Is House of the Dragon Poised to Pull a Trick Outta Buffy‘s Bag? Read Episode 5 Recap

By the end of this week’s House of the Dragon , Rhaenyra’s #TeamBlack has taken a huge hit. The Battle of Rook’s Rest robbed the Dragonstone Targaryens not only of a dragon, Meleys, but also of a seasoned fighter, Rhaenys. And with more of the scaly beasts on hand than riders to mount them, what is the Black Queen to do?

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I have a feeling that Jace, who comes up with a possible solution, might be streaming Hulu in his down time. Because the idea he brings his mom toward the end of the hour has a decidedly Sunnydale feel to it.

We’ll get into it in detail later — and if you never watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer , no worries; I’ll catch you up — but first, grab a scythe as we recap the major events in Episode 5. (And then make sure to join in the post-episode discussion over here .)

THE KING IS… NOT DEAD YET | As Dawn breaks at Driftmark and Dragonstone, Corlys and Rhaenyra have heard the news of Rhaenys’ death. Their somber mood is in stark contrast to Ser Criston’s, who leads a procession of soldiers as they drag the head of “the traitor dragon, Meleys” through the streets. Poor Meleys’ noggin is still smoking and covered in flies, and none of the small folk are cheering; they’re freaked out and/or disgusted, especially because — as one kid says — “I thought the dragons was gods?” A cart carried behind the wagon is draped with rags so no one can get a glimpse of what’s inside. Cole sneers at the crowds. “Don’t they realize we won the battle?” he grouses. “Strange victory, if it was one,” Ser Gwayne replies.

Alicent and Aemond watch from the castle as the rag-covered cart is loaded into the king’s bedroom. She looks worried; he looks stonefaced, as usual. The kingsguard carries in the box that was covered in rags and removes the lid, then carefully deposits its contents on the bed: a badly burned and unconscious Aegon.

“Is he alive?” Alicent demands. “His Grace remains with us, for the moment,” Grand Maester Orwyle tells her as other maesters work at peeling away the king’s half-melted armor from his oozing, bleeding body. Aemond slinks in at one point and — in a totally uninvolved, third-party way, I’m sure — points out that someone will have to rule in Aegon’s stead.

“What happened?” Alicent asks when she beelines it to Cole’s quarters. He reports that Sunfyre is dead and “His Grace fought valiantly.” But he won’t — er, sorry, “can’t”— say what part Aemond plays in how everything shook out.

‘WHAT WOULD YOU HAVE ME DO?’ | At Dragonstone, Ser Alfred is being his usual, bordering-on-treasonous self, bemoaning the fact that they’ve lost their biggest dragon and the only army they have is one Daemon is allegedly raising, though the prince is nowhere to be seen “after some marital spat.” Rhaenyra calls him out on his lack of deference, and when his defense is that she’s a woman and doesn’t know about war, she points out that there’s been peace throughout their lifetimes: “You’ve seen no more battles than I have.”

They all argue about the best next step: With Vhagar depleted, it seems like maybe attacking King’s Landing is the key. But if so, Rhaenyra says, she will lead the charge — an idea that the others nix because she’s the whole reason for their fight. “What would you have me do?” she wonders, exasperated.

Meanwhile, Rhaenyra post-games her less-than-stellar small council meeting with Mysaria. “They speak around me, not to me,” she grouses. And she’s not interested in reaching out to Daemon for help, musing, “If I must be supplicant to my own husband, what does that make me?” Mysaria advises the queen play into the discontent of the smallfolk of King’s Landing to achieve her ends. “There is more than one way to fight a war.”

Elsewhere in the castle, a frustrated and bored Jace hatches a plan to treat with the Freys to allow Cregan Stark’s greybeards a direct route to the Riverlands (via the Twins). If he achieves his goal, they won’t have to wait for Daemon to act. Rhaeynra will be mad, Baela says. “So don’t tell her. Not until I’m away,” he replies.

MOMMY ISSUES | Let’s see what weirdness is up at Harrenhal! Daemon — who is sure taking his sweet time sending that raven to Rhaenyra, isn’t he? — threatens to kill the Brackens with fire, but they’re not interested in bending the knee to the same leader that their Blackwood enemies do. Daemon secretly is impressed with their unwillingness to succumb (after all, he is trying to raise an army, for which you need live, un-flambéed men), but he and Lord Willem Blackwood draw up a plan of “persuading” House Bracken to see things their way. “There are things the Crown itself must not be seen to do,” he whispers. “Show them your worst.”

One night, in a dream or vision or some messed-up headspace, Daemon has sex with a silvery-blonde woman who tells him all the things he wants to hear. But as he kisses her neck, he leaves behind a bloody trail. And when she says “If only you’d been born first, my favorite son,” revealing that she’s his mother, we’re squarely in ick territory — even for this incest-loving universe. Then Ser Simon Strong interrupts, asking him about the duck, and Daemon comes back to reality at the dinner table, where Alys Rivers is watching him with a gimlet eye.

Later, Harrenhal’s resident witchy woman tells Daemon that she’s heard about wives and children being kidnapped nearby — turns out, that’s what he and Blackwood were plotting about, to put pressure on the Blackwoods. She taunts him that the queen surely does not approve of his tactics. “She cannot succeed, Alys,” he says, flat-out, all pretense dropped. “When I take King’s Landing, Rhaenyra is welcome to join me there and take her place by my side.” He starts to walk away but is brought up short when she suddenly mentions what a pity it is that he never knew his mother. But soon Strong rushes in with news that the Brackens have bent the knee. So, dastardly mission accomplished?

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ALICENT, OVERRULED | At the Red Keep, when the grand maester reports that Aegon may never wake, the small council has to pick a regent to serve in his place. Alicent assumes she’ll be chosen, given that she did the job for years while Viserys was ailing. But almost everyone else — including Larys and Cole, those rat finks — backs Aemond. The eyepatched tyrant wastes no time; as Alicent starts to have the most elegant of panic attacks right there at the table, he rules that the gates to King’s Landing will be locked in order to stop the flow of panicked smallfolk and the rumors they spread.

Aemond orders the ratcatchers cut down; my favorite character of the season so far is still keeping vigil by his master when the murderer’s body is loaded onto a cart. Alicent passes the heap of corpses on her way to rip Ser Criston Cole a new moon door.  “Has your loyalty faded, or does it flourish only at night and flee at sunrise like a moth?” she wonders. “We have ignored the dragons,” he says. “The dragonriders should lead us.” He’s sparing her from responsibility for what’s to come, but “I did not ask to be spared,” she says sharply.

IN WHICH BAELA TELLS HER GRANDFATHER TO GET OVER HIMSELF | At Rhaenyra’s request, Balea visits a grieving Corlys to give him the Hand of the Queen pin. But he scoffs at the honor:  “Even the death of my wife does not content her.” He’s sullen, expressing a desire to sail into the West and get lost, but his granddaughter isn’t having it. “Rhaenys was not only your wife, not a thing to be taken from you,” she says. “She was a Targaryen princess… and she flew to Rook’s Rest of her own will, in defense of her kin.” She’s a little disgusted as she vows to help Rhaenyra ascend the Iron Thrones, like Rhaenys was trying to do, and leaves Corlys to do “as you see fit.”

Meanwhile, Rhaenyra meets with Ser Alfred and admits that he has made some good points, that they can’t wait for Daemon to act. She sends him to Harrenhal to make sure that Daemon isn’t trying to raise an army for himself . “Tell him I would much like to finish our last conversation,” she sends by way of message.

BACKFIRE! | Don’t worry: Daemon hasn’t finished mucking things up this episode yet. The Riverlords arrive at Harrenhal in the middle of the night, demanding an audience with Daemon. They’re irate about the war crimes the Blackwoods visited upon the Brackens, all done while carrying the Targaryen banner. Daemon’s dead wife, Laena, appears to whisper about how he hasn’t checked in on their daughters in a while. So you’ll have to excuse him if he’s distracted while the Riverlords vow never to support “a tyrant” like him.

LOCK IT DOWN | Remember how we were talking about panicked small folk in King’s Landing? Hugh’s daughter grows sicker by the day, and the situation in their corner of the city has devolved so badly that his wife wants them to leave. But when they try, they’re stopped by the chaos caused when Aemond’s lock-in is carried out.

It’s not a problem for Rhaenyra’s handmaid, Elinda, though. She travels to King’s Landing, telling a guard at the gate that she’s on an errand for Mysaria, and promptly is let into the city.

A WHOLE NEW CROP? | Jace returns home with news that the Freys would like Harrenhal in exchange for their cooperation and fealty, and Rhaenyra says she’s proud of what he’s achieved. Still, she’s super frustrated that he got to take action when she can’t.

Their conversation then turns to their biggest problem: They have two dragons without riders. Jace suggests finding Targaryens who’ve married into other families — maybe there’s dragonrider blood flowing through a random person or two out there? “It’s a mad thought,” she says, but her face betrays the hope the idea holds.

The same kind of hope, might I point out, that saved Buffy the Vampire Slayer and her pals in that show’s final season. The Big Bad they were up against was just too powerful to be taken down by one slayer, as had happened in the past. All looked lost, until Buffy and the Scoobies figured out that they could activate Slayer powers in all of the potential slayers out there and that, essentially, led to their victory over evil.

So I look forward to how this could play out in Westeros. But a note of caution, Rhaenyra? If any of those possible dragon-wranglers is named Lady Kennedy , run .

Now it’s your turn. What did you think of the episode? Sound off in the comments!

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