Hmmm.  Don’t remember her saying that.  But if she did, I could totally see it as bravado--just Cinda again acting like she’s smarter than everybody else.

I might be wrong, but we just finished up the season last night (late to the party). But I don’t think at any point was it confirmed that Cinda knew that Poppy was Becky–or at least that Becky told her, or that she knew before the end of the season. Becky/Poppy was playing the long game, & in the end planned to…

Exactly. Becky wants to disappear–Poppy wants the spotlight.

Lucy didn’t disappear. She’s sitting right there in the audience in the last scene, between Mabel & Joy. Nina didn’t disappear—we got closure on her in the blackout episode. Sazz is barely a character, & only exists for very brief comic relief. As long as Charles stays on his Brazzos reboot show, she’ll drop by…

To be fair, he’s been presented as a kind of honorable naif, a pure soul, so he’s the kind of guy who WOULD think Rhaenyra would go for that.  I do think there are people like him, who because they have no drive for power & scheming, really can’t understand those who do.

How were you watching the episode? I almost always watch the show on my laptop with earbuds in, & I rarely have trouble with the sound or understanding dialog. Might be different on the TV in the family room, though.

Or get pummeled by that pommel (in the next paragraph).

Presumably that’s why they had her dressed all in whit for this episode? I don’t remember for sure, but I do think she’s been clad in white for the whole series so far?

Came down here to say exactly this. We’d already seen the weapon (looks to me like a hatchet-cum-hammer) wielded several times by the Crabfeeder, & never by Daemon, who has a named sword (Dark Sister) we’ve seen him use repeatedly. Also, the line “Add it to the throne” makes it obvious that it’s not Daemon’s. The…

“Somehow every man she talks with gets pegged as her love interest against all evidence.”

The DVD sets still have those “offensive” episodes. So we just get the DVDs from the library. We’re re-watching the series, this time with our kids, & it’s not at all hard for them to understand how & why they used blackface on the show.  But I’m one of those weirdos who thinks context matters, so what do I know?

Is there a professional, urban woman in a movie who’s NOT an editor?  Why do they always seem to works at magazines or publishing houses?

Right--but that whole conversation happened before he arrived.  So if they discussed that plan WITH him, it happened off-camera, is what I’m saying.

Assuming that Alicent & Rhaenyra are the same age, by now she’s 17, which is technically legal in most states in America. In ancient Rome it wasn’t uncommon for girls as young 14 or 15 to marry (& to be betrothed even younger), especially amongst the aristocracy (& for the same reasons as the marriages on Got & HotD).…

Definitely not Daemon’s, which is bigger, & red. Laenor’s dragon is named Seasmoke (silvery grey): https://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/Seasmoke#Known_dragonriders_of_Seasmoke

Yeah, I thought her read that that was Viserys’ dragon was odd, especially considering how Daemon reacted to his brother’s offer of help. Plus, the rider was clearly the Laenor Velaryon.

The singing in the trailer sounded, to me, like Al’s vocals from the songs. Even though Radcliffe can sing, I’m not sure he could sound enough like Al for it to work here.  That said the whole trailer is deeply absurd, so using Al’s vocals & having Radcliffe lip-sync them kinda badly seems fitting.

Yeah, I thought that was a weird read—both that Alicent is a schemer & that she & Viserys are already sexually intimate. If anything, it feels like the show is taking pains NOT to suggest those things.

If anybody’s grooming anybody here, it’s Alicent grooming the King. Or, more accurately, the Hand her father using Alicent to groom the king.

It’s been a long time since these “reviews” have been anything but recaps. The “Stray Observations” section at the end allows for just a bit of opinion or analysis, but the main body of the piece is pretty much a play-by-play, only occasionally editorializing.