It may, in this very specific sense, be the more sophisticated political critique.
The second season of “House of the Dragon” begins as expected, with the Greens and the Blacks edging ever closer to war. Rhaenyra (Emma D’Arcy), newly coronated and freshly bereaved, grapples with grief and rage over her son Lucerys’s (Elliot Grihault) death and agonizes over her responsibility to the kingdom. Her half brother Aegon II (Tom Glynn-Carney) experiments with his new powers as the monarch in King’s Landing. Neither claimant to the Iron Throne drives the action in the first four episodes critics received; Viserys’s (Paddy Considine) absence effectively creates not one but two vacuums. (Not bad for a weakly magnetic ruler who seemed to be dying from his very first moment on-screen.)
There are, however, discontinuities, and those who found the first season’s jumps unsatisfactory will no doubt find certain developments here as surprising as they are sudden. Other plot points are strikingly repetitive. The road to the “Dance of the Dragons” (as the war will come to be called) is frustrating and circuitous, powered largely by impulses and errors, misunderstandings and stupidity.
It can feel like bad writing. But that’s also, of course, this show’s thesis: The reasons that stack up until they spill into outright war are often (lethally) absurd. The catalyst for this one is tragically dumb: Lucerys’s death on dragonback in the finale — an accident, as his cousin’s Aemond’s (Ewan Mitchell) expression makes clear — is the latest escalation in a series of incidents that began with Aemond’s cousins taunting him (with a pig) for being dragonless. The theft of a dragon resulted in the loss of an eye, all while the adults remained unable and unwilling to adjudicate these childhood squabbles.
Seen another way, the brewing war began because Alicent (Olivia Cooke) genuinely misunderstood Viserys’s deathbed ravings about Aegon the Conqueror’s dream (which he intended for his heir Rhaenyra’s ears) to be a last-minute wish that their son Aegon be crowned in her stead. As someone driven more by outrage over double standards than pragmatic self-interest (or the pursuit of power), Alicent wasn’t (at first) maliciously plotting to usurp the throne. However much Viserys repulsed her, she was truly affected by his death and believed she was honoring his wishes.
Indeed, when it comes to clarifying people’s motives, “House of the Dragon” has arguably overcorrected. Whereas “Game of Thrones” reveled in court intrigue, pitting skilled players such as Margaery and Olenna (for whom sincerity was beside the point) against monsters like Cersei and Joffrey in ways that made them opaque, the folks in HOTD are rather obvious. They wear their feelings on the surface. People act on impulse. They are blunt. Sure, they can be cruel or stupid, sometimes malicious and sometimes murderous. But no one — not even the darkest schemer in the series — comes close to Iwan Rheon’s Ramsay Bolton in the original show. “House of the Dragon” is a kinder but more muddled universe. One where, rather than murder Rhaenyra’s inconvenient husband, Laenor, Daemon (Matt Smith) pays him a large sum and fakes his death.
I would defend that as the weirder choice (however unlucky it was for the poor man who was murdered in Laenor’s stead). Those moments of needless moderation are so often the ones that make a fantasy universe feel real. Villainy is its own kind of hackneyed formula, and Daemon — whom Smith can play as very twisted indeed — compels precisely because he isn’t nearly as depraved (or predictable) as the Targaryens of the future (particularly Daenerys’s brother Viserys).
The second season works to unpack Daemon’s whole deal — sometimes through actual dreamwork. It’s a promising investigation, but one that works against the momentum the series builds elsewhere. That side quest also necessarily isolates him from the main cast. The show suffers similarly from the physical distance between Alicent and Rhaenyra. The peculiar, not-quite-explainable tension between them drives so much of “House of the Dragon” that the show goes a little slack without it. Motherly love — which neither spends much screen time displaying — can carry only so much of the plot.
That leaves the children and subordinates. Many of these are hastily drawn, given the speed of the series, so particular credit goes to Phia Saban as Alicent’s daughter Helaena, who delivers effects that far exceed her limited screen time. And to Glynn-Carney, whose believably petulant Aegon II combines stupidity, arrogance and cruelty with a stochastic combination of kindliness and need.
The most prominent and least compelling player this season is unfortunately also its most pivotal. Ser Criston Cole (Fabien Frankel), the King’s Guard Rhaenyra seduced, has risen in station and has, by the fourth episode, taken on more roles than any one person at court could plausibly fill. Rather than enrich his character, this highlights how tiny the “House of the Dragon” universe is compared with the extraordinarily deep “Game of Thrones” bench. Cole does at least serve as a sounding board for Mitchell’s Aemond, the second season’s most formidable (and most intriguing) antagonist. And as an amusing foil for Alicent’s brother Ser Gwayne Hightower (Freddie Fox), a dapper and condescending newcomer who joins him on a campaign.
Those who happen to like how “House of the Dragon” challenges some of the more irritating aspects of “Game of Thrones” will probably enjoy this new season, which promises more of the same, along with twists and dragons aplenty. (“House of the Dragon” has been also renewed for a third season.) For those who prefer the latter for its vast network, menacing speeches and subterfuge, this world will probably continue to feel a little impoverished. “Dragon,” after all, isn’t really an epic. It’s more of a family feud. That’s why I prefer it, while acknowledging that it can sometimes seem more like a sadder “Arrested Development” than Shakespeare (with dragons).
House of the Dragon, Season 2, premieres Sunday on HBO and will be available for streaming on Max.
