Rewatching ‘House of the Dragon’ Caused a Big Shift in My Opinion on One Character
To celebrate the almost anniversary of Game of Thrones prequel House of the Dragon premiering on HBO and getting me even more obsessed with the Targaryens than I already was, I have of course embarked on a rewatch—since there’s no news so far from the set of the show’s second season to keep me entertained.
Now that I’m almost at the midway point, just before the big time skip and cast change, I can say that most of the opinions I held during my first watch and the subsequent time I spent in the fandom were confirmed.
I remain firm in my stance that Rhaenyra should indeed be queen but that Alicent is in no way shape or form the villain that the show and many fans make her out to be, but actually the ultimate victim of the one true enemy in Westeros—a patriarchy so toxic it’s basically radioactive, of which feudalism works as a perfect exemplification.
That’s one of the reasons my opinion of King Viserys turned much harsher upon rewatching the show. Now that I can focus on something else that isn’t Paddy Considine’s brilliant performance, which blew me away as the show was airing, I want to scream for all the world to hear that boy oh boy Viserys did pretty much everything wrong. And I hate hate hate him for it.
So let’s break it all down.
Viserys is a pretty bad king in House of the Dragon
First and foremost, there’s the issue that pretty much sets the whole Dance of the Dragons into motion—who is going to rule the Seven Kingdoms after Viserys? We learn from the first episodes of House of the Dragon that his conundrum is between his absolutely deranged murderous little brother—who’s being the public menace all second sons in Westeros are—and his daughter, whom he technically has time to mold into a ruler but who has committed the incredibly grave sin of being born a girl.
Once little Prince Baelon dies—more on Viserys’ treatment of his wives later—he could technically choose to solve the issue with a Great Council, the same way his predecessor and grandfather Jaehaerys I had done. That Great Council went against the usual succession rules in Westeros, which go children before siblings and sons before daughters, and so should have given the crown to Princess Rhaenys and Laenor after her. Still, it worked as an exception to the widely accepted rule because it came from a grand unified discussion among almost all the lords in the realm.
Viserys chooses instead to name his heir himself, basing this very important decision on his sole authority. And sure, fair, he can do that, he’s an absolute ruler and that’s what absolute rulers do—the issue here is that he has the political foresight of a teaspoon and does absolutely nothing to put this succession into writing. Sure, he has the lords swear fealty to Rhaenyra as his heir, but it’s not like he codifies this choice into some kind of law—which is what makes Rhaenyra’s position so weak as soon as Viserys goes and has a son.
Granted, Otto “Biggest Tywin Lannister Wannabe” Hightower would probably have tried to do some shenanigans to get closer to power—or at least get Daemon as far away from it as possible—anyways, independently of any male children existing or not. But the fact that those male children exist—a whole trio of them, so an heir and a spare and yet another spare—and that Viserys never codifies Rhaenyra’s succession more than simply saying that no one should mention the whole “Strong boys” situation, is one of the main reasons everything explodes into a garbage fire of epic proportions the second Viserys dies.
The lords of Westeros have every reason to expect Aegon will inherit because that’s simply how succession works—sons go before daughters, who go before the other siblings of the deceased. Viserys should have had Rhaenyra proclaimed Princess of Dragonstone and then had it put into law—but then again, this would have meant switching the Iron Throne to absolute primogeniture regardless of gender. And not a single nobleman or royal prince in Westeros would have been very happy to do that.
An even worse husband
While not as bad for the Seven Kingdoms as a whole as the succession issue, the way Viserys behaves in his personal relationships is also a collection of the biggest red flags you can find. I would argue that it’s even more telling of who he is as a person.
Let’s take his first marriage with his oh-so-beloved Aemma. He consummates the marriage and leaves Aemma pregnant most likely way before it’s advisable—sure, Westeros might be a collection of the worst Medieval customs you can find, but maesters knew very well that forcing young girls to carry a child and give birth to it could have disastrous consequences on their health, reproductive and otherwise.
This might be one of the reasons Aemma has such difficult pregnancies and childbirths, and why only one of her children—Rhaenyra—survives past infancy. So that’s already a pretty horrible move. But then there’s the whole sequence of Baelor’s birth, which occupies a good chunk of the first episode of House of the Dragon and is honestly one of the most disturbing the entire Game of Thrones franchise has ever aired.
We’re meant to note how Viserys chooses to sacrifice his wife, condemning her to a horrible death on the off chance of getting an heir out of it, or they wouldn’t have chosen to show us Daemon in pretty much the same situation a couple of episodes later. I have my beef with Daemon as well, and he’s by no means a perfect husband just because he refuses to have Laena cut open, but the parallels between the two brothers are right there in the text, and they certainly don’t go in Viserys’ favor.
Then, we come to Alicent. First of all, let me say that Viserys didn’t really have to marry, no matter what his Small Council was saying—sure, having a single heir would have presented some issues, but he did very much have an heir. Rhaenyra was his heir, anointed as such in front of the lords of the Seven Kingdoms.
He marries Alicent because he wants to marry her—which is all sorts of wrong considering Alicent is a young girl and Viserys is a grown man. And he knows something is not exactly right in all this, considering how he asks her not to tell Rhaenyra anything of what’s going on between them—not that Alicent has many choices in the matter, given how she’s a literal teenager dealing with the supreme ruler of the country she lives in and her master manipulator of a father.
So Viserys marries Alicent, proceeds to get her pregnant as equally young as he did Aemma, and then completely ignores her. He belittles her—see him cackling with Daemon at her polite offer of seeing some tapestries. Sure, it’s not in the top ten most adrenaline-filled activities Westeros has to offer, but this is a royal court we’re talking about. It runs on pleasantries. He dismisses her, doing seemingly nothing in her eyes to ease or prevent what she perceives as a genuine threat to the lives of her children.
An arguably even more terrible father
So let’s talk about those children. Viserys cares relatively little for Rhaenyra. She’s on his Small Council as a cupbearer when she should be learning something about governing, because otherwise, that’s how you end up making bad moves like leaving the capital and living on a secluded island, allowing those who would very much like not to see you on the Throne gain power—as long as he hopes to get a male heir out of Aemma.
Then he guts her, and suddenly Rhaenyra is all he cares about—and I have to wonder how much his guilt at what he’s done to Aemma plays into it. He names her as his heir but, as seen before, does nothing to really secure her position, nothing to really teach her how to rule except revealing Aegon’s prophecy to her, and also “forgets” to mention the tiny detail of him planning to marry her best friend.
And once said best friend has four children, Viserys proceeds to ignore the hell out of them. Aegon gets a little more love and attention as a baby, but by the time he’s a teenager, we see that the king largely overlooks him except when it’s time to yell at him. Viserys’ oh-so-desired male heir, completely discarded—sure, Rhaenyra by now is his heir in his eyes, but that doesn’t mean he couldn’t spare some fatherly love.
Then, there’s Helaena, who’s absolutely invisible in her father’s eyes despite the fact that she’s a dragon dreamer, something that Viserys himself expresses great admiration for—perhaps even more so than being a dragonrider. We never see him interact with her, and he doesn’t think twice about marrying her off to Aegon when she’s still very young, thus recreating once more the pattern that happened for Aemma and Alicent and arguably Rhaenyra, as well.
Aemond is, by his own description, greatly interested in history and philosophy. Viserys, as fascinated as he is with everything regarding the Valyrian Freehold of old, could definitely have found something to relate to with his second son. But again, the only interaction that we see between the two is when Viserys completely glosses over the fact that Aemond has just been horribly wounded, to instead focus on defending Rhaenyra’s children—Rhaenyra, who is asking that Aemond be “sharply questioned.” Let’s all remember that little detail.
We haven’t seen Daeron yet, but given everything else, I’m sure the relationship there was not a textbook example of fatherhood. Then again, with Daeron younger than Aemond and having spent a considerable amount of time being raised by Alicent’s family in Oldtown, we can assume that Viserys didn’t really have much of a chance or a desire to bond with his youngest son.
(featured image: HBO)
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