Here’s my review of House of the Dragon S3E01 and despite my criticisms of how Season 2 ended, I have to say this is brilliant start to Season 3. As with all my HOTD reviews I will be keeping Spoiler Free in this review, not ruining any surprises for those who have not managed to watch it yet.
Let’s start with what works really well in this episode. There’s a true ensemble feel to events this week as the show quickly takes us across the Realm. Yet at the same time I felt we had enough room at each location to get a feel for how the story is progressing across multiple ‘fronts’. We also get some time for a bit of character development here and there, but this episode relies a bit more on it’s epic scale this week and it works.
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We see troops in battle, dragons at battle and perhaps the best naval battle I’ve seen in a fantasy series ever and that includes film. It really is a spectacle and superbly put together by the director and the team.
What I really like is there is no desire to make everything revolve around Allicent and Rhaenyra in this episode, for once. They remain the matriarchs, but both have smaller, lesser roles to allow more screen time to those who serve them. This is welcome because there are some great characters that we really were not spending enough time with. or, shall we say, were not as Season 2 came to its close. Sadly as fans will expect in this series, many characters don’t hang round too long, or won’t as the series ends it’s fourth and final season. So it’s a shame to have some great characters not get more screen time thus far. Highlights for me this week… Actually, in terms of staying spoiler free I’ll keep that to myself as frankly everyone was good.
This episode looks expensive which means it probably was. However, at least it does look like it was, which is refreshing. Recently this has not always been the case on TV in general. I’m often of late wondering where the money went on other tentpole budget TV shows. Not here! It’s beautifully shot, again, best represented in the naval scenes and the lighting used. The action is well thought out and does a great job of teasing your emotions this way and that, with a fair few surprises thrown in.
Is HOTD Back?
Listen just because this episode was brilliant, I would not go as far as to say HOTD is back like it was in Season 1. There still remain several challenges to overcome for the writing team given the ill advised changes they made in Season 2. Changes that annoyed not jus the fan base of the books, but also the story’s creator George R. R. Martin. I think some of those are going to come home to roost before the Season has ended. I’ve also seen a few full Season reviews which were less than positive. So, perhaps it’s in the post, but it is not present in Episode 1.
When you review a show episodically like I have always done with this show, you have to call it as you see it on the day. Therefore,
GRADE: A+
I have to, this episode looks fabulous, better than some movies and your emotions will be twisted up and back down several times in this near feature length (120 Mins roughly). This episode is everything this Thrones universe can be. Yet I do wonder if the problems from Season 2 will eventually prove a hindrance as this Season progresses. I can already see some walls coming up down the line and I have no idea how the show gets round them well, at least currently.
Brilliant episode though and ultimately as a standalone, worthy of an A+ rating. The acting was top notch as well from all involved.
As always, leave us your own thoughts on House of the Dragon S3E01, or your thoughts on my review, below.
