[00:00] we're breaking down House of the Dragon. The preview for episode 8 is now here, and this is&nbsp; probably our last look at the finale before we see&nbsp;&nbsp;
[00:14] it on Sunday. In this video, I want to talk about&nbsp; what happens in it, how it differs from the book,&nbsp;&nbsp; and where things could be going next. As&nbsp; always, we will play the trailer first as well,&nbsp;&nbsp; and then get into the breakdown, but there will be&nbsp; spoilers, too. News of Agon's return has set the&nbsp;&nbsp;
[00:30] queen on the dark path. You have an absolute power&nbsp; within your grasp. You have only to wield it.
[00:42] He and Roxton [music] have some secret&nbsp; plot of foot. He has kept it even from&nbsp;&nbsp; me. You still prepared to die for our queen?&nbsp; Can't [&nbsp;__&nbsp;] wait. Our father would hate you&nbsp;&nbsp; for this. Two paths diverge before you.&nbsp; Whether you live or die today, victory,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[01:00] you will be remembered in the histories or&nbsp; a mountain of dead high towers. [screaming]
[01:14] There'll be no doubt who the&nbsp; gods have chosen to rule. Okay, so we begin at King's Landing looking at&nbsp; the Sept with Enjum Tanira who's holding her&nbsp;&nbsp;
[01:28] crown worn by both Jiharis and Viseris. This used&nbsp; to be a symbol of peace. Agon's crown was worn by&nbsp;&nbsp; the kings who sought after war, whereas this was&nbsp; more for the type of leader that Renero wanted&nbsp;&nbsp; to be. However, the realm has been thrust into&nbsp; chaos and things just aren't going the way she&nbsp;&nbsp;
[01:43] wanted. You might also notice we have Viseris'&nbsp; Lego set in the background of the shot. cut to&nbsp;&nbsp; the wide shot of the room and we can see that it&nbsp; has been brought about the basement. So now here&nbsp;&nbsp; the skull that represented um the murderer of&nbsp; her son. I know it wasn't him but she had that&nbsp;&nbsp;
[01:58] in the room beforehand. Um but this is now kind&nbsp; of a more optimistic look at death and how to&nbsp;&nbsp; potentially handle things going forward instead of&nbsp; the skull being like representative of revenge. We&nbsp;&nbsp; then hear Adam telling Alan that news of Agon's&nbsp; return has set the queen on a dark path. So,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[02:13] it looks like the news of Sunfire and Agon has&nbsp; traveled fast and everyone's been telling people&nbsp;&nbsp; about that episode 7 ending and it was a banger&nbsp; to be fair. You also see as she grabs Baylor's&nbsp;&nbsp; face during this. I think this is a moment in&nbsp; which Reneer is going to turn on the dragon seats&nbsp;&nbsp;
[02:28] in the book after elf and Hugh switched to the&nbsp; greens and Damon was fooling around with Nettles,&nbsp;&nbsp; she ended up turning on the dragon seats. Nettles&nbsp; has been changed to Raina in the show and they've&nbsp;&nbsp; done something vastly different where she was&nbsp; responsible for Jayce's death. So that's just&nbsp;&nbsp;
[02:40] kind of driving Reneer at a turn on everyone that&nbsp; she trusts. Actually really like the changes with&nbsp;&nbsp; Baylor as well and they're piling a lot more into&nbsp; how she's going to get in trouble. She used to be&nbsp;&nbsp; engaged to Jace but is now kissing Alan and also&nbsp; being kind to her sister. So it's clearly going&nbsp;&nbsp;
[02:55] to drive a wedge and I think ultimately Rene may&nbsp; lose a lot of her dragon riders because of this.&nbsp;&nbsp; Now in the book it was Callless who warned Adam&nbsp; and Allan that she was turning on her soldiers and&nbsp;&nbsp; because of this he was banished to the dungeons.&nbsp; But with him being captured by Orman, I do wonder&nbsp;&nbsp;
[03:09] if this is going to happen to Baylor instead when&nbsp; it comes to Reneer as well. I'm really glad the&nbsp;&nbsp; show is leaning into her actually going down a&nbsp; dark path. The series had kind of sanitized her&nbsp;&nbsp; a bit, but now she's fully back doing lots of&nbsp; questionable things and is clearly just looking&nbsp;&nbsp;
[03:25] to get power. This is ultimately what leads her&nbsp; to finally attacking Tumbleton. And we see Damon&nbsp;&nbsp; riding out with his legions as well as Caraxis&nbsp; flying overhead. You might also notice the banners&nbsp;&nbsp; of the Tullies and Brackens. And in this bit, we&nbsp; also have the malisters to the right. And a later&nbsp;&nbsp;
[03:39] shot shows a stark sigil as well. Damon then says,&nbsp; "You have an absolute power within your grasp. You&nbsp;&nbsp; have only to wield it." This is to a terrible&nbsp; impression there, but I think it's him finally&nbsp;&nbsp; winning her round of the idea they can just use&nbsp; dragons to make Westeros bend to their will. Damon&nbsp;&nbsp;
[03:55] has spent the entire season talking about using&nbsp; them to take not only over Westeros, but also&nbsp;&nbsp; Essos. And I think he's finally getting through&nbsp; to her. So, they are going to attack Tumbleton.&nbsp;&nbsp; And though the queen succeeds here, it's actually&nbsp; greatly unpopular because she's willing to attack&nbsp;&nbsp;
[04:09] her own people. So it doesn't go down well and the&nbsp; victory actually kind of causes everyone to turn&nbsp;&nbsp; on her. Now it's at this point that we then switch&nbsp; to the green side. Darren tells his uncle that&nbsp;&nbsp; Orman and Roxson have some secret plot of foot and&nbsp; he then says he's kept it even from me. I think&nbsp;&nbsp;
[04:25] he's clearly twigging onto the idea that Orman&nbsp; might potentially be betraying him and possibly&nbsp;&nbsp; setting him up to die. Throughout the episodes,&nbsp; Orund has constantly gone on about playing devious&nbsp;&nbsp; games and basically being deceitful in order to&nbsp; win. Whether it was the story of Miriam Martell&nbsp;&nbsp;
[04:39] or the doppelganger Darren, nothing is really as&nbsp; it seems. Though Orman is seen in armor as well,&nbsp;&nbsp; he doesn't really seem like the fighting type&nbsp; and we've seen his reaction when he's faced&nbsp;&nbsp; with death. So, I can't really see him getting&nbsp; his hands dirty and instead I think he actually&nbsp;&nbsp;
[04:54] wants Reneer to attack the town, kill Darren,&nbsp; and then this will make her look even worse.&nbsp;&nbsp; John Roxton's also going to be interesting in this&nbsp; episode as well, I think, as he is a knight that's&nbsp;&nbsp; known in the blood as Bold Jon and actually&nbsp; forces himself upon Lady Sheriff's Futley,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[05:09] who we met earlier in the season. I do wonder if&nbsp; that will happen in this episode or at the start&nbsp;&nbsp; of season 4. They're also adding a lot of Darren&nbsp; as well. In the source material, Darren the Daring&nbsp;&nbsp; is largely defined by his youthful courage and&nbsp; also his dragon to Sarian. He arrives at Tumbleton&nbsp;&nbsp;
[05:24] with a high tower host and fights honorably until&nbsp; events overtake him and he ends up leaving. That&nbsp;&nbsp; is something that Gwane suggested in episode 7.&nbsp; So I do think that might be what happens here.&nbsp;&nbsp; Now if that isn't the case then the plot Darren&nbsp; cannot be involved in possibly deals with the&nbsp;&nbsp;
[05:39] dragon seeds Hugh and they're already positioned&nbsp; at Tumbleton with Vermathor and Silverwing. Again&nbsp;&nbsp; these two will become the quote unquote two&nbsp; betrayers and Hugh will likely be doing it&nbsp;&nbsp; for his wife whereas Ulf just wants a nice pint.&nbsp; We then cut to the black side and see Damon say,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[05:55] "Are you still prepared to die for our queen?" And&nbsp; we get the excellent, "Can't [&nbsp;__&nbsp;] wait." Think&nbsp;&nbsp; it nicely shows the opposites between the sides&nbsp; and that the blacks have people willing to die&nbsp;&nbsp; for them, whereas the Greens are all backstabbing&nbsp; and screwing each other over. Even the stuff with&nbsp;&nbsp;
[06:09] Allison is pretty bad and they're just all out for&nbsp; their own ends. We then see Helena telling Reira&nbsp;&nbsp; that their dad would hate her for this. I think&nbsp; Rey has probably gone back to her demanding more&nbsp;&nbsp; info. And I do think this might be the episode&nbsp; that Helena finally dies in. In the book, she&nbsp;&nbsp;
[06:24] ends up tossing herself out the window, and she&nbsp; has talked about staying away from it, wanting to&nbsp;&nbsp; see the moon, and basically dreaming about getting&nbsp; away from the kingdom. Allison's abandoned her&nbsp;&nbsp; to go and kill Aemon, and I think she'll realize&nbsp; that her child will be taken away, and she'll be&nbsp;&nbsp;
[06:38] forever forced to tell of her dreams, which will&nbsp; push her off the edge. This is different from the&nbsp;&nbsp; book, though, where Reneer apparently sent her&nbsp; son Moor's head in a chamber pot. She'd been in&nbsp;&nbsp; a depression since Blood and Cheese, and this&nbsp; was something that was a step too far. We also&nbsp;&nbsp;
[06:52] see Allison in the woods as Calla says, "Two&nbsp; paths lay ahead of you. She seems to be lost&nbsp;&nbsp; and nicely looking at two directions that she can&nbsp; go in." And hey, I appreciate the editing there,&nbsp;&nbsp; mate. I do think that she'll come across Egon in&nbsp; the woods, though. But then she'll be hit with&nbsp;&nbsp;
[07:06] another moral quandry. Will she team up with the&nbsp; son or try and kill him as well and truly become&nbsp;&nbsp; mother of the air? We then get some great shots&nbsp; at Tumbleton that seemed like the mounting up to&nbsp;&nbsp; battle. When we cut at the gates inside the wall,&nbsp; I did also notice a woman standing in front of the&nbsp;&nbsp;
[07:20] first horse. It's difficult to make out, but just&nbsp; by the hair, the dress that she's in, I did think&nbsp;&nbsp; it looked a bit like Cat, but let me know below&nbsp; if you disagree. Alan then marches out of King's&nbsp;&nbsp;
[07:32] Landing with the red keep behind him at the back.&nbsp; We then get some of the fighting at Tumbleton,&nbsp;&nbsp; including a shot of Hugh. They also satellite an&nbsp; oil line around the castle to stop the incoming&nbsp;&nbsp; army. We also see Gwain running as the episode&nbsp; text appears on screen and Aemon walking through&nbsp;&nbsp;
[07:45] the halls of Harrenhal. This confirms he lives and&nbsp; this location is clearly symbolic. This is where&nbsp;&nbsp; Jiharis first announces he at the start of season&nbsp; 1 and he clearly comes across something that stops&nbsp;&nbsp;
[07:57] him. Now I think this is likely Vagar who may have&nbsp; returned due to her sensing he was poisoned. Orund&nbsp;&nbsp; also storms the street as a dragon flies behind&nbsp; him which I think might be Ula Hughes. Now,&nbsp;&nbsp; if you love dragons, mate, then why not check out&nbsp; our merch store right below the video. There we&nbsp;&nbsp;
[08:11] have our brand new Sunfire shirt, which we've just&nbsp; dropped for his returning episode 7. We also have&nbsp;&nbsp; them for Sheepsteeler, Krais, Vaggar, and Serax.&nbsp; And if you buy more than one, you'll automatically&nbsp;&nbsp; get a discount. The more you buy as well, the&nbsp; more money you save, and it all helps videos like&nbsp;&nbsp;
[08:26] this get made. But everything in the finale is&nbsp; clearly going to culminate with the first battle&nbsp;&nbsp; of Tumbleton. In Fire and Blood, the sequence is&nbsp; one of the dancers's most brutal and consequential&nbsp;&nbsp; moments. The blacks hold a town with a modest&nbsp; garrison which is reinforced by the winter&nbsp;&nbsp;
[08:38] wolves under Rody the rune for the story. They&nbsp; also have the dragons Vermathor and Silverwing&nbsp;&nbsp; with Hugh and Olf. Orund then marches north with&nbsp; his army and Prince Darren on Tisarian. The winter&nbsp;&nbsp; wolves then charge and Rody kills Orman before&nbsp; succumbing to his wounds. Hugh and Olf then turn&nbsp;&nbsp;
[08:52] their dragons on the town itself. Tumbleton burns&nbsp; and the gates are then opened by the traitors and&nbsp;&nbsp; this leads to the second battle of Tumbleton. Now,&nbsp; I don't think that's going to happen for the show,&nbsp;&nbsp; obviously. Uh, and instead, I think they'll be&nbsp; confined to doing this all in one episode in&nbsp;&nbsp;
[09:06] the space of one battle. I think Orman will likely&nbsp; die in Tumbleton as well, and I can't actually see&nbsp;&nbsp; Hugh burning the town. His wife's there. Cat is&nbsp; new for the show. Um, she is, of course, his wife,&nbsp;&nbsp; so I don't think that's going to happen. Because&nbsp; of that, I'm expecting a lot of big differences,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[09:20] and I think the dragon seeds might even&nbsp; switch sides before the fight even begins.&nbsp;&nbsp; There's also a line in the book about mountain&nbsp; of dead high towers. So, we can expect the body&nbsp;&nbsp; count to be pretty big. More securious if Aund&nbsp; might get a vision at Harrenhal and potentially&nbsp;&nbsp;
[09:34] see something other than Vagar. It seems like the&nbsp; kind of place that he may witness the God's eye&nbsp;&nbsp; confrontation with Damon or perhaps even something&nbsp; from his past like get us another Viseris cameo or&nbsp;&nbsp; from season 2 that they probably need to place&nbsp; their battles throughout the season. I didn't even&nbsp;&nbsp;
[09:51] think Tumbleton would take place at the midpoint&nbsp; of season 3, but I'm glad they kind of flesh it&nbsp;&nbsp; out throughout the episodes. It really adds to the&nbsp; weight of Reneer going bad. In the book, she grows&nbsp;&nbsp; increasingly paranoid and cruel after Tumbleton,&nbsp; and the series is frontloading that change so the&nbsp;&nbsp;
[10:06] finale can land it. The finale also seems to be&nbsp; using Aegon's return as a major catalyst for why&nbsp;&nbsp; she's turning against everyone. The two are&nbsp; heading towards a showdown that will no doubt&nbsp;&nbsp; be a very big talking point on the internet, and&nbsp; they're all kind of laying the groundwork here.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[10:20] His survival in Sunfire's recovery reintroduces a&nbsp; king who in the book spends [snorts] much of this&nbsp;&nbsp; period in recovery and later sees his dragon&nbsp; stone. So this preview kind of makes that the&nbsp;&nbsp; spark that sets Ran era off. Also like the fact&nbsp; that Corus says there are two paths ahead and each&nbsp;&nbsp;
[10:34] character has a certain way they can go. They're&nbsp; all clearly at a crossroads and kind of facing&nbsp;&nbsp; the choice of whether they go down that dark&nbsp; path as said by Adam or they do something good,&nbsp;&nbsp; which I'm sure you can guess they're all going&nbsp; to choose the right options in this more death,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[10:50] I say. Anyway, that's the trailer and I hope&nbsp; to see you on Sunday for our breakdown. Now,&nbsp;&nbsp; we might be a bit late. Uh, and I don't know if&nbsp; they're sending out the finale early for review&nbsp;&nbsp; and they have said they might even be holding&nbsp; it back completely. What? So, I'm going to have&nbsp;&nbsp;
[11:02] to get up on Sunday night. Um, and that means&nbsp; we might not drop it right after the episode,&nbsp;&nbsp; but we will be working on it as soon as it's out.&nbsp; Anyway, thank you for checking out the video.&nbsp;&nbsp; Please drop a like and also leave a comment with&nbsp; all your thoughts below. If you want to follow&nbsp;&nbsp;
[11:15] us out at Heavy Spoilers. Did you know as well&nbsp; that members of the channel get early access to&nbsp;&nbsp; a big breakdown every single week, a week before&nbsp; anyone else? And if you click that join button,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[11:27] all those prizes can be yours. This week, we're&nbsp; going to be dropping our breakdown of the Green&nbsp;&nbsp; Knight. Um, and then next week I think we're&nbsp; going to be doing maybe Edge of Tomorrow. So,&nbsp;&nbsp; that's got to be at least worth a dollar,&nbsp; both of those breakdowns, mate. Uh, so yeah,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[11:41] hopefully see you over there. If not, though, huge&nbsp; thank you for sitting through this video. I've&nbsp;&nbsp; been your host, Paul. You've been the best and&nbsp; I'll see you in the next one. Take care. Peace.