‘House of the Dragon’ Hits Its Stride in a Bigger, Bleaker Season 2: TV Review
variety.comAlison Herman TV Critic The first season of “House of the Dragon,” HBO’s prequel to “Game of Thrones” and the first spinoff in network history, was widely considered a success.
But it was also, in essence, 10 hours of set-up, speeding through decades of context to take audiences to the brink of the Westerosi civil war known as the Dance of the Dragons.
Despite its many strengths, the show began as a structural oxymoron: too rushed to do the patient plotting and character-building that gave its parent show such a strong foundation; too slow to sink its teeth into the real meat of its story until the final stretch of episodes, which saw the death of King Viserys (Paddy Considine) and the formation of factions around his two potential heirs.
In Season 2, “House of the Dragon” feels like it’s finally the show it was always meant to be. What all that runway was leading up to, it turns out, is a tragedy of epic proportions, bleaker than even the famously violent and cynical “Game of Thrones” could ever dream.
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