Word: This story accommodates spoilers for Home of the Dragon season two finale.
HBO chopping to black hasn’t aggravated this many TV followers since The Sopranos ended.
Season two of Home of the Dragon led as much as an ideal battle for management of Westeros — a battle probably fought on a number of fronts, with huge armies, impossibly excessive stakes, and fire-breathing dragons galore! And to see it, you’ll simply have to attend a pair years for season three, since Sunday’s finale concluded moments earlier than the motion was seemingly about to get underway (“When the most action in the season finale is mud wresting,” groused one viewer).
For followers (some the heated and assorted reactions beneath), the finale felt a bit like deja vu. The primary season finale ended with a way of “okay, now it’s war!” The second season finale has now additionally ended with “okay, now it’s war!” HBO’s pre-season advertising issued dueling Inexperienced vs. Black trailers and a viral advertising stunt hanging the rival Targaryen banners at historic places, teasing an epic civil battle conflict between a home divided befitting of a franchise recognized for its epic clashes.
However whereas the season’s fourth episode delivered a well-received motion dragon-fighting motion sequence, and there have been different gripping moments of motion right here and there, this season Rhayerya (Emma D’Arcy) and Alicent Hightower (Olivia Cooke) largely hung round their respective castles enduring small council conferences, whereas fan-favorite Daemon (Matt Smith) was shuttled off to Harrenhal to additionally hang around at a fort and have conferences — plus desires and premonitions.
The Daemon transfer, particularly, perplexed followers this season, because it appeared extra like one thing a present usually does with a well-worn character 5 seasons right into a sequence with 20 episodes to fill relatively than one thing a present does with an especially standard character throughout its eight-episode second season.
At the similar time, followers appeared to actually like what they did get in the finale — significantly, a splendidly tense face off between Rhayerya and Alicent (it’s very easy to sneak forwards and backwards between these castles!), Daemon’s prophetic imaginative and prescient that included a glimpse of Daenerys Targaryen from the first present, the introduction of Abigail Thorn as Sharako Lohar, and composer Ramin Djawadi’s rating. “Simply too much good shit in the #HOTD finale for me to be anything but impressed,” as one viewer wrote beneath.
But the indisputable fact that the season is simply eight episodes is being significantly bitterly felt. The primary season was 10 episodes. Deadline beforehand reported “a major battle” was moved from season two to season three. Showrunner Ryan Condal has beforehand mentioned the shorter season was to present the season “a good opening and a good ending.” However writer-producer Sara Hess was additionally quoted in EW as saying the shorter season “wasn’t really our choice.” The season was shot throughout the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strike, having earned an exemption as many of the actors fell below Fairness union and never SAG, however that was after the season’s scripts had been accomplished. HBO has beforehand claimed the episode change was “story driven” and never the consequence of the intensive price chopping that’s been seen below Warner Bros. Discovery management change. Honest or not, it nearly feels as if “shrinkflation” — which has impacted the whole lot from the packaging of Oreos to Huggies — has come to streaming.
Under are some of the assorted reactions to the finale:
