House of the Dragon trailer breakdown: Key details about Game of Thrones prequel
The highly anticipated trailer for House of the Dragon dropped this week. It contains a bunch of clues - and one very mysterious absence.
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The new trailer for the Game of Thrones prequel series House of the Dragon, released this week, contains a great many clues about the shape of the show’s upcoming first season. Some are more obvious than others.
Those of you who followed our coverage of the original series will recall the wonderfully nerdy ritual of breaking down its trailers frame-by-frame, like detectives examining CCTV footage from a crime scene, searching for the tiniest details. It’s a serious matter.
We are about to do the same thing for House of the Dragon. Be warned, however, that the situation is a little different this time.
In Game of Thrones’ later seasons, we were left to speculate about the potential plot, as the showrunners had exhausted author George R.R. Martin’s source material. Instead of adapting existing novels, they were charting their own course; no one else knew the destination.
House of the Dragon is based on complete source material, chiefly from the spin-off book Fire and Blood, which tells the history of House Targaryen. As such, the broad outline for this story is already available to read, including its ending.
As we break down the show’s trailer below, we are going to use our existing knowledge from that source material to shed light on the various scenes, characters and settings.
So if you wish to go into House of the Dragon blind, without a decent idea of how the first season’s plot will unfold, we recommend you stop reading now.
I should note that we do not know everything about this show in advance. Far from it.
It is an adaptation of fairly dry material – unlike the A Song of Ice and Fire novels, upon which Game of Thrones was based, Fire and Blood is written like a history textbook. There is minimal dialogue or detail, merely a broad outline of events.
It also occurs over a decades-long timeline, which the showrunners may wish to tweak here and there for the medium of television.
In other words, we couldn’t possibly spoil everything, even if we tried.
OK, with the spoiler warning out of the way, let’s move on to the breakdown.
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Spoiler warning: Key points from the trailer
House of the Dragon is set almost 200 years before Thrones, at the apex of the Targaryen dynasty’s power. It will tell the story of a bloody civil war, known in-universe as The Dance of the Dragons.
The trailer opens with a shot of Rhaenyra Targaryen, the daughter of King Viserys, entering the familiar throne room in King’s Landing.
Note the new version of the Iron Throne, which is now surrounded by a sea of swords. This brings it closer to the vision Martin had when he wrote the novels, of a more towering and imposing throne than the one we saw in the original series.
The man sitting on the throne in this scene is not Viserys but his brother, Prince Daemon Targaryen, played by Matt Smith. It’s admittedly hard to tell, given how out of focus he is, but another shot later in the trailer, taken from the same scene, shows him up close.
We then hear a voiceover from King Viserys, describing an apparently prophetic dream of his.
“I heard the sound of thundering hooves, splintering shields and ringing swords. And I placed my heir upon the Iron Throne. And all the dragons roared as one,” he says.
There are a few accompanying images. The first shows a figure with the Targaryens’ characteristic silver hair riding her horse, followed by a knight. The first rider appears to be Rhaenyra; the knight is likely her protector.
We then see two knights duelling. One wields a morningstar; the other bears a shield with the Targaryen sigil. This scene is from a tourney celebrating Viserys’ ascension to the throne. The Targaryen is Prince Daemon, and his opponent is a man named Ser Criston Cole.
Criston wins that fight, and gives his favour to Princess Rhaenyra. Viserys subsequently names him her sworn protector, and he becomes an important character going forward.
Finally, as Viserys’ voiceover speaks of the dragons “roaring as one”, we see someone riding a dragon towards the Dragonpit in King’s Landing. This huge structure, designed to house the dragons living in King’s Landing, was a decaying ruin in Thrones.
The roaring dragons in Viserys’ dream are an allusion to the looming civil war, which will pit Targaryens against each other.
The next significant scene shows Viserys meeting with his Small Council. The Hand of the King, Ser Otto Hightower, tells him the question of his succession is “urgent”.
The context here is that Viserys only has one surviving child, Rhaenyra. Who is a girl. Traditionally, the line of succession favours men, which would lead to Viserys’ brother Daemon succeeding him on the throne.
We hear different council members voicing support for either Rhaenyra or Daemon.
“I will not be made to choose between my brother and my daughter,” the King protests. This reflects what we know of his personality going into the show. Viserys is not a terrible man or ruler, but he is conflict averse.
A detail worth noting here: a young Rhaenyra is actually present in one of the Small Council shots. She appears to be serving as a cupbearer, much like Arya Stark did for Tywin Lannister in Thrones.
Whether she remains in the room for the discussion about her potential ascension to the throne is unclear, but note the significance of her being at a Small Council meeting at all. It indicates Viserys is trying to educate her in matters of state, perhaps in preparation to rule.
A brief cutaway shot shows a group of soldiers beating their fists against their chests in an apparent display of allegiance. They wear golden-coloured cloaks.
You may recall that, in Thrones, the soldiers of the city watch were nicknamed “goldcloaks”. That began when one Daemon Targayren was head of the watch. Later in the trailer we see him wearing a golden cloak of his own.
We can deduce that the goldcloaks, or at least some of them, are personally loyal to Daemon.
We get a quick flash of Rhaenyra in an internal courtyard with a group of knights, representing various houses. This could be happening before the tourney mentioned earlier, though I’m only speculating there.
We get a good look at Ser Criston without his helmet on. The character is supposed to be especially handsome, and I suspect you’ll agree they cast him well.
Next we see an older woman telling her husband that Rhaenyra’s potential ascension to the throne “will be challenged”. Both have silver hair.
The woman is Rhaenys Targaryen, a cousin of Viserys. Rhaenys was a contender to take the throne instead of Viserys, but was passed over due to her sex – hence, some in Westeros call her “the Queen who never was”. Previous teasers have shown her telling Rhaenyra that men will not accept a woman as ruler.
Her husband is Corlys Velaryon, one of the most powerful lords of this time period. Like the Targaryens, the Velaryons have Valyrian blood – hence the silver hair. However there is a key difference between the two families: only the Targaryens are dragon riders.
The Velaryons are the biggest sea power in the Seven Kingdoms, and are also among the richest families due to their control of trade routes. Lord Corlys, an accomplished sailor, is nicknamed “the Sea Snake”.
“Knives will come out,” Rhaenys tells him.
The next scene shows Daemon entering a packed throne room. He approaches Viserys, and is stopped by a member of the Kingsguard, who points a sword at his chest.
Note the crown on Daemon’s head here. We need to pause to explain the context around it.
Remember, during that Small Council scene earlier, Daemon and Rhaenyra were being pitched as rivals for the throne. You can expect that tension to feature in the season’s early episodes – but it doesn’t last. Viserys stamps it out by formally naming Rhaenyra his heir.
Daemon, a roguish and cantankerous sort, reacts by leaving King’s Landing in a rage. Various other events occur to further distance him his brother, and he ends up joining forces with Lord Corlys to wage a private war for some islands in the Narrow Sea, called the Stepstones.
I’m skating over a lot of details there. Probably three or four episodes’ worth.
Anyway Daemon and Corlys conquer most of the islands, and Daemon declares himself “King of the Stepstones and the Narrow Sea”. Hence the crown on his head in the trailer.
The scene, as presented, appears to be confrontational. It is, in fact, a moment of reconciliation. Daemon offers his crown to Viserys, who welcomes him back to the capital and gives him a seat on the Small Council.
Next we hear a woman – I believe it’s Rhaenyra – telling Viserys it’s his “duty” to take a second wife.
This follows the death of his first wife, Rhaenyra’s mother. The woman the King ends up choosing is Alicent Hightower, daughter of the King’s Hand and a close childhood friend of Rhaenyra’s. (A middle-aged man marrying his daughter’s friend is actually among the least objectionable of the Targaryens’ sexual habits.)
Jumping around in the timeline a bit, the next scene shows us the moment Viserys tells Daemon he has “decided to name a new heir”, i.e. Rhaenyra. Then we catch a glimpse of a confrontation between two groups on a bridge.
This is happening on the island of Dragonstone, which you’ll remember from Thrones.
The man with his sword drawn is Daemon. From other shots, we know he is holding a dragon egg, and the woman standing beside him is his mistress, Mysaria.
Daemon’s attempt to give Mysaria the dragon egg, and Viserys’ order for him to return it, is one of the events that deepens the brothers’ estrangement.
Among the party confronting Daemon in the shot above is Ser Otto, the King’s Hand. It is likely the scene involves Otto conveying Viserys’ order to return the egg. Tense stuff.
Next we see Rhaenys telling Rhaenyra that men refusing to accept a woman on the throne is “the order of things”. The trailer then cuts to an adult Rhaenyra, who in a voiceover promises to create a “new order”.
There is a brief cut to Daemon fighting on a corpse-strewn battlefield. This is probably from his war to conquer the Stepstones.
Shortly afterwards we see him alongside his dragon, the red-scaled, vicious-looking Caraxes.
A bit more context before we wrap up the trailer: Viserys and his second wife, Alicent, end up having four children: Aegon, Helaena, Aemond and Daeron. Meanwhile Rhaenyra has multiple children of her own.
The point is, unlike Viserys’ first wife, Alicent gives him sons.
Two competing Targaryen factions form, known as the “Greens” and the “Blacks”, each name taken from the colour of a dress famously worn by the Queen and Princess, respectively. The Greens want to place Alicent’s eldest son, Aegon, on the throne after Viserys. The Blacks remain supportive of Rhaenyra’s claim.
The two women, once close friends, turn into bitter rivals, as do their children.
Thus, as the trailer continues, we see Alicent speaking urgently to an unidentified silver-haired male. I’m presuming this is Aegon.
“If Rhaenyra comes into power, she could cut off any challenge to her succession,” Alicent tells him.
“I am to inherit the Iron Throne. She will block my way,” Rhaenyra says in the next scene.
There is a meaningful cut between two shots of the Queen and Princess: in the first, from their childhood, they are close together; in the second, as adults, they sit coldly apart from each other.
A quick succession of action shots follows. The most significant detail in them is the appearance of this one-eyed gentleman.
It is another of Alicent’s sons, Aemond. And he wasn’t born with an eye missing; he loses it in a fight with Rhaenyra’s sons, just after claiming Vhagar, the largest and oldest dragon alive, as his own.
In the book, Alicent reacts to his injury by demanding the boy responsible – Rhaenyra’s son Lucerys – lose an eye as well. Here we see her run at Rhaenyra with a dagger, brandishing it at her face (this is the same dagger that was used in the attempt on Bran Stark’s life, and then in the defeat of the Night King, in Thrones).
“Now they see you as you are,” an apparently unfazed Rhaenyra tells Alicent.
The final shot of the trailer shows us Rhaenyra’s rather imposing dragon, Syrax.
It’s worth noting that everything described above happens before The Dance of the Dragons, the tumultuous Targaryen civil war, even begins.
So we can expect season one, or the bulk of it at least, to deal with the build-up to the war, introducing us to the various players and putting their rivalries, resentments and yes, romances in place.
The trailer suggests a fair amount of time will be spent with Prince Daemon and his ambitions in the early episodes before the rivalry between Rhaenyra and Alicent takes shape towards the back end of the season.
One thing remains conspicuously absent from the show’s promotional material. Or rather, one person: Aegon. A single shot of what might be the back of his head hardly counts.
When the war breaks out, it is Aegon, not Alicent, whom the Green faction is supporting as ruler against Rhaenyra. For such a prominent character, he remains noticeably mysterious.
Have any thoughts or theories about House of the Dragon? Tell me about them! @SamClench | samuel.clench@news.com.au
Originally published as House of the Dragon trailer breakdown: Key details about Game of Thrones prequel
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