The Ringer-Verse - 'House of the Dragon' Episode 6 Deep Dive | House of R

Episode Date: September 28, 2022

It's time to jump to the future and dive deep into the sixth episode of 'House of the Dragon' with Mal and Joanna! First, they give their brief overall impressions of this important episode (05:59). Then, they dive into the Dragonpit and go deep into the plot details and analysis of the episode (11:11). Later, they give out the episode's awards, as well as look into book spoilers and see what they can predict for the future (02:45:23). If you would like to email Mal and Joanna about the show, you can reach them at [e-mail]. Hosts: Joanna Robinson and Mallory Rubin Senior Producer: Steve Ahlman Social: Jomi Adeniran Addition Production Support: Arjuna Ramgopal Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I'm Yossi Salick, and I'm the host of Bansplain, a show where we explain cult bands and iconic artists by going deep into their histories and discographies. We're back with a brand new season at our brand new home, the Ringer podcast network, tackling a whole new batch of artists, from grunge gods to power pop pioneers to new metal legends and many, many more. Listen to new episodes every Thursday, only on Spotify. For adults with Crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis symptoms, every choice matters. matters. Trimphia offers self-injection or intravenous infusion from the start. Tramphia is administered as injections under the skin or infusions through a vein every four weeks, followed by injections under the skin every four or eight weeks.

If your doctor decides that you can self-inject trumphia, proper training is required. Tramphia is a prescription medicine used to treat adults with moderately to severely active Crohn's disease and adults with moderately to severely active ulcerative colitis. serious allergic reactions, increased risk of infections or lower ability to fight them, and liver problems may occur. Before treatment, get checked for infections and tuberculosis. Tell your doctor if you have an infection, flu-like symptoms, or need a vaccine. Explore what's possible. Ask your doctor about Tramphia today. Call 1-800-526-7736 to learn more or visit Tramphia Radio.com.

For adults with Crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis symptoms, Every choice matters. Tramphia offers self-injection or intravenous infusion from the start. Tramphia is administered as injections under the skin or infusions through a vein every four weeks, followed by injections under the skin every four or eight weeks. If your doctor decides that you can self-inject Trimphia, proper training is required. Tramphia is a prescription medicine used to treat adults with moderately to severely active Crohn's disease and adults with moderately to severely active ulcerative colitis.

Serious allergic reactions, increased risk of infections or lower ability to fight them, and liver problems may occur. Before treatment, get checked for infections and tuberculosis. Tell your doctor if you have an infection, flu-like symptoms, or need a vaccine. Explore what's possible. Ask your doctor about Tramphia today. Call 1-800-526-7736 to learn more or visit Trimfairadio.com. What are children? But a weakness, a folly, futility.

Through them you imagine you cheat the great darkness of its victory. You persist forever in some form or another, as if they will keep you from the dust. But for them, you surrender what you should not. You may know what is the right thing to be done, But love stays the hand. And welcome into the Ringerverse here on the Ringer podcast network. I'm Mallory Rubin and it is my absolute pleasure to invite you not only to the training

yard, but also to join us on the Ringer's Nexus podcast feed for all things fandom. Joining me today, now that she's finished telling me that the truth has many flavors and that Meat without wine is also a sin. It's my house of our working. Go host, Joanna Robinson. Mallory, did you pick that quote about taste to needle me about the fact that I've lost my sense of taste and smell right now? It was more to inspire you because I know that Laris is your deeply problematic fave. So I just wanted to get a lot of Laris in here right at the top for you.

You thought my fondest for Jamie Lanister was a problem. Welcome to my Laris phase. Oh, God. We are, of course, here today to dive deep. Deep, deep, deep, deep. Into House of the Dragon.

Episode 6, The Princess and the Queen, written by Sarah Hess, directed by Miguel Sapotchnik. But before we show off on our dragons for all of Pentos, some programming reminders. The Midnight Boys, Poo-P-P-Poo!

We'll be with you tomorrow. Wednesday to break down episode four of Andor Sublime Show. Can't wait for that. Wonderful. On Thursday, Ben Limburg will be back to chat about She-Hulk

episode seven. And then on Friday, Joe and I will be back for our House of Our Deep dive into episode six, already episode six. I can't believe we're almost done. I'm getting very emotional about it of rings of power.

And then on Sunday, Joe and I will be back with Christopher Ryan for Talk the Thrones on Hot D. Episode 7. Joe, where can people follow all of that? And how can they reach us if they're so inclined? Oh, my God. If you are a listener of this podcast or perhaps even my high school English teacher, or maybe you're Mallory's mom. You can email us, Havits and Dragons at gmail.com. We will read all of your emails. Such a thrill, such a joy. You guys are really crushing it on that front.

You can also follow us on all the socials, right? Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, wherever you can find us, you will find us at the Ring orverse. And then, I mean, the real thing you need to do is subscribe to the podcast on wherever you. you get your podcast, but maybe make it Spotify. That way you won't miss in the words of Stephen Tyler a thing. So was that the surprise?

Steve's told us he has an audio surprise for us this episode. That's not the surprise. That's not the surprise. I'm braced for it. It's disappointing. Another week. Another cravenly bowing

to the legal department and not letting us put Aerosmith on this podcast. All right. Oh boy. And our last reminder at the top here is the same one you always get right here at the top. It's our friendly neighborhood spoiler warning. Because today's podcast, as you might have guessed, will feature plot details from the episode of television that we're here to discuss. That's Hot D episode six. All of that's on the table today. Everything from Hot D to date. Anything that happened in Game of Thrones. On the book front, we will be incorporating book canon from Song of Ice and Fire and Fire and Blood throughout our chat. for Lauren's site historical context parallels. The bulk of our pod will not feature any future details from fire and blood. All future fire and blood info will be contained in a separate book spoiler talk section at the end of the pod.

You'll have another spoiler warning before that section begins. Programming reminders dispensed. Steve once again failing to give us our aerosmith. That means it's time for our opening. snapshot. It's time to rally the realm. Joe, this was a big one. Oh, boy. The dragon screech can't be good for your throat. Every time that I hear it without the dragon screech, I just want you to know, like I hear the screech echo in my head. Okay. Yes. It's a phantom screech. You know, it's always with you at the end of any sound cue. Big episode, Joe. The time jump, the cast, reset.

at the midway mark here of this first season of Hot D. We have so much to get into today. Right here at the top, quick overall impressions. New cast, how did the 10-year time jump work for you? How did you enjoy this episode of TV? I really, really loved this episode. I was worried about the massive time jump when we first, you know, heard that this was coming. And I think, especially in the opening minutes with,

first, Emma Darcy as Renera and then the long walk through the keep and then meeting Olivia Cook is Allison. I think this episode just so brilliantly put us in with these women in a way that did not feel jarring to me. There were some other things that did feel a little jarring to me and we'll talk about them on a case-by-case basis. But I think this episode contains both the best of the time jump and also some of the unfortunate side effects of the time jump. And that being said, you know, like, I think one of the better things that we can dwell on right now is just all the history. Like, because I kept imagining, what if we had just started here? What if we had just started with Olivia Cook and Emma Darcy in these roles?

And then we were filled in via exposition or flashback on some of their childhood. I just really feel like we needed the time with these women as young girls to see them pushed to the place where we find them. So I think it was really smart. Now, maybe could we have taken even more time? Possibly, I have a sort of like book spoiler reason why I think that they didn't take more time. So we'll talk about that in the book spoiler section. But that's sort of where I am. I see the positives and the negatives.

but overall I was just really overwhelmed and overjoyed by these two new actors joining the cast and the possibility of where we can go from here. How about you, Mallory? I feel very similarly. I am absolutely blown away by the new performers and the new cast. I was really worried about the 10-year time jump. And, you know, as you said, and as we will talk about more as we go today, there are certain characters who suffered from that jump and certain plot points and storylines

that I think we really feel the missing time. But broadly, this episode worked much better than I was anticipating. I was worried this was going to be extremely jarring in a real struggle. And I think for a lot of the reasons you already sketched out, giving us that time early to familiarize ourselves with the new performer. and with the characters at this point in their lives, I was able to orient a lot more quickly. And overall, I enjoyed the episode quite a bit.

I also, like, thought that this episode had some of the rye humor that we've been longing for. I laughed more in this episode, even though it is a very dark and disturbing episode in numerous respects. And I also thought that the episode felt more expansive in a really welcome way just because we hit more locations, you know, in addition to being in Kings Landing where we are for the bulk. the episode we get to spend time across the Narrow Sea and Pinto.

We pop over to to Harron Hall for some family horror. We get a moment on Dragonstone. So all in all, a lot to talk about. Not to delay us talking about all the things we're going to talk about. But last week on Trial by Content, the show that I do with Dave Gonzalez, Neil Miller, what a great show. You should subscribe to it. Follow on Spotify or wherever you get your podcast.

Yeah, that sounds great. Neil Miller was saying he was like, well, I think. Emma Darcy's version of Reneura is going to be more severe and I just found the opposite. I found so much of that warmth and humor that we are familiar with in Reneer present

and I think just a lot of shots that they've chosen for the trailers have been maybe more severe dramatic moments because that's usually what they pick for a trailer but I was pleased with I was just really really taken with Emma Darcy

I think they're really incredible so yeah strongly agree. Want to support your gut health? Take Activia's gut health challenge by enjoying two Activia yogurt today for two weeks and see if you feel a difference. With billions of probiotics and 20 years of scientific expertise,

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for our chronological beat by beat, Dragon Wing by Dragon Wing, Episode 6, Deep Dive, into the Dragon Pit we go. Oh, God. We're not good. How are you feeling since you made that noise? You remember when you made that noise and you were so worried about this season of television and podcasting?

Like, how are you feeling now midway through? Like, about the fact that I'm capable of admitting that kind of or just more broadly about this experience. I'm having the time of my life. Yeah, we're doing it. It's fun. It really has been a blast. I am having so much fun

talking about House of the Dragon and Rings of Power every week. Like, so much fun. I really don't want it to end. Yeah, I really, really don't want it to end. Before we dive into the actual episode, we should note at the top here, an update to the opening credits.

We have some new. coursing rivers of blood than making their way towards some new sigils. We get to zoom in and linger on one of your favorite bits of fashion from the entire season so far,

Damon's winged helmet. We have a sigil for Lena. We have two eggs for Bella and Raina, Damon and Lena's kids. And then we get Ranira's three strong sons. So that's a lot of updating there in the opening credits. Exciting stuff. Can't believe you call them strong.

Trying to get yourself executed for treason. Anyway. Yeah. More rivers of blood to come. Can't wait to see where that blood gush is next, you know? Oh, my God. Is it weird that that made me want some gushers fruit snacks? Just when I hear the word gushes, it makes me crave a gusher.

Were you a gushers kid? Did you like gushers? No, I was not a gusher's kid at all. I don't like... What? You know, I don't like when like unexpected... I don't know how to say this. Anyway, you can't say you simply cannot say what you were about to say.

Or you can because there is a first contains adult content and you could just follow yourself by saying phrasing there like you usually say to me, you know? There is a gum brand in the 80s. I don't know if it survived into the 90s called churals. and it was similar to a gusher and that it had like a little pocket of goo and the sun, I don't like it. I don't like any of it. No, thank you.

So, you know, it's almost time, almost time for our seasonal tradition of a candy discussion on the pod. So curve out some time in October. We are aligned on so many things. And then when it comes to candy, we are the, like, mortal enemies. Sworn rivals.

Yeah. Bitterest of foes. The dance of the candy. The Allison to your Rainira. Oh. I think that makes me the bad person. Okay. I do have impeccable candy taste, so that tracks.

All right. Let's start where the episode begins with the Queen's summons. Allison's call for new baby Jaff, Renera and Lenore's trip to Allison's chambers, Vassaris's visit, all of it. But let's start right at the beginning because our first glimpse of adult Reneira post-time jump comes during childbirth. It is, of course, impossible not to think back to our first episode with Reneira and Emma and their royal womb's discussion and all of that history and how that weighed on Reneera and guided her. The way Reneera said to Damon in episode four, my mother was made to produce heirs until it killed her. I won't subject myself to the same fate.

And yet we see here not only this, the cementing of how much time has passed in maybe a way that nothing else could have achieved quite like this, not just to realize that Reneira is a mother now despite all of her reservations, but that this is her third child and that she is a, as we see right away, doting, devoted mother and not only has moved into this phase of her life, but cares deeply, deeply about. How did you feel about this is our first glimpse to orient us anew to where Rainira is in her life now? I love this. Starting in this really extremely vulnerable moment for Renira, and as you say, immediately seeing that tenderness. And so knowing that this girl's fear is something that she has overcome to a certain degree, knowing, of course, that she's probably thinking about her mother, in this moment. I really loved this observation from one of the Girls Gotten Cannon co-hosts

who's at Arrhythmic on Twitter. She observed that that there are no maesters in the room here. It's midwives only. And I love this idea. Like, we don't know how much Rineira knows about what happened

with her mom. We don't know. But, like, I love this idea that she's like, get these quacks out of here or, like, surrounding me with her.

female energy only or whatever it is, but I just thought it was really notable that it was only women in the birthing room with her. And I just, I, and it's, it's, um, the, the fully sound in this moment. We will talk about that later, but I, again, I think it's, it's really specific, the way in which they are drawing that comparison and that line between the violence of childbirth and the violence of war and battle and tourneys and whatever it may be for the men of this world. So I know a lot of people were sort of put off by the sounds, but I think it's really unflinching and really puts us there for like what these women have to go through. And then what we see Rineer do next, which is both pig-headed in a way that she doesn't need,

because she could just let someone take the baby. She could, right? So it's both like stubborn pig-headed. Doesn't want to let Allison twin. But very brave at the same, you know, it's both of these things where you're just sort of like, okay, you don't have to put yourself through this, but I really admire your grit as you do it, you know? Absolutely.

I think unflinching is a great way to describe it. And the filmmaking in this sequence is so interesting, not only the one shot, the continuous shot of the walk, but in the opening stretch here with the birth, passing the afterbirth, sponging Rainera's head, dressing Rainira, snipping the umbilical cord. The camera is right there up against everybody in the middle of what is transpiring. It is such a close and personal and deeply intimate way to be reintroduced to Renira at this phase in her life. And it really embeds us the sounds you mentioned, but also that proximity of the camera, to the realities of childbirth. And I thought that that was really important. And similarly, extending those realities on that walk, we have

We have interesting things to observe on the walk to Allison's Chambers and on the walk out. But on the walk too, the fact that in Leonor, Lenore is with Rainer, as we'll hit in a second, but the fact that Ramira has to move through this throng of the assembled, the people of court, who are there to say hello, offer congratulations, but also gawk at her pain, at the realities of womanhood, just being fully on display in a way that a male claimant or would be heir, we just never have to contend with. That was so interesting to me. But also something that Allison would never, ever, ever do, right?

Like, Reneira, again, similar to that boorwalk through camp, you know, where she's spattered in blood and she's like, we get all the various interesting reactions to that boorwalk, but she's just sort of like, why should I care about what you think of me here? And again, we'll see how I actually genuinely don't know since there are so many interesting book developments and book departures exactly how this aspect of this version of Vernera will play out as things go forward. But it is so, like, will that come back to bite her

how much she doesn't care about propriety or will that be an advantage for her going forward? I'm actually not entirely certain. But what we do know is that Alicent is playing her game inside certain rules of femininity and Reneira is playing her game. Or actually, at this point, not even wanting to play, but just sort of like making up her own rules and saying, you know, if, why should I care? Yeah, this is the reality. You want me to be a birthing machine for the realm.

This is the reality. There will be blood, you know? Right. A literal trail of blood, not only for. from Allison's Chamber, but of course, who was posted outside that door,

Kristen, just unbelievable scene choreography there. Immediately, this opening sequence, the birth, the walk, the exchanges in

Allison's chambers, establishes multiple and resets multiple key dynamics for us, which is really necessary in this episode that in essence

functions as this reset, the second pilot. Let's start with Allison and Rainira. We chatted a bit on Talk the Thorns about how things have flipped for them. Allison is the queen, all caps, no room to doubt the command and control that she is seeking to exert in all situations. Reneira, meanwhile, still stubborn, as you noted, but figuring out how to navigate the

castle maze thinking carefully about the ramifications of her decisions, Ryan Condal had a line on the inside the episode about how she has had to exit this phase of being this impetuous teenager and become more calculating in essence. How did that work for you? That flipping, that inversion. Did that feel like a natural enough evolution based on where we had last left them? We got a really, I don't have it in front of me. I apologize, but we got a really interesting email talking about like.

I'm so sorry. I never expect it when you're not like actually reading. an email, but Steve's always at the ready. Yeah, just for the word email. It's great. Steve's never sleeping. All right. So one of the emails that we got, we got many emails about the recasting and how people feel about it. And one of the ideas was this idea of Allison was maybe less jarring because we are so used to seeing Allison have to hop through many stages of her life already. We've seen her become a wife. We've seen her become a mother. We've seen her be enormously pregnant. We've seen her juggling large crying children, like all the sort of stuff

like that. So every time we see Allison again, she's in another phase of like, okay, what does she have to contend with this time? Right. With Renira up until, you know, the wedding that closes out the first five episodes, she's like teen girl, teen girl, teen girl, teen girl, teen girl, you know what I mean? Like lost her virginity at one point, but like we're not seeing her have to go through these other sort of enforce maturation points. So maybe the leap, I didn't find it jarring, but maybe for people who did,

the leap from that Rainira to this, Reneira feels a little bit more jarring because we haven't had that much. But I love what we see here, which is someone who is, like, tired and doesn't want to play Allison's game, but also does not want to let Allison win. And there are just moments, you know,

where just little moments, little facial expressions. One of my favorite being, like when Allison does get a hold of the baby and Reneer is just sort of like, you know, like I just don't want you to have your hands pulling the cloth back to look at the... Yeah, exactly. Yeah.

Absolutely. I agree. The facial expression acting across this episode was sublime. I thought that Lainor delivered a really key line in this sequence where he says, I thought we were past to this.

He doesn't understand why this farce is playing out. And I thought that that neatly conveyed to us that this is not, not only not a new tension, but the constant, the pot is always at a boil now between these people. And that, that prologue of those first five episodes, as you noted earlier, it, I'm, I will reserve final judgment, I think, on the pacing and overall structure and flow of the season until maybe, maybe not just the end of the season, but the end of the series when we can look back. on this and really assess in full. I have moments.

I definitely agree that it was necessary and I'm glad that we got the time with these characters, even though I have moments where I wonder about a certain recalibration. But I think that like we needed that time with everyone. You know, imagine if you would only see

Viseras in this state and had never seen anything about Viseris's struggles and this absolute anguish and existential dread about what kind of ruler he's going to be through those first five episodes. just have a completely different read on who he is as a character.

And I think with Allison and Renera, most of all, and these divisions that are taking root and setting in, understanding how these people came to feel this way about each other was the point of those five episodes, and I think we feel that bearing fruit here. I was, despite the evolution feeling like natural to me as a result of all of that, I was so blown away by how cruel. Allison was being here to call for the baby while the afterbirth is still passing.

This is really harrowing to watch from Allison. And not only that, but for her to paste it over with that sort of like, Renira, you should be resting after your labors. That was sick. Yeah. That gaslighty, you know, like saccharine BS from Allison. Yeah, it's just really. And so what we are, I mean, if we choose to think about it this way, what we are forced then to do is to mourn the actual nice young woman that we met. Right.

And the tragedy of that, absolutely. And is she gone? I don't know. But you think about Reneira and Allison in the sept, that beautiful sequence with them with all the lit candles, and that genuine exchange of empathy. and then to be here. It's very, very upsetting. I completely agree. The way that Reneira responded to that,

you should be resting in line with. I have no doubt you would prefer that, Your Grace, the fact that they're almost openly engaging in this farcical exchange that everybody understands to be theater and play acting. Ooh, boy. How about Reneer and Lainer? Yeah, so this, like,

the other aspect of this whole opening sequence, in addition to getting us inside Reneer's head really quickly, getting us to understand what Alicent, who Alicent has become. There's also a really tricky, without stopping to explain the family dynamics. I think this was a really elegant, this episode was written by Sarah Hess, who did a lot of work on Orch's The New Black, really elegant interpersonal dynamics between Lainor and Reneer and then eventually with adding Harwin into the mix.

But like us understanding that they are on the same side, that they have a genuine affection and, and like understanding of each other. And we, we are a team. Like we are going up the stairs together. We are going to do this together. I'm coming with you. I should hope so.

Yeah. Yeah, exactly. You know what I mean? Yeah, I love that. Yeah. It was great to see right away the way that their partnership is so firmly intact. The arrangement that they made is working, but that also doesn't mean it's neat and tidy and without its challenges. And I think that the episode would quickly convey that

to us as well, even with something like the naming when Lainor offers up, Joffrey is the name, of course, for his former lover, Joffrey, who Kristen had killed in the prior episode, but 10 years previously, like we know from Fire and Blood that Lainor had been trying to name. Every child, Joffrey. Can this one be Joffrey? Can this one be Joffrey? It's so heartbreaking. And Corliss and Fire and Blood doesn't allow it.

So you get these like friction points and these little bits of tension, but inside of this commitment to soldiering through together in the face of this common threat. And that walk gives us that really like organic glimpse into the way that they interact with each other, even though the circumstance is so extreme and so heightened. Yeah, and I had to wonder if that, like, if this particular Joff moment, which takes for near a by surprise, was inspired by the fact that he had to walk past Kristen Cole, you know what I mean, like, to get into that room. So you had to walk past Kristen and be like, okay, let's name this kid Joffrey.

But what I love about that is that, again, that united front, you know, we'll talk a little bit later about Allison and her ideas of, like, who is family and who isn't. in this larger dynamic. And so, like, Lainor and Reneer are presenting their united front, and they will just, Reneer will express her displeasure later, but certainly not in front of Allison.

You know what I mean? And also, like, you mentioned Corliss. We're going to talk about Vesaris for a second and his response to this kid, but, like, I'm, we don't see him in this episode. I'm very curious what Corliss thinks about the fact that none of his grandkids look anything like his son. You know what I mean?

Yeah. How is that going to go over? It's a great question. Before we get to Festeris, I'm glad that you just mentioned Kristen because it was, it made my heart race to see Reneira and Lainor both have to walk past him and the way he says princess, like that these people have to exist in the same space with each other every day for 10 years after what happened in episode five. And of course, we think of everything with Reneira. But poor Lainor as well, as you noted, like, this is so horrific to have to have to look at this person who did this horrible, horrible thing to you. And I think that, Like, not everything about the pacing of season one has worked for me. There's a lot of stuff that we've missed in the time jumps that I really long for and crave. But those moments, Reneura and Lainor holding Joffrey walking into Allison's room past Kristen. Lainor looking back over that trail of blood at Kristen as Reneer around the bend.

And Kristen gave him a sub. Yeah, exactly, lifting his chin. Those moments don't register for us and resonate with us. instantly the way that they do here if we haven't gotten those prior five episodes. They just don't. Vassaris, with a lot of love and respect for our guy Vassaris Targaryen, who is struggling, but also in some ways thriving inside of this episode. Our guy looks 9,000 years old.

When we see the little just like waving sleeve and realize that he has lost his decaying arm, It was just quite a reintroduction to Viseras. I was thrilled to see him. I have heard from a lot of people, anecdotally, colleagues, friends, family members. They are baffled by this. They're just like, I thought he was dead because the show moved him within an inch of death at the end of the prior episode. I find it strange that this show made no attempt to explain inside of this episode how he is still alive. Right.

and that they accelerated his health so rapidly in the earlier section of the season, knowing that they wanted him around through the 10-year time jump. I guess that was just to like accelerate everybody else thinking, hey, he could go at any moment. We better start thinking about the future. This guy keeps fainting in front of everyone. Do we want to talk about, I mean, we had it down to talk about a little later, but do we want to talk about the book context and the maister dynamic?

Go for it. Yeah, definitely. Yeah. I mean, so we see on the small council later that Mastor Mellos is no longer there. Mallory and I presume he's dead. I guess. I guess he's dead. Poor Beesbury, who will sit with him at weddings now.

I don't know. But Orwell, who has been there since the beginning, but is the younger maister who always seemed to have like maybe we shouldn't just dump maggots on the problem, suggestions, is now sitting on the small council. And in the context of the book, there was this idea that his poultices and potions and tinctures did a lot to sustain Vassaris and revive him and extend his life. So hilarious that they decided that wasn't worth mentioning, but that's, I guess, some book context that we can provide. Oh, God. Love a tincture, Joe. Love a tincture. Me too. I know that about you.

I know it. Here's what we can say definitively about Fasaris. He looks marvelous. Couldn't be happier to meet his new grandson, just genuinely like really sweetly holding him, rocking him, whispering to him. Now he is doing this in a complete and total bubble that is ignoring, even when he is later pressed on it multiple times, which we'll get to ignoring the whispers and the murmurs that would seek to tear the family apart. He's delighted. He's having a great time. And crucially, it's not just a tenderness that he is showing toward his grandchild there. He has a real sweetness and tenderness with Ramira in the sequence, the way that he embraces her, the way that he says, well done, my girl. We can see that they are in a stronger place with each other than when we left them. Can I love, okay, we avoided,

on Talk of Thrones we avoided using the C word, but I'm going to use it here now. I didn't avoid it. Just because I love that Reneira says, I think I called the midwife a cunt. And then the Sarah just goes, oh. Again, I think that speaks to him.

That's Reneer being Reneera, right? That's such a Reneer. So, like, she has fulfilled the role that he asked her to, which is make this political marriage pop out some kids. Sure up your succession, right? Yeah. She's done it in a way that has not made things very safe for her, but she has done it. And so in that way, Viseris is grateful to her for having done that.

But she's still Reneira, and he just seems a bit more accepting of that because she has at least made this other concession. Oh. Oh. Oh. King's Landing. Damn me. Can we get a glimpse here. a taste, a morsel of what will be one of the defining focuses of this episode.

The parentage question. We see right away Allison's suspicion, her crusade, setting the tone for this focus. Allison goes to check the baby's hair. Now, a couple things here. Obviously, a lot of characters come later in the story, book and show alike, who are Targaryens, who don't have the silver and blonde hair. John Snow, for example. Spoiler.

Ever heard of him. Ever heard of him. But I was thinking, given the focus on the hair, and it's not just the hair, obviously, there's a lot of talk about their features and how they look like Strongs and they don't have the featuring of the Valerians and of Lainor.

But on the hair front, it is interesting that the show changed Rainier. his hair color because in the books, Renice has dark hair from the Barathean side of her lineage. And so there's like, there could have been if they had kept

the black hair on Renice, someone to point to it just be like, this is like a thing that happens, but they changed it. So it's very notable here. Emma Aaron, Renira's mom, right? Making Emma Aaron,

who is part Targaryen by making her super, super blonde. And then of course, there is the like added element of the fact that the show decided to make House Valerian, like, mixed race, make Leinor like half black. And so the idea of, you know, all of us who are book readers who knew this parentage question was coming knew that it was just going to be that much harder for Renira to try to claim

these babies came from Leinor if they come out white, you know, as they do. So don't tell that to Fasaris, who mentions that he thinks the baby has Lainor's nose everybody is looking at each other. At first, Sarah, it's in that moment. Incredible camera work in that stretch. We get this delicious exchange between Allison and Lainor, where she says, do keep trying, Sir Lainor. Sooner late, you may get one who looks like you. Now, this is straight out of fire and blood.

As you've noted before, fire of blood is largely this recounting of history. But every now and then we actually get a quote, a quote that someone is telling to someone, so it's a game of telephone, who knows. but this quote is such a standout in Fire and Blood that they had to port it over to the show. Though in Fire and Blood, it is about, it's uttered after Luke's birth, not Joffrey. So this boiling point is reached sooner in the text. Should we talk for a second about the baby daddy? Is it time to meet our modern family here?

And for Harwin, Strong, to meet his third secret son? Baked bones. Baked bones. Burnt bones. burnt bones himself. I love this. Again, there's a lot to explain here that is explained just in glances and, you know, what is left unspoken. I think it was really subtle and beautiful.

This is a great scene. Even just when we enter the room and see that Harwin is waiting there with Jason Luke for Renira and Lainor and Joph to return, under the guise of I need to escort them back from the dragon bin. You know, it's not every day. You're walking around with the dragon egg because Jason Luke have picked. an egg for baby chop, which is so sweet. You know, perfectly normal for the Lord Commander of the City Watch to take time out of his busy schedule to walk the Prince Lings back to the Red Keep and then sit in their family apartments with them and hang out with them.

It's just, it's fine. There's nothing to see here. And I don't know why you're asking so many questions about this. People of the realm. Everyone knows that the head of the city watch, like part of his duties is to play. Loves babysitting. Loves playtime, loves recess. Yeah. The look that passes between Reneera and Harwin when he sees her walk in with the baby,

the way he reaches his arm out to help her sit, the way that they look at each other. The camera lingers on the arm. It's so, it's so beautiful. I loved it. Joe. They did a better job than I was anticipating of establishing this relationship and the real affection and depth of feeling between these characters than I was anticipating. This is one of the things I was really worried about. But I am really sad. I just really sad that we didn't get to spend more time with Harwin and see more of their relationship together because you can feel,

again, you can effectively feel their affection. But I found myself really craving more time. I was so bombed when the fire. We didn't all happen at the end of this episode. We didn't even get a smooch. Like, here's the deal. Like, there's so much problematic sex on Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon. Like, they couldn't give us sex between two consenting adults who, like, genuinely love each other.

It's tough. Or even, like, the first. Yeah, like, anyway. It's tough. And the way that Lainor fits into that dynamic, I think, is also really interesting. Like, what do you want to say about that? I just love that, again, that kind of like modern family in this very, like, not modern context. There's a great shot that frames all of them just standing with each other mixed in.

There's this really interesting moment where the kids call out for father and for a second, just a fleeting second. you don't know who they're talking to or who's going to respond. Now, of course, that's clarified over the course of the episode, building up toward Jace asking Renira near the end. Is Harwin Strong my dad? But when Lainor is the one who responds to them in that moment, and to be clear, like Harwin Strong being their biological father does not mean that Lainor is not their father in their found family

that they've built together just because he's not their biological father. He is their father. That was just all right. there for us to parse. And you made such a lovely point that I want you to chat about for a minute here as well. You made such a lovely point on Talk to Thrones about like the mutual generosity on display between all of these characters. Yeah. And the key line being, Renner is saying, Sir Harwin wishes to be introduced to Joffrey. And it's in that moment that she gives Lainor what he wants, which is, okay, we'll name the baby Joffrey, right? So like, this is for you.

and also can you give the baby to his biological father? And again, like, there's a number of moments where Reneer, there's just a lot of kindness in stark contrast to Allison's honey-soaked viciousness. There's just a lot of genuine kindness, like, between these characters and this family arrangement they have. They have an arrangement that works for all of them. You know, there's little hints of slight tension between Lainor. and Renner, which will get to.

This would not be an easy thing. Yeah, but like it works really, really well. And I just, I, and what we see of Renira throughout the episode is that actually she does have a politician's mind. Who exactly taught her that? I couldn't tell you because I'm not sure if a Saris has one. Maybe Lionel helped her. I don't know. Oh my gosh.

It's interesting. The Sarahs just cannot stop catching ills. It's brutal. Oh boy. The number of like texts and slacks I've gotten to you of just his melted face is my favorite thing that happened this week. In basically every forum that it's possible to communicate with another person via, I just keep sending her the screenshot of him gaping like a doofus atop the battlements in the training yard. It's like one of my favorite visuals. It is so funny.

Anyway, we'll get to that one, to see what that is. But yeah, I just, I love that observation that you made about that generosity. Because there's also like a longing mixed in with it when Harwin asks, might I. There's this yearning that is so painful to behold. But Lainor says, of course, he gives them that look when he takes Jason Luke back to the pit so that they can have them this private moment together. Like, there's, there's just a real glimpse of how they've been. interacting and managing this very complex dynamic with each other for all of this time.

Did you want to make an observation here about the chambers? Is it interior design corner time with Joanna Robinson? I mean, you know me in my ponchant for interior design. No, but like the comparing. So we get, we go, we were in Allison's chambers. And we have remarked before that like Allison was in. in Emma's room. And for the first five episodes, there was no design update to Emma's room. By the way, that means that Reneera had to walk right after childbirth into the room where her

mother died in childbirth. Allison, you continue to be a gemstone. Horrific. A wonderful, thoughtful person. So Allison's room when, like for the first five episodes, had all of Emma stuff still in there, to a point where it was like horrifying. She's sleeping. sleeping in the same bed that Emma died in, like the same exact bed. You can see, like, you can go and compare shots. Same bed. She's redone the room, right? She's got, like, the jade green paint on the walls, right? She's giving it, like, yeah, just giving it the real high tower treatment. She's got seven-pointed star, like there's a lot of, like, seven-pointed star imagery in her room. Like, we've been talking about Allison and her piety and stuff like that.

The dragon orgies are gone, right? You called this. I thought she was going to do it castle wide. She still might, but she's definitely eradicated them from her room, right? So the dragon orgies are gone. In its place, religious imagery, high tower green. She's like, I'm not cosplaying Targaryen anymore. This is High Tower time.

Okay. Over in Renera's chambers, not that we get like a ton of like Targi stuff. It's not that. It just looks like the lived in jumbled chambers of like an actual family. You know when you go to someone's house and they have a bunch of kids and you're just like, yep, kids live here. Like that's what it feels like in Rainier's room. That's what people say when they come to my house and they just see my plush dolls,

my merch and my Lego is everywhere. Like, yeah, kids live here. And I'm like, do grown adults live here. But thanks for coming. Thanks for stuff. Yeah, it just looks, it just looks lived in and loved and warm and inviting and comfortable. And not like it's posturing anything, just sort of like it's practical, it's comfortable. We live here.

It's just me, my gay husband, his boyfriend, my baby daddy and my three sons who don't look like their father. Anyway, I just thought that was really interesting decoration work, you know. This episode is brought to you by Paramount Plus. Beth and Rip are back in a new series, Dutton Ranch. Kelly Riley and Colehouser returned, and this time they're taking on Texas. As Beth and Rip build a future together, peace will have to wait as they face corruption, danger, and a ruthless rival ranch, willing to protect its secrets at all costs.

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40 grams of protein. Made to keep up with whatever comes next. New sweetgreen wraps hit different. Order now at order. Sweetgreen.com. I love it. Speaking of interesting sets, Joe, we get to go back to the Dragon Pit. We have not spent nearly as much time at the Dragon Pit as I was anticipating. This time we are inside, not just Landon, out front, but inside this domed, dark, gloomy structure. So fascinating to get a glimpse,

not only of the training for the kids, but the infrastructure at play here. A lot of burns and facial scarring on the dragon keepers. Just going to make that observation. Parallus line of work here. Looks like a tough job. Indeed. Speaking of trial by content. Indeed.

That was officially named the worst job in Westrose by our listeners. Anyway. You mentioned the color coding of the sets. We get some interesting color coding with the outfits once again. Agon and Aymond. Because the boys, Agon, who we had previously met as a young babe, young child. Now we get to meet Aymond, his younger brother. And then we see Jace and Luke, Gisarus, and Lucarius, Reneira's two older sons.

They're all at the pit for dragon training. And Ait and Agon are in High Tower Green, not the colors of their father of the king's house. They are in High Tower Green throughout, except. of course when Agon is completely naked, jacking off out of the window. Can't wait to talk about that scene. When they're clothed, Joe, it's green. Jason Luke are in Valerian blue here, and then later in the training yard, they are in red and black. This has to remind us of Joffrey and his, like, lion, reds and golds and lion stuff that he had going on.

Absolutely. New dragon intro and some teases. We get to meet Baby Vermax. Jason's dragon here. We also have some other established dragons, even though we don't glimpse them. We hear Agon's Sunfire mentioned. I cannot wait.

Yeah. To me it's Sunfire. Luke, I saw some speculation that maybe Sunfire was the dragon that Amon sees down below, but I don't think Sunfire would be... Sunfire is resplendably gold. Yeah.

Although it was incredibly hard to see the dragon down below in the tunnels. I thought maybe Dreamfire. That was what I thought. Wouldn't Dreamfire be blue? I thought it might just be Syracx because of the color. It was incredibly hard to tell. I do not know which dragon Amand is approaching. It could be dream fire.

Oh, no. Does this make us the Chris Ryan of this podcast? No! Oh my God. We either have to retire or apologize to Chris on Talk the Thrones, I guess. What are the other? Though, you know, it's not... Until two dragons who are in broad daylight in the same scene,

visible looking at each other are dragons we can't tell apart. I think we still have not quite reached that. that point. So that's, that's comforting. We learn in this scene that all of them other than Amand are dragon riders. And so we can then deduce that Luke is a rider. We also hear Allison later say, she can't believe their eggs have hatched. So Luke is a rider. His dragon's not named or seen here, but we will be meeting his dragon, A or X, soon, presumably on the show. Can we talk about the dragon lessons? I was so interested that the kids appear not to speak fluent Valerian because they need a translator. What did you make of this? So they know the commands.

Well, I was thinking that maybe, wow, it's really interesting. We have very little information out of this exchange, but what does seem clear is that Agon is really good at this. So the point where he's just yawning and doesn't give a shit about paying attention at all. And this is beneath me. And when the dragon keeper is like as Prince Agon has with Sunfire, you know, like, he's just sort of like, yeah, I'm really, I'm a natural, natural talent. a gifted athlete, right? So I was thinking that maybe Jason Luke don't speak Valerian, Valerian, nope, Valerian fluently, but that maybe Agan and Amon do.

But at the same time, what we see from Alicent is that the Targaryen-ness is not necessarily a priority for her with these kids. So, yeah, meanwhile, I guess, it's significant that meanwhile, over in Pentos, Damon is teaching at least one of his children. Yes. Valerian. He's teaching Bela, who is a dragon rider we learn, Valerian.

He is not extending the same courtesy to darling Raina, who is just holding her egg in front of the fire alone while her father ignores her. Some of us are better at learning languages than others. Some of us just have the ear, you know? Oh, God. I thought that was very significant and interesting. Yeah. And one of the things that is translated,

for Jace that he learns from the dragon keepers who are training him is, quote, you must hold mastery over your dragon, my young prince, as Prince Agon has with Sunfire. Once they're fully bound to you, they will refuse to take instruction from any other. Anytime we learn anything on the show about how dragon binding works, about the relationship between rider and dragon, we should pay attention to it. It is acknowledged in the text that a lot of this is unknown, has been lost to time. So any kernel that we get is important for us as we expand our own understanding. And we see that even though Jace is still learning how to cement this bond in full,

he's very excited when that poor little little goat comes out. Can't wait to issue the Dracarist Vermax command and see his dragon burn this poor creature alive, needs a snack. And this is interesting for a few reasons. You know, it's important for us to see not only that Jace has a lot. dragon, but that his dragon is listening to him. In fire and blood, we learn that eggs were placed in Reneira's kids' cradles, quote, by royal decree. And then, quote, those who doubted the paternity of Reneira's sons whispered that the eggs would never hatch, but the birth and turn of young dragons

gave the lie to their words. This is, again, connected to Allison whispering later, so it's a wonder their eggs ever hatched. So people doubted, doubted that this would, that these children, because of the parentage rumors, would become dragon riders. And it's important that we see that they are. And it's important to see that actually, of all the kids, it's Amund who is not, you know, bonded to a dragon. Take us it. Take us through the pink dread prank here. This was, this was, this was cruel. Well, okay, it is. I'm obsessed with Vassaris. reaction where he was like, what kind of dumbass is A-Man that he thought that they just found a dragon and did this, right? But what I do like about it is that it shows that as much as these, at least I would say Allison's kids are being told that Jason Luke are the enemy.

Agon has like done this with Jason Luke, right? This is a cousin. This is, or sorry, uncle. Uncle. Uncle and nephew. Uncle and nephew. Our cool uncle Egon and his two nephews have like put this together for Uncle Amund, right? And like, so I like that. That is like a sort of a we did this together thing. This is, and we're going to talk throughout this episode about what it means, what it would mean for someone like Amund. Like we will feel, I mean, one must feel empathy for young Amant here, especially as he descends into the tunnels because he feels so inferior to his brother, to his nephews. He is frustration at that. We get it, you know, over in Pentos, too. We are forced to think about Vesaris and

his lack of connection with a dragon after Balarion. And again, how much of his is of a priority is it for Alicent, who's like, why do you even care about dragons in the first place? And Viseris, who was like, we should never meddle the dragons in the first place. You know what I mean? So these boys, Agon and Aymond, are not getting that, like, proper Targaryen. They're getting the training, but are they getting sort of the mentality, the philosophy of it? You know, meanwhile, Damon's studying Dragon Scrolls over in Pentos. It's interesting to me.

Absolutely. I love the call out there of how the real sense of inferiority is so at the four in this episode with Amand and Raina, who literally says later in front of the fire, like, am I going to be allowed to stay? They want you and dad and baila to stay because you have dragons. Like, am I going to be allowed to be a part of our family if I don't have a dragon? It is just agonizing.

Yeah, I do always think of now of that that phasaurus, even a dragon can get lonely line. and what a mission statement that is for so many of these characters. And how really like the facial expression that Amon has throughout this training sequence, he looks really sad and glum and left out. But also like there's like a, there's a,

there's that bravado that children have. I'm going to be bold. I'm going to go into the tunnel and see what I can see. But also like this hunger. If everybody around you has the power to command a dragon and bond with a dragon and you don't,

what does that mean for your role in this family and in the realm? Like, what would that feel like? I guess you could just comfort yourself to be like, well, at least I'm not a weird bug girl like my sister. Let's chat about our dear Helena. Take us into Parent Corner here. We get one scene where we see Allison interact with both Helena and Amund. Were you much of a bug collector when you were a kid, Joe? I was not a bug collector. Were you a bug collector? Malory Rubin? Never a bug collector. I did really, I enjoyed rocks. I used to collect rocks. Loved rocks. But bugs. Not really. I think, I think, like, I'm trying to think of, I had like a little, this is like a thing in the 90s.

I don't know if they still do it, but like, that like kids would have little safes. Like you would have a little safe. Did you have one? Oh, yeah. Yeah. I'd be like, I have $5 in here and a rock. I had my like, my like Irish step dancing medals. Sorry.

Yeah. We're going to need more. You can't just say that and move on. My sister and I were Irish dance dancing. Stop the pond, Steve says. We need more. You know, like Michael Flatley, Lord of the Dance, except his technique is not traditional. Anyway, so...

Wow. I have so many follow-up questions. Okay. Carry on. What a revelation. And rocks. So, like, yeah, the medals from the... They're called Fesh's, like, is the name of the Irish St.

Dancing Competition. So Fesh medals, rocks and shells, basically, were the treasures in my... in my safe. I loved a shell as well. Yeah. I loved a shell. No bugs, not a bug to be seen. Can't say the same for Helena.

I did in college live with two entomology majors, which meant that our freezer was always full of bugs because you put bugs in the freezer to like put them to sleep and study them. Did you have a separate freezer for food? No, no, ma'am. You don't like raw, you don't put the bug in there raw. You put it in like a bag or like a, you know, a tupper or something like that. Why don't we even have Dear Me on the soundboard if not for this, honestly? Anyway. Joe.

Helena, not a character that we know a ton about in terms of her personality and her disposition at this phase in her life. What does she make not only of this introduction? But of Allison's vibe. Like, how did you read the interaction here between Allison and her daughter? There's, my read was different than a lot of other people. I saw a lot of people thought that she just looked bored and disinterested. But I don't know. I thought she looked very like she's bored as parents get when their kids ramble about their various obsessions.

Like, I've seen many a pair's eyes glaze over and go, uh-huh, uh-huh. but like she's asking your follow-up questions. Like, why do we think that is? Like, you know, like, I think, I don't think she's a bad mom or a heartless mom. And I would say of all the kids, she seemed tenderest towards Helena, which is sort of similar to Circe and Marcella, right? And so, yeah. Yeah, that was my vibe was like bored, but sort of indulging her daughter's fascination. What was your read on it?

Yeah, I felt a detachment. but also a warmth and a concern as well. Like when Helena says it is beyond our understanding and Allison replies, I suppose you're right, some things just are. I think that's an acknowledgement that she hasn't maybe been able to totally understand or reach her daughter in the way that she would want to.

But I also read, and you know, it's a tremendous performance from Olivia Cook across the episode. I also read on her face as she's looking at her child there some not only warmth, but like, worry about how Helena will find her place in this world already a challenging thing to do as a woman in the realm, a woman in a position of power in the realm inside of this family. And I also was interested because like with the the bugs, this discussion of nature as this corollary for our own natures, it made me think of Laris and Allison and the way that they've interacted with

each other and their scene in the godswood previously. And like this being a version of that here, and that's before we get to any of the horse sex stuff coming later from Vassaris. But I was also struck by how differently Allison interacts with all of her children because she has like an energy here with Lena that is distinct from the energy we get in the next portion of this scene with Amund that is then distinct from the very unique energy that we get between Alison and Agon in one of the best scenes of the episode. Let's chat about this moment with Amund, you hinted at this already. He comes in, he's covered in dirty,

he's brought back by the Kingsguard. And it's not for the first time we learn that he has chased after this pursuit of a dragon. And Allison says to him, as if you needed encouragement, your obsession with those beasts

goes beyond understanding. And even though she hugs him and tells him that he will have a dragon one day, I was really struck by that moment for the reason you mentioned earlier, like the fact that this particular family unit doesn't seem to be placing the emphasis on the dragons, there's Vassaris's relationship to that and history with that. But in a moment like this, you really feel Alicence, we've talked a lot across our episodes,

not just with her character, but with many others, the role that quote unquote, outsiders are playing in this Targaryen division. And for a character who is the mother to potential claimants to the throne, who are the blood of old Valeria and the blood of the dragon, to say that your obsession with a dragon goes beyond understanding means that she does not actually understand the strength of their power. She doesn't even say that. She says those beasts.

Exactly. Like there's a diminishment of this that is really, really notable. Yeah, there's not a lot we can say about Helena outside of the book reader section of this podcast. But I will just read the description of her character. from the HBO character guide. Helena Targary is the only daughter and middle child of King Vassaris, the first Targary, and Queen Alison Targary. She has a unique interest in bugs and often speaks in cryptic language.

So, you know? I love your skexy noises. Really funny. All right. Is that me responding to something intriguing that Joanna just shared on the pod, or is that Vesaris responding to Reneira? Talk about horse sex. All right, let's chat about this astonishing scene where Alicent broaches genetics with

horse sex enthusiast, as Chris Ryan put it, Vesaris. She goes to her husband the king to tell him about the kid's drag and pranks. She's pissed. You noted earlier that he's like, wait a minute. Hold on. Pause. Aymann really thought there was just like they had managed to laura dragons him. And I think that was

interesting also in terms of Agon because he says, because she's blaming his grandsons Renera's kids, she calls them savages. And, which of course is her not so subtle way of alluding to their bastard status and their true parentage. And

she is seeking so clearly to create this rift between her children with Vesaris and their nephews, Reneer's children. Vesaris wants everyone to be one big happy family, which is naive and a failure to acknowledge the really fraught situation and facts on the ground. But despite that naivete, I think in some ways we see here that he has the measure of their family better than she does. Because when he says, are you sure it wasn't our Agon who put them up to it? Like, we have seen Agon. taunting his brother, oinking in his face.

And even though Allison will then challenge Aagon in the next scene, all she can do here is try to blame Jason Luke. And again, this reminds me of, you know, I feel like Robert understood who Joffrey was so much better than Circe did, right? Help him, Ned. And so I think that, yeah, yeah, this is, this is, just sort of consistent. Hard not to think of Bobby B pretty, pretty constantly throughout this episode, you know? The seat is strong. Oh my gosh. Yes. Constantly thinking to Circe in this episode.

Yeah. Allison just launches right into parent theory corner here. Steve, can you play us the clip? I have raised this matter before. And you have forbade me to speak of it so I held my tongue. To have one child like that is a mistake. To have three is an insult. To the throne to you. to house Valaria and the match she battled so hard to make for her, not to mention decency itself. Okay, one thing really quickly. Yeah. Her phrasing there, to have one child like that is a mistake,

to have three as an insult, made me think of the tremendous line from the importance of being earnest by Oscar Wilde, which is to lose one parent may be regarded as a misfortune, to lose both looks like carelessness. Just a great lady brackenal line from the importance of being earnest. But I, again, again, as she always will,

Allison is like masking all of this with the claim of decency, decency itself, right? Yeah, it's this, it's, it's, it's this classic, it's this classic mix because the thing that she's saying is not technically wrong. It is, it is morally horrifying for us, right, to witness. But she's making an astute observation when she says,

if you had one kid like this, like maybe you could convince us and get away with it, but you keep doing it. Like, what do you accept? expect us to say and think and believe, but that not to mention decency itself, that becomes the, we hear later this mention of like the fact that Fasaurus won't acknowledge this is the only shield, the only veil. That's what Lionel says to Harwin later. And like the veil and the shield that Allison puts around her entire mission is this idea of decency. This is also where, this is

where she says the line that we mentioned earlier about. It's a wonder to me that their dragons ever hatched, even though her kids are half-high tower. But anyway, I mean, you... We got so many... Okay, I will just say this. We got so, so many emails about Targaryen genetics. And I think we can only just say,

I agree with you, it does not make sense. It does not make sense that... Aigon and Aymond to have a brunet mother and a, you know, white blonde father would have white blonde hair, but that the strong boys, like, wouldn't. You know what I mean? Like, they're as Targaryen. They're all as Targaryen as each other.

So is the white blonde hair dominant or is recessive? I got a bunch of emails that were, like, I tracked it through the generations. But since Emma is blonde, like, what's going on? You're like, all this stuff. And I just have to say, I don't think it makes sense, to be honest with you. I don't think it does.

And we'll just have to roll forward with that. There is this larger context of, like, the Targaryans constantly inbreeding and fucking each other's we love to talk about. And so a lot of the marriages are either pure Targaryen or largely Targaryen, but there are other examples of only half-targ marriages where the children are Dragon Riders. But, yes. So the idea that it would be impossible is with Renira as their mother no matter what is strange. Yeah, but I mean, we have a prime example of what those kids should look like in Bella and Raina

over impetus, right? Like, we know. I'm not saying it's strange that Allison is going on her campaign, but like the idea that they could not possibly be Dragon Rider specifically. Odd.

One of the things I loved about this conversation is that it is taking place in front of our favorite Lego set. The still in progress, still being worked on stone model of old Valeria, a reminder always

of this legacy that is looming over Vassaris and that is, on the line. I have to ask you, do you think that the stonemason, who is dismissed, Vesaris doesn't want him to hear this as Allison just launching into her campaign here, it's named Edard. Do you think this is a little wink to the Ned Aria, Tywin, my father is a stone mason plot? I love it. Love that idea. I feel like that was put in just for you. A well-red stone mason?

Yes. But speaking of Ned Stark, oh. Isn't it interesting, though, that like Allison's whole the seat is strong detective work that she's doing is exactly what Ned Stark Detective Ned was doing in season one of Thrones and in that case we're like Ned is in the right get him Ned

you'll figure it out like look at the hair color the answer's there blah blah and here we're like Allison you're meddling little biotch what are you doing you know so like I'm not saying

there are different mitigating circumstances between the two but it is interesting that it's the exact same plot, but we feel very differently about one versus the other. Where's this generation's Paisal to hand her a... Ponderous tomb.

I just love the... I always loved the way I said ponderous tomb. Ponderous and presumably he's dead. So, you know. Oh, Allison, as throughout this conversation, is so genuinely furious that... Vesaris refuses to indulge and accept this.

But, okay. Really? Yeah. But, like, this is reckless of Reneira. This is extremely reckless of Reneer. We got a lot of emails about, like, could she not even have tried with Lainor? And I guess we should say in fire and blood that, like, there's many different accounts of Reneer and Lainer and whether or not they ever slept together. But there are a few accounts of, like, they slept together a few times or whatever.

A question is, like, couldn't they have just, like, had sex sometimes just to try to produce some kids who looked like them? And again, I think it speaks to Reneer's, like, recklessness and I can get away with fitness that she has exhibited throughout her youth. And I think that Alice, in a twisted way, I'm not on Allison's side here, but in a twisted way, Reneer's actions here do put Allison's children in more danger because if Reneer is undermining her own claim, that means it will be more, it will be harder for her to stake her claim when the time comes, which means that this idea of having to put the very blonde boys

that are in the castle to the sword, as Otto put it, you know, becomes higher. And it's not like there's no precedent in throne, in history or whatever, Elya Martel and her children were killed. This happens, you know? And so in a way, I don't know that that's Allison's primary motivator here, but in a way, like, Reneira's risky behavior is putting all of them a bit more at risk, you know?

She's not thinking about the far-reaching ramifications of her actions here. She's just like, well, I'm okay with it. Harwin's okay with it. Linau's okay with it. My dad's pretty okay with it. I love my boys. My boys love me. What's the problem?

But like there are larger factors here, you know? We get that great line later between Allison and Egan. You are the challenge. But from Allison's perspective, this is Renira inviting the challenge. And, you know, all of this to Allison is this upfront to her sense of decency and injustice to her own children, her legitimate children, who are now behind these bastards in the line of succession, but also Reneira's recklessness is an affront to her and this idea that Reneer, because this was such a source of the division between them in the first place, that Reneira

thinks she can do and feels that she can do whatever she wants and is pursuing that that freedom and desire, and Alicent has been so bound throughout her life by that duty. It is like a real a real tension between all of those aspects. And so then there's jealousy there, too. There has to be. There has to be jealousy and envy and the fact that Reneura can just flout these various things,

whereas Allison had to have sex with an increasingly decaying, now one-armed old man. Well, and it's part of why when Vassaris tells the horse sex story, Allison is so frustrated in a nudgeous. with him, which only builds over the course of the episode to the point where she just walks out and leaves him in the room. Like, are you going to help me get settled into my chair here? Because from her perspective, it's like, why can you not give me what you give to her? You are willing to just accept this, but you won't even hear what I'm trying to say and what seems plain to so many people. And in fact, he tells her, not only is he not like, oh yes, you've convinced me. He says,

do not speak of this again because the consequences of you doing this will be dire. He's happy, as you noted earlier, that things have stabilized with Renera that she has done what he asked and worked to shore up her own line and her succession, that their family

is growing bigger. He loves his grandkids. You know, there's this little line in fire and blood that always said out to me about Vassaris and his relationship to his grandchildren. It's a small one, but it's this. Quote, Septine Eustace's

tells us that his grace sat jace upon his knee atop the iron throne as he was holding court and was heard to say, one day this seat will be yours, lad. Like, this is for him everything he's been working to ensure. So the idea of the person theoretically closest to him trying to tear that down is not something he is even capable of interacting with her or thinking about, let alone accept it. I never thought of that as a little line. I think that's a really, really important moment. I'm glad he pointed out.

Sweet little jace. Um, Allison has a more receptive audience out in the hall with Sir Christenkel. We see right away because she just lets rip how totally unvarnished they are with each other, that they are confidence. He is in her confidence. She is in his. She could speak not only about her frustration and laments, but about this parentage matter, not that she's trying to keep it quiet, despite what the Sarah's just told her.

And he is equally candid with her in turn, the prehistoric, Francis Renira is brazen and relentless. A spider stings and sucks her prey dry. Too candid for her liking, because this is when he then adds spoiled cunt, and Allison stops in her tracks to glare at him. And it's like he's like a puppy with like, you know, getting his nose rubbed in the shit he just took on the rug. Her quest means having to tell other people, but also herself,

exactly what she says here. I have to believe in the end, honor and decency will prevail. We need to hue to that and to each other. This will come up again later in the episode with Laris, but how long can Allison tell herself that that is true and that that is the heart of her cause when she is surrounding herself with people like Kristen

or like Laris who do dishonorable things? She's so deluded also because, like, and we should say, again, like, I have a lot of empathy for Allison and how she got here. Of course. And that's the beauty of those first five episodes. We really needed them because Allison's a tough thing in the book. You know what I mean?

And so, like, I think as much quarter as we can find for her as possible will help, like, her character feel more nuanced and have a lot of depth. That being said, she's so delusional because when she whines about being all alone later to Laris, being all alone and that her father isn't there, so like that, she is so like that, she is so open with her worst impulses, with both Kristen and Laris, and Vassaris, for that matter, compare that to Reneira

who can't say anything to Harwin or even Linau in some circumstances. Like, there are moments when Linau and Reneer are alone together. And she says stuff like, these are your sons. You know, like stuff like, like she has to maintain

this fiction, even when she's alone because it's so d-you know, so like the, the amount that Reneer is isolated in the, you know, position she's put herself in, but the position that she is in, whereas Allison can just, you know, be her worst possible self in front of all these men that she's surrounded herself with. I think it's interesting. I have we got this really interesting very very long email from listener Hannah is very very very smart but I'm I'm just going to take a piece of it and and Hannah wrote this came in the middle of the email so here's the fucking thesis of my email hot D is twisting the genre of fictive history in removing the structures that exercise

toxic masculinity, therefore portraying the men as a monolith while the literal teenage girls maneuver their institutions with purpose and intention. For example, in the historical record, Reneira begs her father for a problematic cutie Sir Kristen to join the Kingsguard because

he's dreamy and then maybe fucks around with her uncle so she might seduce Sir Kristen who in one account refuses on the basis of his vows and ultimately kills the night of kisses what's his no longer face? an attorney. His actions

are completely justified and at times righteous because of the strictures of societal norms and laws while Rainira simply does not have access to those institutions. Hatte reverses their motives

by having Renira embodies those systems. She expressed this in her rejection of Chris in episode 5. And so she is compelled by her responsibility to choose a knight for the King's Guard

and to marry for political gain with a little sir on the side without the tourney. I thought this is so interesting. Because we've been talking, this is me, Joanna for a second. We've been talking over and over again about how a bizarre adaptive choice it is

to move the death of Joffrey out of the tourney into the wedding. Which is an outright murder. How does Kristen keep his job? But Hannah writes, without the tourney to channel Sir Kristen's choices and emotions, we didn't have a systemic,

context for his emotional breakdown, and the result was a sort of volatile hysteria. The same could be said for much of Damon's motivations which are purposefully not well articulated in the show to parallel the overly sympathized, simplified, and unsupported reactions of women in historical accounts written by men. This contrast is appropriately emphasized by this particular brand of fuckboy who would beat a messenger to death because he's mad at his brother. Is that the fuck boy's music? Yep, here comes Jason Lannister to spell it out for us

with a real shit-ed joke about women taking too long to prepare for battle while the men just rush in, what an ally. So I love this idea of like in removing the tourney, which gives Kristen Cole cover for his sociopathic violent attitudes, we're instead forced to confront just the horrifying truth of like, you know, and actually to put it in a more, quote-unquote, female context of, like, a wedding feast. Like, he does look hysterical and out of control. Oh, yeah.

Whereas the attorney would give him cover for that. And I do love that, like, the show has found all these reasons for Rainier and Allison to act the way they did rather than, and oftentimes those reasons are sourced in, like, shitty actions of the patriarchy. Whereas in the book, we meet Allison, we're like, well, this queen sure is a bitch. And it's just sort of like, that's a, that's a, a really tough read of a, of a, of a, of a woman, a complicated woman. So the show is like, let's show you how she got here. And let's, let's really, really upset you with a shot of the Saras, painting her down on the bed and having sex with her and her disassociating entirely for you to understand how she got to where she got.

And I think that that is like, the show has its flaws. The show has its issues, especially. when it comes to this time jump stuff. But what it's doing to flip this story in fire and blood told entirely by male sources on its head is really interesting. I completely agree. I think the naked truth of that then makes it even harder to understand how no one in the realm

would ask follow-up questions, though. So that's still very strange, right? That's a great, a great thesis from Hannah. Speaking of being unclothed, as you said, is it time to talk about Egon Roman Roy Targaryen? The, maybe a touch of a touch of Homelander in the mix as well, you know? Did you think of Roman Roy and Homelander first, or did you think of poor darling Tallman first? What did you think of first? Literally all.

I mean, Roman was the first. If someone's standing up in a window jacking off, I'm going to think. of Roman immediately. But I thought of I thought of Dear Tomman and his window and Homelander pissing from the roof

onto the city below. It pretty short order. What a scene this is. Lots of this kid is a sex-crazed horn dog energy in this episode. Not only here, but kind of

leering at the maids in the yard later on, etc. As Agon is frantically masturbating in the nude from his window perch, his mother walks in. Now, you know, some folks at home might be able to relate

to a parent walking in on them, somebody finding them in a compromising position. It happens. Here's what doesn't typically happen after. No acknowledgement, but as Agon dives into his A little shame mattress on the ground. Allison just walks over for chat, including eventually sitting down with him

and leaning into him to touch him as he is cloaked. I assume this is like one of the most scarring experiences of his entire life. What a sequence. Allison just say I'll come back later. Leave. But like, okay, so Allison not being like,

oh, oh, no. Like none of that. from Allison. But I don't know. Like, he didn't seem that. He wasn't like, Mom, get out. Like, he didn't, he dope for the blanket pillow cover, for sure. But he wasn't just like, Mom, what are you doing in here or anything like that? And I don't know.

I feel like, you know. Exactly. That one really scared me. Oh, God. She asks him about the Pink Dread Prank. He blames Jason Luke At first he calls Amen to twat And Allison, who is busy in this moment

attempting to destroy her extended family tells him blood trumps all We are family You may carve him about as you wish at home But in the world we must defend our own This is so fascinating for so many reasons It reminds us of numerous other moments Not only in this show but in Thrones

I was thinking of Damon with Corliss in episode two and his whole like, you don't get to talk that way about my brother. Only I can talk that way about my brother. By the way, he's really bad at being king. I can't wait to make fun of him in front of you. But I'm interested in how to reconcile this with Allison's exchange later with Laris

when he says to her, you know, you'd also have your willful blindness toward your own kids. And she says, I would not. And is so insistent. And those ideas feel like in conflict to me because she's saying here, we have to protect and accept each other.

We must protect our own. And then later saying, unless. Yeah, that's interesting. I mean, I think it's just, again, that, like, Alison not seeing herself clearly, like the self-delusion of, like, and what I like about this is that she goes to Vassaris and she's like, absolutely Prince, baby, golden king lord, Agon had nothing to do with this prank. But then she marches to Agon's room and she's like, do you do this? What the fuck?

Yes. Again, you have to think of Searcy and Joff, and you have to think about Searcy saying to Joffrey, everyone who isn't us is an enemy, you know? Like that, and again, it's just sort of like, these are their nephews. Like, in theory, this should be their family. But Allison is drawing the line around family much narrower in this instance.

Well, I love what you said earlier, too, about why it was important to see the kids together, even though they're pranking Amand, the fact that there could be this, like, unity and good cheer between them, if not for the adults in their lives guiding them. And that gets us into really one of the themes, core themes of the show that plays out over this next exchange. Steve, can you play us the soundbite here? If Reneera comes into power, your very life could be forfeit. Ammon's as well. she can move to cut off any challenge to her succession

you are the challenge you are the challenge Egon simply by living and breathing incredible stuff his little noises by the way Ty Tenet David Tennant son who plays Agan in this episode incredible stuff phenomenal wonderful

phenomenal work from him truly phenomenal this is almost note for note the speech that Otto Hightower gave to Allison at the beginning of episode five. It's so interesting here that Agon doesn't seem to give a shit about this at all. He's in full John Snow. I don't want it mode right here. And so much of this exchange, so much of this episode, so much of this series is about this idea of what we pass on to our children and how through that this hate can fester

and warp and spread over time. And we see just in this conversation the way it's moved from Otto to Alicent, and now Alicent is trying to push that on to Agon. And this idea of the birthing bed as the battlefield, as we've talked about, it's not just in that very literal sense,

though we are reminded of that too in this episode, of course, but the way that the children who emerge become pawns in this war, in that battlefield. And like, the way that she's not just parroting Otto's words here, but we feel how she has

internalize them, how she believes this now, how this is a guiding, orienting principle for her life, like right down to that idea that we talked about last week with Otto of this sense of inevitability, right? She says later, like, you are the king's firstborn son. And what they know what everyone in the realm knows in their blood and is there in their bones is that one day you will be our king. This from the character who used to challenge that idea to say to her father, Reneira will be a good queen to say to her father, if you hadn't been so insistent on pushing Agon's claim, is now the character who's doing exactly that.

It is really, really tragic. There's this line from this section of fire and blood that I read out on Talk the Thrones, but I think it's worth repeating where George Rice, the sins of the fathers are often visited on the sons. So again, this like we talk about. a lot about legacy and like what is

what is the platonic ideal of legacy what do you want your legacy to be but what is often you know like the character we think about a lot when we think about legacy is Taiwan and Lanister right but what is

Taiwan's legacy you know that he didn't see what was happening in his own house but like Jamie and Circe like all the cruelty and all the like twistedness and all of that

comes directly from Taiwan and Tyrion succeeds in the end almost despite who his father is. You know what I mean? Out of spite for who his father was in many ways, yeah. Throwing off as much Lannister as he can. So that idea of the, you know, versus Ned Stark and his legacy in the way in which his children pick up his mantle and carry it forward and the way that John does and all of that. So, you know, Allison in turning into her father so completely. It's a tragedy, as you say.

Like, we miss that young woman who genuinely seems lovely. We miss her. And it's so sad that she got ensnared in this. And how successful is she going to be in ensnaring her children in it as well? Because to see Agon here, to hear him say, well, then I won't. Like, then I won't. I don't want it, you know? I just want to masturbate out a window.

and like, fuck some serving girls. That's all I want to do. And like ride my really cool dragon, you know, like that's it. So we'll see. The purest teen energy there from Agon. Joe, let's pop across the narrow seed. Let's go to Pentos where Damon and Lena are married with children and fly in their dragons together. We have a lot to catch up on here.

You've got to do it in a hurry just like the show does. Caraxis and Vagar flying together. These dragons, this was really fun because they used to fly together, of course, in Fire and Blood. We know Eamon and Baylon respectively rode Caraxes and Vagar. So to see these dragons back in the air together, that was like really cool. I have to ask, did you like me scream, why know when they did the fireball thing in the air? Because you knew it was going to spark the Ar Targaryens fireproof. conversation again?

They're not. We got an email from, we got many emails about this, but this one's from Cynthia, who says, so Damon can fly his dragon through dragon fire, no problem,

but his wife can be cremated by the same dragon. Was she not Targaryen enough? Here's the bottom line. And we'll say it a million times, and then we'll have to say it a million times more. Targaryens are not fireproof. DeNaris emerging from the pyre

the beginning of Game of Maroons. Martin describes as sort of like a once in a millennia miracle, sort of magical, incredible situation. The fact that she is then fireproof later in the TV show is something why some Beniof decided to do to cause headaches for Mallory and me for the rest of our lives. Danny kind of forgot about the Iron Fleet and throws kind of forgot that Targaryians aren't fireproof.

And now here we are. Tarians are not fireproof. Maybe if you're flying a dragon through a fireball really quickly, there's just a lot of like air- occurrence and you're fine. I'm going with that. I feel like that at my TV. No, don't.

I know. Please, God, no. What I loved is that the yada yada over Damon and Lena's courtship in the first many years of their marriage, etc. We don't get to see any of that. What I like is that in the books

or in the book, Damon and Reneer when they had their thing that we got a couple episodes ago, they would race their dragons. around that was like a thing that they did and it's just a very damon damon who is like so pure targ focused all the time like the thing that would excite him and get him hot is racing his dragon with his wife and like speaking valerian with raneer you know like he just like

really really hardcore spread it on thick targary and shit with damon and so like the um like the fact to see them riding together and like you understand like you understand like you Like, Lena is incredible in so many different ways that, you know, but Ray and Roy seem pretty cool, too. But like, Lena has all this dragon stuff that comes with her that I think that Damon would particularly enjoy. It's a great and very important point. You know, Agon jacking off from the window. I'm sure that Damon has gotten his kicks from a top dragon back more than once. You're on to something there.

The Vagar intro at last, on the one hand, thrilling. So exciting to finally see Vagar in the show, the oldest and largest dragon in the world at this point in the story that we know of, previously written by Vesnia, one of Aon's sister wives, Bailon, Viseris and Damon's father, the spring prince who we've talked about before. huge. Vagar is gigantic. It was so cool to see Vagar on the screen at last. I do feel, however, that we were cheated out of seeing the Elena Vagar origin story. Now, on the one hand, you could say, well, that's why we got those lines of set up, those teases, the mentions of Vagar early, little Lena asking Vassaris during their creepy walk about Vigar's whereabouts, mentioning that people had heard Vagar's song in Spice Town. Spacetown is on Drift Mark. So we can, we have,

have enough to kind of piece this together on our own, but I badly, badly, badly wanted to see this origin story, not only because of how consequential vagar is as a figure in this world, but also because of how much we know flying means to Lena. And like, we just didn't get enough time with Lena overall. And I think that Lena is really one of the characters who's hurt by the time jump.

From Fire and Blood, quote, only Lady Lena herself seemed untroubled. Her ladyship shows far more interest in flying than in boys, the maister at High Tide, to the Citadel. Like, this is like a central part of her life. And I just wish we'd gotten to see, to see more of it. How about you?

And like, just what a badass she is to, in the book at 12 years old, to take Vagar, the biggest oldest living dragon. Like, Lana, Lana's so cool. I fully believe that Damon is into her. Again, there's this line, you know, from the books. Yeah, walk us through this, the book account of their courtship. The line that sticks out to me is, Prince Damon fell in love with Lena, the singers would have us believe men of a more cynical bent,

believe the prince saw her as a way to check his own descent, right? So you can decide whether or not this is an opportunity to marry into a super rich and powerful family, the Valerians, after he's been kicked out multiple times by his own brother, or whether he actually adored her. But like, you know, she's got this bravocee fiancee that Damon goads into a duel, you know, and kills. You don't fuck with Dark Sister or Damon. Or Damon. You don't get away in between. If you're Rea Royce or a bravocee fiancé, you don't get between Damon and who he wants to marry next.

Yeah, they travel around. I actually think it's really interesting. We'll talk about this in a second. But there's even this idea that they went to Ovalier on the Dragons, you know, to search out the secrets of the dragon lords of the old freeholds. I think that's really interesting. But yeah, it's very tumultuous. It's very interesting.

Could have been its own episode, honestly. But yada, yada, yada. Here we go. Here's Lena. And I will say that what we get of Lena in this episode, she seems super interesting. She seems super cool. The actress does a great job.

It's just simply not enough in my view. We are firmly on the same page. there. What did she make in this dinner sequence? They are being courted in Pantos by the prince, Prince Regio, trying to recruit the family in their dragons. And we get this dragon math update, not only seeing Lena with Vagar, but as mentioned, Bela, one of their daughters, has a dragon. We learn here in this conversation. So this family has currently three dragons, maybe soon four, the prince says. They're totally, toasting Egon the Conqueror.

And one of the things that the Prince of Pentos mentions here is he calls back to the century of blood. So fascinating to me. Like to toast the events, the absolute carnage that followed the fall of the Valerian freehold. What a tone setter for what is to come. Great dinner conversation, I think. Also, quick question. Did it seem to you like Damon was flirting with his waiter? Definite vibe.

Without question, right? Yeah. There's a moment. What does you make of the Damon dynamics, like, overall, just with everybody? That moment, the way that he responds to this courtship here, everything we see with him and the Valerian reading lessons here. And then the conversation that he and Lena have after about this offer. And they're drastically different reads on how they should respond. I think Damon's in a really interesting place right now.

Again, we are left to wonder about so much. so much is left for us to fill in the gaps of who we think Damon is and what we think is on his mind. This idea that he is relieved to escape the politicing, that he doesn't mind what Prince Reggio wants from him, because at least it's honestly transnational. It's refreshing, right? We've got dragons, they've got gold. Yeah. But I think this this habit he has of, like, tucking up in the Penthouse Library is super interesting. Again, it goes back to that whole like search out the secrets of the dragon lords of the old freeholds because lena says to him you spend your time a year in the library reading accounts of the same dead dragon lords whose legacy you claim

have has no hold on you i think so regio heratus is the name of this prince there's a there's another herodas in fire and blood jessio herodas who is the author of a book called before the dragons which claims that the city of pentos already existed before the valerians expanded to the narrow sea he lived during the century of blood when Voluntus threatened to restore the Valerian Empire under their rule. I just like, okay, Herodus, first of all, I feel like is George R. Martin playing with Herodotus, the famous historian. But I think this Pento's library that, again, the set decorators spent an incredible time. You can zoom in on the titles. There's Library of Tira. There's one that's just called dragons, like whatever. The fact that Damon

like all of my friends' dads in middle school who became obsessed with World War II, the fact that he has become like a history book obsessed targ guy is really interesting to me because I think, I know that Laris lays out the thesis for this episode as being about children and legacy and love and duty and all of that at the end, we heard at the beginning of this podcast.

But I think the idea of Targaryan identity, what makes you a Targaryen? What is a Targaryen? is either hand in hand with that because we're talking about these Targaryen kids or just a side-by-side thesis of this episode

because that's the question Allison is asking, right? How Targaryen are these children who have brown hair? This is the obsession of Damon whose brother is the king but whose brother is not a dragon rider and he's like, what is it to be a Targaryen? You have to think because they're...

And who keeps casting him out, yeah. Right, and because they're in Pentos, we have to think about DeNaris. Yes, absolutely. Because this is where DeNaris and Vesaris go. This is where we meet them, right? This is where she was brought up. And so that idea of being a Targaryen alone in the world,

what does it mean to be a Targaryen outside of court, outside of your family, outside of the shadow of your brother? What is that Targaryen identity going forward? And like, for Vassaris, Vesars seems wildly uninterested in being a Targaryen Targaryen, King Vassaris the first, right? Like, he's got this prophecy looming over him. But, like, being a Targaryen, as you've pointed out so many times, he uses his ancestral sword as a walking stick.

Like, he just doesn't get it. But Damon is like, but really, what does it mean to be a Targaryen? And I think that that is an interesting question for the show to ask as we weigh who should follow Viseris when he goes. I love that. It's such an important observation and made me think of the exchange where where Elena says to him, you know, we are the blood of old Valeria. We don't belong here. And Damon's response to that is Valeria has gone. We don't belong anywhere. And again, that idea of loneliness and searching, searching for your tie to history, which Damon often espouses, you know,

it was right there at the beginning when he gave the Valerian steel necklace to Renera and talked about how they each had a piece of their homeland, the way that he seeks any opportunity to speak old Valerian, but also as you noted, like then, what does it tell us, not only about himself, but who he thinks is worthy of inheriting that or attempting to foster a stronger tie to it. And like, it's so interesting to see Damon as a dad, girl dad. Damon, girl dad are one of my favorite exchanges we've had with Chris. But it's also heartbreaking to, and these characters are flawed and that's part of why they're interesting, of course. But it's heartbreaking then to think about, like, if Damon is steeping himself in that scholarship and that study and seeking to better

understand that history and how it might apply to himself and their lives and their family and their future. What does it mean if he's only giving that to one of his children, the one who has a dragon? Yeah, he's favoring the daughter with the dragon. That's terrible. Because that's awful. Yeah. Truly, truly, truly awful. And we get these, it was a good Damon episode because we got a lot of those moments of like, that make us want to recoil like that mixed in with this sweetness, like when he reaches for Lena's pregnant belly and is like rubbing it and knuzzling it and kissing it. It was a really just a fascinating Damon episode in that way.

And we have a couple more scenes to chat about with them later in the episode. But we must now go back to Kings Landing to the training yard with Kristen and Agon and Amund and Jace and Luke. Lionel and Viseris watching from the battlements. Viseris thinks that these kids are bonding for life. This poor fucker has no idea. what he is watching unfold. The way that his face falls

as he watches Harwin and Kristen and he sort of sits slowly dawning on him in a way that even he can't ignore. I thought this was such a great scene and a really like vintage Game of Thrones scene for a couple reasons. One, just thematically, the number of relationships and dynamics

that are at play in this sequence, the number of strands of personal strife or ambition in history that everybody who, involved in that sequence brings to that moment. Yeah. Incredibly rich. It also just makes us think of so many great Game of Thrones training yard sequences.

And there are too many to mention here, but like we can think of the very beginning and the way we see John and Rob down there with Bran, relax your bo-a-am and then see Ned watching from up above. Or we can think of Aria and Brian and the way that Little Finger and Sons are watching from above or getting to go into the past, watching through Brand's eyes as we see Rickard say to young Ned, if you have to fight win.

Like, all of that was on my mind watching this, and I love being able to bring that history as a throne's viewer to a scene like this in addition to all of the history with these characters. Did you enjoy this scene? Yeah, I loved it. I thought it was really incredible to... I mean, if I can get past the idea

that Kristen has this job, at all, which is ridiculous, then I really enjoy the scene. To watch, again, we're talking about toxicity flowing downhill, right? And the way in which, like, Allison is, you know, pouring the toxicity that Otto poured into her into her children. Kristen is, like, rearing little sociopaths. That's what he's doing. He's using his influence here to teach them, as Harwin puts it, cruelty.

And I think that's really interesting. And I think you have this quote here in our notes. Or Kristen says, I know you've never seen true battles, sir. But when Steele is drawn a fair match isn't something anyone can expect. So he's throwing in Harwin's face that he, Kristen Cole, is battle tested and a Harwin isn't. And it is such a creepy echo down from Reneira being so proud of herself that she's picked Kristen because he has seen battle. But what does he say when he's,

I focused a lot on the way he said incursions, the Dornish incursion, but what he says to her when she asks him if he's ever seen battle in that initial Kingsguard selection scene, he says Sir Arland Andarian knighted me after we raised two of the watchtowers along the boneway.

Raising a watchtower is not like honorable battle at all. And so like a lot of people have been like, oh, this is very jarring to me. I thought Kristen was a hot, honorable, haughty, and I was going to be really excited to root for him. Some tiny clues were there, and for those of us who knew this was coming,

like, you know, we bristled at them, but that's a really interesting one. This idea of he is battle tested, but that's not necessarily a great thing, actually, at the end of the day here. Yeah, it's almost just emboldened his worst tendency. And I think, like, I loved this. There's so many different aspects of the scene I loved.

Like when Harwin, my God, we're just like pleading Harwin to not do what we see happening in real time. Walk away. Oh, my God. Yet another own goal from our, from our hot lads on this show here. But the way that when Harwin's picking up the swords, Kristen just kicks another one in front of him or the way that he is so relentlessly guiding and coaching. Aigon to show no mercy.

Well, kick them. You know, don't let them up. Keep them pinned down. Use your feet. Use your feet. Like, it's really, like, horrific. And that quote that you read, the true battle one, for all of the ways, it's a real parallel between Kristen and the characters who are aligned in this episode, because for all of the

ways that he would champion virtue and his honor and the way that he views that vow as the sacred guiding North Star, like we talked about last. last week, he doesn't actually believe or care about fairness at all. And we can see that so clearly here. And he baits Harwin, right? He's doing this to out Harwin. He's doing this for Alicent. He knows what response he will incite when he says, oh, your interest in the brinslings.

Cousins. I hate this guy. Cousins here. You know, cousins, brothers, sons. And in fire and blood. Harwin and Kristen have an exchange and have a fight. And Kristen wins. And I thought that this was so smart for so many ways to like invert the actual physical setup here because we get Kristen on the bottom pinned down the opposite of where we saw him on top of Joffrey last week.

We see that breakbones, strongest in the realm. One punch knocks this guy down to the ground as it should. We haven't really gotten to see that reputation bear out, so we kind of like need a little moment like that. But of course, like the fact that Kristen, the fact that he's on the wrong side of those punches is actually irrelevant. And that's part of the ploy that he is enacting here.

When he spits blood onto the ground and says thought as much, he's the real winner there because he got Harwin to reveal to everyone watching. And when we hear later, Lionel say that like all the fish are, wives are going to be gossiping about this, he's right. Like, this would travel like wildfire throughout the realm. And when Reneira hears this news, because it's immediately brought to her, she has to act.

This changes things. Well, yeah, let me go back to the fight in the yard really quickly and say, I think it's so interesting the way in which Kristen is just not treating Jace as the heir to the throne, right? he grabs Jace and yanks him in a way that I was just, like, astonished that he would get away with. And we get, like, Vesaris is barely intervening at one point he says, Agon in an admonishing way. But barely. And like, when Agon's like, how dare you put your hands on me? Right. So Harwin pulls Agon off of Jace, and Chris and Cole says, you forget yourself strong.

That is the prince. Okay, but technically in the line of succession, Agon is further down than Jays. and who is Cole yanking about the yard. Renira is Vesaris's air and Jace is hers. Absolutely, yeah. Yeah. Jace is the air and he's not, and Aigon is being treated,

and Kristen is treating Agon like the air. And it's just this whole like, it's like the secret, you know? He's just like manifesting the reality that he wants. So, anyway. Reneera's got to react. Let's go. Sneaking via Damon's secret passageways.

Nice to see that those are still in good use here for Reneera. I think you know Harwin used that passageway. All. Yes, got to think that came into play, because where does she go? She goes right to find Harwin, only Lionel's already there. And Rainer stops in this stairwell, those stairwells coming back and play again, Joe, to over here and listen to this exchange that shakes her and then sparks the conversation that she has with Lainor right after. This has gotten to a point where they can no longer maintain their normal daily lives and, of course,

of events. Lionel says, this is where he says that Vissaris's refusal to acknowledge the truth is the only thing that's saving them. And it's just very clear on Reneer's face as she's listening to this, their time is up. That's it. I loved when Harwin said, you have your honor and I have mine, because in a show where so many different characters are championing honor as the way to validate or justify whatever action they enact. Honor means different things to different people.

It's like Jamie's, they make you swear and swear ideas spread out across multiple character sets. Like there's not just one thou. There's not one oath. There's not one version of honor. And so that is constantly putting these characters in conflict

not only internally, but with each other. That takes us to Renira and Lenore. He's hammered. I'm mad. Okay, so like, even with the closed captioning on, they're not telling me what the lyrics are, like, what is the song? It's not, it's sounds-ish, bear in the main fair-ish, but it's not the bear in the main fair. But it's not, yeah. Yeah.

And I want to know what the song. I like learning the songs. Give me the song, Fire and Blood. Come on. You love a song. You're a song scholar. I am. It's tough.

What we see not only that Lainor and Carl love music, but that Lainer wants to go back to the stepstones. He's longing for war. He's longing for purpose. And when Reira asked if he's mad and says dark rumors are hunting us, we have this really intense exchange. Steve, can you play this for us? And I have played my part here. Faithfully.

Years. I am owed someone. You are owed nothing. For 10 years, you have indulged yourself at court. bought the f*** drunk, the rarest of wines, fuck the lustiest boys. This was our agreement. I have not begrudged you.

But you do not desert your post when the storm lashes. The wise sailor flees the storm as it gathers. Joe Moore's storm language from House Valerian. I need the Valorian family to all come together and sit down and agree on their storm metaphor. because this is the third time and they're all using it differently. I kind of like it that instead of being like their house words, everybody's just putting their own little spin on it.

This is a really like sad scene because they've built this partnership as we chatted about earlier. But they also both feel trapped by it in certain ways, compromised by it in certain ways to the point where Reneera has to say, I command you and pull rank on the future king consort to get him to agree to what she wants. I have a question about her speech here, though, when she says, you bought the finest horses, drunk the rarests of wines, fuck the lustiest of boys. That sounds to me like something you would say to someone who married you for your money. What have you gotten?

You've gotten to spend all this money. Sorry, Linar-Vlorite is rich as hell. richer, I think, than the Targary's before he came to this marriage. So I don't know quite exactly what card she's pulling there. But the reason that stood out to me is because so many people used to say to Renira, like stop thinking about what you want and what brings you pleasure and your desires, focus on your duty. And she is now giving that speech to him.

Yeah. Yeah. That's a fair point. I like it. What did you think of your favorite Tyrochi getting a call out here? Okay. Call it. Recallio Rendon. Your guy.

What a tease. He says there's a Tyraishi general there. A giant, they say, who dies his beard purple and wears women's frocks. I would like to see it. I'd like to see the baby. I would like to see the Tyrahi. I think I'm not going to see him. Oh, that makes you want to go to a Manda rewatch.

I don't think I didn't see him until season two. But if we get him, I'd be thrilled. And it would be a nice way. like I hope he does dye his beard purple because that would, you know, heal the Darya Naharis book fans who are like, we never got the blue. The dyed beard, it's true.

So you and Chris both going on the record on ringer pods this week that you're eager for more time spent in the stepstones in the future. Couldn't be me. Listen, we got, okay, we got Dorn, Martel. I know. The Dorn mentioned was very exciting. And Ricalio or Dune mentioned.

I mean, that's, fuck the crab feeder. That's boring, right? That was, Kragut's crab feeder was a red herring, but were Collier and Dune. It could be really fun. But let's talk about, wait. I just need to read out this line. First of all, I hope you heard in that clip that we just played that Emma Darcy has one of the best voices in the entire world.

Every single line rate, delicious. Their true father will not abandon them now to go carousing through the narrow sea, wagging his sword and winking at his sailors. He knows a sword waggler. gone. But anyway, let's keep going. I thought that was quite rude, honestly. Quite rude. As Lenore

says when he's like, I am a warrior and a knight. And I long for battle. We're popping back over across the narrow sea where we've talked about a lot of what transpires in this sequence. This is where Lena seeks to comfort Raina, their daughter who is holding her egg, who does not have a dragon, this parallel with Amund,

Vassaris. And Laina sits with her child as Allison did. And I thought it was interesting that even though the energy and the vibe in these scenes is quite different, Lina's also championing to her child action. There's more than one way to bind yourself to a dragon, she says. You have a harder road. Bela's dragon was born to her. But if you wish to be a rider, you must claim that right. Like these parents are not, are not counseling passivity, are not counseling waiting for the storm's do you think that would have been more rich and rewarding an exchange if we had seen Lena claim vagar I do just I do indeed as you know this is also where we get that heartbreaking moment where Raina says that Damon ignores her and Lena says he's doing his best

but that's very painful and then she goes to him on the roof how did you feel about this conversation this is some heart-wrenching stuff okay again again again they have a nice little relationship. When she walks up, he scoots over. He fluffs the pillow. Lost the pillow. He gets room for his little bench for her. Like, yeah, like, hey, hey, babe.

Like, come sit on the roof with me. You know, and then he slips into, you know, a more bitter mode about his one. I love his, I love his, like, smirking joke. Did your brother mention that this one also bears a market, but entirely coincidental resemblance to the commander of the city watch. Great shit from Damon. It's so funny. And then she says,

she says, like, that she's not the wife you wanted. He says, Laina. Like, I love that because it's like, it's true, I think, but I also really like you, Lena, so don't say it like that, you know what I mean? It's sort of how I read that. Yeah, and in the context of like a conversation

about with this character who were always trying to assess, well, what does he actually want? It was even more heart-wrenching. We will be back with Lena shortly, but we must now go to the small council where there's a big conflict. New faces to the table we already talked about

or while here. We also have Jasper Wilde. Our new master of laws, Ironrod. Why is he called Iron Rod? You might be wondering, I would just like to read this sentence from fire and blood. At least do.

Lord Wilde's unbending attitudes on matters of law earned him the sober kit. Septin Eustace says, A butt mushroom declares that Ironrod was named for the stiffness of his member, having sired 29 children on four wives before the last died of exhaustion. God's been good. Damn me, indeed. Oh, my God. And he fucked that poor woman to death.

Oh, my God. what we're saying. Iron rod. Welcome to the show. And then Joe, most notably of all. Speaking of woggling sports. Yes. Is at the table. Renira is, of course, there, but had previously been there. Alicent is at the small council table. Everyone's playing with their small balls. And we get, we kind of have three. Renira, most of all. Renira, oh, yeah, constantly playing with the small ball. Like, get that woman a fidget spinner. She's, uh, yeah, Anyway. We had to have three

three different moments in this scene. We have a very quick Blackwood Bracken exchange. They're back. Our favorite feuding families. You were thrilled, as you talked about on Talk to Thrones with the Grover Tully mentioned.

Workable stuff here. Reneira says the brackens in the Blackwoods will use any excuse to spill each other's blood. Now, she saw this firsthand, right? On the marriage door. But also, like, it's this moment where

you're watching as a viewer and you're saying, can anyone in this room spot the parallels here, spot the warning, and maybe apply this to your own situation and heat it? No. And Allison mutters this not at all subtle, of course, when Lionel says, yeah, what Renier is telling me to do, I'll check in with the country folk. I'm going to do that. So nothing is really like couched or shaded about the way that these people feel about each other in that exchange. Then we get some Stepstone's talk. Viseris is all of us, Joe, when he says, will we ever be shut of that blasted place?

I loved this. To trust a Martel is to be disappointed. So good. Is that how you feel about House Martel? To trust a Martel is to be disappointed? For the Tarx at this point in their history, I think it's a reasonable thing to say with Doran, not yet in the fold. Joe, concerning moment here from your guy, Beesbury.

Real problems. Real problems. They've moved on to the stepstones and then he tries to talk about the last thing. It's tough. We've moved on, Lord Beesbury. What does you make of the way that Alicent and Reneer are espousing,

opposing approaches here to how to deal with the stepstones, going back and forth as everybody else looks on and you're like, has it just been like this for 10 years of this room? Well, there's a couple things that play here. First of all, I think part of what Reneer is doing here is being defensive of Damon, right?

you know, because Allison is sort of dumping all of this. This is all Damon's fault. He got us into this. What a mess. And Reneer is like, or alternatively, we don't just win a war and then just fuck off. And, you know, we do, should we try some infrastructure, maybe? Leave some people behind to sort of watch. And I think that again and again, in these three instances, we're about to get to the third,

Reneura is presenting herself as the more, like, with better political acumen and an actual better care. This is in contrast to who she was when Damon took her into the city a couple episodes ago, better care for the people. It's not let them eat cake. It's how about we set them up to succeed and not leave them to fail and tear each other apart? You know, I think it's really interesting. Yeah, absolutely.

And like, obviously they're speaking of the stepstones, but what's really happening is this subtext of their opposing views on leadership and this question of, well, who would actually be a more adept steward for the realm and the people of the realm? And then Allison dismisses everyone. And Reneer is like, I got one more agenda item. Faceras tells everyone to sit. Allison does not. I have felt the strife between our families of late, my queen.

and for any offense given by mine, I apologize. But we are one house. And long before that, we were friends. Okay. It's heartbreaking. I mean, okay, I understand that, like, Reneer does have her back against the wall and is, like, this is a defensive maneuver. But there is genuine, but long before that, we were friends, I think, in her statement there.

That is truly upsetting. She makes this marriage proposition, which, again, like, I think it's an interesting revelation of the lesson she learned from her father about political marriages. Like, she chafed against this, but she's like, you know what? It actually worked out pretty okay, except for this current oopsie scrape we fight ourselves in. I built a little modern family and we're fine. So let's, you know, I have a son, you have a daughter.

Let's join our houses, you know? Yeah, absolutely. the Jace Helena match followed by the offer of an egg for Aymond if that seems slightly that seemed like a misstep to me honestly. You thought it was one degree too far? I feel like that's underlining the fact that Aman is not have a dragon, which is like, all my boys have dragons. Let me. And I don't think Reneer meant it that way, but Allison, who's reading everything in bad faith, I like that. I think she would take it that way.

You know what I mean? I love that. Viseris is delighted. He's so happy that everything is about to be repaired in his mind, how wrong he is. But before we can get to Vissaris and Allison's arguing about this, Allison does not respond to what Reneera says. What does she do? She just says Reneera and looks pointedly at Reneera's nipples.

She's leaking breast milk. What did you make of this moment? Mia Sreen says Allison weaponizing the patriarchy to silence Reneera. She's trying to shame her. And she's using, you know, and like she's using in this room of men, you are leaking, my dear, my God, you know. And you don't know how to be like a woman and a mother out in the world the way I do. So embarrassing, you know. And Renira being like, oh, Seven Hells.

Love that. Love that from Renira. But like something, you know, Aria would say or something like that. I loved it. That was just such a. such a... It was ugly. Such an ugly moment,

yeah, from Allison. There it really was. And when Allison and Vesaris are making their way back to Vesaris's chambers, Kristen right on their heels, Allison says, basically, I'm not here for this, right?

And here's the quote, how sweetly the Fox speaks when it's being cornered by the hound. Now, I think what you just said about Reneira's offer and her efforts to try to repair this are right, and I agree, and she is trying, and not everybody does.

Allison's also right here, though. This is very similar to what we discussed with Corliss and Renice, being able to sniff out Vassaris's desperation when he sailed to Driftmark to High Tide to propose marriage. This has that same overt. I have reached a point where I must try to convince you to align with me again. Allison doesn't feel compelled by that at all. It makes her think I am actually now even more in a position of power than I realized. Well, and I think it also makes her think of like that exchange in the wherewood when Reneura is like,

Sister, how could you possibly think this of me? I swear on my mother's memory that Damon never touched me, you know? And so she's just like, this is more classic shit from Reneira. Yeah. That's a great point. And we see in this, not only this exchange with Viseras on the stairs, where she's like, you can do what you want after I'm fucking in my grave. Like, you will not do what you want while I'm around.

And then also the way that Allison navigates in the next scene, which is when Lionel comes in to speak to Vassaris and attempt to resign and Vassaris won't let him, both in the ways that Allison is attempting to get Linal to say this thing out loud. That would be it. It would be the death knell. Not even if Vassaris could pretend that he didn't hear Linal. The person he's sitting there saying, you're the only one who's ever given me. sage impartial advice,

but also the way she interacts directly with Fasaris, fluff in the pillow, getting his chair set, putting the blanket on him at the beginning of the scene, and then later, after the line all exchange doesn't go the way she wants, she pieces out, and he's like, are you going to help me with my chair?

So this real shift in the way that she's relating to, like, the caregiving aspect of her role and her duty is so fascinating to see here. Right. Fussing over him when, like, more than is necessary, when he's like, I got it, I got it, and she's just still plump. It's infantilizing to him.

Absolutely. Infantilizing to him in front of his hand, right? And then, yeah, and then ditching him when she decides to. I am being enlisted first over, Lionel. That's so funny. I think when she says, when she says we must have your reasoning in plain language, it has to remind us of a Ceres making auto say coupling.

How can it not, you know? Coupling. And the bowels of the proper. And so she's, so she's trying. She's like, well, let's go ahead and hang Lionel with the same, like, rope that hung my father. Let's get him to say some shit about Renira and get him out of here, you know. Especially because they have to all be thinking about Otto, given that Vassaris is like,

uh, no, everybody else, your only your advice has been unmarked by self-interest with stands in contrast to all others, aka Otto, her father. So he's very top of mind for everybody there. Is there anything else you want to say about the Lionel? of that scene before we move to his son and eventual murderer, Laris? So, like, the question here is,

is Lionel the only character who actually cares about the realm? And, like, because he's he cares a lot about what it looks like. Like, constantly his advice has seemed unmarked by self-interest. And here he is concerned about what it will look like if he,

the hand of the king, is compromised and all this sort of stuff like that. And I think he is thinking of the larger. This is not really who Lionel Strong is in the book. And I think that they've just given this to us, this idea of an honorable man unmarked by self-interest. It seems to be who he is until he dies, right? And I don't know, reminds me of Ned Stark a little bit.

That's interesting. Because, I mean, I think you could say, though, that even in this conversation about how he's the only character unmarked by self-interest, he's showing self-interest by not actually saying this is what I'm talking about. Like he doesn't speak it aloud. He does protect his child.

A ceiling on it, which is not putting his son's head directly in the noose. You know what I mean? Laris is there for that. Speaking up. All right, so this Laris Allison scene is super interesting,

not just because Laris is so incredibly interesting, but the intimacy between that, right? She takes, he's already started eating before she got there. Can you imagine? She's the queen.

He's already started before she got there. She takes her shoes off. Such a sign of the kind of intimacy you build with someone if they're in your life in that way every day. Yeah. I do not think they are coupling. No. But there is another kind of intimacy there. You know what I mean? That is

very interesting. And we learn that Laris has in essence been like a master of whispers for her feeding her this information. And he flips that there. in a way that's sincere, I don't know what you're about to tell me, maybe in a way that just makes her feel like she has the power in that moment. Tell me what you know that I don't.

But we get this discussion of Harwin's transgressions. Lionel's attempted resignation. And it builds toward Allison's longing for Otto's return. And inside of this exchange, she shows this real like vulnerability and humanity that I think is absolutely essential. for us to get with her in this episode. This is still a person who just wants other people to believe her, to align with her, to want to help her get the thing that she wants and somebody else doesn't. Because Lara says, you cannot say, my queen, that your father would be impartial on this matter. Bangs her hands on the table.

No, but he would be impartial to me in all of King's Landing. Is there no one to take my side? I feel like she's not seeing the picture clearly. And she's not seeing how much she does get her own way, you know, and this reads very childish, childish to me. He would be impartial to me is very human, but it's also she says it in a, kudos to Olivia Cook. It's a petulantrum type delivery. I do want to shout out, there's this character who walks into this scene, Talia, who was in the earlier scene when the baby first came into Allison's room. And you and I both were like, what's up with Talia, yo?

Like, why is there so much, like, I feel like we're being directed to notice this woman. The way that Lara stops speaking and looks so pointedly, like, some of that is his care, but it does draw attention to the person walking in the room. Yeah, and she's also just, like, seems very, like, ostentatiously there in the first scene as well. We should note that this, the woman playing Talia is Miguel Sapashnik's wife. So it might just be that his camera loves her the way that many husband's cameras love their wives. But I'm just, I got my eye on Talia.

Talia. Talia, watch. What are you up to, Talia? What are you up to? What's Laris up to? What we find out? Because he goes down to the dungeon to recruit three prisoners

to murder his father and brother. We zoom in on this emblem on his cane. We see it later on the lapels of the men he sends on this question. I thought initially that it was a bee because there was a bee. Yeah, the fire and blood, the line about the words dripped from his lips like honey from a comb. But the HBO, the official HBO guide, labels it as a firefly. So is this Laris like crafting his own sigil?

What do you make of this? It feels very Peter Bailish and the mockingbird of him, right? And there's so many little finger comps between him. Again, we talked with Chris about this. It's a little frustrating that we don't get any scenes between Laris and Lionel. like we're there, so we don't understand their dynamic at all. And we only got one sequence between Laris and Harwin. But it's possible in seeing this and him fashioning maybe his own sigil here,

his rejection of How Strong of Heron Hell, like that he might have had some sort of upbringing that he chooses to not be associated with. And despite the fact that How Strong is like a very, you know, high, powerful historyed family, Lord of Heron Hall is like a high honor. So it's different that Bayliss who is like a self-made man making his own sigil. It still speaks to me as sort of like a re-invent, a rebranding. I'm rebranding myself away from my dad and my brother out of the shadow into this new thing. Yeah, I think that's right.

I was going to talk about the point you just made about the relationship with his father and brother a little later when we learn what he has done. But like since you mentioned here, I just think that that's, I'm having a hard time with that. Because last week we saw, and again, last week was 10 years ago, but we see Harwin and Laris at the welcome wedding feast together, like whispering to each other about the beacon of House High Tower and what it means that Allison's wearing this dress. And then the next thing that is happening is he's killing that brother seemingly without any kind of internal conflict over it. And like, Kinsling is a gigantic, and we'll talk about Allison's response to this later, but Kinsling is a gigantic. gigantic consequential thing. And to understand how that character would be capable of doing that or what it would mean to him. Like, was that even a hard decision for him to make?

It doesn't seem like it. I really think we need more time there. I thought the performance was great. And the line reading of the speech at the end is, like, incredible and gave me chills. But I really need to understand the way that Laris thinks about these people in his lives and how he feels about the future he's trying to craft to be able to accept that. he just burned his own father and brother alive. Wild stuff.

Otherwise, we'll talk about when we get to that later. He was always one of the candidates. Can you explain for folks his, you know, Chris asked us about the Sontaka Thorns, like, how is he able to just make his way down there and his role as a confessor? Yeah, there's this role in George R. Martin's. I actually don't know if this is the historical term as well. But the king's confessors, which are the torturers, essentially. They're there to extract information.

from prisoners. So this is, he is one of, when Harwin's strong in the book, at least, when, sorry, when Lionel Strong in the book becomes Hand of the King, he makes Laris one of the king's confessors. So Harwin, Harwin has established as the head of the city watch. You know, so in the book, I really feel like Lionel is a little bit more of an operator, positions his son as the head of the city watch and his other son is like one of the king's confessors. It doesn't really what this Lionel, like, you know, the show version of Lionel doesn't read that way, but it's still, this is what Laris does. It cuts people's tongues out for a living.

This is a whole thing. Yeah. Oh, my God. If I were going to the trouble of cutting out tongues so that people didn't tell them what I had asked them to do, I would not show them my face and then put my new Firefly emblem on their shirts, but that's just me. So. Joe, before we actually say goodbye to.

Harwin and Lionel, though, we say goodbye to Lena. We go back to Pentos and we lose Lena. Take us through this. So we had an email from a listener, Ashley, and a number of people wrote in about Lena, but Ashley wrote in, you know, we've voiced this a couple times on this episode. I still don't understand why it seems like we're flying through these characters' lives at breakneck speed. The show has proven it can be thoughtfully, it can thoughtfully build out parts of the story that were scarce in the book, and I just wish they had continued to do that. Losing Harwin and Lena, this episode is obviously sad, but it didn't hit as hard as it would have if I'd gotten to get to know them better or see any glimpses of how they ended up with their partners.

It's not that I didn't catch the context clues leading up to this episode, the grin at the hunt, the compliments of the wedding, et cetera. But picking up on a clue that people may end up together isn't the same as giving us an emotional investment in those characters.

Ashley went on in this email, and we got a bunch of emails about this, about this accelerated pace thing is so interesting because wasn't that one of the strongest critiques we leveled at the end of Game of Thrones? A rush to the finish line. So why are we running?

rushing here. Again, I have a book spoiler guess on that, but I think it's worth questioning. But, you know, basically, we really wish we had spent more time with Lena. We've already mentioned the claim of Vagar, but, like, more importantly, and you mentioned this on Talk the Thrones, like her relationship with Reneira, that they were close friends. For this to not be in the show at all is like really a huge bummer. That Reneer is devastated when she dies, that she's by her bedside with demon when she, you know, when she goes into labor, all this sort of stuff. So it is a, it feels like a big miss, especially when we are absent a lot of female friendships in this story to miss out on this one.

I strongly, strongly, strongly agree. I really wish we'd gotten all of that with Lena and Renira with Lena and Vega, with Lena and Damon, all of it. the actual childbirth scene and Lena's death, we had that line earlier in the episode where Lena said that she wanted to die a dragon rider's death. And we see that unfold here.

We also see that Damon receives, in essence, the same offer from the doctor that Viseris got and Viseric makes the decision in episode one with Emma. what is your read on Damon's response here? Because we don't hear him definitively say one way or another. We sort of get a little shake of the head.

How do you read Damon's response to that moment? And then, of course, the decision that Lena makes. It's tough. I think with all things Damon, we're supposed to feel ambiguous about it, I literally just rewatched it while you were describing it. And it really does look to me like he's making a different decision than Vassaris does. but what's most important here is that in the end, Lena gets to make her own decision, do you know?

And she decides she has the agency. But it does seem that he's set up to make a different choice here. That's my read on it too, that he is primed to make a different choice. I've seen a lot of people read it differently. Yeah. It's definitely open to interpretation. But like you said, the crucial thing is she's not going to wait to find out. And she goes out to Vagar.

and that moment, too, where we can feel the depth of the bond between Lena and Vagar, between Rider and Dragon, where she is begging, begging, begging, Jukaris, Jukaris, Jukaris. And Vagar, of course, does not want to do this thing. That was just so, so, so heart-wrenching to watch. And in the book, In Fire and Blood, the baby is born, malformed, and dies. And Lena is gravely ill for three days and try. to go reach Vagar to fly one more time and can't and dies on a staircase where Damon finds her. So it plays out a little bit differently in the book.

It does. And I think, again, I really wish that we had had more time with Lena to build up to this moment. Because I think from a technical point of view, the play of expression on Vagar's dragon face is like the most expressive, like more even. than anything we ever saw from Drogan, I think this is the most expressive dragon moment that we ever have had. And so I really would have loved to have felt it's tragic and upsetting, but I would have loved to have felt it even more knowing their bond. Of course, we're thinking about Jace and Vermax and the lesson that he gets at the beginning of this episode and what the dragonkeepers say to Jace about a dragon obeying your command. And so then when we get

Vagar's reluctance here, you know, to not immediately Dracar, you know, is, you know, it's deeply upsetting. Heart wrenching. Back in Kings Landing, we get a farewell. Before we actually get to Harrod Hall and get to the fire, Joe, we have this farewell with Harwin and Reneera and their sons. They cannot properly say goodbye. Reneera and Harwin can't even have this private moment. It speaks again to all the ways in which Reneer is restricted from being her true self. They don't get to say goodbye.

We never see these two kiss. We know that they loved each other, though, and that they loved their family and that he loves those boys. And it's just so tough. Jace running out into the hall, Jace asking if Harwin is his dad. And I loved her, I think her response here when she doesn't say no, but she says you're a Targaryen and that's all that matters. Again, I think that goes back to what I was saying earlier about like, what does it mean to be a Targaryen? She's like, you are a Targaryian, right? But also to go back to what you said earlier, it's like kind of reckless and like there's

real hubris at play there. You're a Targaryen, that's all that matters? Yeah. So you get to do it. That's interesting. Yeah. Were you like not the Ned Stark promise when Arwen promised me? He's like, oh no.

Never say I promise. Talk about your mother. Talk about your mother when I returned. Oh, God. The way that, like, Jase is looking up at them as Harwin and Reneira, as Harwin is saying goodbye to Jophe and touching Rennar's arm. These little boys, Jason Luke, are so cute.

Precious. They are cute little children. Absolutely precious. They seem very sweet. Very sweet. After this, Rineer goes to find Lina in the yard and it's like, actually what you said about the storm, that's right, we're doing that.

Let's bounce. It's time to go to Dragon's, we need to get out of here. Interestingly, in Fire and Blood, they go to Dragonstone after Luke, not after Joff. And Harwin goes with them. So that would have been a way to spend more time together.

Alas! Alas! And Renira kind of builds this bridge back to Lanor by using the logic that he shared and then also saying, right of Carl, bring them. So off they go. And in our closing stretch of this episode, we get the fire of Harren Hall, the mystery from fire and blood revealed.

As you outlined on Talk the Thrones, there had been numerous different candidates. Was it just, was it an accident? Was it the curse of Harrenhal? Was it Damon? Was it Laris? Was it Fissaris? There are all sorts of possibilities we don't know. So the Laris confirmation is huge.

And as Laris is speaking, the quote we opened the episode with this great and kind of haunting speech about children and the mistakes that we make in life. We cut, we'll talk about the conversation between Allison and Laris, of course, but we also cut to all of these different scenes and all of these different character sets. We see that arrival on Dragonstone, Renera and Lanor and Jace and Luke and Jaff and Carl and their household arriving right against the water children, but a weakness line, very ominous. We see in Kings Landing, Vesaris weeping as he is looking down at Emma's ring that he still wears on his finger. The rat, Joe, not only is the rat back crawling across the mantle, but Vesaris looks at the rat and notices the rat.

Our attention is really being drawn to the rat, which we need to talk about. We see on Pentos, Damon, walking away from Bela and Raina up on the roof. There's a glimpse of him hugging them and embracing them in the House the Dragons film. Behind the scenes. feature it, like put that in the episode. But they cut that. Oh, my God. And then, of course, the charred bodies and the chaos at Harenhall. So we're being reminded that this warning from Laris, this message,

cements, like, what a harbinger this is for everybody in the story. What did you make of the rat? Okay. Like, hopefully everyone's listening week to week. But if you're not and you didn't listen to us talk about the Laris theory last week. Go check it out. Yeah, go listen to it, but Mallory and I just, like, flipped out when we saw this rat. Basically, there's this great theory by our pal Matt, who poses Joe magician, that Laris is a

green seer, can see through the wearwood, the way that Brand could, and can also warg into things and maybe is working into rats, and maybe that's why we're seeing rats everywhere. But, oh, my God, this rat in this episode was like, I mean, okay, but we're going to, we're going to, again, hold these theories loosely and be ready to let them go and we need to, because, like, there's another read on this. The rat is just the decay, the rot, the, you know, gnawing at the center of this realm,

and Viceris is forced to confront, you know, sort of what he has the, you know, the rot at the center of his kingdom and his crown and all of that. That's there too. Absolutely. Absolutely. Lair's speech, like, let's like quickly kind of

annotate this and parse this because it's such a rich text. What are children but a weakness of folly of futility through them? You imagine you cheat the great darkness of its victory. This is Taiwan's famous legacy speech, basically inverted. This is also, of course, a connection to Vassaris, who pursued his dream, that dragon dream at such great cost. He says you persist forever in some form or another, as if they would keep you from the dust. Before them, you surrender what you.

you should not. You may know what is the right thing to be done, but love stays the hand. Love is a downfall. Take that, Loki. Love's not a dagger. It's a downfall. I guess those ideas are. This is that Amen. Love is the death of duty idea, but like really highly weaponized and warped here. And then later, the queen makes her wish what servant of the realm would not strive to fulfill it. The realm Joe, the characters who talk about the realm and protecting the realm, who does that make you think of? Farrison Littlefinger, obviously. But I think...

But like, it's... I mean, I would have to go rewatch E.M. Thrones again, even though we just did it. I think it was very... It was pretty rare on Thrones for there to be a speech laid over a montage checking in on different characters.

That wasn't a regular incident. Chaos is a ladder is one of them, though. So we get that. little finger comes again. But the most famous one, I think, is the climb speech. And the way the climb speech starts is Littlefinger saying, the realm. Do you know what the realm is? It's a thousand blagues of Aegon's enemies. The story we're going to, you know, and how does Laird start here? What are children? But a weakness, a folly, a futility. So it's a very clear line that they're drawing between those two. The queen makes her wish whatsoever in the realm would not strive

to fulfill it is what he says when Allison's like, Dear me, I never thought you would burn your brother and your father. How could you? But many people have pointed out, many, many people have pointed out this historical comp, which is Henry 2 who said

either, well, no one rid me of this turbulent priest or this meddlesome priest speaking of. And that his knights enacted that for him and then him to be like, oh, I didn't mean what? How could what? That's not what I meant.

So you think this is like a convenient faux horror in the face of this or? I think she's, she is genuinely sincerely shocked. But again, I think it is delusional. I think she buys into her own delusion because like what did she think, what kind of fire did she think she was playing with here? They've been having dinner together every night for 10 years, as far as we know. Like, how shocked can you be by what somebody is capable of? Yeah.

But the sanctity, again, the righteousness of her mission being, having that called so forcefully into question with an action like this is what she's really grappling with. The other interesting historical comp is Margaret Bufort, who is, was the mother of Henry Tudor and is one of the people suspected of killing the princes in the towers. The main suspect is Richard III. but there's this idea that maybe Margaret Bufort in order to put forth her child's claim, but she was an extremely religious woman, so would not be able to sort of speak directly to her want or desire for this,

but through sideways wishes and whatever, you know, arranged for this to happen. So Allison is horrified, but genuinely like, clutch those pearls harder, babe, I don't believe you really fully at your core. So. Laris just playing with what we believe to be like a clipping from the plant in the godswood that he used to talk about their respective status as outsiders and thriving when they shouldn't. And just playing with that and fingering it as he's like, I feel certain you'll reward me when the time is right. I mean, freezing. Yeah.

Tell me. He's fingering her flower. Oh, my God. All right. Let's do the episode awards. It's time to make the end. Big watch. Best wig, worst wig, Joe.

What do you got? Best, you know what I actually really loved? I'm going to give Allison something in this episode. I loved Allison's wig. It goes all the way down to her waist. We see a lot of really bad blonde wigs. I just want to shout out a good brunette wig that we get in this episode. Worst wig.

And I think it's on purpose is Agon's insane. Absolutely insane wig. And I think it's just to like super, super, super highlight his blonde targiness. What do you think? I love that. that it that's agon is my runner up i'm going with for best the day the new damon halfback i thought i'd really miss the short hair oh yeah this is working for me i love it you called it you call it silky you loved it worse and i feel bad for piling on but i'm sorry it's and again it's intentional

to make him look so so elderly and enfeebled but it's vizaris's like wilting head wisps i just Oh my God. Fitwatch. Best worst. Okay. I'm going to give, I'm going to give because he died in this episode, I just want to give Harwin, you know, in his gold cloak uniform, I thought he looked very dashing. His curls were amazing. That wasn't a wig. That's his hair. I think he looked incredible. Very, very hunky. My friend Jenny texted me. She's like, where all the hunks now? Kristen calls an asshole and Harwin's dead. The show is hunkless. It's a great note. Oh, man. I don't, I don't wear, whither the humps. I don't know.

Worst, I hope we have the same one. It is going to Vassaris's flapping sleeve. Just like give it up, man, and pin that sleeve up. What do you think? So this is true. I had that and then I was like,

I'm being too mean to Vassaris. I have to change it. For best, I'm going with Damon's like open reading leisure frock. Oh, looks great. That was wonderful. The sleeve was my pick for worse. And then I switched to,

While I like the Firefly and I like the symbolic resonance of crafting his own identity for Laris, you can't put your personal emblem on your murder crew. What are you doing? I just, I have to dock your points for that.

I'm sorry. Careless, reckless. Wait, wait, hold on. Really quickly, I have to read what our friend Matt Joe magician message me about that. Sorry. He says,

you cut these guys' tongues out so they can't tell anyone who they work for, but then give an ID card saying works that clubfoot industries. Exactly. Yeah. It's a bad move. It's baffling. It's absolutely befuddling. My goodness.

Number three. They got bigger and bigger. Best bit of Dragon Dumb. I know. It should go to Vagar, but I'm going to give it to the pink dread. Oh, okay. I respect that. Yeah.

Yeah, that's great. Great choice. The little wings. I'm going with our first glimpse of Agar. Not just the sheer size, but the way that we saw the ripples of the air currents to, like, reinforce that heft was just amazing. Incredible. The doctrine of exceptionally weird sex stuff. To me, this is not only easy, but I wonder if this pick will carry the championship belt for the rest of the season.

What do you have here? I feel like I'm missing something really important. It's the Roman Roy. I mean, this was just this whole sequence. Like, you have a different pick here? Yeah, it's me thinking about whether or not Alison still doing her queenly duties. Yeah. Yeah.

Because that's still happening. I have some questions about that too. Okay. That's a good one. If this show had Netflix subtitles. Are you doing another Roman Roy here? No. We have to give it to the folie.

I think we have to give it to the folio. at the beginning of the episode. Yeah. And so I wrote Joff, gushes forth slickly. Oh, I love that. I went with afterbirth squelches rapidly. Great.

Tell me. We were aligned there. That's great stuff. Archmester Ebro's can never. Best quote, tough one. There were so many great ones in this episode. What's your pick here?

I don't know if this is a good one. Just like now every time they say mummers, what should they say in like every single episode? And I think of Chris. So Lena talking about what they're not. She says, we are not minstrels or mummers who play at the pleasure of an alien prince. Is there a mummer reference in every episode? I'm going to start mummer watch. I'm on it.

We should keep tracking not only the rats, but the bummer callouts. It's great. Yeah. Normally I go with a line that is like, yo, this is so poetic. Oh, my God, so lyrical. That's not what I'm doing this week. this just killed me the way that if Sarah says he's watching the training and he's like this is the stuff line all lads that learn together train together knock each other down pick

each other up they will certainly form a lifelong bond wouldn't you agree absolutely killed me oh my god i just loved it so much it was perfect it was perfect. Oh my God. God. Run her up for the David line you read earlier. We moved on to the stepstones, Lord Beesbury. Oh my God. That was also really good. Beesbury. Tough one for Beesbury. Okay.

Joe's most reliable narrator tracker. Any keen insights this week? We will have an official updated tally for you next week, I promise, but I have COVID, so I'm doing my best. But the line, keep trying. you know, so Lanor eventually will get one that looks like you is, is a mushroom report from the book. So he nailed it word for word this week, Mushroom. Mushroom officially has a writing credit on the show after this, yeah.

Yeah. It's big. Yeah. So Mushroom gets a point this week, but I'll have a full tally for you next week because there was a lot going on this week in terms of. And it's, it's, I don't know, it's really interesting. Anyway, who won the episode, right? Yeah. Who got?

Allison, fucking hi. Tower. Yeah. Sorry. Agreed. Yeah. Easy call. I don't like to give her the win, but she won.

Easy call. Is it time for our moment of mourning here, our death send off? It's time to say goodbye. Joe. Steve. Give us the Dracaris for Lena Valerian and her babe. Dracaris. Oh, my God.

Might have noticed a change there. Wow. I should have guessed when he said we had a surprise coming. Joe looks delighted right now. Delighted. Oh, my God. Steve. That is in fact Joanna Robinson.

It's amazing. It sounded like me that's terrifying. Can I hear it again? You're about to, yeah. Steve, give us the Drakaris for Harwin Strong and give us the Drakaris for Lionel Strong. How strong here? Double Drakaris. Drakaris.

Drakaris. Oh my God. Mallory, now I understand. That's great. Now I understand Mallory. I'm sorry. Oh, my God, I'm crying. Beautiful.

Thank you, Steve. What a beautiful gift. This is why Steve's undefeated, a one of one. Beautiful. As we're about to be reminded of with another sound cue because it's time for faceless man watch. That gets me every time. Just unbelievable. Every time.

Joe, who's your pick? Who might be a faceless man in this episode? Oh, my God. It's so fucking easy for me this week. God damn Talia. Talia watched 2022. Oh, yeah. That's the right pick. I'm annoyed that I didn't pick that.

Tali, what's your deal? What are you doing? Hear me out for a second. Viseras. Because what other explanation do we have for him continuing to exist? I'm serious. I'm serious. Oh, my God.

If someone took his face and his. He said his corpse is actually a corpse as it should be, and a faceless man is just impersonating the king. It would explain a lot. I feel like soon, if parts of him keep falling off pretty soon, Ceres will be faceless. Okay, here's your warning if you do not want to hear about future events from the text, fire and blood.

It's been real. Thanks for hanging. See you next week. If you do, it's time for our book. Look ahead. It's time for a dance of dragon dreams. Okay. Let's do it. We have something to say about basically every new kiddo in the mix here. Start with Agon too. And the you are the challenge line. This was so interesting in this moment for a couple reasons. One, it's like, you are the challenge, you are the challenge because I will make you the challenge. And Kristen will make you the challenge when we crown you and keep Viseris's death secret for days so that we can prepare your coronation as Reneera is on Dragonstone. That's what I was hearing. Right, because he's like, well, then I just won't.

And like I can see us getting a scene because Chris, so like we said before, people definitely listen to this section without having read the books. So if you are not aware, Kristen gets, you know, this name of Kingmaker because he's the one who basically forces Agon. I don't know, we'll see how it plays out in the show. But essentially there's a version in which Kristen forces Agon to take the crown here or persuades him, whoever he decides to do that. I think we saw some of that foreshadowing in the, in the turning yard, in the fighting yard.

Like that is like Kristen pushing him, pushing him, pushing him, Kristen Kingmaker. It was important to get that little bit of reluctance from Agon to set that up if it does go that way in the show too, for sure. I'm going to miss Ty Tenant. I think we only get one more episode with the kids this age. I know. And then we're going to get new kids. I'm sure the new kiss will be great, but Ty is so good. Phenomenal.

All the kids have been great in this episode. Speaking of, Amon needs a dragon, Joe. Now, the teaser for next week leans in heavily to Vagar. So even if you haven't read Fire and Blood, you're probably like something interesting is going to happen with Vagar. I wonder if it has anything to do with the character they keep saying needs a dragon. It does. We're setting the stage heavily here, of course, for the other thing that's teasing this episode,

which is not only Amon claiming Vagar, but the eye for an eye sequence. Luke and Amon's fight, Luke cutting out Amon's eye, the challenge. I mean, this was so central in the trailers before the show even launched.

The dagger, that moment with Ranira and Alicent, how they see you as you truly are. We're going to get all of that next week. Something I think that's really interesting in the trailer for next week, and I really apologize because I should be able to tell them apart.

I can tell them apart when they're sitting next to each other because one is much taller. But it's either Baylor or Raina, maybe Raina, who wakes the boys and says, you know, that someone's going after Vagar or whatever. And I like that because that it makes it more personal. I always was like, why do the boys, why do the strong boys, I'm calling him a strong voice, you know, put my head on a pike if you want, Vassaris. But like, why does strong boys care so much? much that Amen is doing this. But if it's like the girls who care about their mom's dragon, like that could make it more personal and more, you know, poignant and more urgent, urgent that the boys get involved,

you know. Also, we see when we see Lena riding Vagar in this episode, we see all these ropes dangling off of Vagar. And I think that that will just make it easier for a tiny boy to climb up on a dragon if there's a bunch of convenient ropes there dangling. Reneer of Fashion Watch. What do you have here? Oh, so, you know, Allison's firmly in the green. She's dressing her boys in green.

Like, you know, like a Pinterest girl who's just found her color. And, you know. Oh, God. But Reneer is not in black. She's not, so we don't have the blacks and the greens. We have the greens and Reneer is like, what are we doing here? I don't know. I'm just trying to live my life and have my children.

I don't know. We see her in like, she's still wearing the golds and the creams and all this sort of stuff. And I wonder if the black will come later for her as like a color of mourning, either for Vassaris or maybe for Luke. You know what I mean? If the black that she wears will be tied to someone she's lost. It could be. It could even be for Lainer. which I guess we can just hit that one now.

A lot of death coming her way. We're going to have some regret about the Lainor Bring Him. We'll need every sword we can muster Carl plan because Carl is going to kill Lainor. Very tough. Joe, there's a shot in the teaser for next episode where a cloaked figure looks out at ships. Is this for you? Again, we have not seen the episode. We sincerely don't know.

But as is often the case, there's some demon-centric speculation around the Carl murder. he have orchestrated this to get Lanor out of the picture, et cetera? There's a sequence about, you know, getting him on a ship, et cetera, whether he makes it off the ship alive. Is that just Damon? His murder cloak. If I had to guess, I'm not sure. But if I had to guess, I would say that's Damon and his murder cloak in Spice Town,

ready to kill Carl. That's what I would guess. But I don't know. I mean, I always assumed that in the book, you know, Lena's dead. David, Damon wants Rainerah. He gets Lainer out of the way. He pays Carl to kill Lainor, and then he kills Carl to cover up the crime.

That's what I assume happened, but we'll see. This is going to be tough. This is going to be very, very, very tough for our guy, Damon Targaryen. Reneira, Alliance Watch. Yeah. So she's dragging herself up the stairs. This man stops and says,

if I could be in any service, and she says the day may yet, Come, my lord. That's Lord Caswell. And HBO gave him a first name, Lord Alan Caswell. But House Caswell is on Rainer's side. So I thought that was like a nice little, well, at least she made one friend on her way through the kingdom as she alienates Lannisters and Baratheans. At least she spared a smile for Lord Caswell in this moment.

I love that. I also thought that line delivery on the day may yet come, my lord was so perfect. And like, kind of implies that this person has been totally useless. To this point, the day, may you come? It was amazing. It made me a chuckle. Yeah. I think Emma is really funny.

Yeah, that was great. Future dragons teased. We talked already about the dragons we met, the dragons who we didn't see, but were either named or alluded to. There's more even beyond that. So Jaff receives an egg here. This will become Tyraxies. Raina.

So Bela has, again, not named, but moon dancer. Raina will ride morning. Do you think that the off, do you think that this egg will eventually? hatch? Or is this egg going to remain petrified? And the offer that Reneira made, if Syrax brings forth another clutch of eggs, Amid can have one. Do you think that's a new Syrac's egg will go to Raina? Morning just doesn't hatch for so long from now, though it's hard to tell with time jumps. I like the idea of her just toting this egg around forever. And everyone just being like,

give it up, baby, that one is never going to go. And then morning comes out. And morning is not a very large dragon, but, you know, morning exists. The next question is, like, is Helena already flying Dreamfire at this point? She's not at the pit training. I like to think she is only because otherwise wouldn't they say something to Amund, like you're not the only one who doesn't have a dragon. Yeah, your sister doesn't have one either. Your weird bug sister doesn't have one either.

I think so, but then why wasn't she at the training session at the pit with the rest of them. Because she's so weird. I don't know. I like her. I'm very protective of her, but like, I can see her having separate training them from the boys. Well, you hinted. I mean, this gets us to our next thing, which is Helena, Dragon Dreamer question mark, except not really a question mark. This seems clear, right? It's a huge moment for book readers, so we can't say anything because what she says, Allison says, you all the dragon one day, I know it. And Helena says he'll have to close an eye. We text each other immediately about this. like it's huge.

This is big and wild and prophesizing exactly what will happen when Eamon. To Eamon, because Aymn will lose an eye. Right. But we can't say that yet in the non-book section. We couldn't tell Chris that. So we were just sort of like, ugh. But then she says,

then Helena says the last ring has no legs at all. And I think people have had like, this is also, I mean, the Luna Love Good thing. Just like, she's very Luna-e, but like I think she's just going to keep saying things that we're like, what the fuck does that mean? And then later we're going to be like, oh, remember when Elena said that? So the last ring has no legs at all. I don't know what that means.

Real Maggie, the frog energy. I'd love to parse a riddle and a prophecy and try to figure out what it might mean. This is going to be so fun for us. My hope is that when we get the I thing next week, we can just then say this in the main section of the pod. And then every time Helena says something in the future, we can talk about what it might mean unless it's something that we know what it might mean. it has to go here. Anyway, we'll see. Speaking of Allison and Vassaris's kids, where is Darren?

They're just missing a kid on the show. This is so strange to me. Is their third son and fourth child in the story still? Are they writing Darren out of the show? He's supposed to be Jace's age. They're supposed to be raised as Milk Brothers, but he can't be out of the story. It has to be in the story. It plays a huge role, right?

There's a number of reasons why Darren has to be. story, but like, from a, like, optics perspective, I will say is, like, a gay character that we really care about, like, I really feel like they cannot cut Darren out of this story. It has to be in the show. I feel very strong. So, yeah, like, a theory that people have is that he's already in Old Town, which is where he gets sent in fire and blood. And maybe they just won't cast him until next season, you know. Can we get a quick mention of him then to confirm that?

like mention they have another child. I hope next week they're like, wow, if only Darren could, he loves a funeral. Our Darren wish she were here. Well, we see Otto teased for next week. So if Otto's back in the mix as soon as next week,

maybe he can say, I hope Otto comes back and Allison's like, where's Darren? Why didn't you bring my other child with you? Oh, I left with Hobart. I want to say on the like, Damon Targaryen comma Targaryen scholar front.

I think all the images we've seen of the Damon Renier our wedding are super interesting because like it appears that they do like a they do hand fasting which is not that odd though I don't think we've seen it a ton

and maybe Marjorie and Tomon got hand fasted and I can't remember but like they do hand fasting tying their hands together. They have also gushing blood out of their hands as they tie their hands together and plus they're wear I feel like they're going to have like a super weird targy wedding, like a really like old targ ritual or something like that.

And I'm just curious how far Damon's targ history obsession is going to go. You think they're going to fuck on a dragon? Wouldn't you? Just asking. Just asking the questions. I'm saying, wouldn't you? Like, if you could, would you not? I don't know.

It seems perilous. I will say that, which I guess brings us to another thing that we should note here in the book section, which is sweet little baby Joffrey's fate. When you mentioned, you know, the Dragon Keeper lied to Jace, like inside of this episode, what that primes us for. But of course, we also can't help but think

when we hear you must hold mastery over your dragon. My young princess, Prince Agon has with Sunfire. Once they're fully bound to you, they will refuse to take instruction from any other. We can't not think about what that foreshadows for Joffrey, who will attempt to ride Syrax, who is, of course, Reneiros Dragon.

And we'll be thrown from Syrax's back to his death. Tough one. Over King's Landing. Yeah. His own sword through his belly, rough. All these children are going to die, by the way. Like, all of them. A lot of death coming our way.

Horrible. Before they die, they're all going to marry each other, though? Because this Jason Elena offer, well, it's not going to be that, but Jace will be betrothed to Bela and Luke. Terena and Agon and Helena. Stop us if you've heard this before. Targary and siblings will marry each other. And it's going to go fine.

It's going to be fine. They will live happily ever after. Oh, my God. Anything else you wanted to mention in the book section? I mean, we've talked in past pods about how the triarchy does come back into play as a future ally for Otto against Damon and Corlis during the dance. Anything else that you wanted to know? I can't think of anything. I'm just going to stay on vigilant on Talia Watch.

I don't really understand why she's here. I have a lot of questions. And then Laris, just ever, just ever Laris switching sides and doing what he likes. So, I mean, I guess the point is, the question we shouldn't be asking is, like, we're so confused. Didn't Laris like his brother? How could he kill him? question is like, does Lairis like anyone? Has that Lairns ever liked anyone?

You know what I mean? Or does he not understand what that means? We'd love to spend more time with him and find out. I have to say, we all know that I have a soft spot for Beesbury. I feel... You love Beesbury. You love the Bees. Please with the Bees.

I'm really sad that he is losing it because that means when he is killed... Like, if Christy... does kill him, which I feel confident he will. And let's say he bashes his head in with the ball or whatever. Like, that's Kristen murdering a senile old man. It's terrible. Like, be in the face off a young gay man and he's about to like murder an elderly senile man.

Oh, my God. Brutal. Bring us some unproblematic hunks. We demand it. Beesbury, man. We need someone. We need people. Beesbury to stay strong, man.

We need someone to challenge fucking iron rod. And is anyone who doesn't want to go through with this coronation is going to be killed for treason? Poor bees. Well, I feel like Beesbury might be like, wait, are we talking about Queen Renaira? And they'll be like, we moved on to King Hagan. We've moved on. Beesbury. All right.

I think we did pretty well. Oh, my God. I'm considering I have COVID. I think we're in. absolutely fucking legend. What a champion and what a trooper. Oh my God. This was so fun.

All right. A queen among women. We're being endlessly fussed over, Joe. It's a wonder we could have been sent the privy alone. But somehow we did manage to wrap today's episode. So thank you as always to our dragon lord, Steve Allman, for producing this episode. Arjuna Ram Gapal for his additional production work on this episode. and join me a denner on for his work on the social for this episode.

Remember, send us your emails at hobbits and dragons at gmail.com. We will see you again on Friday for our Rings of Power, episode six, deep dive. I'm so excited. And then again, on Sunday night immediately after Hot D, episode seven for Talk the Thrones. The Midnight Boys will be with you tomorrow. Poo, phew for Andor, episode four. Until then, remember the wise sailor flea. The pod as it gathers.

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