Deep in a thick forest, on the fringes of an expensive court hunt, a king stands facing a majestic deer. Brandishing the verdugo procured by his followers, he tries to strike, and fails, pathetic, twice. In the half-light of a brothel, an assembly of mercenaries and prostitutes clink glasses to the glory of the man they sadly dream could become her monarch, the very dissolute brother of the king, while the latter drowns his envy, and his rage, in alcohol and debauchery. Away from a wedding that everything announced as historic, a rat feeds on the blood spilled during a stampede, a burst of ultraviolet violence that does much worse than spoil the party, completes to discredit this union to which no one believes.
At what point in life does agony begin? At what stage of the golden age of a civilization begins the decadence that will lead to its end? Here is the program of House of the Dragon, first spin-off show from the very last television series of the so-called “coffee machine” era, the most discussed and watched in the world until the streaming platforms shattered everything, Game of Thrones.
Adapted from a double volume of “chronicles” (fire and blood, published in 2019 by Pygmalion) and a string of scattered short stories from the creator of his very dark medieval fantasy universe, the American George RR Martin, House of the Dragon takes place almost two centuries before the events told in the iron Throne (books and series). Consider an era presented until then in the past, a bygone era of prosperity and stability. Until his fainting caused by the excesses of a mad king, his dynasty of rulers, the Targaryens, imaginary cousins, dragon riders and platinum blondes – exclusively – Carolingians, in a way founded the modernity to which they will aspire to return. the characters of Game of Thrones 170 years later. The whole point of House of the Dragon, subtly perverse, being of course to sacking the legend by presenting this so-called political golden age to us as an era of turmoil and decline before its time, proof by the depravity of the powerful that no age of gold never existed.
Everyone has their torments and reasons
As expected from Martin, passionate about the Tudor dynasty in England and avowed admirer of cursed kings by Maurice Druon, House of the Dragon therefore takes place exclusively among the powerful. Projected in a constant semi-darkness, revealing the spirit of very learned seriousness chosen by the showrunners Miguel Sapochnik and Ryan Condal – we are not in a novel by Hilary Mantel –, we initially follow the intrigues of palaces around the king, Viserys, his brother, the tormented Daemon, his daughter Rhaenyra, her best friend, Alicent, daughter of the king’s counselor, Otto Hightower. Everyone has their torments and reasons, more or less debatable, to think that the life of a monarch is not more enviable than that of everyone else. Viserys has pustules on his back, Daemon is overwhelmed by his brother’s political weakness, Rhaenyra would like to become a knight rather than a court figure and laywoman of future kings (“the birthing bed is our battlefield”, his mother hits him, before specifying that she “may the dragon”). Above all, everyone is obsessed with the throne, the delicate question of his succession already proving to be problematic, intensely. The queen consort is certainly pregnant, but what will happen if she gives birth to a girl, and not a boy? Because nothing prevents a queen from being crowned rather than a king, but everyone remembers that on the death of Jaehaerys, the previous monarch, his most direct descendant, Rhaenys, cousin of Viserys, was dismissed. And what about the rebellion that rumbles on the edge of the kingdom, this “triarchy” bringing together pirates and enemies of the regime, which dreams of crushing Corlys Velaryon, the “Sea Serpent”, descendant of the oldest dynasty of the kingdom, the Valyrians?
We feel it, we feel it very early, House of the Dragon, whose plot initially seems much more collected and concentrated than that of Game of Thrones, is very complicated inside, and will not stop recomplicating itself further (wide temporal ellipses, sometimes of several years, helping). Arising from outside, from fate, or provoked by the closest intriguers (the family itself), catastrophes abound and electrify, much more than the battles spiced up by the intervention of dragons: it is the shenanigans that cause blood to flow, cracking skulls and cutting tongues (close-up). It is also for them that House of the Dragon could well make a huge new success, despite the weight of the one that preceded it.
Obsession you sang
Because if we do not notice any significant difference with Game of Thrones in aesthetic choices (bronze photos, virtual architectures and beautiful costumes), language (Oxfordian accent on all levels) or staging (the time is no longer for the authors’ interpretation but for coherent frankness in maximum to optimize their packaging and relationship), this spin-off is a real step aside, which takes the risk of betting everything on the novel of power. And bet on the escape, ideal in these times of creeping political chaos, of the most delirious monarchy, always easier to make romantic than democracy. The royal dynasties of course offer on a plate symbols and symmetries, allegories and easy metaphors where the intimate dross threatens nothing more serious than to break the lineage. But House of the Dragon in addition allows itself to add a layer, subversive, with the obsession with blood – the one that makes you blond (oops), the one that allows you to control dragons, the one that drives your ass crazy (fire) – the great question of the series being: who among those born rich and powerful will succumb to what curses, madness, ill-arranged marriage or the rise to power itself? “In the end, indecency will prevail,” a character whispers to us towards the middle of this first season. To see so much abjection in a blockbuster series, responsible for bringing in billions and not disappointing after the cosmic success of the one it follows in its footsteps, is as delicious as it is unexpected.