Between the 10-year time jump, the new actors and the new storylines, last week’s episode of House of the Dragon felt like a second premiere. Episode 7, “Driftmark,” is here to get things rolling again. Based on the trailer, we know tensions are going to rise between Rhaenyra (Emma D’Arcy) and Alicent (Olivia Cooke), which is only to be expected when both sides of the family gather for Laena Velaryon’s funeral.
HBO just released a new batch of images from “Driftmark.” Let’s take a look at them below:
The Targaryens and Velaryons mourn Laena’s death
Sadly, Laena Velaryon lost her life last episode after realizing she would not survive childbirth and deciding she’d rather go out by dragonfire. In the photos below you can see Laena’s uncle Vaemond (Wil Johnson), as well as her mother Rhaenys (Eve Best) and her daughter Baela (Shani Smethurst).
As for Corlys, here he is having what looks like a serious conversation with his grandson Lucerys (Harvey Sadler). We’ll be curious to see what he has to say to him at Laena’s funeral.
Viserys and Daemon reunite in House of the Dragon
Viserys (Paddy Considine) is at the funeral, of course, and he looks… pretty bad. I mean, not as bad as I would expect given his illness but he isn’t in good shape. Is it bad that I keep thinking each episode will be his last? Anyway, he’ll reunite with his brother Daemon (Matt Smith) in Episode 7. I have to wonder how that’ll go.
Daemon and Viserys have had a very complicated relationship, but will things be different after their years apart? We know Daemon probably wasn’t in love with Laena, but I’d assume he’s still pretty upset over her death. I cannot wait to see how this conversation goes.
And of course, Daemon and Rhaenyra will reunite in Episode 7. We don’t have a photo of it (why, HBO!?), but the trailer shows the two of them together in at least one scene. Coming off of Harwin Strong’s (Ryan Corr) death, Rhaenyra might be in a low place. Will seeing Daemon again change her tune? I need to know what’s next for these two!
See Rhaenyra with her sons, Luke and Jace:
Otto Hightower is back on House of the Dragon
And the worst photo of the bunch is here:
I’m kidding. But also not really. As you can see in the photo above, Otto Hightower (Rhys Ifans) is back and we know from the trailer that he’s the Hand of the King again. Great! For some reason he’s staring at Criston Cole (Fabien Frankel). As for Criston, he looks as smug as ever and we can probably assume he’ll do whatever Alicent asks of him in this episode.
Targaryen vs Velaryon on House of the Dragon
As we saw from the trailer, there’s going to be a major fight between the families which leads to accusations of treason and bloodshed. The three photos below don’t do this intense scene justice (give us more pictures!), but we can see a clear divide between the families. And then there’s Daemon, watching alone in the corner.
The next three photos are a bit out of context as they don’t look to be from the *big* scene mentioned above, although all of these characters are important. There’s Corlys, Laenor (John MacMillan), and Laenor’s boyfriend Qarl Correy (Arty Froushan). Remember, Rhaenyra allowed Laenor to bring Qarl with them to Dragonstone when they left King’s Landing in Episode 6.
We don’t know much about Qarl yet, but he looks angry in this photo:
Alicent is left to deal with the consequences of her actions
And finally, we’ll leave you with Queen Alicent. She’s become a stern, malicious person since the 10-year time jump, but in the photo below she looks nervous. As we hear in the trailer, Rhaenyra tells her, “Now they see you as you are.” We don’t know when this scene takes place, but she may be coming to terms with actions she might regret. Take a look and see what you think:
I have a feeling this is going to be another shocking episode of House of the Dragon (when is it not, really?), one I will probably watch more than a few times. Make sure you don’t miss “Driftmark” when it premieres this Sunday night on HBO. And as always, check back with us at Winter is Coming for all of our coverage, plus listen to our podcast, Take the Black, which goes live every Sunday night and Wednesday afternoon.
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