#why have we never had a scene with older rhaenyra and criston?

[ghosts-of-jenny]

Was I out of line?

Did I say something way too honest, made you run and hide

Like a scared little boy

I looked into your eyes

Thought I knew you for a minute, now I'm not so sure…

[nrilliree]

Sanctimonius sermons about how Daemon and Rhaenyra are 'inherently abusive' because he is older and it's an incestuous relationship which is why the writers have to show it fall flat on their faces when you notice how the show has chosen to depict Corlys and his relationship with Rhaenys.

Certain facts about Corlys in canon:

Older than Rhaenys' father Aemon

Is related to Rhaenys because of the Velaryons and the Targaryens' generational intermarriages so yayyy more incest

Made no secret about his designs on the throne

Would rather have his bastards inherit Driftmark before his granddaughters

Sired the said bastards on a girl younger than his children

We are given no details about the nature of his relationship with Marilda so speculation is all that can be done. For her sake, I hope it was based in mutual attraction because he clearly had the power to coerce her.

It is both hilarious and insanely hypocritical when the writers and fans alike try to preach and defend their abysmal choices about Daemon to the point of including events that were never present in the books when most of Corlys' scenes on the show have been framed in positive light and have humanized him. Even his action of trying to marry his 12 year old daughter to Viserys got swept under the rug because they can't emphasize enough on how much he loves his wife. It has to be noted that the canonical age difference between him and Rhaenys was erased on the show because they, for whatever reason, aged her up.

Now, this is not me hating on Corlys. He is a flawed but interesting character. But the double standards in the show's writing makes me wonder whether our most esteemed writers ever read the books or did they obtain most their information from Green infested fandom spaces on Reddit. The less said about their apologists, the better.

"Yeah, we are making stuff about Daemon that wasn't in the books because y'all need to see for yourselves how abusive he is and not romanticize him like that stupid girl Rhaenyra who, we made sure, learned her lesson on the show. What do y'all even see in him? He isn't Han Solo or Paul Rudd.

But, hey look at how much Corlys loves his wife? Isn't he a great husband? So what if he is a much older relative and cheated? Look at our uwu Aegon who was never taught the meaning of consent. Look at our precious Alicent who groomed her daughter from a young age to be a broodmare for her rapist son has toiled in the service of men her entire life."

Eve and Steve have a seven-year age difference between them, so undeniably the age difference between them in the series is much, much smaller than in the book, where it was probably over twenty years. I don't know, the creators wanted to not only lower Alicent's age and raise Viserys' age, but also reduce the age difference between Rhaenys and Corlys to make Alicent look like an even bigger THE victim of marriage?

In the book, Rhaenys married Corlys when she was sixteen, and Marilda was also sixteen when Corlys got her pregnant, so he undeniably has a thing for girls who are much younger than him. Which Daemon is accused of, even though Laena in the book was 23 on the day she married him, and Rhaenyra was even older.

This is very strange to me and I only explain it by the fact that Corlys has a reduced tariff with TG stans and they don't accuse him of his sins (just like they don't do it when it comes to Aegon, Aemond, Criston or anyone wearing the "right" color). , because according to them, Corlys betrayed Rhaenyra and joined the TG. We know it's not true because he only protected his sons' lives and then acted against Aegon II and crowned Aegon III, but for TG stans the only thing that matters is that they can point the finger and shout "ha, he betrayed Rhaenyra".

[lemonhemlock]

Not to be sad in Miss Lemon’s asks, but it is a downer this fandom has become so ship war pilled that me, a little old Helaemond who expected nothing ao3 couldn’t give me, can’t even take the win of these actors acknowledging the ship. It’s now about how they were lying to cover up how he really is or they were doing fan service for promo. Who cares! Either way, who cares. How is that different from any other promo actors do? I can’t get excited for this entirely non canon ship to get brought up in a positive way? Nobody’s fun anymore!

hello there 🍋

unfortunately, anon, i don't think ship wars are going to get any better. i understand the scene between aemond and helaena hasn't leaked in its entirety though? so, if some helaemond vibes do manage to come across, i expect some segments of this fandom will have a full meltdown and take out their ire on helaemonds

and this is an older ask from a couple of weeks ago on the same topic:

Anonymous asked: feel free to ignore more ship discourse, but what ruffles my feathers is ewan and phia confirmed everything people saw for helaemond; they said there was nothing explicit in the script, but the two of them felt these characters were at least comfortable with each other, and they played it that way. and it comes through on screen! that’s why people picked up on helaemond as a ship! but because this fandom is so obsessed with being “right” and what’s canon, they call it fan service that they joked around about the ship and explained their own headcanons. nevermind the same thing is being done right now with criston/gwayne, and people are eating that up 😭 it’s fun for the actors and fun for the shippers. What’s the harm? why is everyone obsessed with something needing to be 100% canon? it’s never going to stop the shippers

during the hiatus, the biggest "concern" antis had was that helaemond made the greens "hypocrites". well, what do they have to say now after the repeated character assassinations of season 2? 😂 it's very ironic because, had the greens remained mostly their book!selves with the sole changes of rhaenicent* and helaemond becoming canon, they would be in a better position character-wise than the constant flip-floping flimsiness we got. ☠ so, to STILL be pressed about this............. honey, you've got bigger fish to fry now. have some perspective

*which we can't get rid of, since they made alicent and rhaenyra childhood besties

[nonbinarylesbianherb]

Here’s the thing Alicent Hightower wasn’t a victim, the HotD writers chose to make her one.

She got married at 18 to a 29 year old, she had her first kid when she was around 20. She had so much political influence at court she was able to create her own faction, run her stepdaughter out of Kingslanding and stop her husband from making his daughter Hand. Want to know what she did when her husband died? She left his corpse to rot whilst she and Criston took control of the Green Council to crown Aegon.

So why did the writers turn around and make her a child bride who is reduced to nothing more than a 24/7 victim?

She is disrespected and humiliated at every turn, we are told constantly Alicent Hightower is a coward who isn’t deserving of respect. The writers have a very clear vendetta against her, punishing her for having the audacity of being against Rhaenyra and I feel her nonstop victimisation is part of it.

It’s because her victimisation was done solely to punish her that Viserys’ actions are so whitewashed in the show. It’s why Hess claims Dyana is the only rape victim. It’s why the writers’ only intention with 2x08 was to remind the audience that Rhaenyra is 100x better than Alicent in every way possible whether it be as a Queen/politician/mother/ruler/leader etc.

I’m gonna be really honest i don’t really feel strongly about book alicent in the way i do show (will come back to this), i know young alicent doesn’t exist in the book, but she was the first alicent i was introduced to and ive attached to her specifically. I know there’s a significant difference between book/show alicent adult version, let alone young alicent who we don’t even see in the books.

I think definitely though the show writers could’ve done a better job for older alicent. young alicent being an addition of the show was interesting and they could’ve built off that for an addition to older alicent’s character (without erasing the core of what her character is from the books) for more potential plots/ characterisation- (similar to how rhaenyra and alicent’s ex friendship is a main key of the show) because these added plots were expected, as with most book to show adaptations - but I’d even say necessary since the book is written specifically to be a historic novel more than the storytelling we’d usually see with other asoiaf books. Obviously for the show we’re gonna need to know the ins and outs of characters and relationships, we’re going to want in-depth introductions and characterisation, so I understand why they’d need to create plots to build off of to add opportunities - but there are ways to do that without completely changing a character (or erasing them, cough maelor, cough)

They couldve still shown this powerful and cunning woman from the books whilst also having scenes portraying how her trauma has affected her, how her old friendship with rhaenyra weighs on her- etc. I think they were doing that well in s1, but s2 is kind of a downer for both the character of alicent (as we know there was a lot of upset/shock/confusion with the seeming 180 her character did in s2) and rhaenicent (not as a ship necessarily but as a main factor and concept of the show)

I think something as well is the show / writers have always angled for a more team black approach - and team black as the “good vs bad” , but no side is good or bad in this war, it’s main victims are the small folk, who suffer the cruelty of two opposing powers , the destruction and death this war will have will never have been worth it - it doesn’t matter what side is what. I highly doubt the books portrayed this retelling of this war with a preference that you tend to see in the show - which coming back to my thing about book alicent, I haven’t read fire and blood lol (so it’s easier for me to connect to the first alicent i was introduced to, especially one we see into her life/character rather than the historical way im assuming f&b retells her story- , also being mentally ill and connecting with the character of young alicent/show alicent in a mentally ill way LOL) but I know a lot of what happens/differences. I agree with what you said about them trying to make rhaenyra/team black seem better than alicent/team green and it ends up undercutting alicent as a character because the idea to paint her more as a villain - as well as hurting rhaenyra’s character too ykwim? Again haven’t read the books but i KNOW rhaenyra IS cruel, does do bad things, is selfish, etc, and that’s great! good for her, but she should be allowed to be terrible without it being because she was ‘pushed to the edge’ or ‘justified’ etc. we are starting to see more of her cruelty and hopefully it’ll start to show that both sides are bad, both sides can be cruel just for the sake of being cruel, there is no underlying reason or justification maybe they’re all just terrible

anyway i think im done yapping, not even sure what i was yapping tbh hopefully it makes a modicum of sense. sorry for not always replying to these anon things sometimes i’m simply too tired or i begin to yap, get busy/distracted/tired, so i draft it and then i forget to finish 😭 have a good day anonymous person on the internet i yapped to

[thefudge]

a few (okay, maybe quite a few) scattered HOTD thoughts now that i’ve finally caught up: 

yay for having a sick day in bed to catch up 

the good: 

1. definitely a better written show than GOT even in its heyday, and that’s because a lot of the character moments are about showing vulnerability and conflict, not about seeing who gets to say the cleverest line. hotd falls into that sometimes too, but it pays more attention to character

2. the battle/action sequences - i rarely ever enjoyed them on GOT but they’re sparse and well done here, at least for now. the dragon scenes have also been pretty good

3. love the fact that we have so many unsettling/creepy/indefinable dynamics and that hotd dwells on them and doesn’t let you forget lol. i also think this show is doing a better job at depicting the “shades of grey” for every character in terms of morality. 

4. the acting is pretty solid all around 

the bad (up to this point):

1. that whole wedding sequence in episode 5. started out promising. loved alicent’s bad bitch entrance. and then...??? ser criston cole just went nuts??? and it was so chaotic and confusing and unconvincing. i assume that we will return to that whole mess at some point? because it was not explained or fleshed out and it makes no sense why they just let criston get away with it. sure, we could argue that the two houses might’ve been relieved to see laenor’s paramour die....but they’d never do that to poor laenor and they wouldn’t have left the culprit go unpunished. was that whole sequence meant to be confusing and dissatisfying? maybe i’m just dumb and didn’t get it 

2. ser criston cole. is just. a cartoonish 2-dimensional villain now? i don’t get it. they’ve shown they can write characters with enough complexity and deftness that we both understand where they’re coming from and condemn some of their actions. but i guess they just gave up for ser criston? and decided to turn him into a weird incel. and how is he not dead or exiled after what he did??? what sorcery did alicent pull.

3. laena’s death. how did a pregnant woman manage to run past everyone, including daemon, and get down to the shore? why did no one stop her? what a waste of a character. i looked up her death in the book....and the changes they made are strange. i like the idea of her choosing to die like a dragon-rider, but everyone’s absolute negligence of her, and her sudden desire to die felt out of left field. laena struck me as someone who wanted to keep fighting, not give up.

ship stuff: 

- daemon/rhaenyra is solid and have plenty of chemistry, but maaaan, she should’ve been way more angry with him after episode 4. i feel like he got off far too easy (which i guess is a running theme with all his pretend exiles). he struck me as pretty callous and calculating, even if he was also conflicted and drawn to her. i’m srsly waiting for her to put him in his place when they’re married. i need that to be a “rhaenyra is boss” family. in general, daemon is fun but also...kind of obnoxious. i think we’re maybe making too much of him, but matt smith does play the asshole type well, what can i say. i guess what i am trying to say is that i see them less as romantic soulmates and more as "we love each other and use each other” kind of targaryen flavor. which frankly makes them more appealing to me

- harwin strong/rhaenyra - very sad and cute and wholesome. would definitely read smut 

- alicent/larys strong - deliciously creepy vibes, but more in the vein of cersei and qyburn. on board.

- alicent/otto - god, i love the fraught & repressed father/daughter relationship. we had too few scenes with them!! love the toxicity, love the devotion, love how otto pretends not to see alicent’s misery, love everything about them

- alicent/rhaenyra - liked them better as youngins, i feel like the tension between them as older women is somehow...less interesting? idk. i still hope they have more interactions in the future. (i loved that montage in ep 4 where rhaenyra was having a blast and alicent was staring at the ceiling in boredom and agony as viserys did his business. the queer longing alone!)

 - alicent/daemon - that one rarepair/crackship i’m probably going to obsess over. i already have an elaborate oneshot in mind. i love ppl who almost never interact but who would have such interesting one-on-one conversations. also the fraughtness of daemon/viserys, and how much daemon probably resents alicent for “taking” his brother. anyway! 

- alicent/criston - i could be down for this in the scenario where alicent just steps on him repeatedly and he thanks her for it. ugh. really bleh about ser criston. 

- alicent’s targ kids have interesting sibling dynamics.....i assume more incest is coming from that corner too lol 

(sorry yall, most of my ships are alicent ships because olivia cooke <3333)

- laena’s girls! baela and rhaena! i want them to have ridiculously complicated subplots & romances, i want them to take center-stage! least they can do after wasting laena/daemon 

i think that’s everything for now. i’m kind of wondering why we’re doing all these time jumps and why we’re not taking our time. have we not learned anything from GOT? anyway, i’ll probably share my final thoughts after all episodes air.

[dwellordream]

Initial Impressions of HotD Episode 3

be warned there are spoilers below.

i have read fire & blood, but i am not judging the show as to its accuracy towards the book, as i had major issues with fire & blood, particularly in regard to how grrm wrote the female characters and handled the Dance.

this is not an evaluation of it as an adaptation but on its own merits.

I’m a little shocked at how fast Season 1 is moving. We jumped six months between Episodes 1 & 2, and now three years between Episodes 2 & 3. I’m a bit disappointed we didn’t see the royal wedding or Alicent’s early marriage.

Alicent shifting to wearing warm, bolder colors now that she’s married Viserys and is more confident as queen is a nice design choice.

The episode does a good job of setting up how isolated and resentful Rhaenyra is, and how dismissive Viserys is of her- despite his professions otherwise- now that he has a son.

I’m surprised they made a Johanna Swann reference from Fire & Blood.

It’s nice to see noble ladies with pets for once, even if they’re pugs.

Viserys and Rhaenyra’s actors continue to have great chemistry and really sell their scenes as father and daughter.

I think they should have made Rhaenyra a bit more open to marriage, especially if she’s feeling insecure as heir. Her total opposition to marriage feels a bit random, though maybe the implication is supposed to be that she’s afraid of childbirth?

Viserys comes across as much more vehement about defending Rhaenyra as his heir here than he ever did in Fire & Blood, but it’s ultimately a lot of words and little action. She’s missing for hours and no one seems all that concerned.

Lyonel Strong gets a lot more character here than he ever did in the book, and he’s a pretty reasonable guy who balances a lot of the more over the top politicians out. 

Showing Rhaenyra and Criston having a friendly relationship is a lot more effective than endless hinting that she’s trying to seduce him at every turn.

The scene of Viserys and Alicent standing before the bonfire was beautifully shot. 

The contrast between Rhaenyra brutally killing the boar in a real matter of life and death, and Viserys essentially being handed a stag to kill for his own ego that his men need to coach him through, is pretty vivid and shows how differently they approach the ideas of what it means to be a ruler.

There’s many interpretations as to why Rhaenyra refuses to kill the actual white stag - I tend to go with that she feels there’s no need to flaunt her power the way Viserys does. Ultimately, while she has insecurities and moments of doubt, she’s much more self assured at her core than her father, and firmly believes she can lead, if given the chance.

I think the episode may have been more effective had we not skipped quite so far ahead, and if we’d seen Alicent at the very end of her first pregnancy, there could have been the possibility of Rhaenyra and Alicent reconciling over fear from the pregnancy, only for it to be ruined by the birth of a boy, driving another wedge between them.

I’m curious to see if they will change it to Rhaenyra actually being in favor of marriage to Laenor, because she feels only he is worthy of her, status wise (besides Daemon).

Laenor’s actor looks about 5 years older, not 3, and he’s pretty stiff, so I’m hopeful he improves as the season continues. 

Daemon’s wig looked way better in this episode than it did in the first two, so maybe warcrimes just suit him lol. 

The music in this show is great, so it aggravates me that they never updated the title theme.

I’m annoyed we see Laenor on Seasmoke before we ever see Laena on Vhagar, but at least the show isn’t introducing him via homophobic jokes.

I think this episode was a wasted chance to not show Rhaenyra starting to become friends with an older Laena, in the wake of her estrangement from her father and Alicent.

I did not enjoy this episode as much as 1 and 2. I think the pacing could have been better, timeline wise. I didn’t find the stag scenes all that gripping, though I enjoyed Viserys and Alicent’s conversations.

[dwellordream]

I'm loving all this great discussion you've got going on about Rhaenyra Targaryen. How would you have preferred GRRM to have written her? What could have given her greater nuance and made her less "total hot mess" and more "nuanced and possibly tragic antiheroine"? Thanks for your generosity in answering all of these questions!

Thank you so much! I hope I’m not annoying people with my constant complaints about Fire and Blood haha.  Just as a whole I think Fire & Blood would have benefitted as being a series of interwoven novellas, not a mock-medieval-history of the past 300 years of Westeros. GRRM’s greatest talent as a writer, imo, is in how he develops characters as nuanced and realistic people with understandable ambitions and fears through their own perspectives. That’s lost out on in F&B. Occasionally it breaks into more ‘novel-like’ scene descriptions, but overall it’s supposed to read as a dry historical text, only it’s an often contradictory, absurdly biased, all over the place, relying on shock value dry historical text. I get that part of the whole idea was to present various viewpoints of certain characters and events and ‘leave it up to the reader to decide’ who they were inclined to believe, but really it’s just more of a vehicle for misogyny than anything else, since we exclusively get the viewpoints of a couple of very sexist maesters and... Mushroom. Yay.  Okay for example if I was going to handle Rhaenyra’s character while still hitting the basic plot points of her story (and this is not me saying I think I’m a better writer than GRRM or that I ‘know his characters better’, it’s just my personal interpretation), I think my goal would be to humanize her to the audience of readers while not shying away from her darker moments. She’s supposed to be controversial and provocative. However that doesn’t mean she has to be totally 2-dimensional or such a hot mess. I think I would start by emphasizing Rhaenyra’s position for the first 10 years of her life. She is the coddled, cossetted, and beloved only child of Viserys and his adored wife Aemma. She has never had a sibling, she’s never had to share any attention, her parents dote on her, as does all the court. Of course she is going to be spoilt, high-maintenance, proud, and temperamental when she doesn’t get her way. However, Rhaenyra is not just a bratty princess stereotype (or, she doesn’t have to be). She is also an extremely brave and determined little girl. She is extroverted; she likes socializing and being around people, she’s confident and assertive and used to having her voice heard. At the age of seven, she single-handedly tames and bonds with a young dragon. That is an extremely impressive feat for a child. You can’t argue, bully, or demand your way into riding a dragon, a wild beast. Rhaenyra had to show some serious grit and tenacity to do that at such a young age, so she’s not just this puffed up little fragile flower who wails when she doesn’t get her way. Rhaenyra also has a great relationship with her father. He doesn’t seem to hold the fact that she is his only child and a daughter against her; he praises and shows her off in front of his court, he makes sure she is always by his side. Rhaenyra is used to being honored before everyone. She is her father’s cupbearer, she is present while he holds court, she is exposed to a high level of adult political interactions and basic courtesies. She’s probably pretty bright for her age, and has a keen understanding of who is who and what everyone at court’s relations to one another are. She’s not been kept locked up in a nursery playing with toys, she is seen as an active member of court and her father’s little shadow. She also likely has a very good relationship with her mother Aemma. Rhaenyra is Aemma’s pride and joy, her sole surviving child after the trauma of a very young marriage and multiple miscarriages and stillbirths. Aemma has no close siblings of her own, and never knew her own mother Daella; no doubt she prizes her relationship with Rhaenyra and hopes Rhaenyra does not experience what she did as a little girl, growing up without a mother and only much-older half siblings in the Vale.  Then there is her Uncle Daemon. Daemon is the ‘fun’ relative little kids adore. He doesn’t treat Rhaenyra like a child, he doesn’t condescend to her, he brings her back all sorts of exciting and interesting toys and gifts, he takes time out of his day to spend with her, he takes her on outings and makes her feel special and loved. He’s not always busy with the mundane aspects of ruling that her father likely is, he’s not caught up with his own wife and children, he has all sorts of wild tales of adventure and mystery. It’s easy to see why Rhaenyra loves him so.  Then Aemma dies. No doubt this is a horrible shock to Rhaenyra. She’s a little girl, just eight years old. She’s not necessarily that familiar with the harsh realities of pregnancy and childbirth, she just knew she was getting a little brother or sister, and now her mother is gone, just like that. Aemma died during the birth. Rhaenyra never got to say goodbye, and her little brother dies a day later, compounding the grief and horror. Her father is heartbroken and reeling, and her favorite uncle is out drinking and whoring.  But Rhaenyra is named her father’s heir. Her mom might be gone, but her dad still loves her, and he loves her so much, in her eyes, that he is willing to buck the precedent that set him on the throne (passing over Rhaenys) in order to name her his heir. She’s Princess of Dragonstone; a whole island! Despite her grief and rage over her mother being ripped away from her, this is probably thrilling for a little girl. She’s going to be queen one day. Everyone loves her and wants her to be happy. She’s going to be the first Targaryen queen in her own right. Doesn’t that make her special and chosen? Then a year later her father remarries. Rhaenyra likely isn’t happy about this; her mother has only been dead a year!- but she is willing to try to get along with her new stepmother, Alicent, who probably seems like less of a mother and more of an older sister figure, just a teenaged girl of 18. Alicent is smart and pretty and Rhaenyra remembers her from court as a very small girl. Her father is Rhaenyra’s father’s Hand, someone Rhaenyra probably knows well, maybe even considers almost family, having grown up seeing him all the time, exchanging gifts at holidays and birthdays, attending tourneys with his family, etc. Then Alicent gets pregnant, something 9 year old Rhaenyra probably wasn’t really thinking about. She has a son, and people are saying he will be king, that her claim doesn’t matter. Then Alicent has another son. She doesn’t have time for Rhaenyra anymore. She’s not Rhaenyra’s mother. She has her own sons, and Aegon will be king, even though it’s not fair, even though Father promised she would be queen, even though Mother is dead and never coming back.  These are three major events happening in short succession in the life of a precocious little girl.  Rhaenyra likely feels hurt and confused and angry. Sure, her father hasn’t officially declared Aegon as his heir, but Alicent and her father are pushing it, people Rhaenyra thought she could trust. Who is she supposed to rely on now? Well, there’s Uncle Daemon, who suddenly seems like less of the fun uncle, almost like a big brother, and more of.. something else. He doesn’t treat her like a little girl anymore, he calls her beautiful and encourages her to show off her good looks and charm, assures her that regardless of what her father says or does, he will always care for her. She can count on him! And Ser Criston Cole, her longtime crush- well, he just sees her as that spoilt little girl. She’s growing up! She’s not a child anymore but he just doesn’t get it. She’s certain he feels the same way about her, that he loves her back, but his vows and white cloak are in the way, and he won’t stop seeing her as the little princess, not a girl of sixteen, a woman grown! She doesn’t have a mom to talk to this stuff about, but there is Uncle Daemon, and he knows pretty much everything about love and seduction; that’s why there’s all those wild tales about him. If she asks him to help her show Criston that she’s a woman now and wants to be treated as such, he wouldn’t turn her down, would he? Besides, he treats her like a grownup. He thinks she’d be an amazing queen. Father and him fight all the time, but Father’s blinded by his love for Alicent- she’s manipulating him! Uncle Daemon gives her advice, and she tries to impress Criston, but it backfires. He leaves her feeling humiliated and rejected. It’s not fair, she’s the princess, she’s supposed to be good at everything, but he acted like she was wrong to try to show him how much she cares and wants to be with him! Now he won’t talk to her anymore, and Father is sending Uncle Daemon, who seems like her one true friend, away from court because of some stupid rumors that he ‘deflowered her’. Alicent is saying she should be married to Aegon, her half-brother who she can’t stand; he’s a spoilt little creep, always groping servant girls and kissing up to their father. Dragonstone seems like the escape she needs from all of this, but Father is threatening to strip it from her unless she marries Laenor- Laenor who she knows isn’t even into women! They’re not even close friends. He doesn’t want to marry her anymore than she wants to marry him, only their fathers are insisting on it. Daemon’s gone and she has no idea when he’s coming back, and Harwin is sweet and says he loves her, but he would have never been accepted as her husband. Still, at least he’ll never leave her or turn on her, the way everyone else has. And that is basically how I would cover Rhaenyra’s childhood and adolescence in a way that I think at least gives her some understandable motivations, some nuance, and some real emotion beyond ‘she threw a fit when she didn’t get her way’.