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House of the Dragon S2 |OT| Blood for Blood, Fire to Fire (no book discussion)

Seriously, did they really need to introduce this terrible non-binary character in the last episode of the season? 🤦‍♂️

When they finally show that one guy having sex with all of non binary wives in the next season, I wonder if they are all ugly and whether they will still show explicit nudity of all the wives if they are pretty and not fat? I want answers!
 

SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
Look at medieval warm films like Braveheart, Kingdom of Heaven, El Cid, and many others, and how much they manage to accomplish and show in 3 hours. Why does a TV series need 8+ hours of episodes to get to the actual war? The war has started, but we need 8-10 hours of moving the chess pieces around before we get to the good stuff. Come on man, there's no excuse for this.
maybe tv is just not a good medium for game of thrones. we all thought that the massive books and dozens of characters would need long 10 hour episodes, but honestly, if LOTR can be adapted in three 3 hour long movies then game of thrones couldve been adapted as well. just get a good director, give it a massive budget, cut some characters, insert some montages and get to the good stuff.
 

jason10mm

Gold Member
maybe tv is just not a good medium for game of thrones. we all thought that the massive books and dozens of characters would need long 10 hour episodes, but honestly, if LOTR can be adapted in three 3 hour long movies then game of thrones couldve been adapted as well. just get a good director, give it a massive budget, cut some characters, insert some montages and get to the good stuff.
Nah, you just need to watch some films that have economical storytelling and make sure every scene advances a character. Then you will realize that the 4th scene of Corlys and Alyn, the fidth scene of Rhaena wandering after a dragon, theb3rd time Jace has ro be told to sit and mind his business; these are extraneous scenes that repeat info over and over. The dialogue isn't snappy, it's flowery but most conversations are circular and indirect, so they can be edited in anywhere in an episode and none directly lead to another. We just hop around, aimlessly, and have to be TOLD stuff like how cool someone is because they rarely SHOW anything because the writers favor dialogue over action, any kind of action.
 
When they finally show that one guy having sex with all of non binary wives in the next season, I wonder if they are all ugly and whether they will still show explicit nudity of all the wives if they are pretty and not fat? I want answers!

Come on, it's HBO in 2024! I'm sure all the wives will have the voluptuous dicks that we've been clamoring for.
 
Come on, it's HBO in 2024! I'm sure all the wives will have the voluptuous dicks that we've been clamoring for.

Sausage Kielbasa GIF
 

Lolofonek

Neo Member
I saw this on Reddit, what the hell? I quit the show after Rhaenyra sneaked into King's Landing and Alicent just let her leave, it reminded me just how much i disliked the way Rhaenys escaped in S1. Discussions about S2 are more entertaining than the show itself.
XOD4X7N.jpeg
 

Erebus

Member
Any idea what the production budget for a single episode is?

I find it odd that we only got like 15 minutes of battle action in a whole season.
 

Gp1

Member
Oh…transgender mud wrestling. Close enough!

"S/He" has a troop of a hundred of sailors and captains under her/him/them command.

Considering that she only sail with who can at least put up a fight against him/her/them/aerself...

We can say that she/he got his her them, ass kicked a lot on that mud :)

Ps. Gotta get the pronouns right.
 

jason10mm

Gold Member
So after listening to showrunner Condal on the HBO podcast talking about the character of Lohar, the intent is that it's a biological woman who is just very tomboy (if that's an allowed term these days) and kind of plays as a man as an illusion for her crew to better accept a woman being in charge. No trans as we think of it today, more like...

uHKbmzR.png
 

NecrosaroIII

Ultimate DQ Fan
So after listening to showrunner Condal on the HBO podcast talking about the character of Lohar, the intent is that it's a biological woman who is just very tomboy (if that's an allowed term these days) and kind of plays as a man as an illusion for her crew to better accept a woman being in charge. No trans as we think of it today, more like...

uHKbmzR.png
Is that Punky Brewster?
 

IntentionalPun

Ask me about my wife's perfect butthole
What are you guys going on about? There’s zero mention of that person being non binary… its just a tough-woman who likes women, which they had in GoT too.
 

Madflavor

Member
So after listening to showrunner Condal on the HBO podcast talking about the character of Lohar, the intent is that it's a biological woman who is just very tomboy (if that's an allowed term these days) and kind of plays as a man as an illusion for her crew to better accept a woman being in charge. No trans as we think of it today, more like..

That whole storyline cemented the fact to me that the writers for the show really suck. The character was just such a try hard. Would’ve been far better if she was just a no nonsense, strong silent type.
 

jason10mm

Gold Member
What are you guys going on about? There’s zero mention of that person being non binary… its just a tough-woman who likes women, which they had in GoT too.
That's what you get when you cast a trans actor. What gender are they playing? Then you layer in a somewhat androgynous character that is never specifically gendered (other than being a male in the book) and it leads to confusion beyond the creators intent. The character was ambiguous, but not in a particularly good way (IMHO) and a bit if silly levity in a show that was in it's final ep of the season, so it was time wasted that could have been spent on, oh, I dunno, a BATTLE, an explanation for why Otto was in a cage, why Alicent was so ready to give up both her sons , or any of the other heel turns we got this ep. The poor ratings shows they mismanaged their time and didn't stick it.
 

Madflavor

Member
That's what you get when you cast a trans actor. What gender are they playing? Then you layer in a somewhat androgynous character that is never specifically gendered (other than being a male in the book) and it leads to confusion beyond the creators intent. The character was ambiguous, but not in a particularly good way (IMHO) and a bit if silly levity in a show that was in it's final ep of the season, so it was time wasted that could have been spent on, oh, I dunno, a BATTLE, an explanation for why Otto was in a cage, why Alicent was so ready to give up both her sons , or any of the other heel turns we got this ep. The poor ratings shows they mismanaged their time and didn't stick it.

The actress was trans? I feel retarded for just learning this now. I knew there was something slightly off, but I couldn’t put my finger on it because I was just so zoned out of the episode.

It was one of those situations where you may not have noticed it, but your brain did. All I could think of at the time was how big her teeth and mouth was. Fucking Tony Robbins over here.
 
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jason10mm

Gold Member
I think they wanted a Daario type character, flowery and ostentatious

vRABarA.jpeg


And in the show we got that translated as

bEWBUL5.jpeg


Which made all the ladies swoon. Lohar ain't doing that. In fact, HotD seems hell bent on destroying any studly leading men, I know all the women I watch it with are groaning at the lack.
 

IntentionalPun

Ask me about my wife's perfect butthole
That's what you get when you cast a trans actor. What gender are they playing? Then you layer in a somewhat androgynous character that is never specifically gendered (other than being a male in the book) and it leads to confusion beyond the creators intent. The character was ambiguous, but not in a particularly good way (IMHO) and a bit if silly levity in a show that was in it's final ep of the season, so it was time wasted that could have been spent on, oh, I dunno, a BATTLE, an explanation for why Otto was in a cage, why Alicent was so ready to give up both her sons , or any of the other heel turns we got this ep. The poor ratings shows they mismanaged their time and didn't stick it.
So you thought a trans woman was playing a man?

I had no idea either way… it was just blatantly obvious it was supposed to be a woman.

It’s the entire premise of why any of it was remarkable and why Lord Tyrod acted surprised.
 
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jason10mm

Gold Member
So you thought a trans woman was playing a man?

I had no idea either way… it was just blatantly obvious it was supposed to be a woman.

It’s the entire premise of why any of it was remarkable and why Lord Tyrod acted surprised.
No, I don't think it was meant to be "blatantly obvious" that the character was a woman. If that was the case, they would have hired a woman for the role. They WANTED the character to feel ambiguous and unsettling to Lannister. And I think it worked. The problem is that it was 3 episodes too late and ONLY that character acted like that, so she seemed more unhinged than just culturally different.

Just imagine if the character looked like this. Badass, but definitely feminine....
3qDzLcz.jpeg
 
Alright everybody, shoot me straight.

I watched season 1 (when it was new) of House of the dragon and felt completely underwhelmed. It felt disjointed in the story telling, some actors did not seem to fit their parts well like GoT did, and it was just mostly boring.

Is Season 2 better and worth investing in?
 
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EviLore

Expansive Ellipses
Staff Member
Found a quote that explains the character’s intent. Ryan Condal seems to be afflicted with some issues that were being kept in check by Miguel Sapochnik until S2. (Highlighting not mine)

imui24Q.jpeg
 

SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
Trash. I dont even know why episode 7 is rated so high. Episode 4 was the best but everything since then has been atrocious. Maybe people liked the dragon killing everyone.

GUbXf6yasAASCV-


Apparently HBO really wanted to make amends for GoT's final season with House of Cards but this is only making things worse. They better go back to Miguel and beg him to come back because Ryan Condol sucks ass. Cutting the season short is on HBO but its the showrunner's job to work around the budget and im sure HBO gave him a way bigger budget than most tv shows get nowadays. he just wasted it.

This is by far the worst second season of any tv show ive stuck with. HBO better be looking at these ratings.
 
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Auto_aim1

MeisaMcCaffrey
This show does not have enough material for 4 seasons. Should have made it 10-12 episodes each and finished it in two seasons. Three seasons max. WTF is left anyway.
 

Werewolf Jones

Gold Member
This is by far the worst second season of any tv show ive stuck with. HBO better be looking at these ratings.
You watch TV a lot or...? I'm not even a big consumer of white people TV and I've seen worse. The Walking Dead and The Boys immediately come to mind. Don't get me wrong it is a clear quality drop but there's WAY worse trash out there.
 

jason10mm

Gold Member
You watch TV a lot or...? I'm not even a big consumer of white people TV and I've seen worse. The Walking Dead and The Boys immediately come to mind. Don't get me wrong it is a clear quality drop but there's WAY worse trash out there.
Funny you would call HotD "white people tv" when they went SO FAR out of their way to make it NOT "white people tv". Why would you still call it that? Or do you just mean 'english language tv' versus Korean shows or something?
 

Werewolf Jones

Gold Member
Funny you would call HotD "white people tv" when they went SO FAR out of their way to make it NOT "white people tv". Why would you still call it that? Or do you just mean 'english language tv' versus Korean shows or something?
Should've said normie TV tbh. I mostly just watch anime or used to.
 

SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
You watch TV a lot or...? I'm not even a big consumer of white people TV and I've seen worse. The Walking Dead and The Boys immediately come to mind. Don't get me wrong it is a clear quality drop but there's WAY worse trash out there.
I dont. Dropped The Boys mid way through season 2, and never bothered with The Walking Dead after finding out it has 24 episodes per season. The last 24 episode tv drama i watched was Season 3 of 24, and i read that they had no idea how to end the season up until the last 3 months or so. These 24 episode seasons are written on the fly so they are just making shit up on the go. The ending didnt make sense and none of the character arcs were consistent. I was like fuck this and stuck with HBO, AMC and Showtime.

Thats why i said its the worst season 2 of a show ive actually stuck with. i dropped Stranger Things in season 2. house of Cards around that time as well. Those two shows put me off of Netflix for good. Didnt think an HBO show would do this. I thought TLOU Season 1 was a huge misfire last year with exceptionally poor casting and writing that id expect from CW shows. Like Lord Panda Lord Panda said above, the acting from certain members of the cast is just piss poor in this show. Stuff i consistently saw in network tv shows, CW trash, and more recently in netflix, Disney and Amazon shows. To see HBO sink to these lows is extremely disheartening especially when the rest of the cast is phenomenal and carrying the show despite the poor writing.
 
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SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
The actress that plays Mysaria makes me roll my eyes each time she's onscreen. Her expressions, her dialogue, her delivery ... ugh just kills me.

549zqV7.jpeg


She's even worse than this guy who at least tries pretty hard to act in the last episode.

images
There are a lot of really talented black and other minority actors in other HBO shows like Euphoria, We Own This City and Watchmen. I have no clue why everyone from House Valeryn and that asian lady were cast because they are c tier actors at best. They were the weakest link in season 1 when Paddy Consdine, Rhys Ifans and Matt Smith just crushing every scene they were in. It almost looked like self sabotage they were all so bad. The trans lady in the latest episode is so fucking bad. I get that the pool for trans actors is small and that Euphoria trans girl is the only good actress we have from the trans community but if you cant find a good actor for the role, dont make it trans or black or asian in the first place.

True Detective's Season 4 is also full of really really bad actors. Jodie Foster kills it but everyone around her is awful. People will look at it and say native american and black actors cant keep up with her, but yellowstone went out and got the best native american actors. HBO got a fucking 2 time oscar winner to play the lead in True Detective Season 3. An Oscar winner to play the lead in Watchmen. Now they are hiring randos who cant act for shit. old HBO pre-Max would not have allowed this shit. Game Of Throne pilot was literally reshot and recast Danyrs because they had standards back then. Everyone in Game of Thrones is perfectly cast. Everyone. Literally dozens of major side characters, all cast flawlessly and they drop the ball here with house valeyrian. lord corlis, his brother Daemon beheaded, his two bastard sons, his granddaughters (just compare them with Arya and even Sansa), all bad actors with no screen presence or charisma. The only actress who was somewhat decent was Daemon's wife but she died in one episode.
 
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BadBurger

Many “Whelps”! Handle It!
Well, this season was unfortunate IMO. The season finale was arguably as poor as the final episodes of GoT.

The plot, whether considering any of the various threads individually or all taken as a whole, barely moved forward from the first season. The writing of the characters was inconsistent (to say the least), with some altering their motivations in nonsensical ways at random times. There were many events that could be mocked for the absurd ways in which they played out.

The next season is two years away and that's fine - I am not looking forward to it all. The only way they could pique my interest again is if the show runner and writing crew are replaced.


Found a quote that explains the character’s intent. Ryan Condal seems to be afflicted with some issues that were being kept in check by Miguel Sapochnik until S2. (Highlighting not mine)

imui24Q.jpeg

I guess Condal kind of forgot that one of the most legendary figures within this fictional world was a woman admiral who led a massive fleet - famously known to be ten thousand strong.

If this guy actually read any of the books, including Fire and Blood, or hell even just a bunch of the wiki articles, I'll eat my hat.
 
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EviLore

Expansive Ellipses
Staff Member
I guess Condal kind of forgot that one of the most legendary figures within this fictional world was a woman admiral who led a massive fleet - famously known to be ten thousand strong.

If this guy actually read any of the books, including Fire and Blood, or hell even just a bunch of the wiki articles, I'll eat my hat.
Condal kind of forgot a lot of things, it seems, like how Daemon’s assassins already evened the score. The Alicent scene in the finale made Rhaenyra a psycho and Alicent willing to sacrifice her own children for extremely dubious reasons. Will probably need to be retconned in S3.
 

Mattdaddy

Gold Member
No, I don't think it was meant to be "blatantly obvious" that the character was a woman. If that was the case, they would have hired a woman for the role. They WANTED the character to feel ambiguous and unsettling to Lannister. And I think it worked. The problem is that it was 3 episodes too late and ONLY that character acted like that, so she seemed more unhinged than just culturally different.

Just imagine if the character looked like this. Badass, but definitely feminine....
3qDzLcz.jpeg

Omg I forgot about this chick hahaha.

This show was like my generation's coming of age boner material.

Xena, Callisto, Aphrodite, Gabrielle. Those girls made me a man.

Edit - holy shit I just googled it to see who else was in it... I completely fucking forgot Karl Urban was in this!
 
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Dr.Guru of Peru

played the long game
I think you guys are being a bit harsh. I think the acting was fine and the cinematography, music, and CGI were all excellent. The plot was a bit silly at times, but some of that has to do with the source material and some of it was the writers taking their own liberties.

The season was mostly let down by it's pacing and script, I think. I'm not sure how much I can say here without getting into the details of the book, but I'll say that its obvious they're trying to draw things out as much as possible but don't seem to know what to do with these characters in all of this downtime.

Also, I didn't think that last scene with Alicent or Rhaenyra was out of character. Rhaenyra want's Aegons head because she thinks its the only way to end the war without the constant threat of a larger scale civil war, which is what she has wanted throughout the series. She may have been willing to spare him earlier, but it's harder to do that now that Aegon has mustered enough support to start sacking castles and burning towns. It isn't clear if Alicient actually agreed to sacrifice Aegon, but she has grown increasingly horrified by her children's actions throughout the season and probably realizes that they're going to die anyways so might as well save what she can.
 
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SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
I think you guys are being a bit harsh. I think the acting was fine and the cinematography, music, and CGI were all excellent. The plot was a bit silly at times, but some of that has to do with the source material and some of it was the writers taking their own liberties.

The season was mostly let down by it's pacing and script, I think. I'm not sure how much I can say here without getting into the details of the book, but I'll say that its obvious they're trying to draw things out as much as possible but don't seem to know what to do with these characters in all of this downtime.

Also, I didn't think that last scene with Alicent or Rhaenyra was out of character. Rhaenyra want's Aegons head because she thinks its the only way to end the war without the constant threat of a larger scale civil war, which is what she has wanted throughout the series. She may have been willing to spare him earlier, but it's harder to do that now that Aegon has mustered enough support to start sacking castles and burning towns. It isn't clear if Alicient actually agreed to sacrifice Aegon, but she has grown increasingly horrified by her children's actions throughout the season and probably realizes that they're going to die anyways so might as well save what she can.
She literally says I want Aemond Targaryan after she returns after finding her son's remains. So she wanted Aemond when says son for a son and Alicent offers up Aemond to her telling her where he will be and when he will attack, and shes like nah I want Aegon. Besides, if the whole son for a son thing was real then surely they were even when Aegon's fucking 5 year old was beheaded alive in front of his mom.

it just doesnt make any sense. They spent the whole season with her NOT wanting to start a war going as far as to sneak into kings landing to hold peace talks with Alicent. What was her plan then? To have Alicent convince Aegon to let Rhynera kill him? What's changed now?

I wouldnt be surprised if they made up all these scenes because they simply dont make any sense whatsoever. I highly doubt George wouldve written this mess.
 

jason10mm

Gold Member
all bad actors with no screen presence or charisma. The only actress who was somewhat decent was Daemon's wife but she died in one episode.
Which wife? The Velarian one or his first wife he dropped off a horse? :p

I wish they had Daemon be just an absolute ass to all the riverland lords but writting these mushy love letters to Rhaenyra all the time. A much better play off his character than just sitting around in a haunted castle for months moping.
 

jason10mm

Gold Member
I think you guys are being a bit harsh. I think the acting was fine and the cinematography, music, and CGI were all excellent. The plot was a bit silly at times, but some of that has to do with the source material and some of it was the writers taking their own liberties.

The season was mostly let down by it's pacing and script, I think. I'm not sure how much I can say here without getting into the details of the book, but I'll say that its obvious they're trying to draw things out as much as possible but don't seem to know what to do with these characters in all of this downtime.

Also, I didn't think that last scene with Alicent or Rhaenyra was out of character. Rhaenyra want's Aegons head because she thinks its the only way to end the war without the constant threat of a larger scale civil war, which is what she has wanted throughout the series. She may have been willing to spare him earlier, but it's harder to do that now that Aegon has mustered enough support to start sacking castles and burning towns. It isn't clear if Alicient actually agreed to sacrifice Aegon, but she has grown increasingly horrified by her children's actions throughout the season and probably realizes that they're going to die anyways so might as well save what she can.
They could have circled back to the original plan, having Rhaenyra's kids (with Daemon, the true Targaryan heirs) pair up with Aegon's kids. Dragonriders are easy enough to marry off to other houses. Aemond is probably the only really troublemaker of the lot after Aegon gets torched so he's the one you need to appeal to, Alicent has fuck all authority of capability to do anything without him, really. That no one, especially Larys, never tried to assassinate Daemon in Harrenhall is kinda shocking. I mean, he torched his own father and brother there, so clearly he has contacts.
 

EviLore

Expansive Ellipses
Staff Member
That no one, especially Larys, never tried to assassinate Daemon in Harrenhall is kinda shocking. I mean, he torched his own father and brother there, so clearly he has contacts.
And if they needed to sideline Daemon at Harrenhall for a season, having him deal with treachery and assassination attempts (perhaps in addition to some Old Gods weirdness) would have been much more compelling than what we got.
 

nkarafo

Member
That trans guy or whatever... Sure i guess, have a trans actor. But at least find one who can also act maybe? This one was terrible. Completely distracting.
 

jason10mm

Gold Member
They sacrifice this season for building up .. I'm ok with that if they go crazy next season.
I wouldn't count on it. In fact, I think it will have maybe 1 more "big" scene than what we got in S2 (so 2 total). I think I can guess the plotting Condal wants if he doesn't get some exec pressure. I guess I'm saying that you should expect a lot of scenes of Lohar giving Lannister the old "nudge nudge, hint, hint, wink, wink" routine as they slooooowly sail across the sea :p
 
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