House of the Dragon season 3 (thus far)

I was a huge fan of Game of Thrones like most people and I have been enjoying House of the Dragon almost as much as the original series. We don't really have the iconic characters this time around so much as we did on the first merry go round but it is still a really well-done show but season 3 has been a bit of a challenge for me and I'll tell you why.

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First off, for people who have been struggling a bit with the release time-table of this series like I have I will say this to you: There is a good chance you are going to be a tiny bit confused in the first couple of episodes.

Unlike other series, HBO has decided to not give us a refresher about what has happened thus far in the start of the episode and instead to just thrust you straight into the action. For me, even though I paid pretty good attention to seasons 1 and 2, I couldn't remember anyone's names nor did I have much of an idea as to why we were in this huge battle that takes place in the first episode.

I would recommend doing something that I didn't do and that would be to go back and watch the last couple of episodes from season 2 at the minimum.

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Some are calling it the "bloodiest naval battle ever" but for me it was a big battle of WTF is going on? We do not get our memories refreshed about who people are and why they are there and this can be problematic in a series like this where there are a ton of characters and they also have very forgettable names like Daemon, Corlys, Rhaenys, and Mysaria. So unless you are watching with your notebook in hand you may fight these names slightly more difficult to remember than Jon, Ned, and Robert.

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Even if you can't really follow what is going on though it is extremely well-done and very entertaining. The dragons are some of the main characters in this of course and they are wonderfully integrated into the action as well. I do have one question that starts to enter my mind more frequently as this goes along though and that is does just everyone have a dragon? It seems like every time we turn around there are some new people that have dragons. They aren't even all that rare and there seem to be some pretty good counter-measures to fight against them that I don't recall being as much of an issue in previous seasons. Maybe I just don't pay attention as well but I kind of felt like the only thing that could take down a dragon, was another dragon.

That is not the case here but whatever man! Dragons are cool even if I think they are kind of overusing them.

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I do appreciate directing and cinematography on this level though and I can only imagine how complicated and expensive it must have been to film these really intense and long naval sequences that are a big part of the first episode.

Just like Game of Thrones the seasons tend to "bookend" meaning that there are big events in the first and last episodes so like you would expect given this tried and true method, things slow down quite a lot in episode 2.

This is where we start to get back into the more of a story-telling part of things but not in a bad way. At that point for me anyway, it was very necessary for some talking to take place because while I enjoyed the battles, I didn't really know what was going on or even who it is that I am meant to be rooting for. There were a bunch of sub-plots that I didn't understand at all and even some characters that I don't remember.

So this would be a warning to those of you out there that aren't watching season 3 yet that it might be a good idea to maybe rewatch season 2 to get back up to speed with the characters. Since there are only 3 episodes of season 3 released at this point and only 1 episode being released per week, it could be a good idea anyway since for a lot of people you are going to binge watch all of these anyway.

I have only finished the first 2 of the 3 but have decided to go back and rewatch all of season 2 before proceeding. Some of this is because I want to understand all of it and another piece is because my girl just told me that she wants to watch it with me and since I don't want to have a million questions headed my way that I don't know the answer to, perhaps it is best if we both just rewatch the past 10 hours or so of it together.

Although it should be obvious the only legal way you can stream this is through an HBO Max subscription.