June 11, 2024 • 50 mins
A civil war is brewing! Jason and Rosie revisit the first season of House of the Dragon and discuss their expectations for season two. Then they chat with House of the Dragon showrunner Ryan Condal about what to expect in the upcoming season.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:15):
Hello, I'm just get touching on and on werisday night
and welcome to Xtra Vision of the podcast where we
dive deep into your favorite shows, movies, comics, and pop culture.
Coming to you from my Heart podcast where we're bringing
you two episodes a week, every Tuesday and every Thursday.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
In today's episode, it's a House of the Dragons smrga's
board of feasts and features and conversations and airlocks. In
the previously on, we're going to talk about George R. R.
Martin's blog posts Bomb Bomb Bomb. If you're in the
world of the Dragon, you will know about this blog post.
If you are not, we will give you a little
(00:55):
insight into it. In the airlock, we're going to be
looking back at House of the Dragons season one before
season two and the omnibus Jason deep dives with House
of the Dragon show run of Ryan.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
Come, that's a guest.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
For you, and we're gonna end the show with a
little Who's who about our favorite with George R. R.
Martin characters.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
First up news in recent news Rosie George R. Martin,
creator of the Song of Ice and Fire series Out
of It that spawned the Game of Thrones, House of
the Dragon. He's also written for TV, wrote the cult
classic Beauty and the Beast series of various episodes of
(01:38):
the Twilight Zone, and more. Has posted to his not
a blog blog a post titled the Adaptation Tango That
Begins that talks about the state of adapting IP to
TV shows and movies. One would assume, Rosie, ye, it is,
(01:59):
I urge people to read the piece. It is mainly
a praise of for the producers and writers who adapted
Showgun and did it in such a authentic way to James
Clavel's vision. The blog post has a lot to say,
including this quote that was all back in twenty twenty two,
(02:20):
but very little has changed since then. If anything, things
have gotten worse. Everywhere you look, there are more screenwriters
and producers eager to take great stories and quote make
them their own. He then goes on to note various
creators including Stanley, Questionmark but that's okay, Charles Dickens, Ian Fleming,
and Moore, who have been adapted and whose adaptations are
(02:42):
different than the original works, and George decries this. Why
is this important? Because George's works are currently being adapted
in the form of House of the Dragon and other
projects currently in development at HBO Max, including his Night
of the Seven Kingdom's project about the Duncan Egg stories.
And this is quite a provocative blog post, Rosie.
Speaker 4 (03:06):
It feels like there are implications.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
It feels like there's something implied.
Speaker 3 (03:11):
Yeah, that is implication.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
It feels like there's implications. To go out of your
way to kind of praise Shogun in this way while
you are being adapted. I'll just say it's very interesting.
Speaker 3 (03:22):
It's very interesting.
Speaker 2 (03:23):
I will also say I'm not trying to disagree with
no Armatin, but I will say Shogun is authentic in
some ways.
Speaker 4 (03:30):
But if James clavew was alive, he would probably.
Speaker 3 (03:33):
Have hated it.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
I think he might have hated it.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
It was so focused on the Japanese characters and the
Japanese experience rather than being through this kind of lens
of John Blackthorn. So you know, it is all subjective.
But yes, this is heavy with implications and quite I like.
Speaker 4 (03:49):
Your word provocative. It feels important.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
It's provocative, and we should say that. You know, when adapting,
money is a finite resource. I don't know what you know,
decisions are made that I don't know why George is
doing this, but it is it's it's interesting, it's provocative,
and I'm.
Speaker 4 (04:09):
You're just seeing might be the last we hear a bit.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
I wonder, I do wonder. Up Next, we dive into
a House of the Dragon season one as we look
forward to season two. Okay, Rosie, let's do a speed
recap of everything that happened season one of House of
the Dragon. It opens with the end of the reign
of King Jaharis, the greatest king in west Rus's history.
(04:34):
He's got a big problem. Low, No, he just didn't
couldn't manage to do it. He had a lot of kids,
and a lot of things happened to them, bad luck, death,
set duels, getting sick and dropping dead, getting hit by
a lucky era, a lot of bad luck. Dragon time
Shenanigans to a classic shenanigans. So what are we going
(04:56):
to do?
Speaker 3 (04:56):
Though?
Speaker 1 (04:56):
The realm gets together at a great council and votes,
and they vote for Prince Visaras over Princess Rainice, basically
because Prince Vassaras is a man. Yeah, that's the reason.
That was the primary reason. King Vissars would then have
the same problems. He had a very placid calm rule.
(05:19):
He was a very even tempered man, magnanimous, just honorable,
but he couldn't seem to make that air. And when
his wonderful and loving wife, Queen Emma, died in childbirth,
Visarahs found himself with one living child, the Princess Rania,
and he's a girl. And he decides to break with
(05:39):
tradition and name his beloved daughter, Princess Rania, his heir.
And he makes all the nobles in the realm swear
to uphold this choice, gathers them together. Yea, they kneel,
They kneeled, They swore that they would do it.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
That could definitely never go They could never go back
on that, right. I mean, this is sat and Stone.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
That's it. And the story ended there.
Speaker 3 (06:03):
Yeah, that's it.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
But you know a lot of people had misgivings, chief
among them Auto high Tower the hand of the king.
This guy, member of powerful high Tower family of Old Town.
He manipulates his daughter and Raniera's best friend forever, Allison
high Tower, into the heartbroken king's path, and he wasted
absolutely no time. He does not wait for the morning
(06:29):
period to end. He's just like Allison, go put on
your mother's dress. By the way, she's like a child.
She is legitimately a child. And go see if the
king needs any sandwiches or anything.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
Yeah, see if he need someone to read to him,
look at his legos, you know.
Speaker 1 (06:45):
And she does this and soon they are married, which
is exactly what Otto is hoping for. And soon after that,
Alison gives birth to a son, Prince Egon. Uh oh. Meanwhile,
Raniera creates huge pr problems for the kingdom by hooking
up with her uncle Damon, who was also much older
than them and is also a very chaotic guy who.
Speaker 3 (07:06):
Extremely chao conniving. Man.
Speaker 1 (07:09):
It probably killed his wife death slash definitely did it.
Slash absolutely killed his wife. We've smirched every way to
Sunday before killing her. No one knows that Raniera is
also in a kind of situationship slash workplace romance with
Kristin Cole of the King's guard. Visas finds out about
(07:31):
the Damon thing and he banishes Damon. He then tells Ranera, listen,
you need to get serious about this thing, about like
leading westrous about becoming the ruler, because here's I'm gonna
let you in on a little secret egg on the conqueror.
Our ancestor who conquered this continent had a top secret
prophecy dun dunt dun. He added, inscribed in this dagger
(07:53):
that bran Stark will almost be killed by years and
years and years later, and it says that Turgeria needs
to be on the throne. And this is the song
of ice and fire. So Raniera's like, okay, you're right, dad,
I need to get serious. So I agree that I
will marry Leonor Valerion. But I also have an ask,
and that is that Auto high Tower, who has been
(08:15):
constantly trying to get me deposed and get you to
change your mind, and has been manipulating various people behind
the scenes in order to subjugate your will to his.
I want him gone, and so Viceu's is like great
Auto's fired. Raniera gives birth to three boys, Jase, Luke,
and Joffrey, and they look nothing like Rania's husband, Leonor Valerian,
(08:42):
and they look quite a bit like Harwin Strong Chief,
you know, captain of the City Watch, who everybody calls
Breakbones because he's so big and strong, and he's also
very handsome. And also Raniera and Harwin seem to get
along very well, very well, very very very well, and
then all of a sudden, these three boys have shown up.
(09:02):
Vissera's wants his children and grandchildren to get along, but
he's powerless to stop the family fracturing. In two, we
have the Green Party led by Auto high Tower with
Alison high Tower as his main pawn, and the Black
Party led by Crown Princess Rania and her allies laras
strong Curry's favor with Alison. Lara's the club foot by
(09:27):
having his brother Harwin and father Lionel and the King
murdered by fire. And then Otto gets his old job back.
When Damon's wife Lena dies in childbirth, Damon returns to
the realm. Raniera and Damon rekindle their relationship. At Lena's funeral, Aimoned, bad, bad, bad,
don't do it. Aimond, Alison's second son, steals Lena's former
(09:52):
dragon Vagar, sparking a kick fight in which Luke cuts
out Aimon's eye.
Speaker 2 (09:58):
Very bad again, Like these children need to be raised parented.
Speaker 1 (10:04):
Where is the King's guard through all of this? Don't
ask going on?
Speaker 3 (10:07):
I need to know.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
Alison goes nuts, tries to stab Raniera and later apologize
for it. But Otto is like, forget that I loved it.
I love that you tried to kill the queen. That
was great.
Speaker 3 (10:19):
He's like to get you to do this all the time.
He's like, I don't care if you two had.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
Obvious sapphic teenage lover vibes. He's like, I want you
to hate her. I need you to understand. This is
not Rosie's version of the story where you to admit
that you're in love with each other and then rule
the kingdom in peace.
Speaker 3 (10:37):
No, this is the war version.
Speaker 4 (10:38):
This is going to war.
Speaker 3 (10:39):
You need to want to kill her.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
Later, Damon and Raniera fake Layer's death so he can
go east and stop pretending to be a straight man.
Speaker 3 (10:47):
That's actually very lovely.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
That is a very very lovely thing that.
Speaker 4 (10:52):
They actually do something good in this show.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
I agree, a beautiful golden silver lining in these clouds
of darkness. Damon and Nier get married right afterwards. Corlis
valari On Laner's dad, leader of the most powerful fleet
in West Rows, is obviously heartbroken that his son is dead,
but is also kind of generally speaking fine with pretending
that Jace, Luke and Joff are his grandchildren. That said,
(11:17):
the thought that Raniera might have killed the son, drives
him and Renee and Rennie's his wife to the sidelines
of this cold war between the Greens and Lives.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
I know we did bring this up, but it's gonna
be relevant when we talk about season two. Said like,
they should have just told the parents. They should have
just told the parents. I believe they would have kept
the secret. That's they should have just told them. They
should at least the mom I feel like it would
have saved some drama.
Speaker 1 (11:40):
I think Renee might have agreed with it. I think
that Corlis is so his legacy, yeah that I think
that he would not go for it.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (11:54):
True.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
Later Daymond Valerian, Corlis's brother, with Alison's support, files a
lawsuit with the Crown against Luceras Valerian, claiming that he
Vaymon should by rights inherit the family seat of drift Marks,
since Luke and his brothers are not Leanor's kids and
everybody knows it, do they not. Visaris is by this
time in an advanced stage of rot. His body is
(12:19):
in open rebellion against him, but he rouses himself with
a mighty burst of strength and his last dregs of
energy and reaffirms that yes, Rainy's her children were fathered
by Leanor, and to claim otherwise as a crime. And
my decision is my decision, and the next person who
(12:40):
brings anything up besmirching the ancestry of my grandchildren will
have their tongues ripped out. Damon then adjourns the case
by decapitating Vaymon right and right right in the mouth line,
right through the mouth line. Later, at dinner, Viseras begs,
he pleads with his family to put aside their issues
(13:02):
and heal and forgive each other and just get together
as a family. Can't we all just get along? He
takes off his mask, shows them his rotting, decaying face,
and he says, please, please, please, please for me, for
an old man, old dying man just loves you to death,
just wants to be your your doting grandfather. Just get along,
(13:23):
Just stop it. And it almost works. It really comes
close to working, Rosie, because Raniera and Allison they like embrace.
Speaker 3 (13:33):
And like, wait a minute, maybe this could work. Like
I missed you, I.
Speaker 1 (13:37):
Love you, I love you so much, and you're gonna
be a great queen and you're you're a great queen
and you're a great, mom, and you're the best, and
we've just got to hang out more.
Speaker 3 (13:48):
Yeah, we just unfortunately long, it's.
Speaker 1 (13:50):
Been too long. Unfortunately Vissarah dies like an hour later.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Okay, But the problem and the problem that he makes
here right is a classic problem in like any fictional show,
has a lot of naming off the people. As he dies,
he says Agon, but he doesn't mean. He doesn't mean
the Eggon, Allison's son should be on the throne. He means, shit,
Eggon's Prophecy's gonna come true. What's going on? But Alison
(14:15):
hears him and she thinks, uh oh, he does want
my son to be the king, and I bet I
tell my dad so he can put his long health
plans into motion.
Speaker 1 (14:25):
He doesn't mean Eggon Alison's son. He doesn't even mean Eggon.
Raniera's not the infant son. He means egg On the conquer.
He's talking about the prophecy. But of course Alison doesn't
know that, gets it wrong. I don't. Meanwhile, puts into
motion long laid plans to elevate Eggon, and all of
(14:48):
that works. Egon gets on the throne. Rainie and Corlis
come off the sidelines. They joined team Black. Each faction
vies for supporters. But when Luke Young Luke Young precociously
aimed one, I end up at Storm's end. At the
same time, tragedy strikes Luke and his baby dragon Raks
are killed by Aimond and Vagar. And that is where
(15:12):
we leave season one. Rosie, I ask you this, do
both sides have a pointer? Or is there a side
that's more right than the other side, Green or Black?
Who do you stand with?
Speaker 2 (15:24):
I do not believe both sides have a point. The
truth is Look, I am an Alison apologist.
Speaker 3 (15:29):
Put it on a T shirt. I love this version
of Alison. I think Olivia Cooke does such a good job.
Speaker 4 (15:35):
I just think this is such a nuanced, interesting.
Speaker 2 (15:39):
Cool look at these two women in this space. All
of that said, Ranera is and always has been the Air,
no matter what shenanigans have gone on, no matter how
much she's cheating with people and her you know, you
could question whether her as are supposed to be the
as or not because of the way they a sayad,
(16:00):
but she has always meant to be the air.
Speaker 3 (16:02):
She should have been the air. And I'll tell you
this for free. For Sarah's I'm sorry.
Speaker 2 (16:06):
Allison would have ended up. Forgiven, you should have just
chopped OHI Tower's head off. That means too many problems.
He should have been executed a long time ago, and
I think all of this would have been avoided. At
least some of it would have been avoided.
Speaker 1 (16:18):
I agree with you, and that is, to me, the
fatal flaw of Visarah's reign. I think the seed of
tragedy lies with him. He made this decision and then
he basically like walked away. He was like, Okay, Raniera's
gonna be my heir, and that's it. Should I do
some work in order to make this happen? Should I
give her, like some powerful lands with an army that
(16:41):
she could use to build up.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
Should like in meetings so that she kind of seen
as a face of the kingdom?
Speaker 1 (16:48):
Like, yeah, Should I just do everything to get And
to your point, should I stop saying, hey, don't don't
spread any rumors about Raniera's children or else, or else
I'll rip your tongue and then ripped zero tongues out.
I think you're absolutely right. He should have ripped a
couple tongues out, maybe five or six, and maybe thrown
auto high terror in chains. I think that made people
(17:10):
understand that he's serious because I think I agree with you.
I think Raniera is the air. She has the moral
right on her side. Look at the Black side, they're
like committing murders five minutes after Viceas dies in order
to be able to usurp the throne and elevate egg
On that said, I am, I am saddened by how
(17:33):
ill prepared Visas left Rania.
Speaker 3 (17:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
I think that is the real tragedy of this is
she's right, but she's also not ready. Yeah, and that
leads me to my next question. Do you think who
has the advantage here? Because the Blacks have more dragons,
as we hear Damon say at the end of the season.
At the same time, I think the Greens have inertia
(18:03):
and momentum on their side.
Speaker 3 (18:05):
They also have a strategy. That's the thing.
Speaker 2 (18:08):
Ranera's side is so chaotic, Like she's married to her
own cousin, who is like the most chaotic evil person
you could have on your side, who's always just doing
really badly planned, badly timed, terrible shit, which sometimes works.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
It sometimes does work.
Speaker 4 (18:29):
But but.
Speaker 2 (18:31):
Vaniera doesn't have an otto. Vanera doesn't have someone who's
been planning for a long time. Vannera doesn't have someone.
Speaker 4 (18:38):
Look.
Speaker 2 (18:38):
Otto has used Alison consistently, but Alison he needs her
for his plans to work. There's nobody who really needs
Rnera for their plans to work. There are multiple people
who who could use her, but I don't think there's
anyone with as much of a a mission as Otto.
Speaker 3 (18:57):
And I also think you're right.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
I think Vasis is it's all well and good to
have like a quiet, peace time king, but he didn't
really teach her anything about how to deal with conflict.
And now Ranier is being driven by this horrific grief
that's kind of this all consuming anger which is never
gonna lead anywhere good, and as we know with Targarians,
(19:21):
you know that can lead to madness.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
So I just think he didn't do a good job.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
He didn't leave her like some great war council because
he didn't want to admit there would be a war.
So the Greens have been preparing for war, whereas Rinera
was under the impression that they didn't need to be
a war because she is there and that's going to
be recognized. And then her son is killed in this
most horrific, you know, accidentally on purpose kind of way,
(19:46):
and suddenly she's thrown into a war with you know,
the parents of the guy that she faked his death,
that they think she killed. They're like her biggest allies,
and these people who think maybe she.
Speaker 3 (19:59):
Killed their son.
Speaker 2 (20:00):
So I do think that Greenside has the advantage, and
I do think that this is kind of a tragic,
all consuming fire of a war. You know, there's not
I want there to be some kind of happier ending,
but we just know that's never gonna happen in this case,
not just not because of spoilers, but just because.
Speaker 3 (20:21):
Of the nature of how this became and how it happened.
This is a very.
Speaker 2 (20:26):
Violent, horrible spark that's gonna set fire to this conflict.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
I want to call out one person who I really
really hate. I don't like Otto, but I respect him.
Hilaris I is an evil man.
Speaker 3 (20:44):
He's trying to do what he can.
Speaker 2 (20:45):
To survive in a world that's like, you know, he's
he's he's an evil creeper.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
Here's who I hate, Christian call in cell the fucking
jilted boyfriend energy coming off of Kristin Cole, who as
Captain and Lord Commander of the King's Guard. I just
think he acts in an unprofessional nature. He's too angry.
And Chris, we talked about this a lot. When we
(21:13):
talked about this.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
He betrayed hide like he loved us so much, and
then it was just betrayal, betrayal, betrayal because you.
Speaker 3 (21:19):
Can't be ha king. Are you mad?
Speaker 1 (21:21):
They broke up because Kristin Cole said the following, He's like, hey, yeah, Ranier.
They were on the boat back from drift Mark I believe,
or maybe it was the storm Lands, and he said
to Rner and is like, hey, you know what we
should do. Let's I know you're gonna be queen, like
you're slated to be queen, and currently what we're doing
is we're on tour to find you a husband so
(21:43):
that you could be queen. That said, why don't we
just like hit the road. Let's just it's just like,
let's just like follow the grateful dead. I saw oranges
one time on DOC when I was in Dorn, and
I've become obsessed with oranges. I want to see where
rare fruits grow. Oh, let's just go like get on
a ship and just like live free and like look
(22:04):
at fruit trees from like all around the world. What
do you say about that? And Rania was like, bro,
are you are you?
Speaker 3 (22:11):
Are you serious? Like you serious? Does he?
Speaker 2 (22:14):
The thing is like, by not doing that one because
it was a dumb idea, But also she saved his
life because that is the a you're gonna get hunted down.
Speaker 3 (22:23):
No one was just gonna let her go.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
That's right. Not only that, Kristen, not only did she
save your life, because you if Raniera ever tells anybody
about this, you're.
Speaker 3 (22:34):
Dead, literally dead.
Speaker 1 (22:37):
Next you can't propose to the the person who will
be the first woman in history to rule West. You
can't propose to her. Just run away, because now you have,
you have destroyed any chance that a woman ever ever
be elevated, because they'll just be like, well we did
(22:58):
it that one time, and remember she just right away,
she just left. He doesn't care, he does christ and Cole.
And now you're mad about it when you are the
one who caused a lot of this. I don't like
that guy.
Speaker 3 (23:11):
N He's my enemy, number one enemy.
Speaker 1 (23:14):
Do you have any things you're looking forward to in
a season two or just anything? Any thoughts that you
have as we look ahead, We're going to do a
more season two centric episode coming up as we draw
closer to the House of the Dragon premiere, which is Sunday,
June sixteenth. But yeah, any predictions for season I'm.
Speaker 2 (23:33):
Really excited to see more Dragons, I wrote. I wrote
an article on IGN when the first trailer dropped that
I was just really happy that the season two trailer
seemed to be doing exactly what I thought season one
did really well, which is like focusing on the women
in the story, whether it's you know, Damon's kids or
(23:54):
whether it is Raynie or Ranera. I think season one
kind of blew me away with this really nuanced, interesting
look at like how women survive in this space, you know,
in which then I feel like Shogun, you know, to
go back to it from where earlier. But Shogun did
this similar thing, and I really felt like it was
(24:14):
something that the original Game of Throne series had often
struggled with over a long period of time.
Speaker 3 (24:18):
But House the Dragon seems to.
Speaker 2 (24:20):
Be doing really, really well, and I'm just excited to
learn more about these female characters, to see new dragon writers,
to see new dragons, to talk about it with you,
because it's like a lot of fun.
Speaker 3 (24:31):
But I am gonna be.
Speaker 2 (24:32):
Like heartbroken because I am a I'm I'm a Ranierer
Allison Shipper, and it's gonna be hard to see them
at war.
Speaker 3 (24:40):
That is my.
Speaker 1 (24:42):
Pradiction in the thing I am. I'm both. It's super
super excited for this upcoming season. It's gonna be There
are a lot of notable time jumps in season one.
That's out of the that's out of the way in
season two. The showrunners have talked about that this is
just basically now a story that is going to unfold
in a typically chronological manner. Now, so that's going to
(25:05):
add a lot of intensity excitement. But as a person
who is aware of what happens in this story, I'm
also looking forward to this season with quite a bit
of anxiety. Bad things are gonna happen to everyone, and
bad things are gonna happen to good people, and bad
things are gonna happen to innocent people, and I am
(25:30):
dreading it a little bit. I will say this too.
I wonder if you know, looking back at Game of Thrones,
Tyrian Lanister is such an important character in a way
that I think is underrated because He brought a mirth,
a quick witted kind of acerbicness that I think we
(25:54):
might need a little bit of lift of someone to
crack some one liners because the amount of death and
misery that's coming. You know, if they hew closely to
the story in the books, as we know George wants
them to, then I think we're gonna need a little
(26:15):
We're gonna need some reasons to smile, because it might
it might get really really intense, really really quick. That
is my thought. Up next, an interview with House of
the Dragon show runner Ryan Conton.
Speaker 2 (26:44):
Welcome to another edition of the Omnibus where law, analysis
and understanding come together. Today, Jason concepts you and have
you heard of him. He's going to be chatting to
He's the host of the official House of Tracking podcast
and he's going to be chatting too. House the Dragon
show runner Ryan Condall.
Speaker 1 (27:05):
Ryan, thanks so much for joining us. Really appreciate it.
Speaker 5 (27:08):
Thanks Jason, good to see you.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
Wonderful to see you again. Did you get to enjoy
the reaction to season one at all before diving right
back into it or is it just right back to
the mines we were?
Speaker 5 (27:19):
We were we were deep in the minds already, So yeah,
I mean I got to enjoy it. I had this
surreal moment where I've inherited a Premiere League club out
here in the Tottenham Hotspur and Oka. I have a
very good friend of mine is as being a supporter
(27:39):
for a very long time and knows knows people in
in in the club and said that I was a fan,
and then they got excited because they were fans of
the show and of course the original Game of Thrones
for the the first show, and they invited me to
a game and I got I sat in the owner's
box and they brought me down on the field for
an oscar let and they gave me a jersey with
(28:03):
my name and it was crazy, and I was standing
there like just thinking this is this is insane. And
there were moments like that I think throughout season one
that have never happened to me before in doing this job.
So I did get to enjoy that part a bit.
Speaker 1 (28:17):
That's wonderful. Did that bring you into conflict with any
of the Arsenal supporters in the cast and crew. I
believe Tom Glencardi is an Arsenal guy, but I'm not sure.
Speaker 5 (28:28):
Yeah, we try not to talk about all of it,
because I mean, I'm not you know, it's not it's ye,
I'm a I inherited this team. It's not in my
blood the way that the New York Football Giants are
so where it's much more tribal for me. But no,
I'm always fascinated. It's a thing out here. You always
ask where are you from? Who do you support? Because
(28:50):
there's so many different leagues. It's not just the Premiership.
There's the Championship League, and then the league's below like
the Rexhamer in and all that, So everybody always has
a different answer. But there are lots of Arsenal fans
on these parts, so I try not to wear my
cap too much.
Speaker 1 (29:04):
One of the speaking of blood but also fire. There
are so many moments in season one where I'm feeling like,
oh gosh, there's an off ramp here maybe and if
they miss it then there's no turning back. Is there
Is there anything that could have been done at any
point to avert this war?
Speaker 5 (29:22):
I think there. I think you're correct in saying I
think there were many off ramps, or or also possibly none.
I mean, it's so.
Speaker 1 (29:28):
Hard to say.
Speaker 5 (29:29):
Yeah, I think I think viserus unfortunately for poor Visius,
who just wanted everybody to be happy and get along
so that he could read his histories and work on
his philosophies. I think I think it's it's really his shortcomings,
and and we always talked about him as being a
good man and a great father, but a bad king.
(29:49):
At least a great father to Raniera. He had the
opportunities to stave off this war, and I think that's
one of the tragedies of this series and circumstances. His
the one thing that he stuck to for his whole life,
you know, all the way through. His final words, although
he didn't know who he was speaking to at the moment,
were in defense of this radical thing he did in
(30:11):
naming his daughter the heir to the throne. But that
is the thing that ultimately tore the kingdom apart in
the end, because it's such a patriarchal society and it's
so rooted in tradition, and this is the way things
are done, and we do not, as particularly in government,
we do not change this order that's been ordained by
the gods and all the targarians that came before, and
(30:31):
all the kings that even predated the Targarians. It's always
been the first born son of the king of the
monarch is the one who, inherits and Bessarah's broke that
order and then wasn't strong enough to put the battlements
up in place around it to protect Rania, or to
give egg On something to help him in his side
(30:51):
of the family save face, or to make you know,
make alliances to make sure that Ottohai Tower couldn't execute
a coup, or that Auto High Tower was in hand,
so it didn't have the power to be that close
to the throne. It's just it's Visceras's weakness that ultimately
leads to this. And then of course there's all the
little moments and the infighting that happened all the way
along that engender this sort of you know, green and
(31:13):
Black divide, this entrenchment that we see happen over the
course of the first season.
Speaker 1 (31:18):
One of my absolute favorite moments from season one is
the conversation that Rainie's has with Alison when Renie's essentially
a prisoner in King's landing and says to Alison, you know,
have you ever imagined yourself ruling? And I'm going to
paraphrase now and absolutely mangle the beautiful dialogue here, but
you know saying, you know, what you're seeing is is
(31:39):
a window to freedom, but you're still in the prison
created by these men. What was Renee waiting for? What
was she hoping for before she essentially makes a decision
to take a side. What did she want to hear
from Alison or anyone?
Speaker 5 (31:54):
I mean, I think I think Rainie's is dealing with
her own grief over the fact that she was originally
passed over, and she was probably Rainis. I mean, we've
spent a lot of time with her now, she was
probably more suited personality wise for the job of rule
than Visera's and for the same reason that Eggon is
(32:16):
now usurping and challenging the throne. Raini's was passed over
at the Great Council, but Jaharis was a better king
and he knew that just naming her would probably lead
to a war, so he put the vote to the lords.
You guys decide, You tell us how law and tradition
is going to be moving forward. So I think in
her conversation with Alison, I think that's what she's wrestling with,
(32:36):
and I think she's trying to she probably doesn't. I mean,
Rainie's probably an Allison at this point. I would guess
they've had a couple of shallow conversations over the course
of their life, and I don't think Rainis knows much
about Allison at this point and is trying to get
under the skin to figure out who this person actually
is before she makes her daring escape attempt to try
(32:57):
to get out of King's Landing and go to Dragonstone
to pledge your support for Visaras's her cousin's chosen air.
Speaker 1 (33:06):
Fire and Blood. The source material for House the Dragon
is written from the perspective of several different, unreliable historical chroniclers.
How did that affect your adaptation?
Speaker 5 (33:16):
I mean, it is the adaptation. It's I always say
this is it's a screenwriter's dream because it's a it's
an adaptation that provides a ton of latitude for invention
and interpretation. But it's also screenwriter's nightmare because I do
have to we as the creative team with me, make
(33:39):
you know, making the kind of fine I'm King Jaharis
in this I have I have a council of great
council of lords and ladies that stand around me, and
I have to make the final rulings on things. And
it's very challenging because on the face of it, it
requires you to invent a whole a whole lot just
because of the nature of the book. It's an outline
of historical events that does not have scenes and a
(34:02):
narrative in the you know, most strictest of senses. And
also these characters didn't didn't live through this time, so
they are I mean, Mushroom did, if you believe that
Mushroom existed and was there, But the others are. It's
more like the Gospel in the Bible. I think I
forget which one forgive me. My biblical history is from
my Augustinian education is failing me. But I think the
(34:24):
gospel that was written the closest to the man who
is Jesus was thirty years after his death. So even that,
I mean, we can't agree on We can't agree on
something that happened last week that was filmed on television
that we all witnessed. So trying to pair through that
history and find the central through line through it is challenging,
as you know, as an adapter, and you have to
(34:44):
you have to fold things together and keep the narrative
moving and you have to invent but try to keep,
you know, honoring the history. So it does, you know,
drive our minds into pretzel knots quite often. But in
the end it's a very rewarding and fun creative challenge
because you get to bring this thing that is a
different medium to it's not a dramatic narrative in the
(35:05):
most traditional senses, and we get to bring it to life.
And I think in the most open interpretation of Fire
and Blood next to House of the Dragon, a fan
that has read the text and watched the show, hopefully
each enhances the enjoyment of the other, where you get
to see how we're playing with the interpretation of the history.
And if you've only watched the show and you go
(35:25):
back and read the book, you get to see how
it goes in the other direction, and you get to
try to hopefully guess as to how things are going
to come together. And the things that are never given
in the book are the whyse because there's no you're
never inside the character's head, and I think those are
the most fun things to dramatize. But yes, it keeps
me up lying awake at night. Quite often.
Speaker 1 (35:47):
We spent a lot of time over watching season one
and reading the books wondering what drives Damon, And I
think a lot of the other characters in this story
wonder what drives Damon? And I'm wondering, now, does Damon
know what drives Damon? What is it that motivates him?
It really seems at the tragically at the end of
(36:07):
season one that he is he's at war. He seems
very comfortable and ready to be there. But what is
it that he's what's his goal? What is he looking for?
Does he know?
Speaker 5 (36:18):
I think Damon's goal through his through the ninety five
percent of season one was simply to find the love
and the respect of his brother. The thing that we
always talked about in the room is that everybody around
Damon presumes that he wants the throne, But for Damon
to get the throne in any scenario, it requires his
brother to die, and he loves his brother so deeply.
(36:40):
It's a complicated love. It's a it's a love that
was you know, shows a childhood where certain emotions were
not modeled for him in the most healthy of ways.
So what we always said is Damon really during Visaras's
life Damon wanted to be Vizara's hand, not the king,
but Visaras's hand. He wanted to be the guy that
Visera's called up and chose to stand to decide and
(37:01):
be as most trusted. And the fact that it was
Otto High Tower, Damon's arch enemy, it drove him to
madness until the end of Visas. So I think when
Vices dies, it's this Damon is freed in a way
of this thing that tortured him his entire life because
his brother never accepted him in that way. And when
he grabs Raniera's throat in that very controversial moment at
(37:23):
the end at the end of season one, it's not
about Raniera as much as it is about Visers didn't
trust him enough to let him into this secret that
he instead chose to share with a fourteen year old
girl and name her heir. So now, as Damon sets
forward into season two, I think it's a fascinating question
that you're asking, is what does Damon want? And I
(37:43):
think Damon is now starts from a place where he's
projecting Viceras's reign into Rnira. So Rniera is in a
way an embodiment of his brother and I'm going to
fight for the death for that thing so that the
Otto and his ilk don't win the prize in the end.
And I think the fun thing about Damon is he
of course grows and evolves over time, so we'll see
(38:04):
where that takes us. But to me, that's his starting point.
Speaker 1 (38:08):
You mentioned the Eggon prophecy. You're also a huge fan
of these stories, Georgis works independent of being the showrunner
of House of the Dragon. One of the things that
as that I love to nerd out about, just I
think about all the time is how the Eggon prophecy,
which was revealed by the show, could have influenced events
(38:29):
in Westers For instance, you know, the tragedy at Summer
Haul may take on a different kind of significance. You
know if egg On the fifth knew about the prophecy.
Do you think about that at all, just from a
nerd perspective.
Speaker 3 (38:45):
Oh totally.
Speaker 5 (38:46):
I mean we've talked about this a whole lot, and
I think the fun of the fun of this is
that whenever you set out to make a prequel, I
think the trick is made is why are we here?
Why are we telling this story? Beyond making money and
even the franchise going and putting butts in seats and
all the reason that we continued these big franchises, What
(39:07):
is the actual creative reason that this prequel needs to exist?
And I think both the fun end the challenge of
this show is how far in the past it is,
and that makes it really cool because it unburdens you
from having to do the Oh, this is how you know,
this is how Indiana Jones got the scar in his chin,
and this is where he found the hat, and that's
how the you know, whoever got the lightsaber that they found.
(39:29):
Because there are no character interlinkages, so you're really talking
about the historical interlinkage between our period and the period
that we know very well that comes one hundred and
twenty years from now. So for us, the linkage is
very much based around the Targarian blood line and then
this secret that was very much alive in this era,
and then what happens to it after this civil war
(39:49):
that we know is we know from the outside looking
in is the worst to ever be fought. And at
the end of it, whether it's a result of this
war just a result of the events that are set
in motion, all of the Dragon die off and don't
exist again until they're born again to Denaris Targarian, the
beggar Queen or the beggar Princess at that point. Yeah,
(40:10):
in the story of Song of Ice and Fire. So
I think that's the fun of it. And look, I
don't know whether I'll ever tell another one of these stories,
but there is so much rich Targarian history that happens
between here and there. I think you're asking a key
and great question that hopefully somebody like me that is
enthused about this world gets to play with an answer.
I think at some point in the future is like,
(40:30):
how does that secret live on? And how does it
live on? And what happens and how does it influence
the rains to come?
Speaker 1 (40:37):
I completely agree. I love thinking about it. Back to
the show, which faction in your mind, black or green
or some shade in between. What's the best outcome for
west Ross, for its people that gives the least amount
of destruction across loss of life, loss of treasure, etc.
(40:57):
What's the best way out of this?
Speaker 5 (41:00):
I mean, that's so hard to say. I have to
get in my medieval DeLorean and go back to Visaras
and get him to take a stand more in his life,
and maybe maybe he doesn't. Maybe if he doesn't get ill,
maybe he does. He does something stronger in the end,
take a stronger stand before the end, and it's probably
some version of betrothing egg On to Rania or naming
(41:22):
you know, naming egg on the air afterwards and giving
Rniera us something enough that doesn't cause the other side
go to war. He's got to do something with Damon
because Damon's not going to let that stand. It's a
really hard question. It's a really hard question. But I
as of right now, as as this war takes off,
I honestly don't know what that answer is because I think,
and that's the fun of the story and also the
(41:43):
tragedy of it, is each of these the victor that
comes out of this, there is a complicated story that
follows them. I think on the face of it, Rnier
is probably a little bit more centered and assured at
the moment versus you know, where egg On is. But
with her comes the thing that Otto warned us about
all through season one is the realm will never accept her.
And that doesn't mean individuals within the realm. It means
(42:04):
the realm as a united body, even in victory in battle,
after a long and bloody war, will they really accept
and bend the knee to a woman in the end.
And that's a big story that plays out this season.
Even within Raniera's own world, is her struggles to be
a queen to her own fiefdom and what that entails,
and you know the entrenched patriarchal attitudes that are so
(42:28):
alive in her period of history.
Speaker 1 (42:31):
Well, you open the door. What can we expect? And
I'm sure you're going to give us. You're going to
stay within the guidelines and do this in the safest
and most responsible way, But what can we expect for
season two?
Speaker 5 (42:44):
I mean, hopefully you know, should I just run down
all the character deaths just in alphabetic you want to
discuss it? My biggest hope is that the very nutritious
meal that we prepared for everybody in season one, and
the fact that everybody engaged with this really intricate Shakespearean
slash Greek tragedy that's all based around one house in
(43:06):
this one family, and getting to know all these family
members and sitting through multiple childbirths and weddings and marriages
and divorces, some of them forced by a Rock has
built up the stakes to such a point where all
of the events as the dominoes start to fall in
season two, are not only satisfying on a sort of
visceral level week to week and the surprises, but that
(43:27):
because you understand all of the deep roots and history
that we set out in season one, that it becomes
greatly satisfying and we pick up right where we left off.
I mean, it's just a couple of days after the
events of season one. I really do think the things
that we work so hard to set up in season
one are paid off, one after the other after the other,
and the new things are set up as we move ahead.
But I think that the thing that I hope that
(43:49):
most for the audience in season two is a reward
for having engaged so deeply with season one.
Speaker 1 (43:55):
Is there a person in this world right now you
mentioned Renie would be a great ruler who, if you
could pick them up and drop them down on the throne,
would be something like the ideal ruler, an upgrade, so
to speak.
Speaker 5 (44:10):
Oh that's a good question.
Speaker 1 (44:12):
Uh.
Speaker 5 (44:12):
I think I actually think he's complicated. But I think
the Sea Snake would be a great, a great classic
monarch there's a bit of ego.
Speaker 1 (44:19):
Wrap up in all of that.
Speaker 5 (44:22):
But I think you know, Corlis has weathered and experienced
enough in his time. He's been he's actually been in
combat and had multiple near death experiences, so he knows
the cost of sending people off to war. He doesn't
have a dragon. He has good relationships with the family
that do have dragons. He's a self made man, as
we know. He built he built his own castle, which
is such a kind of an unheard of thing in
(44:43):
this time. He's new money in a in a way.
So I think I think he because he he because
he's he's a he's a business owner, you know, he's
he's a he's a he's he's an entrepreneur. I think
he's very That suits him very well to be able
to be just and and we've seen he he can
tell people how it is and make hard decisions and
break some eggs along the way of making his making
(45:05):
his drif Markey and omlet. So I think, and I
just love Steve Tossant, So I actually I want Steve
Tossant to be king.
Speaker 1 (45:13):
There you go him personally. Okay, well, we now come
to probably your most important plug of the show tell
the audience about your the podcast you co host with
Deep show runner David Mandel, What Dreams Are Made Of?
Speaker 5 (45:27):
Bless you, Jason, thank you. Yes, it's called The Stuff
Dreams Are Made Of. It's a somewhat weekly podcast. We
sort of do seasons and then take little breaks. We're
gonna a little break now, we'll be back this summer.
But we talk about our passion for collecting, collecting things,
I mean, particularly movie and television memorabilia from our kind
of childhoods, the genre, things that we grew up with.
And you can't see here, but I'm sort of surrounded
(45:48):
by it in my office here. My joke is I
collect anything from nineteen eighty nine and sorry, nineteen seventy
seven to nineteen eighty nine.
Speaker 3 (45:55):
And yeah.
Speaker 5 (45:56):
We talk about all how collecting works, authenticating things, and
you know, Indiana Jones whips and lightsabers and follow a
whole saga while Dave tries to win a very expensive
X Wing model from the original Star Wars. It's it's
really it's a it's a movie podcast that that gets
very deeply in the weeds and nerdy about the stuff
(46:18):
that's used to make the movie and the nerds who
collected afterwards.
Speaker 1 (46:23):
What's your favorite thing, your favorite prop uh collectible.
Speaker 5 (46:28):
My favorite thing that I have is probably I have
Conan's hero sword from Conan the Barbarian, and it was
one of the four that was made for the film,
and it was something that I actually tracked down. We
call it in the wild, so I found it. I
did a lot of sleuthing when I moved to la
and I found it with one of the original crew
members who worked on the film and and extracted it
(46:49):
like Conan from the from the Atlantean tone from from
a from the trunk of a car in a Starbucks
parking lot in Calabasas. So very proud. I'm very proud
of that.
Speaker 1 (47:01):
House of the Dragons Season two debuts on HBO and
Max Sunday, June sixteenth, nine pm. Ryan Connell, thank you
so much for joining us.
Speaker 5 (47:10):
Thank you, Jason, it's great to be here.
Speaker 1 (47:27):
Thanks to Ryan for joining us. Up next, Who's Who.
We like to end each episode with a series of
fast moving segments. In this episode Who's Who, where we
talk about our favorite weird characters. And in this case,
we're gonna talk about our favorite weird characters and weirdly
named characters in George R. R. Martin's universe. Rosie who
(47:50):
you got?
Speaker 3 (47:51):
Okay?
Speaker 4 (47:52):
Now, I did select this Who's who simply because I.
Speaker 2 (47:55):
Deeply wanted to talk about this character, because I think
about him every time I think about please anything to
do with isifier.
Speaker 4 (48:01):
I gotta go for Dickon Manwoody.
Speaker 3 (48:05):
Dickon, Dickon Manwoody. This what a name? What a name.
Speaker 2 (48:12):
He is the son of Lord Dagos Manwoody, and he
goes to King's Landing as part of the entourage of
Prince Oberon Martel. Remember him, but yeah, Dickon Manwoody. I
feel like I will forever be trying to make a
name that fantastic and that Dickon Strong Dickon Manwoody. He
(48:34):
was like, Dickon, you know, we get a lot of
Dickons and Rickons in this universe. But he was like,
just in case, just in case this doesn't sound manly enough,
just in case this doesn't sound phallic.
Speaker 4 (48:45):
Enough, I'm also adding the man Woody.
Speaker 3 (48:48):
You know.
Speaker 4 (48:48):
I was like, George, you're really going wild on that one.
Speaker 1 (48:51):
Ah. I'm gonna shout out a character whom actually may
play a role in events and how to the Dragon,
the Aged Lord of River Run, Grover Tully and Grover's grandsons,
Elmo Tully, Hey Kurbat Tully.
Speaker 3 (49:12):
Oh my god, Shsker Tully.
Speaker 1 (49:14):
I'm dead serious. George R.
Speaker 4 (49:19):
Love, Jim Hedson, Jim dam Scoundrel.
Speaker 1 (49:24):
Groover Tully, Elmo Tully, Kurmatully, and Oscar Tully. That's right, folks.
Speaker 3 (49:29):
Oh that's so good.
Speaker 1 (49:30):
Those are active characters that may or may not appear.
And how's the Dragon season two? I don't know, but
I know that in the books they play a role
and George had some fun with al.
Speaker 2 (49:42):
That's the kind of easter eggs I'm trying to put it.
I want to write something. I want to name some
characters who are named after like comic book characters we like,
and I want in like twenty years, I want people
to be like they reference that, like in this I'm like,
you put the Muppets and Sesame Street and that you
you were like, I.
Speaker 3 (50:01):
Love Jim Henson.
Speaker 4 (50:01):
Baby, this is my Jim Henson family shout out.
Speaker 3 (50:05):
That's magical. I love it.
Speaker 1 (50:07):
Well, it's been a magical episode. And that's it for
us today. Thanks so much for listening.
Speaker 2 (50:12):
Thank you for listen Thanks Bye.
Speaker 1 (50:20):
X ray Vision is hosted by Jason Kensumsion and Rosie
Knight and is a production of iHeart Podcasts. Our executive
producers are Joelle Smith and Aaron Kaufman. Our supervising producer
is a Boo Zafar. Our producers are Carmen Laurent and
Mia Taylor. Our theme song is by Brian Basquez.
Speaker 2 (50:41):
Special thanks to Soul Rubin and Chris Lord, Kenny Goodman
and Heidi A discoll Moderata
Hello, I'm just get touching on and on werisday night
and welcome to Xtra Vision of the podcast where we
dive deep into your favorite shows, movies, comics, and pop culture.
Coming to you from my Heart podcast where we're bringing
you two episodes a week, every Tuesday and every Thursday.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
In today's episode, it's a House of the Dragons smrga's
board of feasts and features and conversations and airlocks. In
the previously on, we're going to talk about George R. R.
Martin's blog posts Bomb Bomb Bomb. If you're in the
world of the Dragon, you will know about this blog post.
If you are not, we will give you a little
(00:55):
insight into it. In the airlock, we're going to be
looking back at House of the Dragons season one before
season two and the omnibus Jason deep dives with House
of the Dragon show run of Ryan.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
Come, that's a guest.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
For you, and we're gonna end the show with a
little Who's who about our favorite with George R. R.
Martin characters.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
First up news in recent news Rosie George R. Martin,
creator of the Song of Ice and Fire series Out
of It that spawned the Game of Thrones, House of
the Dragon. He's also written for TV, wrote the cult
classic Beauty and the Beast series of various episodes of
(01:38):
the Twilight Zone, and more. Has posted to his not
a blog blog a post titled the Adaptation Tango That
Begins that talks about the state of adapting IP to
TV shows and movies. One would assume, Rosie, ye, it is,
(01:59):
I urge people to read the piece. It is mainly
a praise of for the producers and writers who adapted
Showgun and did it in such a authentic way to James
Clavel's vision. The blog post has a lot to say,
including this quote that was all back in twenty twenty two,
(02:20):
but very little has changed since then. If anything, things
have gotten worse. Everywhere you look, there are more screenwriters
and producers eager to take great stories and quote make
them their own. He then goes on to note various
creators including Stanley, Questionmark but that's okay, Charles Dickens, Ian Fleming,
and Moore, who have been adapted and whose adaptations are
(02:42):
different than the original works, and George decries this. Why
is this important? Because George's works are currently being adapted
in the form of House of the Dragon and other
projects currently in development at HBO Max, including his Night
of the Seven Kingdom's project about the Duncan Egg stories.
And this is quite a provocative blog post, Rosie.
Speaker 4 (03:06):
It feels like there are implications.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
It feels like there's something implied.
Speaker 3 (03:11):
Yeah, that is implication.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
It feels like there's implications. To go out of your
way to kind of praise Shogun in this way while
you are being adapted. I'll just say it's very interesting.
Speaker 3 (03:22):
It's very interesting.
Speaker 2 (03:23):
I will also say I'm not trying to disagree with
no Armatin, but I will say Shogun is authentic in
some ways.
Speaker 4 (03:30):
But if James clavew was alive, he would probably.
Speaker 3 (03:33):
Have hated it.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
I think he might have hated it.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
It was so focused on the Japanese characters and the
Japanese experience rather than being through this kind of lens
of John Blackthorn. So you know, it is all subjective.
But yes, this is heavy with implications and quite I like.
Speaker 4 (03:49):
Your word provocative. It feels important.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
It's provocative, and we should say that. You know, when adapting,
money is a finite resource. I don't know what you know,
decisions are made that I don't know why George is
doing this, but it is it's it's interesting, it's provocative,
and I'm.
Speaker 4 (04:09):
You're just seeing might be the last we hear a bit.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
I wonder, I do wonder. Up Next, we dive into
a House of the Dragon season one as we look
forward to season two. Okay, Rosie, let's do a speed
recap of everything that happened season one of House of
the Dragon. It opens with the end of the reign
of King Jaharis, the greatest king in west Rus's history.
(04:34):
He's got a big problem. Low, No, he just didn't
couldn't manage to do it. He had a lot of kids,
and a lot of things happened to them, bad luck, death,
set duels, getting sick and dropping dead, getting hit by
a lucky era, a lot of bad luck. Dragon time
Shenanigans to a classic shenanigans. So what are we going
(04:56):
to do?
Speaker 3 (04:56):
Though?
Speaker 1 (04:56):
The realm gets together at a great council and votes,
and they vote for Prince Visaras over Princess Rainice, basically
because Prince Vassaras is a man. Yeah, that's the reason.
That was the primary reason. King Vissars would then have
the same problems. He had a very placid calm rule.
(05:19):
He was a very even tempered man, magnanimous, just honorable,
but he couldn't seem to make that air. And when
his wonderful and loving wife, Queen Emma, died in childbirth,
Visarahs found himself with one living child, the Princess Rania,
and he's a girl. And he decides to break with
(05:39):
tradition and name his beloved daughter, Princess Rania, his heir.
And he makes all the nobles in the realm swear
to uphold this choice, gathers them together. Yea, they kneel,
They kneeled, They swore that they would do it.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
That could definitely never go They could never go back
on that, right. I mean, this is sat and Stone.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
That's it. And the story ended there.
Speaker 3 (06:03):
Yeah, that's it.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
But you know a lot of people had misgivings, chief
among them Auto high Tower the hand of the king.
This guy, member of powerful high Tower family of Old Town.
He manipulates his daughter and Raniera's best friend forever, Allison
high Tower, into the heartbroken king's path, and he wasted
absolutely no time. He does not wait for the morning
(06:29):
period to end. He's just like Allison, go put on
your mother's dress. By the way, she's like a child.
She is legitimately a child. And go see if the
king needs any sandwiches or anything.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
Yeah, see if he need someone to read to him,
look at his legos, you know.
Speaker 1 (06:45):
And she does this and soon they are married, which
is exactly what Otto is hoping for. And soon after that,
Alison gives birth to a son, Prince Egon. Uh oh. Meanwhile,
Raniera creates huge pr problems for the kingdom by hooking
up with her uncle Damon, who was also much older
than them and is also a very chaotic guy who.
Speaker 3 (07:06):
Extremely chao conniving. Man.
Speaker 1 (07:09):
It probably killed his wife death slash definitely did it.
Slash absolutely killed his wife. We've smirched every way to
Sunday before killing her. No one knows that Raniera is
also in a kind of situationship slash workplace romance with
Kristin Cole of the King's guard. Visas finds out about
(07:31):
the Damon thing and he banishes Damon. He then tells Ranera, listen,
you need to get serious about this thing, about like
leading westrous about becoming the ruler, because here's I'm gonna
let you in on a little secret egg on the conqueror.
Our ancestor who conquered this continent had a top secret
prophecy dun dunt dun. He added, inscribed in this dagger
(07:53):
that bran Stark will almost be killed by years and
years and years later, and it says that Turgeria needs
to be on the throne. And this is the song
of ice and fire. So Raniera's like, okay, you're right, dad,
I need to get serious. So I agree that I
will marry Leonor Valerion. But I also have an ask,
and that is that Auto high Tower, who has been
(08:15):
constantly trying to get me deposed and get you to
change your mind, and has been manipulating various people behind
the scenes in order to subjugate your will to his.
I want him gone, and so Viceu's is like great
Auto's fired. Raniera gives birth to three boys, Jase, Luke,
and Joffrey, and they look nothing like Rania's husband, Leonor Valerian,
(08:42):
and they look quite a bit like Harwin Strong Chief,
you know, captain of the City Watch, who everybody calls
Breakbones because he's so big and strong, and he's also
very handsome. And also Raniera and Harwin seem to get
along very well, very well, very very very well, and
then all of a sudden, these three boys have shown up.
(09:02):
Vissera's wants his children and grandchildren to get along, but
he's powerless to stop the family fracturing. In two, we
have the Green Party led by Auto high Tower with
Alison high Tower as his main pawn, and the Black
Party led by Crown Princess Rania and her allies laras
strong Curry's favor with Alison. Lara's the club foot by
(09:27):
having his brother Harwin and father Lionel and the King
murdered by fire. And then Otto gets his old job back.
When Damon's wife Lena dies in childbirth, Damon returns to
the realm. Raniera and Damon rekindle their relationship. At Lena's funeral, Aimoned, bad, bad, bad,
don't do it. Aimond, Alison's second son, steals Lena's former
(09:52):
dragon Vagar, sparking a kick fight in which Luke cuts
out Aimon's eye.
Speaker 2 (09:58):
Very bad again, Like these children need to be raised parented.
Speaker 1 (10:04):
Where is the King's guard through all of this? Don't
ask going on?
Speaker 3 (10:07):
I need to know.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
Alison goes nuts, tries to stab Raniera and later apologize
for it. But Otto is like, forget that I loved it.
I love that you tried to kill the queen. That
was great.
Speaker 3 (10:19):
He's like to get you to do this all the time.
He's like, I don't care if you two had.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
Obvious sapphic teenage lover vibes. He's like, I want you
to hate her. I need you to understand. This is
not Rosie's version of the story where you to admit
that you're in love with each other and then rule
the kingdom in peace.
Speaker 3 (10:37):
No, this is the war version.
Speaker 4 (10:38):
This is going to war.
Speaker 3 (10:39):
You need to want to kill her.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
Later, Damon and Raniera fake Layer's death so he can
go east and stop pretending to be a straight man.
Speaker 3 (10:47):
That's actually very lovely.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
That is a very very lovely thing that.
Speaker 4 (10:52):
They actually do something good in this show.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
I agree, a beautiful golden silver lining in these clouds
of darkness. Damon and Nier get married right afterwards. Corlis
valari On Laner's dad, leader of the most powerful fleet
in West Rows, is obviously heartbroken that his son is dead,
but is also kind of generally speaking fine with pretending
that Jace, Luke and Joff are his grandchildren. That said,
(11:17):
the thought that Raniera might have killed the son, drives
him and Renee and Rennie's his wife to the sidelines
of this cold war between the Greens and Lives.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
I know we did bring this up, but it's gonna
be relevant when we talk about season two. Said like,
they should have just told the parents. They should have
just told the parents. I believe they would have kept
the secret. That's they should have just told them. They
should at least the mom I feel like it would
have saved some drama.
Speaker 1 (11:40):
I think Renee might have agreed with it. I think
that Corlis is so his legacy, yeah that I think
that he would not go for it.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (11:54):
True.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
Later Daymond Valerian, Corlis's brother, with Alison's support, files a
lawsuit with the Crown against Luceras Valerian, claiming that he
Vaymon should by rights inherit the family seat of drift Marks,
since Luke and his brothers are not Leanor's kids and
everybody knows it, do they not. Visaris is by this
time in an advanced stage of rot. His body is
(12:19):
in open rebellion against him, but he rouses himself with
a mighty burst of strength and his last dregs of
energy and reaffirms that yes, Rainy's her children were fathered
by Leanor, and to claim otherwise as a crime. And
my decision is my decision, and the next person who
(12:40):
brings anything up besmirching the ancestry of my grandchildren will
have their tongues ripped out. Damon then adjourns the case
by decapitating Vaymon right and right right in the mouth line,
right through the mouth line. Later, at dinner, Viseras begs,
he pleads with his family to put aside their issues
(13:02):
and heal and forgive each other and just get together
as a family. Can't we all just get along? He
takes off his mask, shows them his rotting, decaying face,
and he says, please, please, please, please for me, for
an old man, old dying man just loves you to death,
just wants to be your your doting grandfather. Just get along,
(13:23):
Just stop it. And it almost works. It really comes
close to working, Rosie, because Raniera and Allison they like embrace.
Speaker 3 (13:33):
And like, wait a minute, maybe this could work. Like
I missed you, I.
Speaker 1 (13:37):
Love you, I love you so much, and you're gonna
be a great queen and you're you're a great queen
and you're a great, mom, and you're the best, and
we've just got to hang out more.
Speaker 3 (13:48):
Yeah, we just unfortunately long, it's.
Speaker 1 (13:50):
Been too long. Unfortunately Vissarah dies like an hour later.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Okay, But the problem and the problem that he makes
here right is a classic problem in like any fictional show,
has a lot of naming off the people. As he dies,
he says Agon, but he doesn't mean. He doesn't mean
the Eggon, Allison's son should be on the throne. He means, shit,
Eggon's Prophecy's gonna come true. What's going on? But Alison
(14:15):
hears him and she thinks, uh oh, he does want
my son to be the king, and I bet I
tell my dad so he can put his long health
plans into motion.
Speaker 1 (14:25):
He doesn't mean Eggon Alison's son. He doesn't even mean Eggon.
Raniera's not the infant son. He means egg On the conquer.
He's talking about the prophecy. But of course Alison doesn't
know that, gets it wrong. I don't. Meanwhile, puts into
motion long laid plans to elevate Eggon, and all of
(14:48):
that works. Egon gets on the throne. Rainie and Corlis
come off the sidelines. They joined team Black. Each faction
vies for supporters. But when Luke Young Luke Young precociously
aimed one, I end up at Storm's end. At the
same time, tragedy strikes Luke and his baby dragon Raks
are killed by Aimond and Vagar. And that is where
(15:12):
we leave season one. Rosie, I ask you this, do
both sides have a pointer? Or is there a side
that's more right than the other side, Green or Black?
Who do you stand with?
Speaker 2 (15:24):
I do not believe both sides have a point. The
truth is Look, I am an Alison apologist.
Speaker 3 (15:29):
Put it on a T shirt. I love this version
of Alison. I think Olivia Cooke does such a good job.
Speaker 4 (15:35):
I just think this is such a nuanced, interesting.
Speaker 2 (15:39):
Cool look at these two women in this space. All
of that said, Ranera is and always has been the Air,
no matter what shenanigans have gone on, no matter how
much she's cheating with people and her you know, you
could question whether her as are supposed to be the
as or not because of the way they a sayad,
(16:00):
but she has always meant to be the air.
Speaker 3 (16:02):
She should have been the air. And I'll tell you
this for free. For Sarah's I'm sorry.
Speaker 2 (16:06):
Allison would have ended up. Forgiven, you should have just
chopped OHI Tower's head off. That means too many problems.
He should have been executed a long time ago, and
I think all of this would have been avoided. At
least some of it would have been avoided.
Speaker 1 (16:18):
I agree with you, and that is, to me, the
fatal flaw of Visarah's reign. I think the seed of
tragedy lies with him. He made this decision and then
he basically like walked away. He was like, Okay, Raniera's
gonna be my heir, and that's it. Should I do
some work in order to make this happen? Should I
give her, like some powerful lands with an army that
(16:41):
she could use to build up.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
Should like in meetings so that she kind of seen
as a face of the kingdom?
Speaker 1 (16:48):
Like, yeah, Should I just do everything to get And
to your point, should I stop saying, hey, don't don't
spread any rumors about Raniera's children or else, or else
I'll rip your tongue and then ripped zero tongues out.
I think you're absolutely right. He should have ripped a
couple tongues out, maybe five or six, and maybe thrown
auto high terror in chains. I think that made people
(17:10):
understand that he's serious because I think I agree with you.
I think Raniera is the air. She has the moral
right on her side. Look at the Black side, they're
like committing murders five minutes after Viceas dies in order
to be able to usurp the throne and elevate egg
On that said, I am, I am saddened by how
(17:33):
ill prepared Visas left Rania.
Speaker 3 (17:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
I think that is the real tragedy of this is
she's right, but she's also not ready. Yeah, and that
leads me to my next question. Do you think who
has the advantage here? Because the Blacks have more dragons,
as we hear Damon say at the end of the season.
At the same time, I think the Greens have inertia
(18:03):
and momentum on their side.
Speaker 3 (18:05):
They also have a strategy. That's the thing.
Speaker 2 (18:08):
Ranera's side is so chaotic, Like she's married to her
own cousin, who is like the most chaotic evil person
you could have on your side, who's always just doing
really badly planned, badly timed, terrible shit, which sometimes works.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
It sometimes does work.
Speaker 4 (18:29):
But but.
Speaker 2 (18:31):
Vaniera doesn't have an otto. Vanera doesn't have someone who's
been planning for a long time. Vannera doesn't have someone.
Speaker 4 (18:38):
Look.
Speaker 2 (18:38):
Otto has used Alison consistently, but Alison he needs her
for his plans to work. There's nobody who really needs
Rnera for their plans to work. There are multiple people
who who could use her, but I don't think there's
anyone with as much of a a mission as Otto.
Speaker 3 (18:57):
And I also think you're right.
Speaker 2 (18:57):
I think Vasis is it's all well and good to
have like a quiet, peace time king, but he didn't
really teach her anything about how to deal with conflict.
And now Ranier is being driven by this horrific grief
that's kind of this all consuming anger which is never
gonna lead anywhere good, and as we know with Targarians,
(19:21):
you know that can lead to madness.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
So I just think he didn't do a good job.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
He didn't leave her like some great war council because
he didn't want to admit there would be a war.
So the Greens have been preparing for war, whereas Rinera
was under the impression that they didn't need to be
a war because she is there and that's going to
be recognized. And then her son is killed in this
most horrific, you know, accidentally on purpose kind of way,
(19:46):
and suddenly she's thrown into a war with you know,
the parents of the guy that she faked his death,
that they think she killed. They're like her biggest allies,
and these people who think maybe she.
Speaker 3 (19:59):
Killed their son.
Speaker 2 (20:00):
So I do think that Greenside has the advantage, and
I do think that this is kind of a tragic,
all consuming fire of a war. You know, there's not
I want there to be some kind of happier ending,
but we just know that's never gonna happen in this case,
not just not because of spoilers, but just because.
Speaker 3 (20:21):
Of the nature of how this became and how it happened.
This is a very.
Speaker 2 (20:26):
Violent, horrible spark that's gonna set fire to this conflict.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
I want to call out one person who I really
really hate. I don't like Otto, but I respect him.
Hilaris I is an evil man.
Speaker 3 (20:44):
He's trying to do what he can.
Speaker 2 (20:45):
To survive in a world that's like, you know, he's
he's he's an evil creeper.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
Here's who I hate, Christian call in cell the fucking
jilted boyfriend energy coming off of Kristin Cole, who as
Captain and Lord Commander of the King's Guard. I just
think he acts in an unprofessional nature. He's too angry.
And Chris, we talked about this a lot. When we
(21:13):
talked about this.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
He betrayed hide like he loved us so much, and
then it was just betrayal, betrayal, betrayal because you.
Speaker 3 (21:19):
Can't be ha king. Are you mad?
Speaker 1 (21:21):
They broke up because Kristin Cole said the following, He's like, hey, yeah, Ranier.
They were on the boat back from drift Mark I believe,
or maybe it was the storm Lands, and he said
to Rner and is like, hey, you know what we
should do. Let's I know you're gonna be queen, like
you're slated to be queen, and currently what we're doing
is we're on tour to find you a husband so
(21:43):
that you could be queen. That said, why don't we
just like hit the road. Let's just it's just like,
let's just like follow the grateful dead. I saw oranges
one time on DOC when I was in Dorn, and
I've become obsessed with oranges. I want to see where
rare fruits grow. Oh, let's just go like get on
a ship and just like live free and like look
(22:04):
at fruit trees from like all around the world. What
do you say about that? And Rania was like, bro,
are you are you?
Speaker 3 (22:11):
Are you serious? Like you serious? Does he?
Speaker 2 (22:14):
The thing is like, by not doing that one because
it was a dumb idea, But also she saved his
life because that is the a you're gonna get hunted down.
Speaker 3 (22:23):
No one was just gonna let her go.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
That's right. Not only that, Kristen, not only did she
save your life, because you if Raniera ever tells anybody
about this, you're.
Speaker 3 (22:34):
Dead, literally dead.
Speaker 1 (22:37):
Next you can't propose to the the person who will
be the first woman in history to rule West. You
can't propose to her. Just run away, because now you have,
you have destroyed any chance that a woman ever ever
be elevated, because they'll just be like, well we did
(22:58):
it that one time, and remember she just right away,
she just left. He doesn't care, he does christ and Cole.
And now you're mad about it when you are the
one who caused a lot of this. I don't like
that guy.
Speaker 3 (23:11):
N He's my enemy, number one enemy.
Speaker 1 (23:14):
Do you have any things you're looking forward to in
a season two or just anything? Any thoughts that you
have as we look ahead, We're going to do a
more season two centric episode coming up as we draw
closer to the House of the Dragon premiere, which is Sunday,
June sixteenth. But yeah, any predictions for season I'm.
Speaker 2 (23:33):
Really excited to see more Dragons, I wrote. I wrote
an article on IGN when the first trailer dropped that
I was just really happy that the season two trailer
seemed to be doing exactly what I thought season one
did really well, which is like focusing on the women
in the story, whether it's you know, Damon's kids or
(23:54):
whether it is Raynie or Ranera. I think season one
kind of blew me away with this really nuanced, interesting
look at like how women survive in this space, you know,
in which then I feel like Shogun, you know, to
go back to it from where earlier. But Shogun did
this similar thing, and I really felt like it was
(24:14):
something that the original Game of Throne series had often
struggled with over a long period of time.
Speaker 3 (24:18):
But House the Dragon seems to.
Speaker 2 (24:20):
Be doing really, really well, and I'm just excited to
learn more about these female characters, to see new dragon writers,
to see new dragons, to talk about it with you,
because it's like a lot of fun.
Speaker 3 (24:31):
But I am gonna be.
Speaker 2 (24:32):
Like heartbroken because I am a I'm I'm a Ranierer
Allison Shipper, and it's gonna be hard to see them
at war.
Speaker 3 (24:40):
That is my.
Speaker 1 (24:42):
Pradiction in the thing I am. I'm both. It's super
super excited for this upcoming season. It's gonna be There
are a lot of notable time jumps in season one.
That's out of the that's out of the way in
season two. The showrunners have talked about that this is
just basically now a story that is going to unfold
in a typically chronological manner. Now, so that's going to
(25:05):
add a lot of intensity excitement. But as a person
who is aware of what happens in this story, I'm
also looking forward to this season with quite a bit
of anxiety. Bad things are gonna happen to everyone, and
bad things are gonna happen to good people, and bad
things are gonna happen to innocent people, and I am
(25:30):
dreading it a little bit. I will say this too.
I wonder if you know, looking back at Game of Thrones,
Tyrian Lanister is such an important character in a way
that I think is underrated because He brought a mirth,
a quick witted kind of acerbicness that I think we
(25:54):
might need a little bit of lift of someone to
crack some one liners because the amount of death and
misery that's coming. You know, if they hew closely to
the story in the books, as we know George wants
them to, then I think we're gonna need a little
(26:15):
We're gonna need some reasons to smile, because it might
it might get really really intense, really really quick. That
is my thought. Up next, an interview with House of
the Dragon show runner Ryan Conton.
Speaker 2 (26:44):
Welcome to another edition of the Omnibus where law, analysis
and understanding come together. Today, Jason concepts you and have
you heard of him. He's going to be chatting to
He's the host of the official House of Tracking podcast
and he's going to be chatting too. House the Dragon
show runner Ryan Condall.
Speaker 1 (27:05):
Ryan, thanks so much for joining us. Really appreciate it.
Speaker 5 (27:08):
Thanks Jason, good to see you.
Speaker 1 (27:09):
Wonderful to see you again. Did you get to enjoy
the reaction to season one at all before diving right
back into it or is it just right back to
the mines we were?
Speaker 5 (27:19):
We were we were deep in the minds already, So yeah,
I mean I got to enjoy it. I had this
surreal moment where I've inherited a Premiere League club out
here in the Tottenham Hotspur and Oka. I have a
very good friend of mine is as being a supporter
(27:39):
for a very long time and knows knows people in
in in the club and said that I was a fan,
and then they got excited because they were fans of
the show and of course the original Game of Thrones
for the the first show, and they invited me to
a game and I got I sat in the owner's
box and they brought me down on the field for
an oscar let and they gave me a jersey with
(28:03):
my name and it was crazy, and I was standing
there like just thinking this is this is insane. And
there were moments like that I think throughout season one
that have never happened to me before in doing this job.
So I did get to enjoy that part a bit.
Speaker 1 (28:17):
That's wonderful. Did that bring you into conflict with any
of the Arsenal supporters in the cast and crew. I
believe Tom Glencardi is an Arsenal guy, but I'm not sure.
Speaker 5 (28:28):
Yeah, we try not to talk about all of it,
because I mean, I'm not you know, it's not it's ye,
I'm a I inherited this team. It's not in my
blood the way that the New York Football Giants are
so where it's much more tribal for me. But no,
I'm always fascinated. It's a thing out here. You always
ask where are you from? Who do you support? Because
(28:50):
there's so many different leagues. It's not just the Premiership.
There's the Championship League, and then the league's below like
the Rexhamer in and all that, So everybody always has
a different answer. But there are lots of Arsenal fans
on these parts, so I try not to wear my
cap too much.
Speaker 1 (29:04):
One of the speaking of blood but also fire. There
are so many moments in season one where I'm feeling like,
oh gosh, there's an off ramp here maybe and if
they miss it then there's no turning back. Is there
Is there anything that could have been done at any
point to avert this war?
Speaker 5 (29:22):
I think there. I think you're correct in saying I
think there were many off ramps, or or also possibly none.
I mean, it's so.
Speaker 1 (29:28):
Hard to say.
Speaker 5 (29:29):
Yeah, I think I think viserus unfortunately for poor Visius,
who just wanted everybody to be happy and get along
so that he could read his histories and work on
his philosophies. I think I think it's it's really his shortcomings,
and and we always talked about him as being a
good man and a great father, but a bad king.
(29:49):
At least a great father to Raniera. He had the
opportunities to stave off this war, and I think that's
one of the tragedies of this series and circumstances. His
the one thing that he stuck to for his whole life,
you know, all the way through. His final words, although
he didn't know who he was speaking to at the moment,
were in defense of this radical thing he did in
(30:11):
naming his daughter the heir to the throne. But that
is the thing that ultimately tore the kingdom apart in
the end, because it's such a patriarchal society and it's
so rooted in tradition, and this is the way things
are done, and we do not, as particularly in government,
we do not change this order that's been ordained by
the gods and all the targarians that came before, and
(30:31):
all the kings that even predated the Targarians. It's always
been the first born son of the king of the
monarch is the one who, inherits and Bessarah's broke that
order and then wasn't strong enough to put the battlements
up in place around it to protect Rania, or to
give egg On something to help him in his side
(30:51):
of the family save face, or to make you know,
make alliances to make sure that Ottohai Tower couldn't execute
a coup, or that Auto High Tower was in hand,
so it didn't have the power to be that close
to the throne. It's just it's Visceras's weakness that ultimately
leads to this. And then of course there's all the
little moments and the infighting that happened all the way
along that engender this sort of you know, green and
(31:13):
Black divide, this entrenchment that we see happen over the
course of the first season.
Speaker 1 (31:18):
One of my absolute favorite moments from season one is
the conversation that Rainie's has with Alison when Renie's essentially
a prisoner in King's landing and says to Alison, you know,
have you ever imagined yourself ruling? And I'm going to
paraphrase now and absolutely mangle the beautiful dialogue here, but
you know saying, you know, what you're seeing is is
(31:39):
a window to freedom, but you're still in the prison
created by these men. What was Renee waiting for? What
was she hoping for before she essentially makes a decision
to take a side. What did she want to hear
from Alison or anyone?
Speaker 5 (31:54):
I mean, I think I think Rainie's is dealing with
her own grief over the fact that she was originally
passed over, and she was probably Rainis. I mean, we've
spent a lot of time with her now, she was
probably more suited personality wise for the job of rule
than Visera's and for the same reason that Eggon is
(32:16):
now usurping and challenging the throne. Raini's was passed over
at the Great Council, but Jaharis was a better king
and he knew that just naming her would probably lead
to a war, so he put the vote to the lords.
You guys decide, You tell us how law and tradition
is going to be moving forward. So I think in
her conversation with Alison, I think that's what she's wrestling with,
(32:36):
and I think she's trying to she probably doesn't. I mean,
Rainie's probably an Allison at this point. I would guess
they've had a couple of shallow conversations over the course
of their life, and I don't think Rainis knows much
about Allison at this point and is trying to get
under the skin to figure out who this person actually
is before she makes her daring escape attempt to try
(32:57):
to get out of King's Landing and go to Dragonstone
to pledge your support for Visaras's her cousin's chosen air.
Speaker 1 (33:06):
Fire and Blood. The source material for House the Dragon
is written from the perspective of several different, unreliable historical chroniclers.
How did that affect your adaptation?
Speaker 5 (33:16):
I mean, it is the adaptation. It's I always say
this is it's a screenwriter's dream because it's a it's
an adaptation that provides a ton of latitude for invention
and interpretation. But it's also screenwriter's nightmare because I do
have to we as the creative team with me, make
(33:39):
you know, making the kind of fine I'm King Jaharis
in this I have I have a council of great
council of lords and ladies that stand around me, and
I have to make the final rulings on things. And
it's very challenging because on the face of it, it
requires you to invent a whole a whole lot just
because of the nature of the book. It's an outline
of historical events that does not have scenes and a
(34:02):
narrative in the you know, most strictest of senses. And
also these characters didn't didn't live through this time, so
they are I mean, Mushroom did, if you believe that
Mushroom existed and was there, But the others are. It's
more like the Gospel in the Bible. I think I
forget which one forgive me. My biblical history is from
my Augustinian education is failing me. But I think the
(34:24):
gospel that was written the closest to the man who
is Jesus was thirty years after his death. So even that,
I mean, we can't agree on We can't agree on
something that happened last week that was filmed on television
that we all witnessed. So trying to pair through that
history and find the central through line through it is challenging,
as you know, as an adapter, and you have to
(34:44):
you have to fold things together and keep the narrative
moving and you have to invent but try to keep,
you know, honoring the history. So it does, you know,
drive our minds into pretzel knots quite often. But in
the end it's a very rewarding and fun creative challenge
because you get to bring this thing that is a
different medium to it's not a dramatic narrative in the
(35:05):
most traditional senses, and we get to bring it to life.
And I think in the most open interpretation of Fire
and Blood next to House of the Dragon, a fan
that has read the text and watched the show, hopefully
each enhances the enjoyment of the other, where you get
to see how we're playing with the interpretation of the history.
And if you've only watched the show and you go
(35:25):
back and read the book, you get to see how
it goes in the other direction, and you get to
try to hopefully guess as to how things are going
to come together. And the things that are never given
in the book are the whyse because there's no you're
never inside the character's head, and I think those are
the most fun things to dramatize. But yes, it keeps
me up lying awake at night. Quite often.
Speaker 1 (35:47):
We spent a lot of time over watching season one
and reading the books wondering what drives Damon, And I
think a lot of the other characters in this story
wonder what drives Damon? And I'm wondering, now, does Damon
know what drives Damon? What is it that motivates him?
It really seems at the tragically at the end of
(36:07):
season one that he is he's at war. He seems
very comfortable and ready to be there. But what is
it that he's what's his goal? What is he looking for?
Does he know?
Speaker 5 (36:18):
I think Damon's goal through his through the ninety five
percent of season one was simply to find the love
and the respect of his brother. The thing that we
always talked about in the room is that everybody around
Damon presumes that he wants the throne, But for Damon
to get the throne in any scenario, it requires his
brother to die, and he loves his brother so deeply.
(36:40):
It's a complicated love. It's a it's a love that
was you know, shows a childhood where certain emotions were
not modeled for him in the most healthy of ways.
So what we always said is Damon really during Visaras's
life Damon wanted to be Vizara's hand, not the king,
but Visaras's hand. He wanted to be the guy that
Visera's called up and chose to stand to decide and
(37:01):
be as most trusted. And the fact that it was
Otto High Tower, Damon's arch enemy, it drove him to
madness until the end of Visas. So I think when
Vices dies, it's this Damon is freed in a way
of this thing that tortured him his entire life because
his brother never accepted him in that way. And when
he grabs Raniera's throat in that very controversial moment at
(37:23):
the end at the end of season one, it's not
about Raniera as much as it is about Visers didn't
trust him enough to let him into this secret that
he instead chose to share with a fourteen year old
girl and name her heir. So now, as Damon sets
forward into season two, I think it's a fascinating question
that you're asking, is what does Damon want? And I
(37:43):
think Damon is now starts from a place where he's
projecting Viceras's reign into Rnira. So Rniera is in a
way an embodiment of his brother and I'm going to
fight for the death for that thing so that the
Otto and his ilk don't win the prize in the end.
And I think the fun thing about Damon is he
of course grows and evolves over time, so we'll see
(38:04):
where that takes us. But to me, that's his starting point.
Speaker 1 (38:08):
You mentioned the Eggon prophecy. You're also a huge fan
of these stories, Georgis works independent of being the showrunner
of House of the Dragon. One of the things that
as that I love to nerd out about, just I
think about all the time is how the Eggon prophecy,
which was revealed by the show, could have influenced events
(38:29):
in Westers For instance, you know, the tragedy at Summer
Haul may take on a different kind of significance. You
know if egg On the fifth knew about the prophecy.
Do you think about that at all, just from a
nerd perspective.
Speaker 3 (38:45):
Oh totally.
Speaker 5 (38:46):
I mean we've talked about this a whole lot, and
I think the fun of the fun of this is
that whenever you set out to make a prequel, I
think the trick is made is why are we here?
Why are we telling this story? Beyond making money and
even the franchise going and putting butts in seats and
all the reason that we continued these big franchises, What
(39:07):
is the actual creative reason that this prequel needs to exist?
And I think both the fun end the challenge of
this show is how far in the past it is,
and that makes it really cool because it unburdens you
from having to do the Oh, this is how you know,
this is how Indiana Jones got the scar in his chin,
and this is where he found the hat, and that's
how the you know, whoever got the lightsaber that they found.
(39:29):
Because there are no character interlinkages, so you're really talking
about the historical interlinkage between our period and the period
that we know very well that comes one hundred and
twenty years from now. So for us, the linkage is
very much based around the Targarian blood line and then
this secret that was very much alive in this era,
and then what happens to it after this civil war
(39:49):
that we know is we know from the outside looking
in is the worst to ever be fought. And at
the end of it, whether it's a result of this
war just a result of the events that are set
in motion, all of the Dragon die off and don't
exist again until they're born again to Denaris Targarian, the
beggar Queen or the beggar Princess at that point. Yeah,
(40:10):
in the story of Song of Ice and Fire. So
I think that's the fun of it. And look, I
don't know whether I'll ever tell another one of these stories,
but there is so much rich Targarian history that happens
between here and there. I think you're asking a key
and great question that hopefully somebody like me that is
enthused about this world gets to play with an answer.
I think at some point in the future is like,
(40:30):
how does that secret live on? And how does it
live on? And what happens and how does it influence
the rains to come?
Speaker 1 (40:37):
I completely agree. I love thinking about it. Back to
the show, which faction in your mind, black or green
or some shade in between. What's the best outcome for
west Ross, for its people that gives the least amount
of destruction across loss of life, loss of treasure, etc.
(40:57):
What's the best way out of this?
Speaker 5 (41:00):
I mean, that's so hard to say. I have to
get in my medieval DeLorean and go back to Visaras
and get him to take a stand more in his life,
and maybe maybe he doesn't. Maybe if he doesn't get ill,
maybe he does. He does something stronger in the end,
take a stronger stand before the end, and it's probably
some version of betrothing egg On to Rania or naming
(41:22):
you know, naming egg on the air afterwards and giving
Rniera us something enough that doesn't cause the other side
go to war. He's got to do something with Damon
because Damon's not going to let that stand. It's a
really hard question. It's a really hard question. But I
as of right now, as as this war takes off,
I honestly don't know what that answer is because I think,
and that's the fun of the story and also the
(41:43):
tragedy of it, is each of these the victor that
comes out of this, there is a complicated story that
follows them. I think on the face of it, Rnier
is probably a little bit more centered and assured at
the moment versus you know, where egg On is. But
with her comes the thing that Otto warned us about
all through season one is the realm will never accept her.
And that doesn't mean individuals within the realm. It means
(42:04):
the realm as a united body, even in victory in battle,
after a long and bloody war, will they really accept
and bend the knee to a woman in the end.
And that's a big story that plays out this season.
Even within Raniera's own world, is her struggles to be
a queen to her own fiefdom and what that entails,
and you know the entrenched patriarchal attitudes that are so
(42:28):
alive in her period of history.
Speaker 1 (42:31):
Well, you open the door. What can we expect? And
I'm sure you're going to give us. You're going to
stay within the guidelines and do this in the safest
and most responsible way, But what can we expect for
season two?
Speaker 5 (42:44):
I mean, hopefully you know, should I just run down
all the character deaths just in alphabetic you want to
discuss it? My biggest hope is that the very nutritious
meal that we prepared for everybody in season one, and
the fact that everybody engaged with this really intricate Shakespearean
slash Greek tragedy that's all based around one house in
(43:06):
this one family, and getting to know all these family
members and sitting through multiple childbirths and weddings and marriages
and divorces, some of them forced by a Rock has
built up the stakes to such a point where all
of the events as the dominoes start to fall in
season two, are not only satisfying on a sort of
visceral level week to week and the surprises, but that
(43:27):
because you understand all of the deep roots and history
that we set out in season one, that it becomes
greatly satisfying and we pick up right where we left off.
I mean, it's just a couple of days after the
events of season one. I really do think the things
that we work so hard to set up in season
one are paid off, one after the other after the other,
and the new things are set up as we move ahead.
But I think that the thing that I hope that
(43:49):
most for the audience in season two is a reward
for having engaged so deeply with season one.
Speaker 1 (43:55):
Is there a person in this world right now you
mentioned Renie would be a great ruler who, if you
could pick them up and drop them down on the throne,
would be something like the ideal ruler, an upgrade, so
to speak.
Speaker 5 (44:10):
Oh that's a good question.
Speaker 1 (44:12):
Uh.
Speaker 5 (44:12):
I think I actually think he's complicated. But I think
the Sea Snake would be a great, a great classic
monarch there's a bit of ego.
Speaker 1 (44:19):
Wrap up in all of that.
Speaker 5 (44:22):
But I think you know, Corlis has weathered and experienced
enough in his time. He's been he's actually been in
combat and had multiple near death experiences, so he knows
the cost of sending people off to war. He doesn't
have a dragon. He has good relationships with the family
that do have dragons. He's a self made man, as
we know. He built he built his own castle, which
is such a kind of an unheard of thing in
(44:43):
this time. He's new money in a in a way.
So I think I think he because he he because
he's he's a he's a business owner, you know, he's
he's a he's a he's he's an entrepreneur. I think
he's very That suits him very well to be able
to be just and and we've seen he he can
tell people how it is and make hard decisions and
break some eggs along the way of making his making
(45:05):
his drif Markey and omlet. So I think, and I
just love Steve Tossant, So I actually I want Steve
Tossant to be king.
Speaker 1 (45:13):
There you go him personally. Okay, well, we now come
to probably your most important plug of the show tell
the audience about your the podcast you co host with
Deep show runner David Mandel, What Dreams Are Made Of?
Speaker 5 (45:27):
Bless you, Jason, thank you. Yes, it's called The Stuff
Dreams Are Made Of. It's a somewhat weekly podcast. We
sort of do seasons and then take little breaks. We're
gonna a little break now, we'll be back this summer.
But we talk about our passion for collecting, collecting things,
I mean, particularly movie and television memorabilia from our kind
of childhoods, the genre, things that we grew up with.
And you can't see here, but I'm sort of surrounded
(45:48):
by it in my office here. My joke is I
collect anything from nineteen eighty nine and sorry, nineteen seventy
seven to nineteen eighty nine.
Speaker 3 (45:55):
And yeah.
Speaker 5 (45:56):
We talk about all how collecting works, authenticating things, and
you know, Indiana Jones whips and lightsabers and follow a
whole saga while Dave tries to win a very expensive
X Wing model from the original Star Wars. It's it's
really it's a it's a movie podcast that that gets
very deeply in the weeds and nerdy about the stuff
(46:18):
that's used to make the movie and the nerds who
collected afterwards.
Speaker 1 (46:23):
What's your favorite thing, your favorite prop uh collectible.
Speaker 5 (46:28):
My favorite thing that I have is probably I have
Conan's hero sword from Conan the Barbarian, and it was
one of the four that was made for the film,
and it was something that I actually tracked down. We
call it in the wild, so I found it. I
did a lot of sleuthing when I moved to la
and I found it with one of the original crew
members who worked on the film and and extracted it
(46:49):
like Conan from the from the Atlantean tone from from
a from the trunk of a car in a Starbucks
parking lot in Calabasas. So very proud. I'm very proud
of that.
Speaker 1 (47:01):
House of the Dragons Season two debuts on HBO and
Max Sunday, June sixteenth, nine pm. Ryan Connell, thank you
so much for joining us.
Speaker 5 (47:10):
Thank you, Jason, it's great to be here.
Speaker 1 (47:27):
Thanks to Ryan for joining us. Up next, Who's Who.
We like to end each episode with a series of
fast moving segments. In this episode Who's Who, where we
talk about our favorite weird characters. And in this case,
we're gonna talk about our favorite weird characters and weirdly
named characters in George R. R. Martin's universe. Rosie who
(47:50):
you got?
Speaker 3 (47:51):
Okay?
Speaker 4 (47:52):
Now, I did select this Who's who simply because I.
Speaker 2 (47:55):
Deeply wanted to talk about this character, because I think
about him every time I think about please anything to
do with isifier.
Speaker 4 (48:01):
I gotta go for Dickon Manwoody.
Speaker 3 (48:05):
Dickon, Dickon Manwoody. This what a name? What a name.
Speaker 2 (48:12):
He is the son of Lord Dagos Manwoody, and he
goes to King's Landing as part of the entourage of
Prince Oberon Martel. Remember him, but yeah, Dickon Manwoody. I
feel like I will forever be trying to make a
name that fantastic and that Dickon Strong Dickon Manwoody. He
(48:34):
was like, Dickon, you know, we get a lot of
Dickons and Rickons in this universe. But he was like,
just in case, just in case this doesn't sound manly enough,
just in case this doesn't sound phallic.
Speaker 4 (48:45):
Enough, I'm also adding the man Woody.
Speaker 3 (48:48):
You know.
Speaker 4 (48:48):
I was like, George, you're really going wild on that one.
Speaker 1 (48:51):
Ah. I'm gonna shout out a character whom actually may
play a role in events and how to the Dragon,
the Aged Lord of River Run, Grover Tully and Grover's grandsons,
Elmo Tully, Hey Kurbat Tully.
Speaker 3 (49:12):
Oh my god, Shsker Tully.
Speaker 1 (49:14):
I'm dead serious. George R.
Speaker 4 (49:19):
Love, Jim Hedson, Jim dam Scoundrel.
Speaker 1 (49:24):
Groover Tully, Elmo Tully, Kurmatully, and Oscar Tully. That's right, folks.
Speaker 3 (49:29):
Oh that's so good.
Speaker 1 (49:30):
Those are active characters that may or may not appear.
And how's the Dragon season two? I don't know, but
I know that in the books they play a role
and George had some fun with al.
Speaker 2 (49:42):
That's the kind of easter eggs I'm trying to put it.
I want to write something. I want to name some
characters who are named after like comic book characters we like,
and I want in like twenty years, I want people
to be like they reference that, like in this I'm like,
you put the Muppets and Sesame Street and that you
you were like, I.
Speaker 3 (50:01):
Love Jim Henson.
Speaker 4 (50:01):
Baby, this is my Jim Henson family shout out.
Speaker 3 (50:05):
That's magical. I love it.
Speaker 1 (50:07):
Well, it's been a magical episode. And that's it for
us today. Thanks so much for listening.
Speaker 2 (50:12):
Thank you for listen Thanks Bye.
Speaker 1 (50:20):
X ray Vision is hosted by Jason Kensumsion and Rosie
Knight and is a production of iHeart Podcasts. Our executive
producers are Joelle Smith and Aaron Kaufman. Our supervising producer
is a Boo Zafar. Our producers are Carmen Laurent and
Mia Taylor. Our theme song is by Brian Basquez.
Speaker 2 (50:41):
Special thanks to Soul Rubin and Chris Lord, Kenny Goodman
and Heidi A discoll Moderata
Hosts And Creators
Jason Concepcion
Rosie Knight
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