”Rhaenyra the Cruel” Review - House of The Dragon: Season 2, Episode 2

This week's 70-minute episode has a lot to break down. The fallout from the gruesome death at the end of last week's episode is felt across Westeros.

Takeaways From This Week

• The acting and dialogue in House of the Dragon are better than Game of Thrones so far.
• The episode sets up the eventual conflict between the two sides.
• The character dynamics and performances are strong.
• The episode explores the consequences of the murder of King Aegon's heir.
• The episode hints at the importance of certain characters and their future roles. Frustration with the decisions made by certain characters
• Discussion of the fight between the twins

Episode Breakdown

• Episode Title: Rhaenyra the Cruel
• Synopsis: Both Alicent and Rhenera are facing the consequences of the murder of King Ageon's heir
• Director: Clare Kilber
• Writer: Sara Hess
• Cast: Matt Smith, Emma D’Arcy, Olivia Cooke, Rhys Ifans, Steve Toussaint, Eve Best, Fabien Frankel, Matthew Needham, Sonoya Mizuno, Tom Glynn-Carney, Ewan Mitchell, Phia Saban, Harry Collett, Bethany Antonia, Phoebe Campbell, Jefferson Hall, Kurt Egyiawan

Hosts:

• Dylan Blight: https://twitter.com/vivaladil
• Ashley Hobley: https://twitter.com/ashleyhobley

South of King’s Landing Credits:

• Intro & Outro Music: Curse of the Scarab by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
• South of King’s Landing Art: Cherie Henriques
• Summary Show Notes: Created by Riverside.FM AI Integration
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