If you’re desperate to avoid spoilers for House of the Dragon (Sky Atlantic/NOW) – the new prequel to Game of Thrones on Sky Atlantic – then for God’s sake stop reading. But even if you don’t mind spoilers and are reading this review out of curiosity, it might be a good idea to stop now. Because the next paragraph may scare you off your breakfast.
Forget the sex, the swords and even the dragons. The moment we knew we were well and truly back in Westeros, 42 minutes into this opening episode came with the shot from the stake. On it lay the mummified corpse of Aemma Targaryen, the queen consort. Gloomy enough. But then, very slowly, the camera went down and, lying on a second, smaller pyre, showed us the small mummified corpse of her baby: the son and heir the kingdom had longed for so long. He had only just been born in the previous scene.
But the main point here is: we didn’t know that the baby had died. This was how the producers chose to tell us the news: with a photo of his remains, which are about to be set on fire. As creative writing teachers always say, “Show, don’t tell.” And this was an extremely brutal example. Still, it was entirely true to the spirit of Game of Thrones. Not just shocking, but casual, even nonchalant.
While House of the Dragon is a prequel, in keeping with the language of the program itself, I prefer to think of it as the heir to Game of Thrones. And like any heir, he is under tremendous pressure to live up to his illustrious predecessor.
One episode is way too early to judge whether this will be the case. But we can sense it’s going to offer a plot of similar suspense and complexity, in the looming battle to succeed the weary and battered old King Viserys (Paddy Considine).
At the very least, we’ve already met someone who seems destined to become a major figure in the Westeros canon: Prince Daemon Targaryen (Matt Smith). Spoiled, narcissistic and gleefully violent, he feels like a classic Game of Thrones villain. In fact, he feels like an amalgam of at least three classic Game of Thrones villains: a dash of Ramsay Bolton, a pinch of Joffrey Baratheon, a dash of Jaime Lannister. Jaime, of course, turned out to have a more noble side. On the evidence so far, it would be a surprise if Daemon does. But then again, the world of GoT has always been full of unlikely twists and turns.
As I suggested in my previous piece about House of the Dragon, we could have used some Tyrion-style humor to lighten the grimness. And at times the episode felt like what critics politely call a “slow burner” (ie not desperately gripping).
Yet patience is rewarded. Wait for the climax of episode six. It makes the pyre scene look like a teddy bear picnic.