignore that um the thing about dragons being bonded to their riders and we can just assume

[02:57:01] whatever we want um but it is it is definitely i you know one of the things that i wonder is if you're bonded to a dragon can you just leave the dragon would the dragon follow you dragon better

[02:57:15] not follow him because that would out say it'll totally out of hand if so smoke is like oh yeah you're going this way okay me too um yeah but yeah it's been so funny if if if sea smoke came and

[02:57:27] like picked up the boat at the end yeah it's like why are you rowing we don't row we flap the other thing that made me laugh was he's rowing um just like entry i know oh yeah yeah

[02:57:48] way too funny um another thing that i'm unsure about what they're doing i'm gonna trust them but it's worrying me a bit is the tension that they're creating between reynice and renira

[02:58:07] because reynice is going to be solidly a member of the black party she's gonna go to war for renira on her dragon mailies um and uh when she tries to convince corleys to make bala air

[02:58:28] to driftmark instead of luke so that um his air will have his blood and that's when corleys says you know the legacy remembers names not blood there's actually a super simple solution to achieve exactly what she wants and that is to betroth renira's sons to lana's daughters which

[02:58:52] is exactly what happens in the books jayce is is um betroth to bala and luke is uh betroth to reyna so if in the future luke inherited driftmark it would pass after him to the children that he and

[02:59:11] reyna had together and therefore both the valerian name and the valerian blood would be preserved um but clearly they're not going to go with those betrothal betrothals you know i think so

[02:59:25] right reynice doesn't seem for it at all so hear me out yeah what if what if the way to get reynice back on uh renira's side is for renira to tell reynice your son's not dead i freed him so he

[02:59:42] could be safe hmm hmm oh okay i mean yeah i wonder that could work totally turn the tides because she knows exactly how much danger that lanoor was in yeah at the which is true yes um in effect she

[03:00:02] is saving his life 100 right because if he tried to play that role with so much suspicion about the parentage of those children he would constantly be at risk um and so yes i that that could really

[03:00:22] work and at the same time then renira could say and while we're at it let's cement our alliance and marry our children yeah and i would like to see a scene like that i think it would be really

[03:00:33] touching i think that it would be very impactful um and it could really solidify instead of like because it's all these women that are hating on each other right now yes and you know we're

[03:00:43] in a time period right now where we encourage each other to lift each other up as women and not tear each other down and i think that this would really go to kind of that theme especially if

[03:00:53] what they're trying to do is in this show is um you know kind of smash patriarchal themes and in in this world and the way to do that is to have at least some of the in in fighting

[03:01:09] of the females stop for once i i like that that direction i think that would be really great if that's what they were gonna do i also like it when i call stuff so if i called it i'm really

[03:01:25] you totally get credit for that i wouldn't be mad about that and maybe you know i could definitely see that as potential because yeah they're it's interesting to see those cold exchanges and cold glances uh that rainice is showing to rinera and i know rinera's like

[03:01:42] dude what's up you know um but yeah i think that would work i like that yeah and something has to happen to make her declare for rinera's cause so that could very well be it

[03:01:59] yeah and it gets the beratheans on her side which also needs to happen in the future because that's a huge that's a huge catalyst for what happens after the meeting with the beratheans yes with um amond and lu series yeah lu i'm sticking with lu because it's easy

[03:02:20] and so yeah easy luke and jace thank you rinera for making that easy yeah that's right although she's gonna confuse things again uh in the next episode because we're gonna find out

[03:02:33] that she too has a son named agon i love that i love it when petty stuff like that happens like in the office when both of the women name their baby philip it's great

[03:02:44] um speaking of agon um agon the second um who is the first born agon in this generation he is described in the book as a lazy and somewhat sulkie boy but possessed of more than healthy appetites a gluttonate table given to swilling ale and strong wine and pinching

[03:03:08] and fondling any serving girl who strayed within his reach and i think that they are they're really doing a good job of making him exactly this exactly that and they yeah they

[03:03:20] have to make us hate him yes because he's gonna be horrible he's both gonna be horrible and he's gonna have really horrific things happen to him yes he is he i can't get out of my

[03:03:33] mind that he is mike from stranger fin wolfhard with long wig just and you know it's just it makes it better though because fin wolfhard is kind of like not the greatest when in in uh stranger

[03:03:47] things like he's not my favorite friend of all of them so it's just fun to see like and he's like the way that he talks and the way that he you know portrays agon i think he's just nailing it

[03:04:00] he's so so good and you know who that actor is he's david tenon son from dr who yeah yes so it runs in the family i thought about that the in the first episode where agon is introduced

[03:04:17] and this you know the scene that we see him um jerking off in the window i thought how would you like to be david tenon see your son's first acting job be jerking off in a window

[03:04:26] yeah do you like your parents watching that see like here it was watch our son's introduction to this you know world of westeros and that's my husband and i in the car today he was just like

[03:04:41] if that window could talk what would it say so many things yeah what else were you did you have rima i have some foreshadowing um comments notes i guess um when okay so i think if i remember correctly

[03:05:07] and i'm and i hope i'm not misremembering but i thought that we had seen before lana adjusting the chains on vagar uh when she was writing him and when we got this scene with aamond claiming

[03:05:20] vagar and his struggle to hold on to her and nearly falling off i wonder if that was a little bit of a lesson that aamond learns so he's always going to chain himself on securely yes so i feel like

[03:05:36] that was a little bit of foreshadowing there that maybe he learned a lesson in that claiming a vagar you know getting yourself strapped in and staying strapped in yeah the scene with where corelease was comforting raniera it was after she had gotten cut by alcent

[03:05:56] they showed him holding her hand and comforting her uh like a literal hand of the queen oh interesting very good yeah uh we have more of helena and her riddles yes uh where i

[03:06:14] they they are really pushing this that she is probably a dragon dreamer dreamer mm-hmm so there's a riddle that she keeps repeating hand turns loom spool of green spool of black dragons of flesh

[03:06:27] weaving dragons of thread it's got to be a reference to the dance and is that referenced in the book no no yeah because that was yeah that was one of my i i love it when you see her because you know

[03:06:43] that we're we're gonna get that from her but i'm wondering if you can be a a dreamer and a dragon rider because it's usually one or the other isn't it because she has a dragon she is a dragon rider

[03:06:56] she has a dragon yes yeah uh well visceris is said to be a dreamer and he wrote belarian had belarian for a brief time um yeah would we really call him a dragon rider you can't ride a dragon

[03:07:15] unless you have bonded with that dragon you can ride as a passenger if they allow but you can't if the if the dragon allows and we saw um in one of the great dragon shots we saw damon trying to

[03:07:30] calm coraxies down so that he could take um miss ira miss ira miss ira as a passenger so if the dragon allows it the rider can take a passenger but you can't ride a dragon unless

[03:07:45] as it's a rider and direct it unless you're bonded with it okay okay so that means visceris and belarian were bonded however briefly right right i do i do love it when helena pops up though

[03:08:07] and i really liked it that they set the scene for the fact that um we're gonna get brother and sister um a brother sister marriage yes and aamon says uh um you know agon is saying you know

[03:08:24] what an idiot helena is and aamon says you know you should be respectful um because you're gonna you're gonna marry her and she's your future queen she's going to be your queen so aamon is assuming

[03:08:41] that agon is going to become the heir somehow he's committing treason for the second time in the episode totally by doing that is totally treason yeah that is completely treason yes because he's implying the agon is the king when he says that's right she is your queen

[03:08:59] yeah yeah he did the first time visceris doesn't really have a handle on everything he he totally does not know what's going on he has the most ineffective king and and yes treason is being committed all around him renara is the named heir

[03:09:18] and anybody who says otherwise is committing treason i'd like it if he actually like followed through with cutting out some tongues i i think he's gonna in the next episode perfect because they they heavily foreshadowed uh what veimond is going to do in the next episode it's when

[03:09:40] corelease is going to get sick veimond is going to think that corelease will die and driftmark is going to pass to luke and veimond is going to contest that and he is going to go contest it with

[03:09:54] visceris okay and the result's not going to be good for veimond i i'd wondered about that because you know during that scene in is it the not the throne room but the where everyone is gathering

[03:10:11] after the incident with the boys i i suck at names and whatever great hall maybe the big yeah maybe the great hall yeah mark when they're all gathering and all of this is taking place uh it's

[03:10:23] the hall of nine thank you that's what it is thank you and called the hall of nine after the nine voyages that corelease made and brought back all these and he's really impressed with him you

[03:10:33] know and yeah he should be and honestly i wish we got i think he's earned the right to be impressed with himself he's definitely yeah he's for sure i and i would love just as a side note get

[03:10:45] to get a lot more detail into what he has um as his collectibles there because i it's going to be just amazing i know we got a few little hints of it the first time that we went to drift driftmark

[03:10:54] but i would love to see more but anyway during that scene as all of this is going down and they're kind of very loudly for all to hear pretty much saying yeah we know rene as boys are bastards

[03:11:12] veyman is watching coreless and corelease does not show any surprise and veyman's watching that and i think you know because corelease has claimed luke or named luke as his heir that's going to

[03:11:27] definitely cause a betrayal um that we're probably gonna see and he was on the side of the greens veyman was while corelease was on the side of the blacks yes on the side of the room yes yes there

[03:11:44] was that division that was such a beautiful visual it was such a treat as a book reader uh to understand what was happening there that clear division of the side and maybe maybe that's a little

[03:12:01] you know smug of me to say that maybe others who don't read the books got that as well but it was just a wonderful visual of the actual divide that here it is here's that division that is going to be taking place moving forward

[03:12:20] i i don't think that i had any other notes i think we've talked about i i um darron was the other note that but we've already talked about him i am curious if we'll even get him or if

[03:12:32] they're just gonna be like nah we're not even gonna talk about him but i mean he's kind of isn't he kind of important to what's gonna happen he is but there would be ways to reallocate um his his stuff to other characters i think okay

[03:12:52] he's you know you there's no way that you could do without um agon and amond and jace and luke couldn't do without them i mean we already you couldn't have replaced what's already happened

[03:13:06] with them but i think um you know down the timeline a bit there's probably some compression and streamlining that they can do without doing serious damage to the story the way that leaving out as you pointed out christin leaving out young griff really damaged the story in

[03:13:26] game of thrones right okay we shall see what they decide to do i think that's all yes and i'm really looking forward to it and one one thing i wanted to say christin is you wanted to see more of uh

[03:13:41] what's in or was that you rima who said you want to see more of what's in the hall of nine all the treasures that he brought back um rima you're gonna see him but you're not

[03:13:49] going to see him in this show because all of that i think is advertising for the spin-off show the sea snake there is so much about young corley's story i can't wait to see that that would be

[03:14:00] fantastic um yeah it's gonna be great i have a question um about the books versus the show because i haven't read the entire fire and blood i've read the pertinent chapters and now i've gone back

[03:14:14] and i've started to read from the beginning um and and maybe you talked about this for those of you who don't know i was incredibly late to this uh to this talk i rushed in from salem

[03:14:27] massachusetts and it was a really it was a really long drive we were in the car for almost three hours it was great um but you but you jumped in seamlessly thank you so much so if this has been discussed

[03:14:38] like we can talk about it later um what were the traditions being observed in that wedding at the end oh yeah the valerian wedding so was it a valerian wedding it was a valerian that was a

[03:14:55] valerian wedding that's odd since they're dark here so um okay uh no not not not not valerian oh valerian yes from valeria got it got it got it yeah yeah yeah which is wonderful okay so

[03:15:10] before you um tell me about that that's great because i remember last week um damon saying how he felt he didn't belong anywhere because old valeria was dead so that's wonderful so um

[03:15:24] please tell me more about that because i'd love to hear about that because i'm not there in the books um it's not in the books okay this was this was created for the show and uh there

[03:15:36] uh there aren't any descriptions of what a valerian wedding would have been like okay uh so one one thing is um almost all the dragons especially those that have the x's in their name like

[03:15:54] cyrax and coraxies they're all named after valerian gods okay that's yeah um so we know the names of some valerian gods but we don't really know much about their rituals and so in the

[03:16:10] inside the episode they talked a little bit about how they wanted to invent a ritual for the valerian wedding ritual that would would be very primal and it would have fire and blood and um

[03:16:25] the the runes that they put on the foreheads with blood one of them said fire and one of them said blood awesome god i love it so much well you know that that's going to be like

[03:16:37] wedding ceremonies now like people are going to have those wedding ceremonies now i hope they don't actually like cut their lips because i was thinking you get your lip cut and

[03:16:46] then you kiss that's kind of sting have to mention lips take a long time to heal like a long time to heal but i just thought it was and i loved what they were each wearing i love

[03:17:00] that you know they match so beautifully and traditional yeah yeah so you have to imagine that dorge rr martin basically wrote that scene right i mean he has a hand in all of this and

[03:17:14] he's gonna give us a clue if anybody's gonna give us a clue to old valeria it's gotta come from him um that's my assumption he has a much what he has and a kind of an approval role in this

[03:17:31] right series that he didn't have in game of thrones so if he didn't tell them what to do he nonetheless approved it right so i think we can consider it official that's canon right it's

[03:17:44] it's my thoughts as well even if he didn't give the direction to the writers and show runners that this is this is kind of how i'm visualizing it like you said reny he has approval he has approved

[03:17:57] the entirety of season one the script and everything and when he saw the finished product for everyone so he said yep that's good so he gives a sign off so i thought it was great and i know that we

[03:18:12] don't get a lot in the books but we know and i don't know the full description because i haven't gotten that far either or went back that far may go may gore and his second wife had a old valerian

[03:18:27] wedding um i don't think there was too much that was talked about the ceremony and what they wore but i know vissenya officiated it right and and i think i think all it says is that they had a

[03:18:40] valerian style wedding and without giving the details of what that is okay it's glorious it's glorious i love the whole fire i really enjoyed that i thought it was beautiful and and like you

[03:18:51] said it was primal it was almost tribal you know it was definitely you know something we've never seen before and um i actually could not wait to get to book talk to talk to you about this

[03:19:03] because i was just like i have to know where this came from well and uh sorry to disappoint you but it did not come from the books and that's okay that's okay you know maybe one day i you know i

[03:19:16] i know that it's supposed to be mysterious la la la la but um i want to know about old valerian so bad give me both just gnaws at me all the time i think we will find out more

[03:19:30] in winds of winter and a dream of spring uh i think we will because i think it's confident it's well i think it's connected right to the whole and you know the visceris having the

[03:19:48] the prophecy that that agon decided to conquer west rose because um the long the long the Targaryens would have to have a role in saving humanity um that came directly from george r martin

[03:20:05] and i think that's a preview of what we're going to learn in winds of winter and a dream of spring and uh so the the magic elements have just been surfacing more and more in the books and that

[03:20:20] is the doom of valeria is something magical just as the way that the hammer of the waters that the children in the forest used to break the arm of dawn which created the sept stone

[03:20:32] islands that's magic as well and i think that we're going to learn i don't know if we'll actually see it played out in in scenes but i think that through bran at least um we're gonna learn

[03:20:46] exactly what happened with the hammer of the waters um not what not when he's king rima just when he's being in a green singer okay i made a face just for those that don't

[03:20:58] and there is a there is a dangling loose end through which i think we may learn more about valeria and that is that um oh my gosh what's his name um gerr old lannister went to went to

[03:21:12] is said to have gone to old valeria and i'm not sure that he and he's been gone for a really long time i'm not sure that you know he will have made it all the way to valeria but he may come back

[03:21:23] with tales to tell so there are many avenues through which we currently have he currently has radiation poisoning so he has to be yeah well there's there's been a couple of he's on the

[03:21:37] set of churnobyl right right he's next door to jorah mormon the citadel the citadel yeah don't worry sam's got him well there's interesting tales you know oh gosh and the name escapes me who

[03:21:51] was it that took valerian to old orrea thank you reya gosh those names or a reya it's like a reya i knew i wasn't gonna remember that um and she don't worry it's not confusing yeah not confusing

[03:22:07] at all all these things not consecutive even when i know them i still mix them up uh but you know she she went with valerian was gone for valerian yeah with valerian and she was a year yeah like a

[03:22:19] year or two i think it was a year and came back and had all kinds of funky stuff going on with her that they that couldn't be explained and you know valerian was not the same i think after

[03:22:31] that trip he was and he had he had big wounds in his side yes and it wasn't long after that that that he he died uh i believe if the if the timeline was right but i don't think he was the same

[03:22:47] anyway he was like a different dragon i think right no he was yeah he had he had suffered um from something whatever yeah attacked him so something happened and yeah george has given us a nugget

[03:23:00] like you said reny george planted that they they confirmed that this detail uh that was revealed in the show that was not talked about in the books was from george and i'm like he's planting it for

[03:23:12] a reason i mean it's it's making it fun for the show uh but it's it's he's doing it for a reason it's either has something to do with the books which i think is is your spot on with

[03:23:22] that and yeah maybe some of the other spin-offs i don't know that that are going on also he's trying to write this ship of season eight he's trying to say listen listen everybody i didn't do this okay

[03:23:36] can and down right please calm down that is not my work probably probably which i appreciate thank you if yeah i know he's not gonna go down this obviously listening so thank you george r martin

[03:23:53] george is listening to us yes hi george i've uh we we admire your works i've met him at book signings a couple of times oh good for you we have so much to talk about offline i have i have questions

[03:24:10] that's wonderful that is wonderful um that's great anyone else have anything else to say about the books or books that was the only thing i had yeah that was great nope that's that's it for

[03:24:25] me that was fantastic i knew i knew we'd have so much to talk about um reny thank you again so much you bring such an enrichment to this that i'm so grateful um for you and and the time that

[03:24:39] you spend with us and the time that you take um to do this with us i know it's it's a lot it's a lot it's fun though you're effortless with it and i know that there's a lot of prep

[03:24:52] that goes into it and you're you you're just hitting it out of the park and we really we really appreciate you oh thank you thank you i i really appreciate um being here with you thanks for

[03:25:03] having me one day we'll just have like one big episode where it's all three of us from start to finish and we'll just go like from the very beginning all the way in a book talk

[03:25:11] and it'll be four hours long and that's just you know how it's gonna have to be release it into sections i'm totally fine with that you don't have to do we'll do it for the finale yeah there you

[03:25:21] go oh my goodness that's going to be a monumental um i think effort there for sure it'll be fun yeah we're ready until next time thank you so so much for your time we'll see you next week all right see you then thank you bye

[03:25:38] next week on house of the dragon well next week we will be covering season one episode eight of house of the dragon titled lord of the tides yes ma'am can't wait i can't wait i hope we get some

[03:25:53] flashbacks i i wouldn't be mad about it i i feel like they could kind of throw just about anything at me and i'm i'm gonna be happy about it i haven't had a lot of great yeah they've done a

[03:26:03] real good job yeah i agree uh you can leave feedback on our past castica facebook page we post weekly feedback threads or you can leave feedback by email at dragon castica at gmail.com

[03:26:19] go out and leave a review and please subscribe uh for dragon cast on apple podcast and thank you to everyone that's already done that you guys i know we mentioned it last week you guys have really

[03:26:30] helped get us up just a little bit higher where at one time you couldn't find us at all that now if you actually search for us we pop up we're not up there at the top yet but that's okay we're at

[03:26:43] least um in the list which i'm so grateful so thank you so exciting so exciting um so thank you and you can find dragon cast and a bunch of other great podcasts at podcastica.com

[03:26:57] so many great podcasts happening right now there's so many freaking shows and so many podcasts that everybody is um pumping out and producing some content there's something for everyone we have she hulk is being covered rings of powers being covered the walking dead just came back for

[03:27:17] the final eight episodes ever just premiered the other night on sunday so walking dead cast is back with the final eight episodes please check out that coverage um so yeah check out podcast also handmaid's

[03:27:30] tail is back handmaid's tail is happening and andor which if you haven't seen it please watch it because it's fantastic it is fantastic i'm going to say that one more time andor

[03:27:45] is fantastic it is so good and we've got a podcast on that right now for podcastica so i mean if you can think of it i'm pretty sure that we are covering it we're trying there's so much

[03:28:00] there's probably rima is very tired um there's a couple of shows i wish i was doing right now and i just don't have the time we're getting ready to cover uh the midnight club over on strange

[03:28:11] indeed we just wrapped up the final season ever of lock and key with myself and jason and paik we've covered that since it's the first season we're getting ready to cover the midnight club

[03:28:25] which is from mike flanagan so if you've ever watched uh haunting of hillhouse um the uh bly manor uh midnight mass mike flanagan in our opinion is uh a genius and we love him so we'll

[03:28:41] be covering that coming up that premieres this week awesome so a lot of great things um happening we'd love it if you go give a listen and subscribe please subscribe too um i know that we show up

[03:28:55] on house podcastica's uh feed but we do have a separate feed for um dragon cast uh so if you could subscribe that would be wonderful thank you so much um and of course like rima said please

[03:29:09] feel free to leave a review and uh don't ever be afraid to reach out by email or by uh uh facebook facebook message or facebook hosting um yeah this was a great episode great week rima

[03:29:28] always i'm so happy to spend this time with you i love you and i'm so excited that we're doing that you it's a good thing we like each other we spend a lot of time together on this yeah this

[03:29:41] is only a small sampling like we talk to each other pretty much every day i love this time with you i do too yeah we gotta figure out a different show for us to like

[03:29:56] cover just let's just have the christian and rima hour people want to listen to that i think so yeah we'll just talk about whatever we want to talk about our subject will be butterflies all right well that's our show thanks for listening everyone until next time i'm rima

[03:30:21] i'm christin dracarys