House of the Dragon Does a Great Disservice to Its Main Character by Making This Mistake
She is supposed to be more complicated than she is portrayed.
Summary
- HotD tips the balance in favor of one of the warring teams.
- The leader of one side of the conflict is portrayed as a benevolent saint.
- In Fire & Blood, she is much more complicated and ambiguous.
One of the best things about Game of Thrones was that it had no real 'good' characters, showing the ambiguity and complexity of human nature. Even fan-favorite Jon Snow proved to be flawed at the end of the series when he killed his lover/aunt Daenerys Targaryen, who trusted him the most. So it would seem that GoT's prequel, House of the Dragon, should adhere to this principle, but it doesn't.
While there are no clear protagonists on the show, which depicts the conflict between two factions of the Targaryen family, Teams Black and Green, it's pretty obvious who the show wants you to root for. The Greens are portrayed as ruthless usurpers who will do anything to secure their rule, and the Blacks are given the moral high ground as the true heirs to the Iron Throne who are not so willing to wage war at the cost of thousands of lives.
Queen Rhaenyra Targaryen is a shining example of this moral distortion. And it really hurts her character in the spin-off.
Rhaenyra the Good
On House of the Dragon, Rhaenyra is portrayed as a benevolent messiah vying for the Iron Throne to fulfill the prophecy passed down to her by her father, Viserys I. The show's Rhaenyra doesn't want power; she was forced into it as a child when she was made Viserys' heir and entrusted with the task of keeping the realm united in the face of a coming apocalypse.
When the Greens usurp the throne, Rhaenyra opposes her small council's plan to start a lightning war, not wanting unnecessary bloodshed. She would rather go to King's Landing disguised as a septa and risk her own life to reason with Alicent Hightower than put the innocent in harm's way. Meanwhile, in G.R.R. Martin's Fire & Blood, Rhaenyra is anything but so saintly.
A Dragon Among Men
In the novel, Rhaenyra is portrayed as a complicated character, as greedy for power as any man in the realm. She doesn't care about peace or keeping her vassals together. She doesn't care about thousands of lives. She doesn't care about her siblings, and she won't even consider giving up her right to the throne to keep the peace. All Rhaenyra wants is the Iron Throne, and she will do anything, however ruthless and cruel, to get it.
Sure, that doesn't make her a nice character or someone the audience will love. But it makes her a complicated and interesting one, and, more importantly, shows that as a woman she can be just as violent and vicious as any man in this fictional world.
Unfortunately, HotD's Rhaenyra is stripped of these layers of nuance. But maybe we'll see more sides of Rhaenyra in future episodes. Episode 4 will premiere on July 7.