Yes, I’m talking about Rhaenyra Targaryen (Emma D’Arcy) and Alicent Hightower (Olivia Cooke), the two leads of the series who stand at the front of the Black and Green factions, respectively. Early in its run, House of the Dragon did a spectacular job with the complicated dynamic between these two women, actually improving in some ways on Martin’s source material. The first five episodes of season 1, where younger versions of Rhaenyra (played by Milly Alcock) and Alicent (played by Emily Carey) developed a strong friendship only to watch it splinter, were extremely compelling. The show made these two characters closer in age than the book, and the result worked really well.
Then came the time skip, where D’Arcy and Cooke took over. Throughout the next few episodes of season 1, the show gave them extremely juicy material, from Alicent’s horrifically petty demand to make Rhaenyra trudge across the Red Keep immediately after childbirth to the pair’s showstopper struggle over a bloody spat between their children in Episode 7. Alicent and Rhaenyra are at their most compelling when they are women who have deep history that should make them allies, but cannot help themselves from snapping at each others’ throats. That’s exactly the way they’re portrayed in Fire & Blood, and when House of the Dragon leans into that idea, the dynamic between these two powerful figures is at its most compelling.
Unfortunately, that went completely out the window in season 2. First, Rhaenyra snuck into King’s Landing to have a secret parley with Alicent, where they discussed whether war could be averted. Then in the finale, Alicent snuck onto Rhaenyra’s stronghold of Dragonstone to offer up her wounded son Aegon II (Tom Glynn-Carney) on a silver platter, along with an offer to surrender King’s Landing — and the Iron Throne with it.
Even looking beyond the way that makes Alicent look like an absolutely horrible mother (a stark contrast from her book counterpart), this back-and-forth between her and Rhaenyra has greatly weakened an upcoming plotline. To discuss it, we have to get into some SPOILERS from Fire & Blood.
Rhaenyra and Alicent’s season 3 storyline has already been weakened
The two meetings between Alicent and Rhaenyra in season 2 felt like some of the most hair-brained moments of the show’s entire run. They did not exist because the show needed them for any particular storyline, but rather because the team behind the series was seemingly afraid to go an entire season without Alicent and Rhaenyra sharing the screen at all. These two characters have been the core of the story, with a passionate fandom who loves their relationship. Surely, it would have been folly for them to not cross paths in season 2.
For my money, it would have been much better had they not crossed paths in season 2 — and that’s exactly what happens in Fire & Blood. In the book, Alicent and Rhaenyra do not see each other once the war starts until Rhaenyra captures King’s Landing, which I’m expecting to happen in the second episode of season 3. When they do finally meet again after all that time and blood has been spilled, they are bitter enemies. Alicent surrenders, but not before proudly declaring that Rhaenyra will not hold the Iron Throne for long, because her son Aemond “will return with fire and blood.”
Throughout the entirety of Rhaenyra’s reign in King’s Landing, Alicent Hightower is her prisoner. Numerous tragedies strike both of their families, driving wedges of grief between them — which would have made for excellent material for the show to explore. The bitterness between Alicent and Rhaenyra festers, even as these common tragedies draw their situations closer and closer together, until finally Rhaenyra is forced to quit King’s Landing, leaving Alicent behind for the final phase of the war.
This dynamic is one I’ve been looking forward to ever since the show was announced, and even more so once I saw how well it handled Alicent and Rhaenyra during the first season. But its fear of upsetting people by not giving them more time with the pair in season 2 has ultimately worked against it. Part of what makes Alicent and Rhaenyra’s reunion so compelling is precisely that they haven’t seen each other for a long stretch of time, similar to the way the Stark reunions hit in Game of Thrones, except with more animosity than relief. When they’re finally back in the same place, they pick away at each other while the world crumbles around them, unable to accept how their own actions are making things worse. It would have made for incredible television.