Small Council: What did you think of House of the Dragon Episode 5?

Every week, we talk back and forth about the latest episode of House of the Dragon. The small council is in session!

DAN: I was torn on this episode. I thought the big moments were powerful, but I don’t think the show earned all of them, and by and large I wish this wasn’t the hour to launch us into the back half of the season.

There were a couple of things I took issue with. First up, there’s Alicent Hightower’s green dress moment. Part of me loved it. I watched the episode three times and got chills every time. But there was another part of me that was like, ‘But why is she going this big this soon? Is it just because Rhaenyra lied about Criston? Seems like a weird reason.’

I know Otto told Alicent that Rhaenyra would kill her kids if she took the Iron Throne, and that would be a good enough reason to assert her authority like this…but what indication has Rhaenyra ever given that she would do that? The moment was executed very well — shoutout to Ramin Djawadi’s score — but I wish I understood Alicent’s motivation better, which is actually a problem I’ve had with her character since the start. Just me?

But the big offender was Criston Cole. I didn’t like the wedding beating upon first viewing and like it less now, and not for the obvious reason that it was violent and upsetting; in that way it was effective. I didn’t like how it was written. I didn’t like that we had no clue about Criston Cole’s hair trigger temper before this; that’s the cheap kind of shocking, the kind that isn’t set up in any way. I didn’t like that it played right into the “Bury Your Gays” trope, what with Criston killing a gay guy introduced just earlier in the episode. And I didn’t like that it raised difficult questions, such as: How does Criston murder an anointed knight at dinner and keep his job, as we see he has in the trailer for Episode 6? (FYI, in the book Criston kills Joffrey during a tournament, so it can be excused in the eyes of society as “sporting event gone wrong.” I dunno how you excuse what he did on the show.)

I liked seeing more of Corlys Velaryon and Rhaenys Targaryen, I thought Rhaenyra and Laenor made a fun pair for the three seconds they got to hang out before Criston’s meltdown, I enjoyed seeing Daemon be a toxic mess at the wedding…but overall this episode left a bit of a sour taste in my mouth. How about you?

DANIEL: I was a little torn on this episode as well, Dan, especially about Criston’s outburst. On the one hand, I could imagine how the show might have made the choice to have all the chaos and action happen during the wedding feast for the sake of adding more variety to its set pieces. After all, we’ve already seen a tournament once this season and will likely never have another chance for an extravagant wedding feast with the Dance of the Dragons looming. On the other, it created some problems, even beyond falling back on the Bury Your Gays trope. Sure, Criston outranks Ser Joffrey, and in the chaos we never really see how the fight starts. When Criston kills him, the Knight of Kisses has a knife in his hand. There are ways it’s explainable, if you squint enough.

But Criston also punches Laenor Velaryon at his own wedding feast. We’ve already established how prickly Corlys can be, so how in the world is he going to let that slide? How is Criston’s act going to be explained away? And how does this wedding, which is rushed through as a result of the bloodshed, not going to be a major source of gossip and a black mark on Rhaenyra and Laenor’s public image? The time jump gives the show’s writers a convenient way to sidestep a lot of those questions, which feels a little like playing a get out of jail free card to me.

All that said, there were a lot of things I did like about this episode as well. The score by Ramin Djawadi was excellent, especially during the feast. High Tide was incredibly cool — I loved how it was filled with trophies and relics from the Sea Snake’s travels, like that giant nautilus shell and the mask of the Crabfeeder. Plus spending more time with Rhaenys, Corlys, Laenor, and Laena was much needed. I wish we got more time with Savannah Steyn as Laena Velaryon before the time jump.

I’m also not quite in the “Criston is irredeemable” camp. His actions were horrifying, but I think the show did a good enough job establishing his conflicted situation that his meltdown was believable, albeit in an awful “I guess you’ve become a murderer now” sort of way.

“We Light The Way” was a slight step down from “King of the Narrow Sea,” which remains the peak of the first half of the season for me. But it was still a damn good hour of television.

SABRINA: The more we talk about and dissect the choice to have Criston kill Joffrey at the wedding, the more I feel like it ends up being a cheap way of pulling the rug out from under us to tell a story about monstrosity that’s been told this way countless times.

We know everyone has the ability to make a decision that’ll turn them into someone else’s nightmare. And we know that it can happen unexpectedly, and that often the victims of these explosions of emotion are innocents, the marginalized, or those who don’t deserve the anger with which they’re confronted.

In all honesty, my issue with what happened at the wedding is how it happened. Dan mentioned on Take the Black Live’s breakdown of “We Light The Way” that he would have written Joffrey into one more episode and had the clash between the Knight of Kisses and Criston happen at a tournament like in the book. I wish that had been what happened.

While watching the brutality of Joffrey’s death scene, I couldn’t shake the feeling that this was meant to be shocking for the sake of being shocking. The lingering camera and the focus on Joffrey’s mutilated face contrasted starkly with Rhea’s death at the top of the episode. She was given the dignity of us not seeing her smashed in skull. We were left with the knowledge that Daemon murdered his wife, but it wasn’t spelled out for us.

Joffrey was left without dignity. His murderer was prevented from killing himself, and it’s quite possible that House of the Dragon will move on as if the show didn’t fall into the “Bury Your Gays” trope by using a gay character’s death and the tragic end of his romance as a means of furthering Criston’s story.

All in all, if the writers wanted to pull focus, they did. They achieved their goal because this episode is now infamous. We’re barely talking about its content beyond this scene. Personally, I liked “We Light The Way” right up until that point. The wedding is an amazing piece of storytelling. We learn more about these characters and they’re not even really talking that much. It’s all face work, the way they carry their bodies, and how they present themselves. I love how well that translated onscreen.

But I have to say, short of missing Milly Alcock as Rhaenyra, this time jump is going to be a much needed palate cleanser even if I do want to see Criston get what he deserves. It’s such a shame, I liked him, too, but in the bin he goes. For inquiring minds, Daemon is sitting comfortably in the garbage disposal, I just can’t turn it on because his apologists are holding me back and there’s more story to be told.

MICHAEL: We must remember that at this stage of House of the Dragon, years have passed since the opening episode. This means that tensions and passions between the characters have been building off-screen, which explains why, for example, Alicent is ready to raise her “war banners” with the green dress. It also explains why Criston snapped the way he did. This has been building for a long time with him.

I’m of two minds about the tactic, as I have been throughout the opening episodes. In some respects, it would have been better to deal with this part of the story in flashbacks. That would help with people potentially getting upset now that new actors are going to replace the ones to whom they’ve grown attached.

It never feels like there’s been much of a time jump on House of the Dragon. Nothing much onscreen has signaled any great leap forward. This can be contrasted with a show like The Walking Dead, which always made a decent effort to show the passage of time.

Perhaps they should have recapped everything that happened in between episodes in the intros. Without this knowledge, everyone looks like they’re overreacting, with Alicent and Criston being the two most notable examples. Criston in particular was very poorly served by the episode, coming across as firstly hopeless and naive in his interaction with Rhaenyra and then a mindless murderer at the wedding.

That said, there was a lot to love here. The wedding was a sumptuous affair, and these royal events are always enjoyable. It’s also good to see Larys Strong get some screentime. One of the great pleasures of Game of Thrones’ early seasons was the conspiratorial maneuvering of Varys, Littlefinger, and others, something largely absent so far in House of the Dragon. Hopefully, we’ll get to see more going forward.

SAVANNAH: Everyone has really broken down this episode, so I will keep my first Small Council entry short and sweet. This episode was beautifully directed and the plotline was classic Game of Thrones. Alicent had her moment, but at the same time I felt she continues to dig because she is unhappy as a whole. Her father warned her at the beginning and that laid the first seed of where she comes in with that GORGEOUS green dress, one of the best outfits in this franchise’s history.

Rhaenyra’s plan with Laenor was progressive and I appreciated that. Also I think Joffrey should have kept his mouth shut at the wedding because to me that is what caused Ser Criston Cole to snap. I don’t think what Cole did was right, but it shouldn’t have gotten said at the wedding.

Daemon is Daemon and that is what makes him so intriguing. Loved the moment where Ser Harwin Strong saved Rhaenyra — to me that was such a telling moment for what’s to come.

Overall I think this is a 9.5 episode. Last week’s was better, but the anticipation we got in Episode 5 really set the time jump up perfectly.

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