How To Fix House of the Dragon: Let Alicent and Rhaenyra Be the Villains the Book Made Them

The way to fix House of the Dragon is to stop shielding Alicent and Rhaenyra and let them be the ruthless, villainous figures they are in the book. There has been a lot of backlash over season 2, and while much of it boils down to the finale, I think the issues go beyond structure and involve those two key characters.

This is just my opinion, but these are the changes I think the show needs to make so that it pays off in the end.

Season 2's finale felt like episode 8 of a 10 episode season

As a whole, the season felt like set up without a massive payoff. Earlier in the week I had a semi viral tweet about what I think the main structural problem is. I said the finale felt like episode 8 of a 10 episode season, and that if we had had two more entries, those events would have left fans a lot happier.

Those extra episodes would have featured the Battle of the Gullet, the storming of King's Landing, or potentially both. What we were left with instead was more of a tease of what is to come.

The show refuses to paint Alicent and Rhaenyra as villains

The major issue I think the series needs to fix was brought up on the Angry Joe Show. The argument there was that the series needs to stop dancing around and refusing to paint Alicent or Rhaenyra as villains. In the book, they are both pretty brutal, whereas the show tries to show them in the best light.

That includes things like Blood and Cheese, and Rhaenyra refusing to go to war even after getting the dragonseeds, and generally refusing to get her hands dirty. Alicent comes across in a similar way. Even though she is to blame for a lot of the deaths and destruction, the show jumps through hoops to make her seem good. That is not what was in the original work.

George R. R. Martin's comments about writers read like shots at the show

I think the softened portrayal is something George R. R. Martin is secretly disappointed about. He recently talked about writers who think they know best, and in hindsight I think he was taking shots at the show. Looking at his quote with what we know now, it seems to make a lot of sense.

He said: "Everywhere you look there are more screenwriters and producers eager to take great stories and make them their own." He went on to say it does not seem to matter whether the source material was written by Stan Lee, Charles Dickens, Ian Fleming, Mark Twain, Raymond Chandler, Jane Austen or anyone else, and that no matter how great the book, someone always seems to think they can do better. People will tell you the book is the book and the film is the film, he said, then make the story their own, and almost every time they make it worse.

Judging by season 2, I feel he may have been venting his frustrations about the show. He had also said that he would not be in attendance when the writing for season 3 was happening.

Alicent asking Rhaenyra to run away makes no sense

Look at the scene between Alicent and Rhaenyra at the end and you start to understand Martin's frustration more. Alicent is essentially saying: I got your son killed, you got my grandson killed, we got loads of people killed, I tried to steal your throne, we have been at war and hate each other, but do you want to run away together? To me this is completely nonsensical.

In the end, she agrees to give up her son. This is a character who, during the coronation of Aegon, stood in front of him and faced down a dragon. Meleys could have killed her in an instant and she still put herself forward to protect her family. Now she is willing to go to the enemy and hand him over without a fight.

The running away idea also feels like it has no reason to be there. At this point, the two characters should truly hate each other. They have ruined each other's lives, and countless people, including their children, have been killed. In the book, Rhaenyra even blamed her miscarriage on Alicent, because the usurping apparently caused more stress and sent her into labour.

It feels like the writers have been reading Reddit and shipping characters because people suggested it there. From a plot and character point of view it does not make sense, and it is a trend I have seen become more and more prevalent. Kylo Ren and Rey are another perfect example: two characters kissing and developing feelings for each other, when their plot and motivations do not support it.

The book never brings Alicent and Rhaenyra back together

These changes move away from the source material and do not even build into what is coming down the line. We have the full outline, and it lays out pretty much all of the plot. Alicent and Rhaenyra never met again after Rhaenyra left King's Landing in season one. The writers seem to feel they need more scenes together to make good TV.

However, there is no way it makes sense for Rhaenyra to just let Alicent leave the island alive. The same issue appeared in reverse earlier in the season. Alicent would never have let Rhaenyra leave King's Landing, and I still do not know why she made that choice. Alicent was determined to win, end the war and put her son on the throne, and capturing Rhaenyra was the clearest way to do it. She turned that down and let her escape, even though in her mind Rhaenyra had just had a hand in killing her grandchild.

On the surface these changes might seem cool or like something that adds to the characters, but in the end I think they take away from them.

Rhaenyra kissing Mysaria goes nowhere

Another example that stands out is Rhaenyra kissing Mysaria, which also did not happen in the book. We know this was something thought up on the day. There was no build up at all: two characters with no signs of attraction to each other, and if you know what is to come, it does not go anywhere. The show might change things down the line, but neither character has acknowledged it since.

If anything, it makes Rhaenyra seem worse, because she is cheating on her husband and uncle, yet it is not played as though she is a villain or dealing with regret. There is no acknowledgement and it does not mean anything. If you cut the scene completely, the season does not change. Again, it ties back to my main point: they need to make these characters ruthless and villainous.

Cersei proves villains can still be loved

The show seems to think that making these characters bad will make the audience hate them, but history says otherwise. Look at Walter White. Daemon and Aemond are both liked by the audience even though they behave terribly. You might think that comes down to the actors or even their gender, but that brings me to who I think is the perfect archetype for how to write Alicent and Rhaenyra: my favourite Game of Thrones character, Cersei.

Cersei was a real villain, but you also enjoyed her. I will never forget the fist pump I did when she blew up the Sept, because we knew exactly what she had been through that season. She was a murderous mastermind, but also someone we could sympathise with. When Robert Baratheon told her he never really loved her and was still obsessed with a dead woman, you knew it hurt. When Ned warned her he was going to expose the truth, I felt really bad for her, even after she had a hand in Bran being pushed out of the window.

She was such a well written character that you could still somehow relate to her. She protected Joffrey because he was her son, which is almost the opposite of how they have handled Alicent. Cersei knew she was in a war and was willing to do what it took to win, which made her far more interesting. Rhaenyra and Alicent seem like they are just playing around, and the whole run away together idea makes Alicent seem like she is not taking it seriously, as if this were some young adult fantasy novel. People are dying because of war crimes, and that is the level the characters need to be portrayed at. I am hopeful the show will do something in the future that at least fixes their portrayal, because at this point in the book both were completely ruthless, but it feels like the show is scared to give us that portrayal.

The problem is not that the pairing is gay, and Criston would have made more sense

Some people might ask whether my objection is because they are gay. It is not. The show has already handled two gay characters running away together, and that got zero backlash. Even though it changed something from the book, it worked because the story built up to it. That character, like Alicent, was sick of the game of thrones and wanted to run away from the situation and be with the person he loved.

I even think this moment with Alicent would have made more sense with another character: Criston. He wanted to run away with Rhaenyra in season 1, but she rejected him. Alicent and Criston have been in a toxic relationship where both have tried to deny their feelings. If she had asked him and he had rejected her, saying his duty was to the white cloaks, it would have made more sense than what we got.

I know some people think there are hints that Rhaenyra and Alicent have had feelings for each other, but I feel that in season one it was more the internet trying to put them together. We have seen what Rhaenyra is like with Criston, Harwin and Daemon, all people she hooked up with. Alicent used to space out with Viserys but constantly called him her love, and she also went to Criston, so we have a rough idea of what each is like when attracted to someone. I cannot think of anything in their dialogue or actions that showed real sexual tension. It seems like the showrunner retroactively added this after reading the internet, because it is not in the book and, to me at least, not really in the first season.

Daemon's visions and Rhaena's story needed to be told in single episodes

On top of that, there are pacing issues. The earlier episodes of the season feel slightly self contained, each with a clear beginning, middle and end. Episode one builds up to Blood and Cheese and finishes on it. Episode two builds up to the Cargyll twins fight. Things keep going until after Rook's Rest, which is when the show falls apart.

Daemon's visions should have been in one episode, and I feel the same about the dragonriders. We should have had a Harrenhal entry and then a dragonseed one, instead of the focus constantly shifting. Rhaena is the perfect example: what is basically a 5 to 10 minute scene of her coming across Sheepstealer is spread across several episodes instead of being contained in one.

With that style of storytelling, things do not get room to breathe, so they feel less impactful. Spending a minute with a character every week makes it hard to become attached to them, and you lose interest in what they are going through. Putting these scenes together makes more sense, and the issue affects multiple characters. No more weeks and weeks of Daemon's visions; you can get that point across very quickly in one episode.

Two months stretched across a season left everyone where season one ended

Both seasons have felt really imbalanced. Season one took place over about 20 years, with several time jumps and even main character recasts across 10 episodes, and it felt like there was a lot going on. Season 2 is roughly a couple of months stretched across an entire season.

No one really feels like they developed beyond season one, and things are pretty much where we left them. Rhaenyra had just learned her son died and was gearing up for war. Daemon had just bent the knee and called her his queen, which is what he was doing again in the finale. The only things of consequence feel like Aegon and Aemond, and even that has not developed to a satisfying conclusion. Aegon has fled, and that is not a good way to close the season.

In general, I think this model of streaming is not working, and it is insane how long production schedules have become. You used to get 22 episodes a season of a show every year, and now you are lucky to get that many in a decade. If the show stops messing about, gives real consequences to both characters and events, and makes the villains villainous, it could get back to what it was.

Should House of the Dragon have kept Alicent and Rhaenyra as ruthless as they are in the book?