I was sceptical going into House of the Dragon, HBO’s new(ish) Game of Thrones spin-off. The grim-dark edginess of the original and the increasing prioritisation of plot twists over thematic coherence caused me to abandon it after the sixth season. I was particularly irked by Game of Thrones’ use of rape to add texture to the world of Westeros instead of engaging with gender and patriarchy on anything but the most surface level. Nevertheless, after seeing enough people gushing about House of the Dragon online, I was finally persuaded to give it a try, and thank goodness I did.
From the very first episode, House of the Dragon is an entirely different kettle of fish. The inciting incident of the plot comes when King Viserys’ wife goes into labour during a tourney. It soon becomes clear that the labour is not going well, and Viserys must choose between his wife and the possibility of a son (no prizes for guessing which one he chooses). Scenes of her labour and her harrowing death are intercut with the violence of the tourney, which takes place in a suspiciously yonic arena. This is really the show’s thesis statement – in Westeros, politics and war are waged on the battlefield of women’s bodies, and it is women who suffer the violence inherent in Westerosi society. Gender is baked into the premise of this show, and the female characters are at its core.
The baby dies, leaving Viserys with only one child, his daughter Rhaenyra. He names her heir, only to later remarry and have a son with Rhaenyra’s childhood best friend, Alicent. The show follows Alicent and Rhaenyra as they are torn apart by their increasingly opposed interests and imagined betrayals. It is these characters and their relationship that prevents House of the Dragon from being just another “look how terrible it was for women in the medieval era” fantasy show. Both women have high levels of agency even within the confines of Westerosi patriarchy, with Rhaenyra being the heir to the throne and Alicent being the de-facto ruler after Viserys becomes too ill to rule. The conflict between the hurt they feel, the goals they pursue, and their deep love for each other is what drives the plot and demands emotional investment from the audience. Who could not sympathise with Rhaenyra’s refusal to relinquish her birthright? And similarly, who could not sympathise with Alicent’s hesitance to protect her son at the cost of her childhood best friend’s life?
Instead of critiquing Westerosi patriarchy through Cersei Lannister’s drunken monologues or through relentless brutalisation and graphic rape scenes, House of the Dragon takes a far more subtle approach. Alicent is not violently forced into marriage, but it’s clear that she has no real choice. As a teenager, she bears children and must sexually satisfy a man decades her senior, and while this is not enforced with overt violence, the horror of it is clear. Alicent’s life stops being her own; her identity stops being her own. Meanwhile, Rhaenyra might seem free and independent, but she, too, has been forced into a life she didn’t want. In the first episode, she rejects the idea of having children, but by the end of the season, she’s a mother of four. Like Alicent, she loves her children, but this is not who she wanted to be. The show’s subtlety also means that the few examples of overt patriarchal violence are treated with the gravity they deserve. It is spine-chilling when, in her previously loving and consenting marriage, Rhaenyra is nearly killed by her husband the second she threatens his access to political power.
This subtlety is perhaps best illustrated in the character of Viserys. He is a peaceful king and, in many ways, a nice man. By Westerosi standards, he is a kind husband to Alicent and a good father to Rhaenyra. He even chooses a woman as his heir and stands by her against other male claimants. Yet, despite all of this, he is patriarchal to the core, and his patriarchal beliefs and actions lead directly to the Dance of Dragons. In choosing Schrodinger’s boy over his wife, he created a situation in which he had to remarry, immediately threatening Rhaenyra’s claim to the throne; in selfishly marrying Alicent, his teenage daughter’s best friend, and fathering rival claimants with her, he put both women in an impossible position; in taking the throne at all when the stronger claim belonged to his female cousin, he opened the doors for all of this. This juxtaposition between his goodness and his misogyny makes clear that this is a problem at the root of Westerosi society rather than the problem of a few bad men.
It has been incredibly refreshing to see a piece of media so overtly sympathetic to complex female characters with opposing interests. House of the Dragon treats both Alicent and Rhaenyra with respect and dignity, even while those around them do not, and even while both of them purport to hate each other – in one of my favourite moments, Alicent is complaining about Rhaenyra with a member of the Kingsguard, only to chastise him when he goes too far and calls Rhaenyra a “spoiled cunt”. The first season ends with both women in situations where they can no longer rely on the men in their lives. The second season is sure to bring tragedy, but whatever that tragedy may be, House of the Dragon has proven that it will be handled with depth and thoughtfulness.
Image: “2022_08_220105 – Rhaenyra Targaryen (later)” by Gwydion M. Williams is licensed under CC BY 2.0.