Usually, when it comes to writing about House of the Dragon, the agreed-upon etiquette is to place a spoiler warning near the top of a piece, to ensure that no important details of the plot for no one a few episodes back. But there’s no need to do that here, because I’ve seen the most recent episode of House of the Dragon and, with a gun to my head, I couldn’t tell you what happened there.
If you’ve seen the episode, you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about. Things definitely happened in the episode, I’m sure. At one point, a yellowish-brown blob may have imperceptibly approached another yellowish-brown blob, and then there was the bit where something gray wobbled over a background that was almost exactly the same color. There might have been a castle, but even though I stared at the screen so hard I dislocated my face, there’s a good chance it was actually a person, or a bush, or a vase, or something.
Which means, I’m afraid, Game of Thrones is back. For all the brickbats thrown at that show’s final season—for the wholesale scrapping of a carefully detailed world in favor of a struggle toward a stupid ending—it’s important to remember that a great deal of criticism in that time was that some episodes were so poorly lit that no one watching had the foggiest idea what was going on.
In particular, there was the episode entitled The Long Night. This was supposed to be the episode the whole series had been building towards, where the army of the living faced off against the army of the dead for the last time. Viewers had been looking forward to it for years, as it promised to be a show unlike anything that had ever been televised. But then the episode came out, and the lighting was so muddy and poor that, for all I know, the production team did it by locking a camera in a filing cabinet and making a bunch of “YARR” noises from background
It was so unwatchable that when HBO Max introduced an HDR viewing option to its service this summer, the main reaction from audiences was “Great! Now I might be able to see what the hell happened in that episode of Game of Thrones from three and a half years ago!”
who are you again … it’s like looking blindfolded. Photography: HBO
So far, House of the Dragon has been careful not to repeat the mistakes of its parent show. Even with the time jumps built in, it’s developed its world slowly and methodically (probably too methodically, as anyone who’s spent the last month waiting for Paddy Considine’s Viserys to die will attest).
Foolishly, I thought this might also mean that all of their episodes would be properly lit. But right? This week’s House of the Dragon appears to be lit by a single tea light for betting. There were times when the proceedings were so incomprehensibly murky that watching them was like being in a coma. You might recognize voices, but you certainly couldn’t open your eyes to see them.
As always, the powers that be maintain that the episode looked that way on purpose, due to an “intentional creative decision.” But others think differently. Vulture’s Kathryn VanArendonk has the impression that the episode was shot in a violently inept way, day and night.
And this right after a complete cast change, too. Last week was bad enough, figuring out who each character was supposed to be now that they were being played by new actors. And now you’re making us do it blindfolded? House of the Dragon, what the hell are you playing at?