14 details you might have missed in the ‘House of the Dragon’ series premiere

A scene from “House of the Dragon. “HBO HBO’s “House of the Dragon” premiered Sunday night with a jam-packed pilot episode.   Since it’s the first “Game of Thrones” prequel, the episode had references to the original series.

See all the best book-references, visual parallels, and other Easter eggs here.   After the prologue, the first thing we see is Rhaenyra flying her dragon Syrax over King’s Landing in a direct parallel to “The Bells” battle episode that showed Dany sacking the city. HBOThe re-introduction to Westeros (in a time period that starts 172 years before Daenerys Targaryen was born) helps the audience understand the totally different relationship that people in King’s Landing had to the dragon-riders of their day.

 In Rhaenyra’s childhood, dragons were a normal part of every day life for the people living in Westeros’ capital city. When she flies overhead, no one flinches or looks up in dread. The dragons are simply a powerful and magical piece of the Targaryen’s rule.

At this point in the story, there had no been war in Westeros for over 60 years. The contrasting scenes were both directed by Miguel Sapochnik, who is a coshowrunner on “House of the Dragon. “HBO”The Bells” (season eight, episode five) was the last episode in “Game of Thrones” that Sapochnik directed.

He first entered the series’ directing rotation in the fifth season, where he masterfully set the stage for White Walkers vs. humans in the “Hardhome” episode.  He followed up that epic battle scene with “The Battle of the Bastards” and “The Winds of Winter” in season six, and then for season eight he also directed the “Battle of Winterfell” episode.

 Now, he’s overseeing “House of the Dragon” alongside writer and cocreator Ryan Condal. He directed the pilot episode, plus others later in the season. It was a fitting choice to pair the Rhaenyra dragon-riding scene visually with the battle at King’s Landing where Dany and Drogon wiped out a swath of the city and its inhabitants.

Rhaenyra flies her she-dragon to the Dragonpit, a location you’ll recognize from the later seasons of “Game of Thrones. ” But in the time of Daenerys Targaryen, the Dragonpit was in disrepair. HBOA good analogy for the story of “House of the Dragon” is the Roman Empire.

Just as the Colosseum once stood as a notable landmark of power and luxury, the Dragonpit was once the grand home for all of the Targaryen dragons (and their eggs).  In this new show, we’ll get to see that structure as a fully functioning dragon stable. In “Game of Thrones,” the entire ceiling of the dragonpit was gone and its walls were left crumbling.

Rhaenyra and Alicent walk through the Red Keep in a familiar room. HBOAfter her dragon ride, Princess Rhaenyra and her best friend Alicent Hightower stroll through the castle. They pass through a courtyard that “Game of Thrones” fans will recognize as the place where Cersei Lannister had a giant map of Westeros painted onto the floor.

There are a ton more swords around this version of the Iron Throne to create a visual that was closer to George R. R. Martin’s written description.

A scene from “House of the Dragon. “HBO”The HBO throne has become iconic,” Martin wrote in a lengthy 2013 blog post about the difference between his Iron Throne and the show’s version. “And well it might.

It’s a terrific design, and it has served the show very well [. . .

] And yet. . .

it’s still not right. “He continued: “It’s not the Iron Throne I want my readers to see. “In a seemingly meta-moment from “Game of Thrones” showrunners David Benioff and D.

B. Weiss, Daenerys observed that the throne didn’t live up to her imagination in the series finale episode.  “When I was a girl, my brother told me it was made with a thousand swords from Aegon’s fallen enemies,” she told Jon Snow.

“What do a thousand swords look like in the mind of a little girl who can’t count to 20? I imagined a mountain of swords too high to climb. So many fallen enemies you could only see the soles of Aegon’s feet. ” While the new design of the Iron Throne in “House of the Dragon” still doesn’t make up a chair “too high to climb,” there are certainly closer to 1,000 swords in its back and the surrounding base.

There’s more height to the seat, and it appears to be more asymmetrical than the version we know from “Game of Thrones. ” The ground around the throne, as well as the steps leading up to it, are also covered in melted blades that stick up like a protective thorny bramble. Rhaenyra also mentions “Dark Sister,” which is the name of Prince Daemon’s Valyrian steel sword.

HBOJust like in “Game of Thrones,” there are a number of important swords that you might want to keep a close eye on. Valyrian steel is a rare metal (though it was more common during this era of Targaryen history) with exceptional sharpness and a lighter weight to it than regular old steel. Jon Snow famously killed a White Walker for the first time with his Valyrian steel sword, Longclaw, and Arya Stark dealt the death blow to the Night King with a Valyrian steel dagger.

Prince Daemon is the wielder of Dark Sister, a famous blade owned by House Targaryen since even before the family first conquered Westeros. Queen Visenya (Aegon the Conqueror’s sister-wife) used Dark Sister in her day. Immediately prior to Daemon’s possession of it, the sword belonged to his father, Baelon the Brave.

The more eye-catching piece of Valyrian steel hardware is the dagger King Viserys wears on his hip at all times: The same blade that later killed the Night King. Viserys and the Valyrian steel dagger. HBOThis Valyrian steel dagger was first shown to fans in “Game of Thrones” season one, when an assassin (AKA “catspaw) was sent to kill Bran Stark with the blade.

It became known as the “Catspaw Dagger,” and eventually made its way to Arya Stark.  She used the dagger, which has a dragonglass hilt along with the special Valyrian steel, to kill the Night King. Seeing the dagger in “House of the Dragon” isn’t too much of a surprise, since we know from one scene in “Game of Thrones” that the blade was documented as part of the Targaryen history and metalwork entwined with dragons and magic.

 “House of the Dragon” gave a nod to another prequel series in development at HBO about Princess Nymeria and her 10,000 ships. Rhaenyra and Alicent in “House of the Dragon. “HBOWhen Rhaenyra and Alicent are memorizing their history, they discuss Princess Nymeria.

 “Princess Nymeria led her Rhoynar across the Narrow Sea on 10,000 ships to flee their Valyrian pursuers,” Rhaenyra recites to Alicent. “She took Lord Mors Martell of Dorne to husband and burned her own fleet off Sunspear to show her people they were finished running. “This story has two pieces of relevance to fans of “Game of Thrones.

” First, Princess Nymeria is the famous historical figure who Arya Stark named her direwolf after.  But Nymeria is also important because HBO is currently considering making another prequel series that would be all about the princess and her conquest. When Queen Aemma jokes about birthing an “actual dragon,” it’s reminiscent of the disastrous birth of Daenerys’ first child in “Game of Thrones.

“Aemma Targaryen in the “House of the Dragon” pilot. HBO”Wouldn’t be surprised if I hatched an actual dragon,” Aemma tells Viserys in this episode. There’s something ironic in that, given that Daenerys Targaryen’s first pregnancy ended with a cursed birth of a stillborn creature.

In the “A Song of Ice and Fire” books and in the HBO series, Dany had a “prophesied” child, Rhaego, with Khal Drogo. Everything went sideways when she enlisted the help of Mirri Maz Durr to save Drogo from dying, resulting in the death of Dany’s unborn child. When Dany wakes up after Mirri Maz Durr’s ceremony, she’s told that the child had dragon-like scales and small wings.

Targaryen prophecies come up twice in this episode, and the reason why those “dragon dreams” are so meaningful harkens back to the Doom of Valyria. Viserys and Aemma. Ollie Upton / HBOOne of the more mysterious events written into George R.

R. Martin’s fictional history is the Doom of Valyria: a cataclysmic event that destroyed the thriving city in Essos.  Valyria was home to the original Targaryen and Velaryon families (which is why people from both of these Houses frequently discuss the importance of their bloodline).

They are the only two families who survived the Doom of Valyria, and credit for that goes to a young girl named Daenys.  Twelve years before the catastrophe, Daenys had a prophetic dream about Valyria’s destruction. Her father, Aenar, agreed to move House Targaryen across the Narrow Sea to Dragonstone (in Westeros).

 Daenys was known as “Daenys the Dreamer,” and cemented a belief in Targaryens that their dreams could be real, prophesied events of the future. At the tournament, we see dozens of house sigils on flags and colorful garb worn by the audience. This was a detail George R.

R. Martin specifically requested. The crown at the King’s tournament in “House of the Dragon” episode one.

HBOIn an interview with Insider, showrunners Miguel Sapochnik and Ryan Condal said Martin had three specific things from his “Fire and Blood” book that he wanted included in the show.  “It’s such a time of high decadence and peace and wealth and prosperity for the realm,” Condal said. “Everybody would really festoon themselves in their house colors and be proud of them as they marched into the tournament.

“To learn more about the other two requests (colorful dragons and a correction to the line of succession), read our interview write-up here. King Viserys names his son Baelon, though he dies within hours. Baelon was also the name of Viserys’ father, who died of a “burst belly.

“A scene from “House of the Dragon. “HBOIf you haven’t noticed by now (unlikely), Targaryens really like naming their children after their ancestors. That’s why the King Viserys in “House of the Dragon” shares a name with Viserys in “Game of Thrones” (Dany’s older brother).

 In this first episode, Viserys names his son Baelon after Aemma dies during a medieval C-section operation. He believes Baelon will live to be his heir to the throne, and clearly wanted to have his father live on in memory.  Baelon (the original, Viserys’ father) was the son of King Jaehaerys I and would have been his successor if he had lived.

But Baelon died unexpectedly of something the maesters called a “burst belly. “Fans have long guessed that this is Martin’s way of maintaining some realism in the story, and that “burst belly” is meant to mean “burst appendix” — but of course the lackluster medical advances in Westeros haven’t quite caught up with modern times. Viserys holds his hands over the flames of the candles for an unnaturally long time, which may be an allusion to the debate over if Targaryens are fireproof.

A scene from “House of the Dragon. “HBOAs far back as 1998, author George R. R.

Martin has made a point to emphasize that Targaryens, including Daenerys, are not immune to fire. Yes — she survived walking into a gigantic pyre and emerged unscathed. This was a one-time occurrence, according to Martin, and had less to do with her Targaryen surname than it did with the effect of blood magic she was invoking.

 Khal Drogo’s pyre was more than just a cremation — Daenerys was burning the witch Mirri Maz Duur. This blood sacrifice, along with the magic of her dragon’s eggs, created a perfect storm of sorcery that left her unburnt. But in season six of “Game of Thrones,” Dany appeared to use her special fireproof powers to kill a temple full of khals.

While all the men burned alive, Daenerys emerged from the hut unscathed (though naked, because fire burns clothes — just not Daenerys). This could very well be a show-only choice, though, since Martin did not write that scene.  Was Viserys holding his hands over the candles meant to stir the pot once again about “fireproof Targaryens”? So far it’s not clear, but this tiny detail is just the sort of thing that book readers might have picked up on.

Viserys’ reveal of Aegon’s “A Song of Ice and Fire” dream was a major moment for book readers. King Viserys and Princess Rhaenyra standing in front of an ancient dragon skull in HBO’s “House of the Dragon. “HBOThe motivation behind Aegon’s conquest of Westeros has never been laid out like this in the books.

But according to Condal, the idea came straight from Martin.  “That was the detail that George actually gave us early in the story break — the idea that Aegon the Conqueror was himself a dreamer and that’s what motivated the conquest, which he mentioned casually in conversation, as he often does with huge pieces of information like that,” Condal said during a roundtable interview attended by Insider prior to the show’s premiere.  “It really changed our thinking of the way we saw the Targaryen reign and what it was all about,” he said.

“The fact that Aegon had this knowledge or perceived that he had this knowledge — because I guess it is just a dream, you don’t know whether it’s going to come true — and he pursued the Conquest thinking that this was an imminent problem. The dramatic irony of this, is that we know with the remove of 300 years, that it takes quite some time for this prophecy to come true. “For more on what this prophecy means for the larger story of “House of the Dragon” and “Game of Thrones,” read our full interview and analysis here.

Read the original article on Insider.