November 22, 2024 • 42 mins
[CW: discussions of abuse and trauma]
Please enjoy our live panel from Fan Expo 2024! We discuss House of the Dragon with Dr. Vanessa Hintz! We mostly focus on the dynamic between Rhaenrya and Alicent and their differing experiences within the patriachy of the Seven Kingdoms.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/popcorn-psychology--3252280/support.
Please enjoy our live panel from Fan Expo 2024! We discuss House of the Dragon with Dr. Vanessa Hintz! We mostly focus on the dynamic between Rhaenrya and Alicent and their differing experiences within the patriachy of the Seven Kingdoms.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/popcorn-psychology--3252280/support.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
Welcome to Popcorn Psychology, the podcast where we watch blockbuster
movies and psychoanalyze them. My name is Brittany Brownfield and
I'm a child therapist and I'm joined by Ben Stover,
individual therapist, Hannah Espinoza, marriage and family therapists. We're all
licensed clinical professional counselors also known as therapists, who practice
out of Chicago. Even though we are licensed mental health professionals,
this podcast is purely for entertainment purposes and to fulfill
(00:37):
our love of dissecting pop culture and all forms.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
Please remember that, even though we are all licensed therapists,
we aren't your therapist.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
If you are struggling with mental health symptoms, please find
a local mental health provider. Hey, everybody, just wanted to
give you a little caveat before you listen to this episode,
as it is a recording of a live episode of
a panel we did at the Fan Expo this year. Because
it is a live panel recording and I did record
(01:06):
it on my phone through this breaker app, you will
notice that the sound quality is not as good as
it typically is. You may hear some chairs creaking here
and there. You might hear clapping in the background from
other panels that were going on. You might also have
a hard time hearing any audience engagement of this episode,
(01:27):
but hopefully you will still be able to enjoy myself
and Hannah and our guest doctor Vanessa, as we discussed
the House of the Dragon. Thank you, Hi everybody, Thank
you for those who made it here early on, well
early for us on a Sunday. So yeah, so we
(01:47):
are talking about half of the Dragon today. So first off,
Hannah and I so Brittany Hannah. We are two thirds
of Popular Psychology podcast, which is a podcast that talks
about pop culture movies through the eyes of therapists. I'm
a licensed clinical professional counselor. Hannah is as well, and
Ben our one co host. He's at a wedding this weekend,
(02:09):
so we couldn't join us, but that allowed us to
talk about a topic he doesn't talk about because he
doesn't watch House of the Dragon, So we use that
as an opportunity to talk about what will we want
to talk about And also we are joined by doctor Vanessa.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
Hello, I'm sorry it's still very early for me as well.
It's still am I am doctor Vanessa. I am a
licensed psychologist based just west of Milwaukee and Walkeshaw, Wisconsin.
Speaker 3 (02:36):
And I'm so thankful to be here with you all.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
A fan of popcorn psychology, and thank you so much
for the invitation.
Speaker 3 (02:42):
I'm like very excited.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
So yeah, we're just gonna rip it up up here.
So if any time, if anyone who say questions thoughts,
feel free to raise your hand interject. We are very
into discussion. What we primarily wanted to focus on was
Allison and Rain. I guess also what I should say
too is if we're gonna be talking about everything so
spoiler spoiler spoiler, and if we're also probably gonna touch
(03:08):
upon like trauma, abuse cycle, stuff like that. So we're
not gonna get graphic into anything, but if any of
those topics that all would be triggering for you, just
want to give every of heads up that we're probably
gonna talk about stuff like that, because I don't know
how you can talk about Allison specifically without talking about
trauma and abuse cycles. So I guess first off, I
(03:31):
will say I'm team Black.
Speaker 3 (03:32):
I'm also team black. Is there another team?
Speaker 1 (03:36):
I don't think there is anybody in here? Yeahs anybody
in here? Team Green? It's okay, are we won't attack
you yet. But I found really fascinating. One is that
how much this show centers two female leads kind of
as the crux, like a friendship basically as the crux
(03:58):
of it, and watching how to women become such different
people even though they kind of start somewhat in the
same place and as friends. So, I guess, do you
guys have any thoughts off the rip about Raniera or Allison?
Speaker 4 (04:13):
So when I think about Alison, I think about somebody
who is coming from the framework of fear. It's very
We went back and rewatched some of the first season,
and it's really clear that she's raised to be afraid
very much, and that she also we also see her
in the first season where we also see the shift
(04:34):
that she feels of being used by her father to
get for him to get to whatever rank he wants
to get to, right like he wants to have all
the power, he wants to have a king.
Speaker 3 (04:46):
He wants to be the boss of the king, basically
is what I feel like Attam really wants.
Speaker 4 (04:51):
And I feel like that's a part of the reason
why Allison's response to everything is so different than what
we see in Raniera, which is someone who has been
raised by with love and connection, and I feel like
that's also why we see them be such different mothers
as well.
Speaker 3 (05:13):
Yeah, and I would I would just add about Rania.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
I think that there's an interesting sort of tension, uh
for Rania as someone who was raised.
Speaker 3 (05:22):
In privilege, right, like she's going home, she was gonna
be the heir, should have been the air a.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
Different conversation, But she is someone who was raised in
privilege and also is raised in this time where as
a woman, she has very little privileges, right, So there's
this tension.
Speaker 3 (05:38):
Within her that I think we see throughout.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
And so I think to that point about Alison being
sort of raised in fear, I think Raniera is raised
in constant conflict. So she has so much power, so
much privilege, she has so much power, right, and still
it's like you're a woman here, a woman here, a
woman like she is gonna forget. But I think it's
just very interesting. She has a very conflictual I think life,
(06:03):
both figuratively and literally.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
Well, I think you're bringing up a great point where
this is where Visius can really poop the bed you
and try to keep this Pegma language in encouraging that
conflict right, because I make you my heir, and I
try to act like I'm doing some like deeply feminist thing. Right.
He's like the dad that like keeps saying he's a
(06:26):
feminist and like maybe even like reads books about feminism.
But yet when I bring my daughter into who's my
heir into the High Council, she's our waitress, yes, like
I like still struggling to not put her in a
feminine role even though he needs to.
Speaker 3 (06:44):
Like the way he can.
Speaker 1 (06:45):
Protect her is by raising her more like his air,
more like a male heir would be, and also teaching
her to defend herself too, Like I think just now
in the show, is she learning combat?
Speaker 3 (07:00):
Yeah, like those kind of things too.
Speaker 1 (07:01):
Like once he decided to make her his heir, he
really doesn't do anything different in terms of preparing her
to be his heir. She's still just let's find you
a husband, let's you know, you're still coming to the meetings,
but you're still like bearing the cups, like he doesn't
do any of the things. But then again, well I
guess he doesn't do with eggon either, but that's on
(07:21):
purpose ish, But like this very like lazy approach he takes,
which I feel like is so vicious. He is that
more benevolent problems where he just doesn't understand where he
is letting her down. And he shows up in these
big ways, right like when he shows up as basically
(07:43):
a skeleton to reaffirm her airdom, but he still doesn't
really put anything in place to keep her safe moving forward.
Speaker 4 (07:54):
You know, I feel like he doesn't even he doesn't
even consider the struggle that she's going to have.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
That's that's like like thalting Winter Soldier. When Sam talks
about like being Captain America and you guys didn't think
about me being black when you were like, just be
Captain America. It's like the same idea for sure.
Speaker 4 (08:10):
Yeah, he doesn't he doesn't even think about it.
Speaker 3 (08:14):
And I think that's a real I think it's a.
Speaker 4 (08:16):
Really half assed job that he's doing mhm of not
bringing her in and treating her the way that she
should be treated.
Speaker 3 (08:24):
And I think we're seeing the unfolding of that in
the second season.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
You know what's wild too, is that he actually has
an awareness, right Like, how many times throughout the first
season does he say like, they will not accept you
did it at whatever he's saying about, like the people.
But then sir, you're not doing anything. Also, you're the
whole king sir, like you didn't make things right.
Speaker 4 (08:46):
It feels like there's so many different ways he could
have supported her instead of in private only that's the
only time that he's really behind hers when they're in private.
I wish Thissarius had more of a spine, especially even
with Damon. Even if we think about Damon, he really
should have curtailed his shit apologies not cursing, he really didn't.
(09:11):
He just continues to not support the people behind what
he's going to do, like he should have been talking
to Damon for a really long time about what his
plan was going to be. I think the other really
shitty thing that he does that Rania is he makes
that decision way too late. Yes, he makes that decision
like another old white man that we know of who
(09:33):
also waited to mf and long to make a decision
that somebody else should be doing the work.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
So so so I.
Speaker 4 (09:49):
Really just feel like he did the least and I
think that really is showing up.
Speaker 3 (09:53):
And I think that's a.
Speaker 4 (09:53):
Part of why we see the conflict that we're experiencing
between and the rest of the realm, and.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
I think you brought a great point too, and like
I was of I think, like most people, I was
really anti Allison by the end of the second season.
I don't well at the end of the first season.
I think that's how they kind of did it right.
And rewatching the first two episodes of the show this
past week, Raymie, really remember how young she is when
the show starts, and how anxious she is. I don't
(10:26):
think that's something I clocked right away, but she's constantly
like screwing with her cuticles, which is also something I
do when I'm restless or anxious, and to watch her
understand the world, like I think you can see in
the first few episodes that she's really starting to understand
the world that she's in as a woman because her
(10:47):
mother just died I think right before the show started.
So as far as I know, she's come to court
with her father post mom's death, and it's like a
whole new world, and she's immediately being groomed groomed, yes,
And the look on her face when she realizes why
her dad sending her to see Vaserris is such a bummer,
And so I think she does what a lot of
(11:07):
women do do, unfortunately within patriarchal structures, is that she
makes a choice, right, you either have to fight against it,
which Rania has the privilege to do, or you try
to fawn your way through it. So fawning is a
trauma response not a lot of people are aware of
because it can look like you're just fine or you're
almost maybe into it. Like fawning is trying to make
(11:30):
the situation palatable for yourself and everybody else, so that
if I'm pleasing, I will get the least amount of.
Speaker 3 (11:37):
Harm done to me.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
And so a lot of people don't know what fawning is,
and they also don't respect fawning is a trauma reaction.
A lot of people like to victim blame via fawning
or you know, because of fawning. And I think with her,
you just see someone who and like I said, a
lot of women do this where they're like, Okay, I'm
just gonna be good with a miss framework and so
(11:59):
then I'll be safe and everything will be okay. And
I think with her too, because she's probably smart, just
seems smart to me. I can access power by playing
the game. And I think you watch so much of
her evolution over the show, trying to gain power for
herself in these very different ways, through religion, through viseras,
(12:20):
through her children, through her dad, almost and she can't
get it because well, Rayne's was correct when she read
her down in season one where she was like, you're
trying to make a window in your cell, babe, and
I'm not trying to be in this prison period.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
And I feel like that was part of her character
sort of, but part of her like pivot season two
was when that house of cards of power came down
when they excuse her from the council, and I think
that that I think until then, I think she was
(12:58):
holding on to that semblance of power and I think
she really thought she had something, and that was one
there were many points throughout the first two seasons I felt.
Speaker 3 (13:07):
Sorry for her.
Speaker 2 (13:08):
That was one of them. And also it was like
ha ha, you know, like I feel like she really
thought that she had power and it came crashing down
so quickly.
Speaker 3 (13:20):
And then she went into the woods and did her
retreat or whatever.
Speaker 4 (13:22):
She did, which is again to perform a place of
privilege that she can just go out and be in
the woods and also abandon her children, right and just
go do whatever she wanted to do to take care
of herself. She really is the most and I feel like,
but we do get that look on her face when
she's sitting at the council and they make that decision.
It's just like you can just tell her. She's like, oh, right,
(13:44):
this is just made up. Yes, this is just made up.
I'm just a pawn in the game, and now I'm
gonna go do whatever I want. And then also show
up and try to make a deal with Ranierra, which
is one hundred days too late.
Speaker 3 (13:56):
And yeah, so again I think.
Speaker 4 (14:00):
Just really seeing these two female characters really struggle, even
though they both have a lot of privilege.
Speaker 2 (14:08):
I think a point you're making too it and I
think that what we've been talking about. You talked about
trauma responses and things like that being trauma informed does,
like understanding that people have traumatic histories does not excuse
harmful behavior, and I think that's something that as we
are trying to navigate trauma in our own lives, right
like my own, other like my clients, whoever, being trauma
(14:30):
informed doesn't mean we affirm people's harmful behavior. And so
like with Alison, I'm sad for you, girl, I'm sad
you had to marry your daddy's friend.
Speaker 3 (14:39):
Like that's I'm so sad for you. And that doesn't
mean you can And.
Speaker 2 (14:44):
You know what I'm saying, Like, I think that that
is and I appreciate the way we're having this conversation
because it's a both and right, it's a.
Speaker 3 (14:50):
Both and like we can both acknowledge.
Speaker 2 (14:52):
That Alison and Ramier both had like traumatic things happened
to them, and that does not excuse harmful behavior, and
so how do we sit with that tension? And I
think that that's part of the reason a lot of
people hate Alison, because it's hard to sit with that
tension and to excuse a lot of her behavior and
arguably Renier also, she's not blamelessness.
Speaker 1 (15:15):
No, we love a perfect victim. And yeah, I love
what you're saying. I like to say a lot when
I because we're active therapists too, we see clients all
the time, and so I always say, that's an explanation,
not an excuse, you know, which is what you're saying.
It's validation, but it's not affirmation. And we don't get
a free pass to treat people how we like. And
I m and yeah, Alice is complicated. I think what's
(15:39):
really interesting, I wonder what you guys think about her
how religious she became over the course of season one,
and how slowly unreligious she becomes post vicious as death,
you know, because when they show up Damon and Raniera
with their two little kids together, and she's fully like,
we're in the head. He's in the thing, and she's
(16:01):
got it up to her neck and she's like, I
shan't show a neck or an ankle, you know, energy,
And it's almost like she's put herself in a nunnery
of her own making while Visius is in his deathbed.
But then once she's he's gone, it's interesting. Once he's gone,
she's like hair out, necklace off, Christy Coke. It's like
(16:25):
she's finally which does happen? You know, it's finally in
her thirties, because she's in her thirties, finally feeling like
she's able to come into her own right and yeah,
you're right, Like, what I really love in I think
it's it is a scene where she gets picked out
of the council that they're like, oh, they're trying to
pick the regent, and she's and they're like, well, the
(16:45):
basis of her whole campaign is that women are too
dumb or whatever to be leaders.
Speaker 3 (16:52):
Sometimes we make you a leader.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
Like we are undercutting our whole thing, which is what
there is this really funny she's I don't know if
she would call herself a TV personality. I know her
from many other things names Francesca Ramsey. She's a really
good caller, and she has this song that she sings
called I didn't think the Daguars would also eat my face,
which is something she'll sing when someone is part of
like a system that then bites them in the butt.
(17:16):
And so I feel like Alison, she did not think
the Draguars read her face, which I think is a
common almost like unfortunately, it is a common consequence of
trying to please the system that is also on your
neck is that eventually you're going to hit a ceiling
and you've only enforced that ceiling, So what did you
think was going to happen? But I think it is
(17:37):
like the Delulu. Sometimes people need to believe so they
can keep justifying what they're doing, because that's all I can.
All Allison's doing all day is mental gymnastics to live
with herself.
Speaker 2 (17:48):
And to your question, I think about religion and people
in here have seen Game of Thrones.
Speaker 3 (17:53):
Okay, I just don't be mad if I spoil this.
We're in a rewatch now, I think rewatching forty two.
I don't know, but we're in the season with.
Speaker 2 (18:01):
The high Sparrow and how it's so interesting that because
that was where my mind went about how well Circe did.
Circe is like next level of manipulative and like we
can have a whole panel talking about her. Yeah, but
I think the way that she sort of tried to
align with the Church and the sept and the past,
Like I think religion is just another power structure, and
(18:22):
I think for Alison it was simultaneously comforting because I
think people find comfort in religion. It was also I
think a power thing for her because she had another
sort of sense of security with the church as a system,
just like it is in our day and age, right,
Like the church is another structure of power, and so
I think her sort of like I wouldn't be surprised
(18:45):
if and I didn't read the book, so I don't
know if this happens, but I wouldn't be surprised if
she didn't pendulum swing and go back to that now
that she has lost all semblance of like royal power,
because I feel like she is like grasping and I
think her religious sort of affiliations were one of those
what was an attempt to do that sort of while
all this uncertainty was happening as a series was dying
(19:05):
for like how many years he was dying?
Speaker 5 (19:07):
He was dying for twenty years, so legitimately, yeah, And well,
like now as you're talking about it too, it's making
me think of I feel like her religious side really
starts to bomb when the whole scandal comes out right
in like episode four or five.
Speaker 1 (19:22):
Where Raniera went out of town with her uncle lover
and you know that became scandalous because Auto has a
big mouth, it won't stop working.
Speaker 3 (19:33):
Well, let me say this thing about.
Speaker 4 (19:37):
I think that Auto decided that he needed to get
rid of Raniero when she shows up in the first
season when he goes to meet Damon at Dragonstone. Yeah,
and she shows up on her dragon and is like,
I don't need a man to handle this, and she's
just a teenager and she comes and she shows up
and I think you can see an Auto's space right
there that he's like, I got to do something about this.
(19:59):
And so we see that when they come back from
that trip, that's when her dad tries to starts trying
to get her married off. And I feel like that's
Auto behind the Sirius trying to get rid of Verneera
in any way that he can or even.
Speaker 1 (20:11):
Make her ConTroll over controllable. Because I think it's also
interesting rewatching it is that Auto is the one that
suggests Raniera as air. But I think it's because it
was like he knows he can't control Daemon. So I
think in the analysis he's doing in his head is
I have a teenage daughter and I control her, So
let's make this teenage daughter and then I'll basically be
(20:31):
king regent behind her. But then she starts to show
pretty quickly how confident she is she's a Targarian.
Speaker 3 (20:40):
I mean, I.
Speaker 1 (20:40):
Don't know how that if you combine the targarian godlike
image and what she's been told her whole life with
being the invincibility that all teenagers have, how can her
and Daemon not be the most obnoxious people you'd ever
met on planet Earth? And so I think also why
Alison kind of dives into religion is because of that
(21:03):
break too, where I mean this happens a lot where
Allison is trying to play the game and she has
a friend who's not playing the game and who is
doing all the things that probably Alison secretly wants to do.
I mean, she ends up having a relationship with the
same guy that Ramier had a relationship with as a teenager.
(21:24):
And so I think you also see Alison having a
very understandable teenage reaction of like, that's not fair that
you get to do what you want, and instead of
me really acknowledging how bad I feel for myself or
how much like pity I feel or empathy I feel
for myself, and the fact that, like I don't get
(21:46):
to do what I want, I'm going to make my
lifestyle moral and your lifestyle immral. That way, I can
live with my lifestyle and I can't be jealous of yours,
because that's just like demon envy, like the devil, like
trying to seduce me kind of stuff, right, And I
think we see people do that all the time. I
definitely I grew up in a more religious area in
(22:09):
southern Ohio, and so I think, and I'm sure I
did my own version of this as someone who's raised Catholic,
which is like, ooh, those girls over there, they're bad,
and like I'm being good by restricting myself and that's
you know, what'll be good for me. And so to
see Raniera succeed while also getting to do the things
that she doesn't get to do, it would make Alison angry,
(22:32):
but she doesn't really understand how to put that anger
in a proper context other than punishing Raniera. And then
I think she just goes right into the religion, like
just keeps floating on them all the way down. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
And what I appreciate too about what you're saying is
how like comment that is for us to other, right
and othering, Like so me and everything that's not me
or us in them to me is not inhanentally a
bad thing.
Speaker 3 (22:57):
Like that's how we create a friend of mine. Doctor
Scott Jordan talks about this. He talked about creating boundaries, right,
like that's necessary.
Speaker 2 (23:05):
What is problematic is when we devalue the other and
so like be mad Alison, but why you gotta like
why you gotta.
Speaker 3 (23:13):
Call like rnero or like that's the thing like that
we don't need to be doing it. And so I
appreciate what you're saying, because again, it's not that because
there was a there was.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
I think it was the last episode of season two
when Allison just randomly showed up at dragon Stone.
Speaker 3 (23:29):
And there's yeah, girls come from like whatever.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
But I think it was in the conversation that she
was having with Raniera, and I think she was sort
of open about all of the things that you mentioned
about how she felt about her and all these things,
and I felt that.
Speaker 3 (23:42):
In my soul.
Speaker 2 (23:42):
I was like, damn, like I've been there, right, As
someone who has was in school for like four hundred years,
I had to put a lot of my life on
hold that people my age, you know, are having kids
that are going to college and me like, oh, I'm
gonna be sixty years old taking my kid to kindergarten
like whatever, right, And there is absolutely some envy that happens,
and I think I have to go acknowledge that that's amazing,
(24:06):
that's not the other people's issue that I feel that
kind of.
Speaker 3 (24:08):
Way, And I think that that's what you're describing. I
think if Allison.
Speaker 2 (24:12):
Would have acknowledged that she felt the way she felt
without devaluing Raniera, I would think about her in a
very different way.
Speaker 1 (24:19):
Yeah. I think she also really struggles, which is not
uncommon to see outside her own world view. It makes
me curious when Allison shows up to be like, hey girl,
let's just film on Louise. I wonder if she's thinking, like,
we're both having a bad time, right, like I've been
faking it this long? Have you been faking it this long?
Let's piece up together. And what she doesn't understand and
(24:40):
what Rainier is trying to explain to her but can't
is no, this means something to me.
Speaker 3 (24:44):
I wasn't just.
Speaker 1 (24:45):
Going along to please all the people around me. You're
taking something. Not only you're taking something meaningful me, but
you've made me really care about it. And so now
I'm going to take this all the way to the
end and I'm gonna have to kill your kids now,
Like I think, what really upsets me and how we're
talking about how Allison's are written in fear is the
way that Auto, which is so he Raniera when their kids,
(25:10):
Rinier seems like the only safe person for Allison, and
I think, what's so awful about what Auto does is
he continuously erodes that relationship. It's very controlling, abusive, like
isolating kind of thing of like repeatedly convincing Alison, she's
gonna kill you, she's gonna kill your kids, there's no
(25:31):
peace here, and like shaking her, like literally shaking the
hell out of her and being like grow up, when
in actuality, what we know is that Raniera wouldn't have
done that. And it's so horrible how these power systems
will erode our trust in each other and not let
us listen to our instincts and even make our instincts
(25:52):
seem like they are stupid. And I think when you
have someone who's based in fear, which is Alison, someone
based in love or more love and support like Rania
and trying to make her confident even though it's not
really pulling it off. I think it's really interesting too
how that trickles down to their kids and their relationship
to their kids. I think a great example of this,
(26:14):
and I'll throw it to you too, is how we
see with Allison, like especially when they have that like.
Speaker 3 (26:19):
The scene where Vita hers is having sex with her.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
I think that's as generous I can be about it.
She's someone who has started to dissociate right like she
is on the moon when that's happening. And so when
you start to clock out emotionally, especially during those kind
of moments, you will struggle potentially to I'm a child therapist,
so you'll struggle to attach to your kids, right and
even if you're present physically but you are absent mentally
(26:45):
or emotionally, that attachment will unfortunately not be secure.
Speaker 3 (26:50):
I think a lot of people think I.
Speaker 1 (26:52):
Can just be physically present with my kids and that'll
be enough, and I can make I can do that,
especially with people who have had kids through trauma or
traumatic relationships. What in actuality like you have to be
able to be present completely and she can't really do that.
And so when you have these moments where she's trying
to connect to Helena into Agon when they're going through
(27:13):
their big grief.
Speaker 3 (27:14):
She can't.
Speaker 1 (27:15):
And I think it's a great example of how like
if you're never taught how to do something, if you're
never shown, if you're never modeled, you don't always just
know how to do it. Sometimes you can, since people
are really naturally resilient and they can just figure out
the kind of intuitively how to do things that they
weren't shown by their parents. But I think a lot
of times, unfortunately, what we see with Alison and her
kids is what that will look like unless someone intercedes
(27:38):
and shows them a different way. And I think they
showed us such a great job of demonstrating how different
Rania's kids and Alison's kids are, just based solely on
the way they're parented.
Speaker 3 (27:50):
I will say, to the point about kids, Jaz really
let me down at the end of the day.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
But I get it. I get it too, But I'm like,
really bro like really I guess.
Speaker 3 (28:01):
With him, I feel like I think it's maybe he's
over there.
Speaker 4 (28:14):
I think he is a product of the patriarchy that
the rest of them are also a part of, and
he's getting raised in the same story, and he wants
to feel special, and he doesn't feel special anymore, and
he doesn't know what his identity is without being special.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
And I think to the point too about the parenting,
I think I call Auto lovingly plash going, but I
think his relationship that we see with Alison is very
transactional to the point that you were making, whereas even
the serious relationship with her Nara and Nara's relationship with
her all she had so many kids, so many kids,
(28:52):
even even David's kids, right, it's not transactional. And I
think that that is what you're pointing to, is we
see Alison. Everything that she does with her kids I
think is transactional. It's very much like what can you
do for me? This is what we need to do.
And maybe some of that is a product of their
royal and that's what they gotta do. I don't know,
but I think it's very clear that it is a
(29:14):
means to an end. I think with her in her
relationship with her kids and with Brenera, it's very very different.
I think the beginning of season two, that scene with
Brenera and Jays when after lucerastat that was too much.
Speaker 3 (29:27):
That was a beautiful.
Speaker 1 (29:28):
Scene and also like such a brutal juxtaposition of Alison
seeing egg On weeping and just staring at him and
walking away like that was such a perfect opportunity to
change the script between the two of them, right, and
to show something different, and I think unfortunately that is
(29:49):
more realistic, like her seeing him I think panicking, and
I think with Helena she feels the safest maybe because
Elena is a girl, you know, and maybe on the spectrum.
But I think that's another good case where even with Helena,
as soon as there is a barrier, which is maybe
that she's very divergent, Alison can't flex. She can't figure
(30:14):
out an end to that either. And I'm such a
soft spot for jasaras I think because I work with teenagers,
but like, you're not wrong, But also I think him
even having those discussions with Ramier is such a good
show of how actually like good relationship they have, yes
that he can challenge her. She even when she pisses
(30:36):
her off, she's like, I'm listening and I'm hearing and
I'm sorry, But like she does, she actually does a
good job of like I'm hearing the way you're feeling,
validating you, and I'm going to get some poor people
on these dragons are the.
Speaker 3 (30:52):
Small folks, so you better.
Speaker 1 (30:53):
But I do think something where she does have the
Visara's energy with her kids is the fact that they
are clearly not Lenor's kids. I know why she no
one ever can really acknowledge it, even her to them,
because of just the safety components so intense, and she's
already someone who is on the razor's edge of like
being in.
Speaker 3 (31:14):
Everyone's good graces.
Speaker 1 (31:16):
But I think that is the part where she really
takes like out of Visara's playbook of like, if something's
too uncomfortable, we just won't acknowledge it, Like we're just
gonna keep putting it under the rug. Putting under the
rug when you couldn't have kids that looked more like
their daddy more like and like the fact that he
even brought up I was like, Oh, we're gonna.
Speaker 3 (31:33):
Have this fight.
Speaker 1 (31:34):
Fine, really, but that was a fight they were always
gonna have.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
Yeah, I'm just siaus.
Speaker 1 (31:39):
At some point because he was always I mean, everyone knew.
Everybody knew. Yeah, that conversation was long overdue. And even
though I was like, oh, this is not the time,
I was also like, but he's not wrong for what
teenager wouldn't be feeling like they've been keeping that in
their back pocket to throw on their mom's face when
they're really in it. They're like, I've been waiting to
launch this duke get you.
Speaker 3 (32:00):
And now I haven't.
Speaker 1 (32:01):
And they was see very validated. That would be something
a teenager in my office would be like, well, and
I'd be like, Okay, I get it, and I get
way felt they need to do it, and time on
place I have hard conversations. So we have about ten
minutes left. We definitely can keep on the apping, but
I wanted to make room for questions or thoughts. If
anyone had any, you can just raise your hand. If not,
(32:21):
it's also totally okay. Let me ask you this question.
Who in here thinks that Damon really loves Raniera?
Speaker 3 (32:29):
Show up hands way less than I thought.
Speaker 1 (32:33):
Okay, can you give me a why?
Speaker 4 (32:43):
M Yeah, because because he can't because a part of
his identity. He can't love Reniera completely because a part
of his identity can't because he wants to be king
so bad. I don't think Damon loves anybody besides himself
and the idea of being the king.
Speaker 3 (33:00):
That's all. That's what I think Damon has got in him,
and that's it.
Speaker 4 (33:03):
I don't even really truly believe that he loves Visius
because Zarus is the biggest barrier to the only thing
that he seems to give a fly.
Speaker 3 (33:13):
In f about.
Speaker 4 (33:19):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely, and respect him as much as he
can as a sick old man, right, because he also
doesn't hold any like the things that Damon finds value
in is not like the Cyrus, is not that he's
basically the antithesis of that.
Speaker 3 (33:37):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely, Thos.
Speaker 1 (33:41):
I mean, I think or I can have empathy for
Damon is a therapist.
Speaker 3 (33:46):
You always have to practice a lot of empathy or
you don't for fake characters. Well, in this I know.
Speaker 1 (33:55):
Is I don't know how being raised with that environ
can't be so screwy for your mentality, for your mental health,
like your identity to be treated like the spare you
know what I mean, to be in this like competitive
space with your family where you can't really.
Speaker 3 (34:17):
You can love each.
Speaker 1 (34:18):
Other sort of, but you're also in this like continuously
comparative adversarial space. And so I think I see with
Damon a lot of attempts to love people and a
lot of attempts to like figure out who he is
if he's not going to be the air like him.
I think he tries to love Lena, and he tries
to settle down in that place wherever they were at
(34:41):
when she's pregnant, right. I think I think what he
can feel confusing as a character is he's trying on
all of these identities but like someone who has like
maybe a personag disort or something like that, like a
central factor of personal disorders that I think people don't
quite understand. And that's why we can someone's like empathy,
(35:01):
is that the sense of self is really hard to find.
It's just not like innate as it can be with
like other people. And so I think he's almost like
a classic example of like, well, maybe I can be
a really good police chief in King's Land commander of
the Guard, and I'm gonna go totally hamm on that, but.
Speaker 3 (35:20):
In a way that's not quite right. And then I'm gonna.
Speaker 1 (35:24):
Try to be, you know, this crab feeder fighter, but
I also kind of do that wrong, and I come
and wearing a crown and like wanting a lot of attention.
It's like, and then maybe I can be good to
reneer it. And then it gets a loan by himself
in Hairn Hall, and then his like his little thoughts
start tinkling. It's like when I work with people personal disorders,
(35:44):
and this is not to disparage anyone that has them,
is that you can be really influenced by the current
environment you're in. And so I think we see with
him that he's getting influenced a lot by like assume.
As ran Er shows up at hair in Hall, He's like, okay,
you call me baby girl. Like they have they are
matching each other's freak. I hate to say it, but
(36:06):
when she shows up, the look on their face at
each other, I'm like, ain't nobody got to match their
freak because it's with each other, And he like very
easily is like okay, Like I know what my role
is now that mommy has shown up again and he
doesn't fight her.
Speaker 3 (36:21):
It's really interesting. And I do think Damon loves Rania
and I think he loves her, which I just have
to continue to acknowledge how girlst it is in so
many ways.
Speaker 2 (36:35):
And I think that he loves her in his way,
like I think that love looks different for a lot
of folks, and I think he absolutely and equivocally loves
her in a Damon way.
Speaker 3 (36:44):
That's not the way I express love. That's not the
way I would.
Speaker 1 (36:47):
Want someone to express love to me, Like give a.
Speaker 2 (36:50):
David way, babe, And like you said, man, if you
work for them, like more power.
Speaker 3 (36:54):
To you live your best life. I think that's a
larger question though, is.
Speaker 2 (36:57):
Does it work for them because so much of their
relationship has been rooted in.
Speaker 3 (37:03):
This quest to get her.
Speaker 2 (37:05):
Like, what outside of their relationship is not like I
don't want to call it traumatic or dramatic, but what
like their whole relationship is rooted in this thing.
Speaker 3 (37:14):
What are they going to do when eventually the does symbols?
Speaker 5 (37:17):
Like?
Speaker 3 (37:18):
What is that going to look at?
Speaker 4 (37:19):
It makes me think of people who have relationships outside
of marriage and how it can only exist in this
really specific way and can exist in any other way.
Like people who have relationships outside of marriages, they often.
Speaker 3 (37:37):
A big part of that is the secrecy.
Speaker 4 (37:38):
A big part of that is the acting like a
different person almost, Yeah, the thrill of being connected in
that way. And so I feel like that's what they
have when they're together. They can do it, but only
in front of each other, and they can't do it
in any other way because it very much the circumstances
have to be just so in order for that to work.
Speaker 1 (37:59):
I just what she could have been with Haran Strong,
you know what I mean, He's the only man who
wanted nothing from her but her I.
Speaker 3 (38:05):
Needed to want.
Speaker 1 (38:08):
Yeah, And I also think which I really like about
the flashbacks we actually they were the dreams in season
two is how much their relationship. I think if they
came into like marriage and family therapy, how much do
you think their stuff would keep coming back to, like
the formation, like her as a teenager and him as
(38:29):
like this kind of swashbuckling hero that would come in
and out of her life. Like I think they also
are a victim of that time of their life, like
kind of what you're saying they got. They kind of
were chasing each other and it was very like thirty
and sexy and forbidden, and you know, the dad didn't
want it to happen obviously, And so I wonder if
(38:50):
there are people that always keep going back to that
part of their life and also for her too, or
I think when Rinier chases chases him, but like goes
after him and is like, we've been happy about you.
That's a combination not grieving the loss of your cousin
husband and your lover husband, and then I think having
that really nostalgic, like toxic nostalgia people can have for
(39:14):
like old crushes and high school boyfriends and this idea
that like it was all good when we were almost
a thing or we were a thing, and so we
set to get back to that and feeling like that'll
fix everything, and it does for a little while, and
then things get hard. And I think Damon is also
that husband or the partner where like things can be
(39:35):
okay until there's actual stressors and then I'm gonna choke you.
That was in your battle, like your planning room, and.
Speaker 3 (39:43):
That was that was hard. That was I mean, it
does I always forget.
Speaker 6 (39:47):
That he did murder his I'm saying he's straight up
murdered his first wife hard in the in the daylight,
right in the daylight, he had he had his criminal
I'll cloak on.
Speaker 1 (40:01):
What are some of our final thoughts here? I guess
where do you think things are going to go next?
For Allison? I'm really curious about that because it veers
off from the book because I did read Fire and Blood,
but it's very different. Allison's very different in the book.
Speaker 3 (40:14):
Yeah, I didn't read the books because and for a like.
Speaker 2 (40:19):
I I would actually o clear, she just went away
and I hope that she this, she.
Speaker 3 (40:30):
Discovers what she wants because again she.
Speaker 2 (40:33):
Was just throw us into all these good relationships and
then she had kids and it's like girl what you like?
Speaker 3 (40:39):
What do you want? Don't know anything about it?
Speaker 1 (40:42):
He's plying it on that dragon and he locked up
his Grandpapy, like what we do? It doesn't seem like
they do like and I think that's I mean, it
does say a lot about her self awareness when she's
like Darren's kind but where she still has a lot
of work to do. Is it seems like she very
is also like, well it's just the environment. But maybe me,
(41:03):
but I don't know, maybe not me though.
Speaker 4 (41:05):
I think Allison is going to find a way to
find another identity because I don't think she knows what
to do. And I think that that's what we're and
I think that that's partially what we're going to see
it go ahead.
Speaker 1 (41:16):
That's a because I think is anything that.
Speaker 3 (41:28):
Is hers.
Speaker 1 (41:36):
And she.
Speaker 3 (41:38):
And she.
Speaker 4 (41:42):
It can't be real, it can't be real, so she
can't she can't hold it for herself. So I think
I think that's I think that's what we're going to see.
I think she's going to try and find another identity however,
how in any way, shape or form she can.
Speaker 3 (41:56):
That was such an amazing scene.
Speaker 2 (41:57):
I'm so happy you brought that up in the set
and just seeing like Ranier's face because she had the
whole thing.
Speaker 1 (42:02):
Oh m h yeah, Ali said, I don't really know
because I feel like they're kind of doing their own
thing in the show with her, But I'm enjoying it.
Like where it's going. It's way more deep And I
guess I just also want to say, as soon as
she the day after Vizaris died, and as soon as
she realized that they've been Plattin and Plattin to put
(42:23):
to you Sir Rania all along, that would have been
the time for her to be like, oh, maybe this
is bad and maybe I should switch sides. And I
still like, I think as long as Otto was in
that King's landing, she couldn't change.
Speaker 3 (42:40):
Where can people find you, Bassing.
Speaker 2 (42:43):
I'm on all forms of social media at doctor van
as it hits hi in TZ and thank you all
so much for coming.
Speaker 3 (42:49):
This is a lovely conversation, and thank you all
Speaker 1 (42:51):
For the oh yeah, thank you so much,
Welcome to Popcorn Psychology, the podcast where we watch blockbuster
movies and psychoanalyze them. My name is Brittany Brownfield and
I'm a child therapist and I'm joined by Ben Stover,
individual therapist, Hannah Espinoza, marriage and family therapists. We're all
licensed clinical professional counselors also known as therapists, who practice
out of Chicago. Even though we are licensed mental health professionals,
this podcast is purely for entertainment purposes and to fulfill
(00:37):
our love of dissecting pop culture and all forms.
Speaker 2 (00:40):
Please remember that, even though we are all licensed therapists,
we aren't your therapist.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
If you are struggling with mental health symptoms, please find
a local mental health provider. Hey, everybody, just wanted to
give you a little caveat before you listen to this episode,
as it is a recording of a live episode of
a panel we did at the Fan Expo this year. Because
it is a live panel recording and I did record
(01:06):
it on my phone through this breaker app, you will
notice that the sound quality is not as good as
it typically is. You may hear some chairs creaking here
and there. You might hear clapping in the background from
other panels that were going on. You might also have
a hard time hearing any audience engagement of this episode,
(01:27):
but hopefully you will still be able to enjoy myself
and Hannah and our guest doctor Vanessa, as we discussed
the House of the Dragon. Thank you, Hi everybody, Thank
you for those who made it here early on, well
early for us on a Sunday. So yeah, so we
(01:47):
are talking about half of the Dragon today. So first off,
Hannah and I so Brittany Hannah. We are two thirds
of Popular Psychology podcast, which is a podcast that talks
about pop culture movies through the eyes of therapists. I'm
a licensed clinical professional counselor. Hannah is as well, and
Ben our one co host. He's at a wedding this weekend,
(02:09):
so we couldn't join us, but that allowed us to
talk about a topic he doesn't talk about because he
doesn't watch House of the Dragon, So we use that
as an opportunity to talk about what will we want
to talk about And also we are joined by doctor Vanessa.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
Hello, I'm sorry it's still very early for me as well.
It's still am I am doctor Vanessa. I am a
licensed psychologist based just west of Milwaukee and Walkeshaw, Wisconsin.
Speaker 3 (02:36):
And I'm so thankful to be here with you all.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
A fan of popcorn psychology, and thank you so much
for the invitation.
Speaker 3 (02:42):
I'm like very excited.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
So yeah, we're just gonna rip it up up here.
So if any time, if anyone who say questions thoughts,
feel free to raise your hand interject. We are very
into discussion. What we primarily wanted to focus on was
Allison and Rain. I guess also what I should say
too is if we're gonna be talking about everything so
spoiler spoiler spoiler, and if we're also probably gonna touch
(03:08):
upon like trauma, abuse cycle, stuff like that. So we're
not gonna get graphic into anything, but if any of
those topics that all would be triggering for you, just
want to give every of heads up that we're probably
gonna talk about stuff like that, because I don't know
how you can talk about Allison specifically without talking about
trauma and abuse cycles. So I guess first off, I
(03:31):
will say I'm team Black.
Speaker 3 (03:32):
I'm also team black. Is there another team?
Speaker 1 (03:36):
I don't think there is anybody in here? Yeahs anybody
in here? Team Green? It's okay, are we won't attack
you yet. But I found really fascinating. One is that
how much this show centers two female leads kind of
as the crux, like a friendship basically as the crux
(03:58):
of it, and watching how to women become such different
people even though they kind of start somewhat in the
same place and as friends. So, I guess, do you
guys have any thoughts off the rip about Raniera or Allison?
Speaker 4 (04:13):
So when I think about Alison, I think about somebody
who is coming from the framework of fear. It's very
We went back and rewatched some of the first season,
and it's really clear that she's raised to be afraid
very much, and that she also we also see her
in the first season where we also see the shift
(04:34):
that she feels of being used by her father to
get for him to get to whatever rank he wants
to get to, right like he wants to have all
the power, he wants to have a king.
Speaker 3 (04:46):
He wants to be the boss of the king, basically
is what I feel like Attam really wants.
Speaker 4 (04:51):
And I feel like that's a part of the reason
why Allison's response to everything is so different than what
we see in Raniera, which is someone who has been
raised by with love and connection, and I feel like
that's also why we see them be such different mothers
as well.
Speaker 3 (05:13):
Yeah, and I would I would just add about Rania.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
I think that there's an interesting sort of tension, uh
for Rania as someone who was raised.
Speaker 3 (05:22):
In privilege, right, like she's going home, she was gonna
be the heir, should have been the air a.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
Different conversation, But she is someone who was raised in
privilege and also is raised in this time where as
a woman, she has very little privileges, right, So there's
this tension.
Speaker 3 (05:38):
Within her that I think we see throughout.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
And so I think to that point about Alison being
sort of raised in fear, I think Raniera is raised
in constant conflict. So she has so much power, so
much privilege, she has so much power, right, and still
it's like you're a woman here, a woman here, a
woman like she is gonna forget. But I think it's
just very interesting. She has a very conflictual I think life,
(06:03):
both figuratively and literally.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
Well, I think you're bringing up a great point where
this is where Visius can really poop the bed you
and try to keep this Pegma language in encouraging that
conflict right, because I make you my heir, and I
try to act like I'm doing some like deeply feminist thing. Right.
He's like the dad that like keeps saying he's a
(06:26):
feminist and like maybe even like reads books about feminism.
But yet when I bring my daughter into who's my
heir into the High Council, she's our waitress, yes, like
I like still struggling to not put her in a
feminine role even though he needs to.
Speaker 3 (06:44):
Like the way he can.
Speaker 1 (06:45):
Protect her is by raising her more like his air,
more like a male heir would be, and also teaching
her to defend herself too, Like I think just now
in the show, is she learning combat?
Speaker 3 (07:00):
Yeah, like those kind of things too.
Speaker 1 (07:01):
Like once he decided to make her his heir, he
really doesn't do anything different in terms of preparing her
to be his heir. She's still just let's find you
a husband, let's you know, you're still coming to the meetings,
but you're still like bearing the cups, like he doesn't
do any of the things. But then again, well I
guess he doesn't do with eggon either, but that's on
(07:21):
purpose ish, But like this very like lazy approach he takes,
which I feel like is so vicious. He is that
more benevolent problems where he just doesn't understand where he
is letting her down. And he shows up in these
big ways, right like when he shows up as basically
(07:43):
a skeleton to reaffirm her airdom, but he still doesn't
really put anything in place to keep her safe moving forward.
Speaker 4 (07:54):
You know, I feel like he doesn't even he doesn't
even consider the struggle that she's going to have.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
That's that's like like thalting Winter Soldier. When Sam talks
about like being Captain America and you guys didn't think
about me being black when you were like, just be
Captain America. It's like the same idea for sure.
Speaker 4 (08:10):
Yeah, he doesn't he doesn't even think about it.
Speaker 3 (08:14):
And I think that's a real I think it's a.
Speaker 4 (08:16):
Really half assed job that he's doing mhm of not
bringing her in and treating her the way that she
should be treated.
Speaker 3 (08:24):
And I think we're seeing the unfolding of that in
the second season.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
You know what's wild too, is that he actually has
an awareness, right Like, how many times throughout the first
season does he say like, they will not accept you
did it at whatever he's saying about, like the people.
But then sir, you're not doing anything. Also, you're the
whole king sir, like you didn't make things right.
Speaker 4 (08:46):
It feels like there's so many different ways he could
have supported her instead of in private only that's the
only time that he's really behind hers when they're in private.
I wish Thissarius had more of a spine, especially even
with Damon. Even if we think about Damon, he really
should have curtailed his shit apologies not cursing, he really didn't.
(09:11):
He just continues to not support the people behind what
he's going to do, like he should have been talking
to Damon for a really long time about what his
plan was going to be. I think the other really
shitty thing that he does that Rania is he makes
that decision way too late. Yes, he makes that decision
like another old white man that we know of who
(09:33):
also waited to mf and long to make a decision
that somebody else should be doing the work.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
So so so I.
Speaker 4 (09:49):
Really just feel like he did the least and I
think that really is showing up.
Speaker 3 (09:53):
And I think that's a.
Speaker 4 (09:53):
Part of why we see the conflict that we're experiencing
between and the rest of the realm, and.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
I think you brought a great point too, and like
I was of I think, like most people, I was
really anti Allison by the end of the second season.
I don't well at the end of the first season.
I think that's how they kind of did it right.
And rewatching the first two episodes of the show this
past week, Raymie, really remember how young she is when
the show starts, and how anxious she is. I don't
(10:26):
think that's something I clocked right away, but she's constantly
like screwing with her cuticles, which is also something I
do when I'm restless or anxious, and to watch her
understand the world, like I think you can see in
the first few episodes that she's really starting to understand
the world that she's in as a woman because her
(10:47):
mother just died I think right before the show started.
So as far as I know, she's come to court
with her father post mom's death, and it's like a
whole new world, and she's immediately being groomed groomed, yes,
And the look on her face when she realizes why
her dad sending her to see Vaserris is such a bummer,
And so I think she does what a lot of
(11:07):
women do do, unfortunately within patriarchal structures, is that she
makes a choice, right, you either have to fight against it,
which Rania has the privilege to do, or you try
to fawn your way through it. So fawning is a
trauma response not a lot of people are aware of
because it can look like you're just fine or you're
almost maybe into it. Like fawning is trying to make
(11:30):
the situation palatable for yourself and everybody else, so that
if I'm pleasing, I will get the least amount of.
Speaker 3 (11:37):
Harm done to me.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
And so a lot of people don't know what fawning is,
and they also don't respect fawning is a trauma reaction.
A lot of people like to victim blame via fawning
or you know, because of fawning. And I think with her,
you just see someone who and like I said, a
lot of women do this where they're like, Okay, I'm
just gonna be good with a miss framework and so
(11:59):
then I'll be safe and everything will be okay. And
I think with her too, because she's probably smart, just
seems smart to me. I can access power by playing
the game. And I think you watch so much of
her evolution over the show, trying to gain power for
herself in these very different ways, through religion, through viseras,
(12:20):
through her children, through her dad, almost and she can't
get it because well, Rayne's was correct when she read
her down in season one where she was like, you're
trying to make a window in your cell, babe, and
I'm not trying to be in this prison period.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
And I feel like that was part of her character
sort of, but part of her like pivot season two
was when that house of cards of power came down
when they excuse her from the council, and I think
that that I think until then, I think she was
(12:58):
holding on to that semblance of power and I think
she really thought she had something, and that was one
there were many points throughout the first two seasons I felt.
Speaker 3 (13:07):
Sorry for her.
Speaker 2 (13:08):
That was one of them. And also it was like
ha ha, you know, like I feel like she really
thought that she had power and it came crashing down
so quickly.
Speaker 3 (13:20):
And then she went into the woods and did her
retreat or whatever.
Speaker 4 (13:22):
She did, which is again to perform a place of
privilege that she can just go out and be in
the woods and also abandon her children, right and just
go do whatever she wanted to do to take care
of herself. She really is the most and I feel like,
but we do get that look on her face when
she's sitting at the council and they make that decision.
It's just like you can just tell her. She's like, oh, right,
(13:44):
this is just made up. Yes, this is just made up.
I'm just a pawn in the game, and now I'm
gonna go do whatever I want. And then also show
up and try to make a deal with Ranierra, which
is one hundred days too late.
Speaker 3 (13:56):
And yeah, so again I think.
Speaker 4 (14:00):
Just really seeing these two female characters really struggle, even
though they both have a lot of privilege.
Speaker 2 (14:08):
I think a point you're making too it and I
think that what we've been talking about. You talked about
trauma responses and things like that being trauma informed does,
like understanding that people have traumatic histories does not excuse
harmful behavior, and I think that's something that as we
are trying to navigate trauma in our own lives, right
like my own, other like my clients, whoever, being trauma
(14:30):
informed doesn't mean we affirm people's harmful behavior. And so
like with Alison, I'm sad for you, girl, I'm sad
you had to marry your daddy's friend.
Speaker 3 (14:39):
Like that's I'm so sad for you. And that doesn't
mean you can And.
Speaker 2 (14:44):
You know what I'm saying, Like, I think that that
is and I appreciate the way we're having this conversation
because it's a both and right, it's a.
Speaker 3 (14:50):
Both and like we can both acknowledge.
Speaker 2 (14:52):
That Alison and Ramier both had like traumatic things happened
to them, and that does not excuse harmful behavior, and
so how do we sit with that tension? And I
think that that's part of the reason a lot of
people hate Alison, because it's hard to sit with that
tension and to excuse a lot of her behavior and
arguably Renier also, she's not blamelessness.
Speaker 1 (15:15):
No, we love a perfect victim. And yeah, I love
what you're saying. I like to say a lot when
I because we're active therapists too, we see clients all
the time, and so I always say, that's an explanation,
not an excuse, you know, which is what you're saying.
It's validation, but it's not affirmation. And we don't get
a free pass to treat people how we like. And
I m and yeah, Alice is complicated. I think what's
(15:39):
really interesting, I wonder what you guys think about her
how religious she became over the course of season one,
and how slowly unreligious she becomes post vicious as death,
you know, because when they show up Damon and Raniera
with their two little kids together, and she's fully like,
we're in the head. He's in the thing, and she's
(16:01):
got it up to her neck and she's like, I
shan't show a neck or an ankle, you know, energy,
And it's almost like she's put herself in a nunnery
of her own making while Visius is in his deathbed.
But then once she's he's gone, it's interesting. Once he's gone,
she's like hair out, necklace off, Christy Coke. It's like
(16:25):
she's finally which does happen? You know, it's finally in
her thirties, because she's in her thirties, finally feeling like
she's able to come into her own right and yeah,
you're right, Like, what I really love in I think
it's it is a scene where she gets picked out
of the council that they're like, oh, they're trying to
pick the regent, and she's and they're like, well, the
(16:45):
basis of her whole campaign is that women are too
dumb or whatever to be leaders.
Speaker 3 (16:52):
Sometimes we make you a leader.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
Like we are undercutting our whole thing, which is what
there is this really funny she's I don't know if
she would call herself a TV personality. I know her
from many other things names Francesca Ramsey. She's a really
good caller, and she has this song that she sings
called I didn't think the Daguars would also eat my face,
which is something she'll sing when someone is part of
like a system that then bites them in the butt.
(17:16):
And so I feel like Alison, she did not think
the Draguars read her face, which I think is a
common almost like unfortunately, it is a common consequence of
trying to please the system that is also on your
neck is that eventually you're going to hit a ceiling
and you've only enforced that ceiling, So what did you
think was going to happen? But I think it is
(17:37):
like the Delulu. Sometimes people need to believe so they
can keep justifying what they're doing, because that's all I can.
All Allison's doing all day is mental gymnastics to live
with herself.
Speaker 2 (17:48):
And to your question, I think about religion and people
in here have seen Game of Thrones.
Speaker 3 (17:53):
Okay, I just don't be mad if I spoil this.
We're in a rewatch now, I think rewatching forty two.
I don't know, but we're in the season with.
Speaker 2 (18:01):
The high Sparrow and how it's so interesting that because
that was where my mind went about how well Circe did.
Circe is like next level of manipulative and like we
can have a whole panel talking about her. Yeah, but
I think the way that she sort of tried to
align with the Church and the sept and the past,
Like I think religion is just another power structure, and
(18:22):
I think for Alison it was simultaneously comforting because I
think people find comfort in religion. It was also I
think a power thing for her because she had another
sort of sense of security with the church as a system,
just like it is in our day and age, right,
Like the church is another structure of power, and so
I think her sort of like I wouldn't be surprised
(18:45):
if and I didn't read the book, so I don't
know if this happens, but I wouldn't be surprised if
she didn't pendulum swing and go back to that now
that she has lost all semblance of like royal power,
because I feel like she is like grasping and I
think her religious sort of affiliations were one of those
what was an attempt to do that sort of while
all this uncertainty was happening as a series was dying
(19:05):
for like how many years he was dying?
Speaker 5 (19:07):
He was dying for twenty years, so legitimately, yeah, And well,
like now as you're talking about it too, it's making
me think of I feel like her religious side really
starts to bomb when the whole scandal comes out right
in like episode four or five.
Speaker 1 (19:22):
Where Raniera went out of town with her uncle lover
and you know that became scandalous because Auto has a
big mouth, it won't stop working.
Speaker 3 (19:33):
Well, let me say this thing about.
Speaker 4 (19:37):
I think that Auto decided that he needed to get
rid of Raniero when she shows up in the first
season when he goes to meet Damon at Dragonstone. Yeah,
and she shows up on her dragon and is like,
I don't need a man to handle this, and she's
just a teenager and she comes and she shows up
and I think you can see an Auto's space right
there that he's like, I got to do something about this.
(19:59):
And so we see that when they come back from
that trip, that's when her dad tries to starts trying
to get her married off. And I feel like that's
Auto behind the Sirius trying to get rid of Verneera
in any way that he can or even.
Speaker 1 (20:11):
Make her ConTroll over controllable. Because I think it's also
interesting rewatching it is that Auto is the one that
suggests Raniera as air. But I think it's because it
was like he knows he can't control Daemon. So I
think in the analysis he's doing in his head is
I have a teenage daughter and I control her, So
let's make this teenage daughter and then I'll basically be
(20:31):
king regent behind her. But then she starts to show
pretty quickly how confident she is she's a Targarian.
Speaker 3 (20:40):
I mean, I.
Speaker 1 (20:40):
Don't know how that if you combine the targarian godlike
image and what she's been told her whole life with
being the invincibility that all teenagers have, how can her
and Daemon not be the most obnoxious people you'd ever
met on planet Earth? And so I think also why
Alison kind of dives into religion is because of that
(21:03):
break too, where I mean this happens a lot where
Allison is trying to play the game and she has
a friend who's not playing the game and who is
doing all the things that probably Alison secretly wants to do.
I mean, she ends up having a relationship with the
same guy that Ramier had a relationship with as a teenager.
(21:24):
And so I think you also see Alison having a
very understandable teenage reaction of like, that's not fair that
you get to do what you want, and instead of
me really acknowledging how bad I feel for myself or
how much like pity I feel or empathy I feel
for myself, and the fact that, like I don't get
(21:46):
to do what I want, I'm going to make my
lifestyle moral and your lifestyle immral. That way, I can
live with my lifestyle and I can't be jealous of yours,
because that's just like demon envy, like the devil, like
trying to seduce me kind of stuff, right, And I
think we see people do that all the time. I
definitely I grew up in a more religious area in
(22:09):
southern Ohio, and so I think, and I'm sure I
did my own version of this as someone who's raised Catholic,
which is like, ooh, those girls over there, they're bad,
and like I'm being good by restricting myself and that's
you know, what'll be good for me. And so to
see Raniera succeed while also getting to do the things
that she doesn't get to do, it would make Alison angry,
(22:32):
but she doesn't really understand how to put that anger
in a proper context other than punishing Raniera. And then
I think she just goes right into the religion, like
just keeps floating on them all the way down. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
And what I appreciate too about what you're saying is
how like comment that is for us to other, right
and othering, Like so me and everything that's not me
or us in them to me is not inhanentally a
bad thing.
Speaker 3 (22:57):
Like that's how we create a friend of mine. Doctor
Scott Jordan talks about this. He talked about creating boundaries, right,
like that's necessary.
Speaker 2 (23:05):
What is problematic is when we devalue the other and
so like be mad Alison, but why you gotta like
why you gotta.
Speaker 3 (23:13):
Call like rnero or like that's the thing like that
we don't need to be doing it. And so I
appreciate what you're saying, because again, it's not that because
there was a there was.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
I think it was the last episode of season two
when Allison just randomly showed up at dragon Stone.
Speaker 3 (23:29):
And there's yeah, girls come from like whatever.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
But I think it was in the conversation that she
was having with Raniera, and I think she was sort
of open about all of the things that you mentioned
about how she felt about her and all these things,
and I felt that.
Speaker 3 (23:42):
In my soul.
Speaker 2 (23:42):
I was like, damn, like I've been there, right, As
someone who has was in school for like four hundred years,
I had to put a lot of my life on
hold that people my age, you know, are having kids
that are going to college and me like, oh, I'm
gonna be sixty years old taking my kid to kindergarten
like whatever, right, And there is absolutely some envy that happens,
and I think I have to go acknowledge that that's amazing,
(24:06):
that's not the other people's issue that I feel that
kind of.
Speaker 3 (24:08):
Way, And I think that that's what you're describing. I
think if Allison.
Speaker 2 (24:12):
Would have acknowledged that she felt the way she felt
without devaluing Raniera, I would think about her in a
very different way.
Speaker 1 (24:19):
Yeah. I think she also really struggles, which is not
uncommon to see outside her own world view. It makes
me curious when Allison shows up to be like, hey girl,
let's just film on Louise. I wonder if she's thinking, like,
we're both having a bad time, right, like I've been
faking it this long? Have you been faking it this long?
Let's piece up together. And what she doesn't understand and
(24:40):
what Rainier is trying to explain to her but can't
is no, this means something to me.
Speaker 3 (24:44):
I wasn't just.
Speaker 1 (24:45):
Going along to please all the people around me. You're
taking something. Not only you're taking something meaningful me, but
you've made me really care about it. And so now
I'm going to take this all the way to the
end and I'm gonna have to kill your kids now,
Like I think, what really upsets me and how we're
talking about how Allison's are written in fear is the
way that Auto, which is so he Raniera when their kids,
(25:10):
Rinier seems like the only safe person for Allison, and
I think, what's so awful about what Auto does is
he continuously erodes that relationship. It's very controlling, abusive, like
isolating kind of thing of like repeatedly convincing Alison, she's
gonna kill you, she's gonna kill your kids, there's no
(25:31):
peace here, and like shaking her, like literally shaking the
hell out of her and being like grow up, when
in actuality, what we know is that Raniera wouldn't have
done that. And it's so horrible how these power systems
will erode our trust in each other and not let
us listen to our instincts and even make our instincts
(25:52):
seem like they are stupid. And I think when you
have someone who's based in fear, which is Alison, someone
based in love or more love and support like Rania
and trying to make her confident even though it's not
really pulling it off. I think it's really interesting too
how that trickles down to their kids and their relationship
to their kids. I think a great example of this,
(26:14):
and I'll throw it to you too, is how we
see with Allison, like especially when they have that like.
Speaker 3 (26:19):
The scene where Vita hers is having sex with her.
Speaker 1 (26:22):
I think that's as generous I can be about it.
She's someone who has started to dissociate right like she
is on the moon when that's happening. And so when
you start to clock out emotionally, especially during those kind
of moments, you will struggle potentially to I'm a child therapist,
so you'll struggle to attach to your kids, right and
even if you're present physically but you are absent mentally
(26:45):
or emotionally, that attachment will unfortunately not be secure.
Speaker 3 (26:50):
I think a lot of people think I.
Speaker 1 (26:52):
Can just be physically present with my kids and that'll
be enough, and I can make I can do that,
especially with people who have had kids through trauma or
traumatic relationships. What in actuality like you have to be
able to be present completely and she can't really do that.
And so when you have these moments where she's trying
to connect to Helena into Agon when they're going through
(27:13):
their big grief.
Speaker 3 (27:14):
She can't.
Speaker 1 (27:15):
And I think it's a great example of how like
if you're never taught how to do something, if you're
never shown, if you're never modeled, you don't always just
know how to do it. Sometimes you can, since people
are really naturally resilient and they can just figure out
the kind of intuitively how to do things that they
weren't shown by their parents. But I think a lot
of times, unfortunately, what we see with Alison and her
kids is what that will look like unless someone intercedes
(27:38):
and shows them a different way. And I think they
showed us such a great job of demonstrating how different
Rania's kids and Alison's kids are, just based solely on
the way they're parented.
Speaker 3 (27:50):
I will say, to the point about kids, Jaz really
let me down at the end of the day.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
But I get it. I get it too, But I'm like,
really bro like really I guess.
Speaker 3 (28:01):
With him, I feel like I think it's maybe he's
over there.
Speaker 4 (28:14):
I think he is a product of the patriarchy that
the rest of them are also a part of, and
he's getting raised in the same story, and he wants
to feel special, and he doesn't feel special anymore, and
he doesn't know what his identity is without being special.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
And I think to the point too about the parenting,
I think I call Auto lovingly plash going, but I
think his relationship that we see with Alison is very
transactional to the point that you were making, whereas even
the serious relationship with her Nara and Nara's relationship with
her all she had so many kids, so many kids,
(28:52):
even even David's kids, right, it's not transactional. And I
think that that is what you're pointing to, is we
see Alison. Everything that she does with her kids I
think is transactional. It's very much like what can you
do for me? This is what we need to do.
And maybe some of that is a product of their
royal and that's what they gotta do. I don't know,
but I think it's very clear that it is a
(29:14):
means to an end. I think with her in her
relationship with her kids and with Brenera, it's very very different.
I think the beginning of season two, that scene with
Brenera and Jays when after lucerastat that was too much.
Speaker 3 (29:27):
That was a beautiful.
Speaker 1 (29:28):
Scene and also like such a brutal juxtaposition of Alison
seeing egg On weeping and just staring at him and
walking away like that was such a perfect opportunity to
change the script between the two of them, right, and
to show something different, and I think unfortunately that is
(29:49):
more realistic, like her seeing him I think panicking, and
I think with Helena she feels the safest maybe because
Elena is a girl, you know, and maybe on the spectrum.
But I think that's another good case where even with Helena,
as soon as there is a barrier, which is maybe
that she's very divergent, Alison can't flex. She can't figure
(30:14):
out an end to that either. And I'm such a
soft spot for jasaras I think because I work with teenagers,
but like, you're not wrong, But also I think him
even having those discussions with Ramier is such a good
show of how actually like good relationship they have, yes
that he can challenge her. She even when she pisses
(30:36):
her off, she's like, I'm listening and I'm hearing and
I'm sorry, But like she does, she actually does a
good job of like I'm hearing the way you're feeling,
validating you, and I'm going to get some poor people
on these dragons are the.
Speaker 3 (30:52):
Small folks, so you better.
Speaker 1 (30:53):
But I do think something where she does have the
Visara's energy with her kids is the fact that they
are clearly not Lenor's kids. I know why she no
one ever can really acknowledge it, even her to them,
because of just the safety components so intense, and she's
already someone who is on the razor's edge of like
being in.
Speaker 3 (31:14):
Everyone's good graces.
Speaker 1 (31:16):
But I think that is the part where she really
takes like out of Visara's playbook of like, if something's
too uncomfortable, we just won't acknowledge it, Like we're just
gonna keep putting it under the rug. Putting under the
rug when you couldn't have kids that looked more like
their daddy more like and like the fact that he
even brought up I was like, Oh, we're gonna.
Speaker 3 (31:33):
Have this fight.
Speaker 1 (31:34):
Fine, really, but that was a fight they were always
gonna have.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
Yeah, I'm just siaus.
Speaker 1 (31:39):
At some point because he was always I mean, everyone knew.
Everybody knew. Yeah, that conversation was long overdue. And even
though I was like, oh, this is not the time,
I was also like, but he's not wrong for what
teenager wouldn't be feeling like they've been keeping that in
their back pocket to throw on their mom's face when
they're really in it. They're like, I've been waiting to
launch this duke get you.
Speaker 3 (32:00):
And now I haven't.
Speaker 1 (32:01):
And they was see very validated. That would be something
a teenager in my office would be like, well, and
I'd be like, Okay, I get it, and I get
way felt they need to do it, and time on
place I have hard conversations. So we have about ten
minutes left. We definitely can keep on the apping, but
I wanted to make room for questions or thoughts. If
anyone had any, you can just raise your hand. If not,
(32:21):
it's also totally okay. Let me ask you this question.
Who in here thinks that Damon really loves Raniera?
Speaker 3 (32:29):
Show up hands way less than I thought.
Speaker 1 (32:33):
Okay, can you give me a why?
Speaker 4 (32:43):
M Yeah, because because he can't because a part of
his identity. He can't love Reniera completely because a part
of his identity can't because he wants to be king
so bad. I don't think Damon loves anybody besides himself
and the idea of being the king.
Speaker 3 (33:00):
That's all. That's what I think Damon has got in him,
and that's it.
Speaker 4 (33:03):
I don't even really truly believe that he loves Visius
because Zarus is the biggest barrier to the only thing
that he seems to give a fly.
Speaker 3 (33:13):
In f about.
Speaker 4 (33:19):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely, and respect him as much as he
can as a sick old man, right, because he also
doesn't hold any like the things that Damon finds value
in is not like the Cyrus, is not that he's
basically the antithesis of that.
Speaker 3 (33:37):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely, Thos.
Speaker 1 (33:41):
I mean, I think or I can have empathy for
Damon is a therapist.
Speaker 3 (33:46):
You always have to practice a lot of empathy or
you don't for fake characters. Well, in this I know.
Speaker 1 (33:55):
Is I don't know how being raised with that environ
can't be so screwy for your mentality, for your mental health,
like your identity to be treated like the spare you
know what I mean, to be in this like competitive
space with your family where you can't really.
Speaker 3 (34:17):
You can love each.
Speaker 1 (34:18):
Other sort of, but you're also in this like continuously
comparative adversarial space. And so I think I see with
Damon a lot of attempts to love people and a
lot of attempts to like figure out who he is
if he's not going to be the air like him.
I think he tries to love Lena, and he tries
to settle down in that place wherever they were at
(34:41):
when she's pregnant, right. I think I think what he
can feel confusing as a character is he's trying on
all of these identities but like someone who has like
maybe a personag disort or something like that, like a
central factor of personal disorders that I think people don't
quite understand. And that's why we can someone's like empathy,
(35:01):
is that the sense of self is really hard to find.
It's just not like innate as it can be with
like other people. And so I think he's almost like
a classic example of like, well, maybe I can be
a really good police chief in King's Land commander of
the Guard, and I'm gonna go totally hamm on that, but.
Speaker 3 (35:20):
In a way that's not quite right. And then I'm gonna.
Speaker 1 (35:24):
Try to be, you know, this crab feeder fighter, but
I also kind of do that wrong, and I come
and wearing a crown and like wanting a lot of attention.
It's like, and then maybe I can be good to
reneer it. And then it gets a loan by himself
in Hairn Hall, and then his like his little thoughts
start tinkling. It's like when I work with people personal disorders,
(35:44):
and this is not to disparage anyone that has them,
is that you can be really influenced by the current
environment you're in. And so I think we see with
him that he's getting influenced a lot by like assume.
As ran Er shows up at hair in Hall, He's like, okay,
you call me baby girl. Like they have they are
matching each other's freak. I hate to say it, but
(36:06):
when she shows up, the look on their face at
each other, I'm like, ain't nobody got to match their
freak because it's with each other, And he like very
easily is like okay, Like I know what my role
is now that mommy has shown up again and he
doesn't fight her.
Speaker 3 (36:21):
It's really interesting. And I do think Damon loves Rania
and I think he loves her, which I just have
to continue to acknowledge how girlst it is in so
many ways.
Speaker 2 (36:35):
And I think that he loves her in his way,
like I think that love looks different for a lot
of folks, and I think he absolutely and equivocally loves
her in a Damon way.
Speaker 3 (36:44):
That's not the way I express love. That's not the
way I would.
Speaker 1 (36:47):
Want someone to express love to me, Like give a.
Speaker 2 (36:50):
David way, babe, And like you said, man, if you
work for them, like more power.
Speaker 3 (36:54):
To you live your best life. I think that's a
larger question though, is.
Speaker 2 (36:57):
Does it work for them because so much of their
relationship has been rooted in.
Speaker 3 (37:03):
This quest to get her.
Speaker 2 (37:05):
Like, what outside of their relationship is not like I
don't want to call it traumatic or dramatic, but what
like their whole relationship is rooted in this thing.
Speaker 3 (37:14):
What are they going to do when eventually the does symbols?
Speaker 5 (37:17):
Like?
Speaker 3 (37:18):
What is that going to look at?
Speaker 4 (37:19):
It makes me think of people who have relationships outside
of marriage and how it can only exist in this
really specific way and can exist in any other way.
Like people who have relationships outside of marriages, they often.
Speaker 3 (37:37):
A big part of that is the secrecy.
Speaker 4 (37:38):
A big part of that is the acting like a
different person almost, Yeah, the thrill of being connected in
that way. And so I feel like that's what they
have when they're together. They can do it, but only
in front of each other, and they can't do it
in any other way because it very much the circumstances
have to be just so in order for that to work.
Speaker 1 (37:59):
I just what she could have been with Haran Strong,
you know what I mean, He's the only man who
wanted nothing from her but her I.
Speaker 3 (38:05):
Needed to want.
Speaker 1 (38:08):
Yeah, And I also think which I really like about
the flashbacks we actually they were the dreams in season
two is how much their relationship. I think if they
came into like marriage and family therapy, how much do
you think their stuff would keep coming back to, like
the formation, like her as a teenager and him as
(38:29):
like this kind of swashbuckling hero that would come in
and out of her life. Like I think they also
are a victim of that time of their life, like
kind of what you're saying they got. They kind of
were chasing each other and it was very like thirty
and sexy and forbidden, and you know, the dad didn't
want it to happen obviously, And so I wonder if
(38:50):
there are people that always keep going back to that
part of their life and also for her too, or
I think when Rinier chases chases him, but like goes
after him and is like, we've been happy about you.
That's a combination not grieving the loss of your cousin
husband and your lover husband, and then I think having
that really nostalgic, like toxic nostalgia people can have for
(39:14):
like old crushes and high school boyfriends and this idea
that like it was all good when we were almost
a thing or we were a thing, and so we
set to get back to that and feeling like that'll
fix everything, and it does for a little while, and
then things get hard. And I think Damon is also
that husband or the partner where like things can be
(39:35):
okay until there's actual stressors and then I'm gonna choke you.
That was in your battle, like your planning room, and.
Speaker 3 (39:43):
That was that was hard. That was I mean, it
does I always forget.
Speaker 6 (39:47):
That he did murder his I'm saying he's straight up
murdered his first wife hard in the in the daylight,
right in the daylight, he had he had his criminal
I'll cloak on.
Speaker 1 (40:01):
What are some of our final thoughts here? I guess
where do you think things are going to go next?
For Allison? I'm really curious about that because it veers
off from the book because I did read Fire and Blood,
but it's very different. Allison's very different in the book.
Speaker 3 (40:14):
Yeah, I didn't read the books because and for a like.
Speaker 2 (40:19):
I I would actually o clear, she just went away
and I hope that she this, she.
Speaker 3 (40:30):
Discovers what she wants because again she.
Speaker 2 (40:33):
Was just throw us into all these good relationships and
then she had kids and it's like girl what you like?
Speaker 3 (40:39):
What do you want? Don't know anything about it?
Speaker 1 (40:42):
He's plying it on that dragon and he locked up
his Grandpapy, like what we do? It doesn't seem like
they do like and I think that's I mean, it
does say a lot about her self awareness when she's
like Darren's kind but where she still has a lot
of work to do. Is it seems like she very
is also like, well it's just the environment. But maybe me,
(41:03):
but I don't know, maybe not me though.
Speaker 4 (41:05):
I think Allison is going to find a way to
find another identity because I don't think she knows what
to do. And I think that that's what we're and
I think that that's partially what we're going to see
it go ahead.
Speaker 1 (41:16):
That's a because I think is anything that.
Speaker 3 (41:28):
Is hers.
Speaker 1 (41:36):
And she.
Speaker 3 (41:38):
And she.
Speaker 4 (41:42):
It can't be real, it can't be real, so she
can't she can't hold it for herself. So I think
I think that's I think that's what we're going to see.
I think she's going to try and find another identity however,
how in any way, shape or form she can.
Speaker 3 (41:56):
That was such an amazing scene.
Speaker 2 (41:57):
I'm so happy you brought that up in the set
and just seeing like Ranier's face because she had the
whole thing.
Speaker 1 (42:02):
Oh m h yeah, Ali said, I don't really know
because I feel like they're kind of doing their own
thing in the show with her, But I'm enjoying it.
Like where it's going. It's way more deep And I
guess I just also want to say, as soon as
she the day after Vizaris died, and as soon as
she realized that they've been Plattin and Plattin to put
(42:23):
to you Sir Rania all along, that would have been
the time for her to be like, oh, maybe this
is bad and maybe I should switch sides. And I
still like, I think as long as Otto was in
that King's landing, she couldn't change.
Speaker 3 (42:40):
Where can people find you, Bassing.
Speaker 2 (42:43):
I'm on all forms of social media at doctor van
as it hits hi in TZ and thank you all
so much for coming.
Speaker 3 (42:49):
This is a lovely conversation, and thank you all
Speaker 1 (42:51):
For the oh yeah, thank you so much,
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