Here’s my hot of the press House of the Dragon S3E08, aka Season 3 finale review. Honestly, this was a decent if not great finale to a rather average season of ups and downs. Let’s get into it.

First off, this will be a spoiler free review, so I’ll not get into the nitty gritty about who does what. I will touch on the themes and overall narrative of the season here though.

The Ol’ Switcheroo

So far House of the Dragon has excelled in giving similarly pointless journeys to both sides of the conflict. Fans were unsure why the show made such a point of presenting the Black’s as the semi-good guys and the Green’s as the more overtly bad side. Well, now we know it was so they could pull the ol’ switcheroo, so both sides get to be more villainous, yay. Honestly, some of the character turns in this finale just do not work for me, without getting into specifics I’ll point to Rhaenyra and Aemond as character arcs not working for me. Or, perhaps I’ll say the show isn’t landing them for me.

There are some moments from the books fans have been wondering when the show will get to. One was the Winter Wolves suicide mission. It’s funny, because they keep winning and not getting the glorious death in battle they crave. This hasn’t be mentioned in the show until this finale. As such, it loses any kind of running humour it should have had.

I also remain extremely dissatisfied with how the show handles both Allicent, who thankfully isn’t in this one much and Healena her daughter, who we get a little more of in this finale. I find it hard to understand how either gets where they are in their character development, other than the script needed them to be doing something where the source material side stepped them.

Expectations

Fans of course have certain events they are expecting to see and one of them has been building to this finale. I won’t get into details other than it involves one of the dragon riders. Suffice to say, I was thoroughly whelmed. For me, the set up was not brilliant, but decent enough. However, the execution and how it was shot from other’s POV’s fell flat.

However, I will commend the battle scenes in this finale which were usually interesting and varied. As usual with this show, there’s a great episode always buried in there and it rarely gets allowed to come to the surface. This battle will also likely serve as the opening of Season 4 and I think they could have and should have had this battle end in Episode 9 and have 10 be the aftermath. The same issues Season 2 suffered from, thus giving Season 3 a better start. However, that better start then means that we are left with an average, but rushed finale.

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My main gripe always with House of the Dragon is the wasted minutes on storylines that are not working. Meaning we can’t get to the really important pieces quickly enough in an 8 episode Season. I do however think that the casual fans, who watch this Universe for the shock moments and violence and don’t get too picky on the actual story will love it. For the more discerning it has become obvious that House of the Dragon is but a pale imitation of the original. The arcs aren’t quite as perfectly developed, the shocks feel less earned and more common and it somehow feels smaller in scope despite all the dragon action.

House of the Dragon seems like executives saying, ‘let’s do this again, but more shocks, more sex, more violence, more taboo, and a damn sight more dragons.’ Sadly, the narrative just doesn’t match those heights. Well, not since Season 1, which was genuinely stellar.

Season Finale GRADE: B-

Graded up for some great action and quality fights, but one could argue me down to a C+ and I wouldn’t feel too pushed. I said the rest above.

As for the whole Season?

Season 3 GRADE B-

Season 3 started really well, with two very string episodes, but the quality began to fall as did Season 2 until a real low point just begore the climax. As climaxes go, it was decent enough and entertaining to watch, but also feels forced and predictable with characters switching their world view on whims.

Lots of cool dragon action, lots of sex and violence and moments designed to leave you in a cliff-hanger till next week. The but the magic just isn’t there and a great cast are being let down by the rather average writing.

As usual, leave your thoughts on House of the Dragon S3E08, or the full of Season 3. Do you agree with my ratings and reasons or do you have a better take?

 

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