Well, the marriage arrangements will preserve the Velaryon bloodline, if not the house name. True, Rhaenyra’s kids aren’t Laenor’s, but they’re still half Targaryen, & so still The Blood of Old Valyria. And Luke & Jace’s newly betrothed wives-to-be are Daemon’s kids with the Sea Snake’s daughter Laena, so THEY are…

They always seemed younger to me, but I agree that this latest casting, as “adults”, makes the age difference seem wider.

Something definitely changed—he made things much worse. There was already going to be trouble with Rhaenyra’s succession, obviously, but by mistakenly telling Alicent about Aegon’s Dream, in a vague enough way for her to misinterpret it as a complete change in the king’s long-standing plans, means a hell of a lot MORE…

I was gonna let “demure” go (the verb is “demur”; ”demure” is an adjective, & while they look alike, they have different roots). But “morays” for “mores” was more than I could bear. Please, PLEASE spend some money on copy editors.

I don’t think that was meant to be a pyroclastic flow—just ash & debris, but without the super-heated poison gas. (More like a pyroclastic fall.) Not even an elf as powerful as Galadriel could survive a real pyroclastic flow.

I was thinking this, too.  But maybe they were just talking about how he disappeared for a while, & was just found by the side of the road? Implying that he was up to something in that interim?  *shrugs*

Yeah, that was cheesy. It would have been better just to have Adar say “Mordor”.

Exactly. This is literally true of ALL film/TV adaptations! Nobody’s taking the original material away—fans will always have that. So to the self-proclaimed purists, I say: If you don’t like the adaptation, don’t watch it—we don’t really need to hear you complaining about it.

They do in the movies, but not in the books. Galadriel leaves with Gandalf & Bilbo & Frodo & Elrond, but Celeborn sticks around into the Fourth Age, continuing his role as a protector over Lothlorian (& adding land in southern no-longer-Mirkwood). He doesn’t stay too long, though, & heads into the West a few years…

So many fans lost their minds over Rian Johnson’s seeming heresy, making Rey a nobody. There’s no reason she HAD to be related to any other SW families, & it was way more interesting having her just be one of the many heretofore-nameless Force-sensitive beings in the galaxy. I would much rather have followed that…

In the “Inside the Episode” bit, one of the showrunners said that the funeral was one of the first scenes they filmed, so the actors hardly knew one another, which added to the stilted awkwardness. He didn’t say whether that was by design or a happy accident, but I do think that vibe comes through.

And I assume the body they pulled out of the fire was whoever Daemon neck-snapped on the stairs?  I didn’t track who that was--I guess some random servant?  Anyways, yeah--very clear that Daemon & Rhaenyra were co-conspirators.

“I don’t understand why people feel the need for every single little thing to be spelled out for them.”

Eh, I’m OK with how the kids look. I don’t disagree with your point, in real life, but on a show like this, purity of bloodline & the specific look of members of any given house are emphasized, so it makes sense here.

“Just show him missing a new body part every episode.”

I actually wondered whether they would do some flashbacks, but the fact that Alcock & Carey didn’t appear in the opening credits answered that question before the episode started.  All in all it was fine, IMO, but I do think just a couple quick flashback scenes would have helped move the pieces into place better.  The…

Re Laena’s death: We had just been told that she would die in clildbirth. Given the choice, she chose to die on her own terms. In an earlier scene, she specifically expressed a preference to die a dragonrider’s death. Smoked by dragonfire would seem to fit that wish.

Right. And Jenna also questions why Laena would kill herself, but it was clearly presented that she would die in childbirth. Knowing that, Laena chose to go out on her own terms.

A Wiki of Ice & Fire says Harren the Black was from House Hoare, at that time the house that ruled the Iron Islands. His grandfather (King Harwyn Hardhand) had also taken over much of the Riverlands, which is why he built Harrenhal there.

No idea.  Clueless Neophyte ALSO hates Kinja.