I think the series' proper start was the first episode. You just can't jump into a story without setting up your characters, setting and situation. Even in serial television.
Spoilers Game Of Thrones’ Spinoff ‘House Of The Dragons’ ordered to series
- Thread starter Enterprise is Great
- Start date
I think the series' proper start was the first episode. You just can't jump into a story without setting up your characters, setting and situation. Even in serial television.
There's still going to be time jumps even now. Maybe even a substantial one in the middle of the sixth episode.
While I was expecting this going into HOTD, it still sorta blows my mind that the first season will likely only cover 51 pages, a single chapter, of Fire & Blood. They have done a good job to this point of fleshing out the story and have made it much more interesting.
Yes you can. That’s why they have recaps.
Recaps don't have the full content.Yes you can. That’s why they have recaps.
Just watch the entire season.
Ramin Djawadi has explained why they decided to reuse the Game of Thrones theme for this show:
Honestly, I think that's weak reasoning. Oh, well.
“We decided to stick with that theme because Game Of Thrones had been off air for three years, and it was decided that we really wanted to tie the shows together. Because even though it’s all-new characters and it’s set hundreds of years before, we felt like it needed that stamp to say ‘This is Game Of Thrones—it’s in a different time, but it’s Game Of Thrones,’” composer Ramin Djawadi explains in an interview with The A.V. Club’s own Hattie Lindert. “We felt like the opening really ties it all together. Even in the first episode, I wrote new pieces, but thematically, you hear the King’s Landing theme, you hear the dragon theme, so it’s very much calling back to the known themes to set the tone again. But then we depart, and as we get to know all the characters, there are new themes. I wrote so much music for the season.”
Huh. Because tits & dragons aren't a big enough clue?
It is a bit weak sauce. I don't mind it - it's a rousing theme. But it doesn't align nearly as well as it did with GoT's visuals.
Considering the astonishing talent and creativity Djawadi has demonstrated over the years, creating musical masterpieces even when the stories they featured in were somewhat lacking (e.g., "The Night King")... I find myself strongly suspecting that this was not actually his decision and that he is repeating talking points given to him by higher-ups. Because just re-using the same theme song is so unoriginal that I just can't quite believe it was his choice.
God, even a new arrangement would have been better than just flat-out re-creating the GoT theme.
It doesn't even make sense to use as a composition because the internal logic of the theme is now lacking. That composition was designed both to establish some of the emotional themes that would be at play in the show -- a complex combination of a sense of longing and sadness, a sense of tension, a sense of hope and optimism, and a sense of dread -- but also to use those emotions to guide us through the map that would familiarize the audience with the complex geography and cultures of Planetos. There is a reason the bridge occurs as we see the Wall, for instance.
But with this show... there's no real connection to the visuals. The ebb and flow of the composition is lost because the visuals we're seeing aren't connected to different themes or emotions. The visual we're seeing is a literal river of blood; this is the kind of visual that should be accompanied by a composition that evokes primarily feelings of dread and horror and disgust. The HotD theme ought to be darker than the the GoT theme song. Which is appropriate, since this show is about a single family violently splintering in a way that even Game of Thrones was never really about.
Reusing the GoT theme is just such an act of artistic cowardice, and it does such a disservice to the show. It takes away from House of the Dragon developing its own distinct artistic identity.
Yuuup. I get the same feeling. There's no way someone with his incredible talent couldn't produce another iconic theme for this show.
Agreed on all points. It doesn't help that I'm not engaged by the visuals at all, which is a complete 180 from Game of Thrones. I closely watched the Game of Thrones intro from beginning to end, not just to see which regions of the world would be featured and which cast members are highlighted, but also because that sweeping landscapes and unique revealing of each city were brilliant.
But this show? It's just a bunch of Shining-esque blood bouncing around everywhere. Maybe I would be a bit more engaged if I knew the sigils they're connecting (which is the main point, I get that) but I don't know any of them except Targaryen. After seeing which cast members are highlighted, I either look at my phone or just skip over the rest.
So it's a double whammy of meh.
Last edited:
The use of the GOT theme is definitely my biggest complaint with the show so far. Actually it really annoys me. I was hoping for a theme that evoked the rage of dragons a bit more. I think a good, outside the box idea would have been a slightly metalish orchestral, riffing kind of track. Adrian Belew would have been wonderful for this. King Crimson songs like "Elephant Talk" and "Dinosaur" show how Adrian is fantastic at getting organic, animalistic type sounds from his guitar. I could only imagine the dragon-type sounds he would create.
I love the irony of people on a Trek board complaining about reuse of music after TMP and TNG. 
I love the irony of people on a Trek board complaining about reuse of music after TMP and TNG.
At least that theme had only been used for one movie, not an entire series -- TNG didn't literally reuse the TOS theme. And no other ST series has reused another show's or movie's theme since.
Which can be made to actually work to make a brilliant title sequence, as evidenced by Netflix's Daredevil opening:
You seriously gonna try to make something like this personal? C'mon.
Absolutely! The problem is how House of the Dragons poorly utilizes the effect.
I think the HotD opener has the blood effects in the wrong order. At the beginning, it should have started out with the model of Old Valyria filled with blood, but as the credits progress, the blood slowly drains and thins out until, by the end, all that's left is a bare trickle, signifying the diminishing strength of the Targaryen bloodline.