House Of The Dragon’s confronting birth scene was a ‘necessary moment’

It was described by viewers as one of the most gruesome things to air on TV, but here’s why “that” House Of The Dragon scene was needed. WARNING: Spoilers.

Meghan O’Keefe – Decider

3 min read

August 23, 2022 - 2:22PM

WARNING: Spoilers for House Of The Dragon episode 1.

The most shocking moment in the premiere of House Of The Dragon had nothing to do with nudity or dragons, but the way Aemma Arryn (Sian Brooke) was killed off.

The Queen of the Seven Kingdoms dies in childbirth, like countless women before her, but what is so revolutionary about her controversial death scene is how the show never cuts away from the pain, horror and savagery of her passing.

It’s a powerful choice that reverberates throughout the fantasy show’s first season, and sets it apart from Game of Thrones in a big way, Decider reports.

King Viserys chooses to save his potential male heir, sacrificing his wife during child birth. Picture: HBO/Binge/Foxtel

The 10-part prequel to GoT is setting up to tell the story of how the Targaryen dynasty imploded upon itself over King Viserys’ (Paddy Considine) successor for the Iron Throne.

When the first episode – now streaming on Binge and Foxtel* – opens, the previous ruler’s eldest heir Rhaenys (Eve Best) is passed over in favour of her younger cousin Viserys, because she is a woman.

By the end of the 66-minute debut episode, Viserys boldly decides to name his only surviving child, Rhaenyra (Milly Alcock), as his heir (even though he has a brother). This decision is spurred by the recent loss of his beloved wife, Aemma, in childbirth. It’s a death that may have been avoided were it not for Viserys’ painful choice to allow the maesters to cut Aemma open in a mad dash to save a potential male heir.

House Of The Dragon is unflinching in its portrayal of this forced birth, framing Viserys’ decision as a grotesque, nonconsensual act. The terrified queen has to be pinned down by multiple people to let the maester attempt the Cesarean section, all while she screams for them to stop.

To hammer home the violence of this scene, Aemma’s death is intercut with Daemon Targaryen’s (Matt Smith) own brutish battle with Criston Cole (Fabian Frankel) on the tourney field.

When Aemma dies, blood gushes out of her belly, soaking the sheets. We hear the dim cry of a baby boy, but he also dies within the day. Her sacrifice was for nothing.

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They’re all smiles now... Picture: HBO/Binge/Foxtel

This sequence is difficult to watch, but necessary. Most of our entertainment flinches away from the uglier parts of childbirth, preferring to frame the experience as a joyful miracle. And when childbirth goes wrong on television, it often happens off-screen or is shown in the most discreet terms.

Thanks to modern medicine, pregnancy and childbirth aren’t nearly as life-threatening as they once were.

Nevertheless, it’s still an unpleasant, trying, traumatic experience. In a later episode, another character successfully gives birth, but then has to deal with the afterbirth – and later, milk-sore breasts and the perceived embarrassment of lactating in public.

In refusing to romanticise childbirth and its aftershocks, House Of The Dragon is emphasising how women aren’t just politically squashed in this patriarchal world, but physically ground down by the demands of their biology.

Aemma Arryn’s death scene doesn’t just set the tone for how the show will approach the intimate experiences of women in a fresh way, but how this event traumatises specific characters.

Viewers have dubbed the scene the most ‘gruesome’ thing they’ve seen on TV.

In future episodes, Rhaenyra will rail against the notion that her most important role in the realm is to marry and give birth to the all-important heirs. You see why that prospect would offend her now.

Likewise, Viserys is a king who will become unable to choose between his loved ones. He wants to make everyone happy, which is a recipe to make no one happy. Having already decided between a wife and child to spectacularly terrible results, Viserys will likely shy away from making the same call again.

Aemma Arryn is a character that House Of The Dragon could have reduced to a footnote. After all, she dies long before the events of the Targaryen civil war that is still to come.

You could argue that her death in childbirth is only worth an off-handed comment or close up shot of a nurse wiping a dying woman’s brow.

Instead, House Of The Dragon introduces us to Aemma as a loving mother and caring wife. She is allowed space to feel things about her circumstance; and a scene where she tells Viserys she can’t mentally, physically or emotionally be pregnant again.

We are pulled into liking Aemma and seeing her as a fully dimensional character. That just makes the visceral nature of her bloody death all the more upsetting, and all the more important for the future of the series.