After nearly two years, HBO‘s House of the Dragon is finally back for Season 3 with an episode titled… Well, no idea, as I’m writing this recap of the Season 3 premiere in advance and HBO is being cagey about the titles. Let’s call it “Maester And Commander: The Far Side Of The Westeros” and see how close I come to the actual title of the episode (or maybe I’ll update this once the premiere hits HBO Max, who is to say)?
In any case, we’ve got a full review of the first four episodes of Season 3 sans spoilers for you to peruse, if you like. But short version, and spoilers for the House of the Dragon Season 3 premiere past this point, I found the massively anticipated — and likely massively budgeted — Battle of the Gullet to be mostly a bore with a few sparks of excitement here and there. Credit this likely minority opinion to a few characters which I, personally, am not as invested in (though they pick up considerably later in the season) and a lot of folks flying around in circles on well animated dragons, something that’s also a little hard to get invested in.
If you’re tuning in to this show for massive, epic spectacle? Conversely from me, you were likely well satisfied. If, like me, you prefer the human, intimate drama more and digging into the characters, then the highlight of the episode was likely the Game of Thrones franchise amping the ick factor to unbelievable levels with a harrowing kiss.
Not to digress too much (I swear this is a recap of the episode), but late last week the great Alan Sepinwall posted an old interview he did with director Alan Taylor, where they went back to talk about Game of Thrones Season 1, Episode 10, aka the one where poor Ned (Sean Bean) lost his head. In it, Taylor talks about budgetary constraints that led to Tyrion (Peter Dinklage) getting knocked out so we didn’t see an “enormous” battle, and having to shoot an 11-page dialogue scene in one tent, since that’s all they could afford.
…And I’d venture that’s the secret sauce that makes Westeros work, not the “under $20 million per episode” budget of House of the Dragon. It’s also why A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms worked so well, as it focused squarely in on Dunk (Peter Claffey) and Egg (Dexter Sol Ansell), two instantly lovable characters, and then it proceeded to fill the rest of this part of the world with even more instantly lovable (or instantly hatable) characters.
House of the Dragon has had mixed success with this, drawing us in with the bond between the true queen Rhaenyra Targaryen (Emma D’Arcy) and her childhood friend Alicent Hightower (Olivia Cooke), who — GOB Bluth voice — made a huge mistake announcing her own son as king, and has now spent the past two seasons trying to make things right. But, while your mileage may vary, most of the supporting characters have yet to make salient cases for themselves, other than Matt Smith’s sneering Daemon Targaryen, anime villain Aemond Targaryen (Ewan Mitchell), and more recently Alys Rivers (Gayle Rankin), who is getting by mostly on being a classic Game of Thrones weirdo.
This is no slight to the actors, who are all doing their darnedest. It’s mostly a setup for me to explain that when you have an episode like this one that focuses on even more new characters as well as hooking an enormous action scene on characters that have yet to pop, the stakes don’t quite feel like they’re there. If you feel similarly, don’t worry, this premiere is the exception to the rule, and next week’s episode is absolutely electrifying. If you disagree, great news, I’m gonna stop offering my opinions right now and get to the recap.
Actually, that’s not true, one more note… Rather than beat by beat through the entire episode, I’m going to go back to one of my old tricks from the Game of Thrones days and break this down (mostly) by location. Subsequent episodes mix things up a bit, but most of this Season 3 premiere is very modular, with events in King’s Landing not crossing with Dragonstone. So enough of me blathering, let’s get into it.
The Vale Of Arryn
Before we get to everything that happens in the episode proper, I’ll just note the new riff on the Game of Thrones theme over the opening credits that front-loads the drums of war. It doesn’t get old, does it? No, it does not.
Anywho, Rhaena Targaryen (Phoebe Campbell) was last seen confronting the massive, wild dragon Sheepstealer on the Vale of Arryn… And that’s where we pick up, with Sheepy roasting — what else — a sheep. Rhaena tentatively approaches the dragon, terrified, and it’s probably important to note that at this point she’s been wandering for days, probably without food. Yet she’s strong enough to clamber onto the back of the dragon, who flies off into the mist as she screams.
Later, they land and Rhaena is tossed from the dragon. Weakly she tries to make Sheepstealer obey, she needs to go back to Dragonstone… But instead the creature flies off. Don’t worry, he comes back, pukes up a sheep, and roasts it for her, sharing the food with the starving Rhaena who gobbles it greedily. Just a nice story of a girl and her dragon! How cute! More on this at the end of the recap!
King’s Landing
Back in the seat of government, if you’ll recall things ended with Alicent making a deal with Rhaenyra: the former will give Rhaenyra King’s Landing… And King Aegon (Tom Glynn-Carney), Alicent’s son. Only little problem, the hideously burnt Aegon escaped with the conniving Larys Strong (Matthew Needham) in the Season 2 finale, and nobody knows where they went.
That’s bad news for Grand Maester Orwyle (Kurt Egyiawan), who was tending to Aegon, as Aemond tears him out of bed and threatens to behead the oblivious Maester. Aemond is stopped at the last second by the news that Larys is gone as well, so Orwyle is safe for the moment — or as safe as anyone can be with Aemond stalking around.
While Alicent waits to see whether Rhaenyra will accept her offer of the throne, she discovers someone else has taken it: Aemond, who is sitting on the Iron Throne since his brother has abdicated. While not stated out loud, this is essentially heresy, to sit on the Throne without a coronation. He’s also suspicious of his mother, who claims she was in the Kingswood. For the plan to work, Rhaenyra needs Aemond — and in particular the massive dragon Vhagar — out of the way. Complicating matters, Aemond has used his new stolen powers to decide to stay on the Throne, and instead has called for Lord Ormund and “15,000 Hightower men” to join them, along with “Daeron and his dragon.” Meanwhile, the Triarchy is coming for the Sea Snake — that would be Corlys Velaryon (Steve Toussaint) — to break the blockade on the city.
So despite Alicent coming up with a plan that would set things right and end the war, instead everything is about to get way bloodier.
Later, Alicent confronts Helaena Targaryen (Phia Saban) about whether she knew her brother-husband Aegon was going to flee, and it’s clear Helaena knows the full plan, or at least part of it. Helaena, always insightful, sees the fear in Aemond, and that if he faces Rhaenyra’s dragons, he’ll die. As Alicent considers that, she is continuing to try and keep her plan on track by falsifying a letter from the king for Lord Ormund.
While this does happen in another location, I’ll mention briefly here that over at the Hightower host, we meet Lord Ormund (James Norton), a handsome, chiseled man in shiny, silver armor. He’s skeptical of Aemond declaring himself king, and briefly smells some sort of flask before he opens the letter from Alicent. He reads it, which merely says they need to wait there for three days until Aemond arrives. Basically: Alicent is delaying the host from reaching King’s Landing, in order to give Rhaenyra time to take the city. That’s pretty much it for him, but keep your eye on this guy, he’s about to become very important this season.
Anywho, back to the Red Keep, Alicent talks to Aemond, and tries to reason with her son, confessing that, “I strove tirelessly to put Aegon on the throne, but I failed to prepare him to rule.” When Aemond defers, she tries another tact, telling Aemond that he should have been king, and urging him to go to Harrenhal. She’s appealing to his vanity, and natural animosity towards his brother, and then plays on the fear Helaena highlighted, telling her son she just wants him to be safe.
Walking to the fireplace, Aemond clearly is afraid, despite saying “I am not afraid” multiple times, so Alicent changes tacts again, suggesting that Daemon’s “one dragon” is no match for him, and killing Caraxes would be a “vicious blow to Rhaenyra.”
“You are so courageous,” Alicent says, putting her hands on her son’s face. “I cannot lose you as I did Aegon. If I do, I will be lost.” And Aemond, staring in his mother’s eyes… Leans in to kiss her, as Alicent looks absolutely horrified. He does kiss her, she breaks off with a disgusted face before he can see, then smiles when he can, and he promises to host a feast in her honor once he’s conquered Harrenhal.
Look, we’re watching a franchise that started with a brother banging his sister, but this somehow ups the disgusting factor considerably, as Alicent is once again doing whatever she has to do, to get the absolutely unhinged men in her life to do what she needs them to do. And while this does convince Aemond to follow her plan (unwittingly), it’s horrifying to think that if Aemond is somehow successful, the main thing he’s going to want to do is marry and bed his own mother. There’s also the level of Alicent knowing that so many of her children, from Aegon to Aemond and beyond, and have gone so very, very wrong. At this point, she must be wondering: is this base level of survival worth it?
Aegon And Larys On The Road
There’s a classic Game of Thrones storyline that finds two mismatched characters thrust into a dangerous situation where they can’t let anyone know their identities and find themselves challenged because of it. Think Arya and the Hound, or Brienne and Jaime Lannister and you have the general idea. And that’s certainly what HotD is going for with the mangled but prideful Aegon and the manipulative Larys, who are on the run, filling in some gaps in time in George R.R. Martin’s Fire and Blood.
And they’re pretty much as low as you might expect as they pick up hiding a raven cart, with Aegon stating he’s “the king of nothing with raven shit for a throne.” Don’t worry, things get worse, as the two are stopped by soldiers who demand they renounce the usurper — that would be Aegon — and bend the knee to the true Queen — that would be to Rhaenyra. Not that Aegon can bend his knees anyway, but renouncing himself is a step too far for the king of nothing.
Larys bends immediately, and when Aegon does not… Larys tells the soldier that Aegon is, indeed, Aegon Targaryen, and they’ll get a lot more money with them alive versus beheaded. What is Larys playing at here? Mostly keeping them alive, probably, though Larys playing Chess one move at a time — versus fifty moves ahead of everyone else — seems very unlike him.
Daemon, At War
As all of this is going on, Daemon is fighting — and slaughtering — enemy forces somewhere in Westeros, stalking the battlefield and killing the Lannister host. He uses Caraxes to take care of the bodies, and also gains some new allies who have “come to die for the Dragon Queen.” Not only that, they bring Daemon the head of Jason Lannister (Jefferson Hall) to seal the deal. Of note, Jason’s identical twin Tyland (also Hall) is headed — no pun intended — to the Gullet, so he’s sure gonna be bummed when he hears about his brother.
Criston, At Rest
While everyone else is doing stuff, Criston Cole (Fabien Frankel) is biding his time in the woods while his men engage in classic Westeros activities like “rape.” All he’s doing is painting his shield and waiting for Aemond to show up on Vhagar. Cole’s second-in-command is demanding action for the rape, and to set a proper tone for the men, but Cole sort of doesn’t care anymore.
Great scene! Love this guy. More Criston, please, let’s do a whole hour about how bummed out Criston is while he waits around and does nothing. This is fun.
The Dragon Riders Three And The Green Man One
Also while everyone else is doing stuff, our three elevated dragonriders — Ulf (Tom Bennett), Addam (Clinton Liberty), and Hugh (Kieran Bew) — hang out waiting for Vhagar to pass by, and are passing the time chatting around a dying fire. Ulf, as usual, confesses a little too much, intimating he was molested by a Maester who told him he had dragon’s blood. They’re actually waiting to kill Aemond, and Ulf is excited that they’re going to get a castle at the end of this, since they’ll be made knights… Which doesn’t guarantee a castle of course. Basically, Ulf continuing to be boorish is the point of this scene.
Later, as Ulf takes a little poop, he sees a black goat and panics. As he runs back to camp, Hugh wonders if Aemond knew they were coming, and muses about running back to Dragonstone. Addam wants to follow their orders, which is when they see a mysterious man-creature with antlers on the ledge, which causes the trio to panic.
If you’re curious what the hell is going on: this is likely a Green Man. There was a brief appearance of these folks in the Season 2 finale of House of the Dragon, during Daemon’s vision of the Song of Ice and Fire, but not much is known about them — and they were never seen in Game of Thrones. The short version, subject to change, is that the Green Men may be men who paint their skin green and wear antlers; or they may be magical men-beasts with green skin and antlers. Either way, they are likely the guardians of the Children of the Forest, the elf-esque creatures who, by the time of Game of Thrones, are extinct other than some survivors north of The Wall. But that’s sort of all we know, as up until this episode they’ve bee mythical in the, er, mythology of Martin’s universe.
Speaking of mystical creatures, before they can flee, who shows up but Alys Rivers, who tells them they’re missing the battle at Dragonstone. Alys claims she’s a witch, to which Ulf says, “Right, look after yourselves,” and immediately leaves. Given how things go later in the episode, one does tend to wonder how things might have gone differently if Ulf, Addam and Hugh had left earlier… And a bigger question: what is Alys up to?
Dragonstone
Over in Dragonstone, Rhaenyra seems to be going full Hamlet as she wrestles with whether Alicent’s deal — basically handing her the throne — is legit, or another deceit. We, the viewers, know that pretty much any time Alicent has done something like this and been stymied, it’s not usually her fault so much as a massive error on someone else’s (read: a dude) part. But Rhaenyra doesn’t know that, and it’s really messing her up, man.
In particular, Rhaenyra’s son Jacaerys “Jace” Velaryon (Harry Collett) thinks this is a trap. Like most of the men in Rhaenyra’s life, including her Small Council, they don’t think she knows what she’s talking about.
We’re jumbling things up a little bit here, but — see “The Battle of the Gullet” below for more — Baela Targaryen (Bethany Antonia) enters the Small Council room to inform Rhaenyra that there is war in the Gullet. Jace believes this is Alicent’s trap, with Rhaenyra deciding to go to the battle. Instead, Jace over-steps his bounds in a not-dissimilar way to Aemond, except with less kissing his mommy, by telling the head guard to lock Rhaenyra in her room in order to “protect” her. Baela tells Jace not to do this, but he won’t listen and tells Baela the two of them can ride dragons into battle together.
Rhaenyra gets ready, but finds the door locked, a final humiliation, as she screams and demands they “open the fucking door.”
While Jace and Baela fly to the Gullet, Rhaenyra sits imprisoned. Her aid, Mysaria (Sonoya Mizuno), who is locked in with her, offers that Jace was only trying to protect her. But she “never asked to be protected.” And even more importantly, she feels betrayed by her own son. “I may appear to have the body of a woman, but I have the heart and spirit of a king,” Rhaenyra says, crying as she tears her clothes to shreds.
The Battle Of The Gullet
Meanwhile, at sea, Corlys looks out at his fleet, and then brings Alyn (Abubakar Salim) to his cabin. He pours him a drink from Ib, though “such luxury is wasted on me,” according to Alyn. Corlys explains the plan to take King’s Landing peacefully to Alyn, who expresses doubts — particularly when it comes to Aemond. But that’s not the real point of this scene… It’s for Corlys to come close to apologize for abandoning Alyn and Addam, his bastard sons who have no last name. “I am sorry for it,” Corlys says, though if there’s more to say, he’s interrupted by the ringing of alarms.
That’s because the Triarchy approaches, 53 ships strong, a name that sends shivers down Corlys’s spine. “Bring my armor,” he says, and the action briefly turns to the Triarchy ships, where Tyland Lannister confers with the Triarchy commander Sharako Lohar (Abigail Thorn). While she’s not a Greyjoy, Lohar is a classic swashbuckler in the mode of Yara Greyjoy (Gemma Whelan), and is first found eating and mocking Tyland. She warns that their armor is going to make them sink the bottom, and she also lays out her own strategy: destroy the Sea Snake.
Whatever Lohar’s beef is with Corlys, it’s a big one (we don’t have any info from the books, since this is a combo of several different characters, but more on this in a sec), and she’s decided to burn down High Tide, Corlys’s home, to distract him. Basically, while Tyland has his orders, Sharako doesn’t care: she just wants to face the Sea Snake, one on one.
Or rather, multiple on multiple, as the battle is joined, with ships on fire, archers firing, and Corlys trying to get the fleet to stand up to the Triarchy. Once Corlys discovers Lohar is in charge of the enemy fleet, he decides to head right to her, and again, it’s clear these two have beef. And similarly, when Lohar sees Corlys approaching, she decides to pursue, against Tyland’s wishes. The thing is, she doesn’t care about contracts.
“The Sea Snake led the persecution and slaughter of my mates for more than 20 years,” Lohar says. “I sealed your contract for him.” So yeah, her plan is destroy Corlys and take his throne. Yikes!
Bad news for her: Jace and Baela join the fight on Vermax and Moondancer, respectively. The Sea Snake’s crew cheers, and he sets a plan to head for the Dragonstone Pass, in order to lure Lohar away and run her aground, as it’s almost low tide.
Bad news for dragons: Lohar has massive harpoons that hook Vermax and begin to drag the dragon (hey, is that why they’re called dragons? Anyway) down into the sea. Moondance frees Vermax, but the dragon is injured, and it’s clear that two dragons isn’t quite the advantage in this fight Jace and Baela may have fought.
Next up? Do you like boat chases? I sure don’t, they’re like car chases at 10 miles per hour in the water. But a boat chase it is, as first Corlys leads his ship through the narrow, dangerous pass, with Lohar in mildly warm pursuit. Versus Corlys, who made it cleanly through, Lohar loses most of her boats. But she does make it through safely herself — and as she has the faster boat, is able to catch up to Corlys and ram his ship. As the Sea Snake prepares, he sees High Tide on fire and freezes, with the bastard Alyn stepping up to rally the troops and get them ready for the fight to come. The two boats ram together, with Lohar storming Corlys’s ship.
He wakes in the storm of battle, and Lohar and Corlys begin to make their way towards each other, while in the wreckage of the boats Alyn fights for his life. He’s successful, and makes it back to deck in time to see Lohar and Corlys locking swords. They all fight, and the two ships run aground, knocking Corlys into the water. Alyn sees Lohar hanging to the sinking deck, and jumps to attack her one-on-one.
Under the boat, they battle, and they enraged Alyn, thinking his father may be dead, first drowns and then stabs Lohar, killing her. Which kind of sucks, honestly? What a bummer to introduce an awesome pirate lady and then kill her in one episode. Look, I’ll always treasure the time we had with Lohar, but back in my day you’d string this stuff out for three seasons as she tortured and then was forced to team up with Alyn. But anyway… Is Corlys dead? Well, a lot of other people are for sure, as Alyn stumbles back to the deck to survey the wreckage. They’re victorious, but at what cost?
While the boat chase is happening, guess who shows up? Rhaena, on Sheepstealer, to, uh, help. Unfortunately for everyone, Rhaena has a wild dragon, not a trained one (like Toothless), and Sheepstealer begins to set every ship on fire, whether they’re enemies or allies.
Speaking of, guess who Sheepstealer goes after next? Moondancer. Which you might be able to intuit, but Moondancer is ridden by Rhaena’s sister, Baela. While Rhaena begs Sheepstealer to stop, Jace rides in on Vermax to fight, thinking the wild dragon is in service of the enemy. He tells Vermax to “kill the rider,” who he doesn’t realize is his first/second cousin (these family trees are weird, man) until it’s almost too late. Jace veers away, but Sheepstealer makes pursuit while Rhaena screams.
It isn’t Sheepstealer who takes down Vermax, though… It’s another harpoon which captures the dragon. Rhaena gasps and calls for Jace while Sheepstealer continues to ignore her, flying away. And this time, Baela is too late as well. Moondancer tries to cut the harpoon, but Vermax is almost in the water. Baela is forced to fly away herself thanks to another harpoon aimed at her, as Jace and Vermax are dragged down into the water. Vermax drowns, bleeding out, while Jace unhooks himself and swims to safety.
Just kidding: he gets shot in the back with an arrow. Then the front. Then with a third arrow as the enemy ship cheers in victory. And we’re left with the image of Jace’s dead body floating the water, his own hubris in thinking he was more prepared to fight this chaotic battle than his mother leading to his own demise.
The final image of the episode is the expanse of the Battle of the Gullet’s aftermath as Moondancer circles, desperately looking for any sign of Jace. Surely Rhaenyra will response normally to this news, right? Right? We’ll see you next week when we find out the answer to that in (I kid you not) one of the best hours ever broadcast in the Game of Thrones franchise.
House Of The Dragon Season 3 Premiere Dates And Episode Guide:
New episodes of House of the Dragon premiere Sundays on HBO and HBO Max at 9 p.m. ET. Here’s what we expect from the full list of episodes in House of the Dragon Season 3 with premiere dates.
- Sunday, June 21, 2026: House of the Dragon, Season 3, Episode 1
- Sunday, June 28, 2026: House of the Dragon, Season 3, Episode 2
- Sunday, July 5, 2026: House of the Dragon, Season 3, Episode 3
- Sunday, July 12, 2026: House of the Dragon, Season 3, Episode 4
- Sunday, July 19, 2026: House of the Dragon, Season 3, Episode 5
- Sunday, July 26, 2026: House of the Dragon, Season 3, Episode 6
- Sunday, August 2, 2026: House of the Dragon, Season 3, Episode 7
- Sunday, August 9, 2026: House of the Dragon, Season 3, Episode 8 *Season Finale*
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