Got to be honest, second episode didn't do much for me.
Story-wise it seems a bit all over the place, like unfocussed. Not enough attention is given to anything sea-snake related, or the twins, for me to care about it much.
Visually, many scenes looked like they had vaseline smeared on the outer edges of the screen. Probably a stylistic choice, but I thought it made the whole thing look like a blurry mess. On the other hand though, the dragons look really good so far, so I'll give them props for that.
Sadly, the confrontation between Rhaenyra and Daemon just didn't connect with me emotionally and I was left feeling a bit unimpressed. Seemed like it was supposed to be a big moment for the episode, but I felt nothing.
I did love every scene involving Otto Hightower and his verbal smackdown of the king, and they managed to make me hate Cole even more than I already did. They did a great job conveying what a clusterfuck this whole situation is.
The set up to the twins fight was a bit goofy to me, not only the fact that the guy can just walk right in, but also the fact that there is like 1 guard around to protect the queen. The fight itself was well done, but again they did not give those characters enough screen time for me to care much about them.
For some reason, this episode highlighted just how tame this show is compared to early Game Of Thrones. Gone is the shock value, brutal violence and explicit nudity, instead what we get is very much toned down and, somewhat generic? Not sure why, but I really felt it this episode.
With so few episodes left, they better hit the next ones out of the park.