House of the Dragon Season 2 Episode 8 Review: The Finale That Never Was

This article contains spoilers for House of the Dragon season 2 episode 8.

A line of dialogue near the end of the House of the Dragon season 2 finale betrays that the show has gotten a little too high on its own supply.

In what amounts to the climactic moment of the episode, if not the entire series thus far, two former childhood friends and current queens have a simple discussion in a candle-lit chamber on Dragonstone. Alicent (Olivia Cooke) has had enough of this war and she has a proposal to her rival Rhaenyra (Emma D’Arcy) to end all of the death and destruction. Alicent and her daughter Helaena (Phia Saban) will simply depart King’s Landing and leave the Red Keep door open behind them so Rhaenyra’s forces can swoop in, occupy the Iron Throne, and declare victory. Naturally Alicent’s eldest son King Aegon II (Tom Glynn-Carney) will have to beheaded in the process to lend legitimacy to Rhaenyra’s claim. Alicent consents.

“History will paint you a villain: a cold queen grasping for power and then defeated,” Rhaenyra says.
“Let them think what they must. I am at last myself with no ambition greater than to walk where I please and to breathe the open air. To die unremarked, unnoticed, and be free,” Alicent says.

It’s not strange that the highborn characters of House of the Dragon would care about their legacy. In the world of Game of Thrones, legacy is pretty much all they have. The best fate any king, queen, lord, or lady can hope for is to live on as a legend in a pretty song the smallfolk sing. With Rhaenyra and Alicent’s exchange, however, House of the Dragon lets slip that it too is fixated on its own legacy as an interpretative adaptation of George R.R. Martin’s work.

You may have heard by now (and I know you have if you continue to read these reviews week after week) that Fire & Blood, the Targaryen prequel novel upon which House of the Dragon is based, is written in an atypical fashion. Rather than presenting a clean omniscient narrative, Fire & Blood takes on the perspective of a “present day” Westerosi maester recounting what is known about the Dance of the Dragons in the historical record. This makes the process of adapting the book for HBO a much more discursive process than adapting A Song of Ice and Fire was with Game of Thrones.

For the most part, House of the Dragon showrunner Ryan Condal and the writers’ room have done a wonderful job of turning opaque “historical” events into compelling human drama. The show’s treatment of Rhaenyra and Alicent is a creative masterstroke, adding a layer of tragedy to an already tragic story. Additionally, the television narrative has a way of getting into its players’ heads far better than any maester-written biographies could. That’s not even to mention the George R.R. Martin-approved improvements to the beleaguered King Viserys I and the dreamy Queen Helaena as characters.

But then they have to go ahead and lampshade it all with a line like “History will paint you a villain.” It’s appropriate for Rhaenyra and Alicent to consider such a thing and it’s appropriate for the audience too as well. I just don’t want the show to be focused on it as it clearly is. While still ostensibly an enjoyable watch, the House of the Dragon season 2 finale is the weakest episode of the series thus far. That’s due, in part, to its breaking of kayfabe in acknowledging the historical record as an all-important unseen character. But mostly, it’s due to the fact that there’s no real conclusion here.

Save for Tyland Lannister’s (Jefferson Hall) hilarious sojourn with the Triarchy in Essos, very little happens in this finale that could be dubbed finale-worthy or even be treated as a surprise…and that’s not only because significant portions of the episode leaked beforehand. The final five minutes or so of the installment serve as a sort of sizzle reel of what the finale should have been with all the realm’s various armies and navies gathering for a war we’ll have to wait many months to see. In hindsight, it’s particularly wild that one the episode trailer’s biggest money shots – the Hightower host marching while the dragon Tessarion flies overhead – actually appears among the episode’s final (anti)climactic moments.

Rightly or wrongly, this finale carries with it the taint of executive interference. The pre-season announcement that season 2 would feature eight episodes rather than the traditional 10 didn’t seem highly significant at the time. But now it feels as though the writers received the altered episode order 55 pages into penning this installment. HBO’s pockets are vast, but perhaps they are not “two Rook’s Rests” deep. Complaints about the finale’s lack of finality aside though, this is still an episode of House of the Dragon, which is to say it’s a good episode of television, all things considered.

The hour is able to carry over the energy of “The Red Sowing” by inviting the bastard dragonriders to acclimate to their new stations…some more gracefully than others. While Hugh Hammer (Kieran Bew) and Addam of Hull (Clinton Liberty) rise to their new level of responsibility, Ulf (Tom Bennett) proves himself to be every bit the drunken asshole he was expected to be. It’s amusing to watch Rhaenyra and Jace (Harry Collett) react to the reality that they gave three strangers nuclear weapons.

Jace, in particular, has a great episode with Baela (Bethany Antonia) acting as audience surrogate by pointing out his pouty lip. In response, Collett is able to turn Jace’s meme-worthy moodiness into something more relatable and present. Another subtle episode highlight is Rhaenyra instructing Addam and Seasmoke to join her on her Harrenhal journey. She’s known these three men for all of one day but she already knows which of them is the most trustworthy and useful.

In King’s Landing, Aemond’s descent into something resembling madness is believable and disturbing. The episode opens with his indiscriminate torching of Sharp Point, the seat of House Bar Emmon in The Crownlands. Aemond’s urgency in the face of three new dragonriders informs everything that happens to the Greens from there on out. Larys (Matthew Needham) is compelled to get Aegon out of the Red Keep to safety while Alicent attempts the same for Helaena.

Speaking of Helaena…if there were any doubts that Phia Saban was season 2’s MVP, this episode removes them. Rarely has a Game of Thrones character been so equal parts believably ethereal and human. The Dreamer’s interactions with Aemond crackle, as she tells him to his face that he will soon die while even offering a precise location. Combine that with Alys’ previous messages to Daemon and House of the Dragon is spoiling itself far better than any international third-party distributor could.

Outside of King’s Landing and Dragonstone, the episode’s secondary plots vary considerably in quality. Rhaena coming across the dragon in The Vale reads as far too inevitable, and not in the intriguing “here’s how you’re gonna die, Cyclops” way. Tyland Lannister in Essos, however? Now that’s cinema. A lesser show would not be so concerned with silly things like treaties and diplomatic relations and would rob us of the chance to see a Lannister bumbling against the Triarchy. Thankfully, House of the Dragon is concerned with such things so viewers get to see a monkey, witness Jefferson Hall’s face caked in mud, and meet the lively Sharako Lohar (Abigail Thorn).

Lohar is one of my favorite parts of the episode and the latest argument in favor of the writers’ getting as creative as possible in their adaptation choices. In the book, Lohar is briefly mentioned offscreen as a Lysene admiral. Here, the show enlists the help of Thorn to play the character who is introduced with he/him pronouns but who is also an androgynous dandy who wants to watch a Lannister impregnate all their wives. Bless them.

And then there’s Daemon (Matt Smith). Oh, Daemon. The Rogue Prince’s arc in Harrenhal this season has proven to be controversial among fans who want to see the Targaryen lay waste to his Green enemies from the sky. I would posit that all the time spent inside his own head allowed Daemon to be the rare House of the Dragon character who concludes season 2 on a satisfying note.

Alys Rivers (Gayle Rankin) saves her most consequential spooky vision for last as she invites Daemon to hack into the weirwood network of Westeros and see what the future really brings. Through all the twisted, bloody roots, Daemon bears witness to some events Game of Thrones viewers are familiar with (the arrival of the White Walkers, the birth of Dany’s dragons) and some others they are not (a mysterious figure known as “Bloodraven,” and the dying of the dragons). These images would be enough to rock anyone’s psyche and tear them away from a cycle of self destruction and delusion. What’s impressive about Daemon’s interpretation of them, however, is that they convince him to return to what he’s always wanted most in the first place: the approval of his family.

When Daemon bends the knee to Rhaenyra in Harrenhal (shoutout to the messy Ser Simon Strong, who loves drama and tattling), it’s not because he saw a vision of her on the Iron Throne as a historical inevitability. It’s because he felt the icy chill of the future and wanted to be close to her once again – just like he wishes he could guide his brother back up the steps to the Iron Throne one last time.

“Leave me again at your peril,” Rhaenyra tells Daemon in High Valyrian.
“I could not. I have tried,” he responds.

As penned by Sara Hess, episode 8 is filled with shockingly lyrical dialogue. Sometimes its to the plot’s detriment like with the script’s winking aside to history, but oftentimes it lends an air of epic finale-quality import to a plot that otherwise doesn’t fully earn it. Rhaenyra has never sounded more Shakespearean with many “well mets” and “I am gladdeneds” and even a mic drop return of “a son for a son.” Criston Cole gets off a proper emo monologue, concluding with “All our fine thoughts, all our endeavors are like as nothing. We march now toward our annihilation.” Even Aegon’s description of his mangled cock is strangely poetic: “It burst into flames like a sausage on a spit.”

Ultimately, this is a very writerly episode of House of the Dragon as though the script is trying to make up for what the budget lacks. The textual skill on display is appreciated and would be appropriate for a mid-season installment. The imagery and action, however, fall well short of finale expectations. They say the pen is mightier than the sword and that’s all well and good. But let’s hope season 3 brings us some actual swordplay.

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