'House of the Dragon' Season 1 Rushed to the Battlefield, But Is it Equipped for War? (Review)

House of the Dragon Season 1 covered about 20 years in just 10 episodes, setting the stage for the war to come. The show assigned itself a monumental task in starting so far back and setting up for a war decades away. While some criticisms may stand when the dust settles, the show succeeded in setting the board for the Dance of the Dragons.

Fair warning: There are spoilers for House of the Dragon ahead! As most fans probably know by now, House of the Dragon is based on a portion of George R.R. Martin's book Fire & Blood, which is not a novel but an "imaginary history book." The book describes all the events for House Targaryen from Aegon's Conquest of Westeros to 136 AC (after conquest), so the TV show only covers about a third of the book – at most. It didn't even need to go back that far, and some fans feel like it gave short shrift to the events of Season 1.

Take, for example, Rhaenyra's relationship with Ser Harwin Strong. It was obviously the most meaningful romance in her life and it resulted in the birth of three of her sons, but most of it happened off-screen. In Martin's history book style, this kind of implied significance worked well, but on TV it left viewers scrambling to catch up, and contributed to complaints that the story was rushed. Fans who didn't read the book complained of whiplash as years passed by between episodes again and again, in increments as large as a decade and as small as a few days.

Meanwhile, book readers were eager to see these kinds of off-the-record events fleshed out, but many were were left disappointed. Those who wanted to see the seeds from Martin's book flower on the screen were bitter about everything the show added, noting that it took up runtime that might have gone to Harwin Strong, Laena Velaryon or the infant Visenya – characters and events that were described sparsely in the history book but could have been elucidated in the TV style. This is undoubtedly a big part of the reaction to Larys Strong's lingering stare at Alicent's feet, for example.

Still, those changes seem to have been one of the big reasons the writers did decide to set the starting point so far back in time. Their main interest in the first half of the season seemed to be establishing Rhaenyra and Alicent's friendship, which was closer than it appeared in the book since they were closer in age. This adds to the melodrama and heartbreak of their enmity and, ultimately, of the war itself. Along the way, the other powerful lords of the Seven Kingdoms could be introduced and could fall gradually into one camp or the other, explaining their own loyalties as they went.

There's no doubt that this setup was successful, but there's an overarching criticism that the season never truly answered for. The frequent time skips and inconsistent timeline were confusing, and they forced the viewers' minds out of the story itself to calculate years and extrapolate how tempers might have cooled or feelings might have changed in that time. The viewers were often forced to decide for themselves when things had changed off-screen. This was all the more distracting as one tried to remember the timeline and how each character had aged between episodes, without even a year in the title card each week to anchor them.

It's hard not to imagine other ways to have conveyed those parts of the story without interrupting the viewers' suspension of disbelief – perhaps frequent flashbacks with parallel timelines, for example. That kind of solution might have forestalled the barrage of small, petty complaints from die-hard fans on social media, many of whom simply argue about whether the showrunners cherrypicked the right moments to include in Season 1. The point is that the season as a whole now plays almost like an anthology, without as much connective tissue as it might have had.

Telling the story differently might also have solved the criticism that built up towards the end of the season: the contrivances made to keep most characters relatable. Fans complained that some of the story's most dramatic moments were chalked up to accidents or misunderstandings between characters – from Rhaenyra and Alicent's falling out to Aemond killing Lucerys. They speculate that this was a way for the writers to keep all the characters relatable and even likable so that fans wouldn't be forced to choose a side in the war to come. In hindsight, this might have been easier with parallel timelines, where the characters themselves would be recalling the memories that would motivate their warfare. That way, the story of Season 1 could have been stretched out as fans seem to have wanted while the spectacle of war on dragon back could have been used as a framing device.

Still, told in any order, the story that House of the Dragon concocted out of Martin's book is a compelling one, and it was set to the screen beautifully. Early calls for Emmys do not seem to be unwarranted, and future seasons with a more concise timeline could easily make Season 1 more enjoyable on the rewatch. More than anything, it was a joy to return to Westeros and be reassured along with the rest of the world that there are still plenty of stories to tell in the Seven Kingdoms.

Ten weeks ago, I wrote that House of the Dragon is better than Game of Thrones. I put plenty of qualifiers on that assessment then and I do the same now, but the point stands so far as it can. House of the Dragon tells a distinct, tragic story in a world and a genre where just about anything could happen. It offers fans fantasies of prophecy, power and dragons – then shows them how each dream could be a terrible curse.

House of the Dragon and Game of Thrones are both streaming now on HBO Max. Fire & Blood is available now in print, digital and audiobook formats wherever books are sold. House of the Dragon Season 2 is expected to premiere sometime in 2024.