House of the Dragon: So far, so unexciting

About halfway through the first episode of House of the Dragon I found myself squirming in my chair, covering my eyes and muttering ‘Why the hell am I watching this vile schlock?’ I think this is probably a good sign. One of the main attractions of its predecessor Game of Thrones was that it kept taking you to places you didn’t want to go – incest, crippled children, mass murders at weddings, sacrificial daughters, lead characters culled long before their time – and on this score at least, House of the Dragon looks unlikely to disappoint.

But I’m less sure, so far, about the court intrigue. Everyone is saying that what Dragon is really missing is the light relief and wit provided by the jaded, drunken, whoring ‘Imp’ Tyrion Lannister (Peter Dinklage). And everyone is right. There are lots of scenes involving oldish men sitting around long tables in vaulted chambers talking politics. It’s like being dragged to a Shakespeare production when you’re 11 and hate Shakespeare.

And not that good a production either. Perhaps this is nostalgia playing tricks on me but what raised Thrones to another level was the acting talent. Sure the younger actors were a bit uneven, as young actors tend to be. But the older roles tended to go to the cream of British film and theatre – Charles Dance, Lena Headey, Iain Glen, Aidan Gillen, Diana Rigg, elevating what could have just been gory, soft-porn swords and sorcery almost to the level of high art.

I’m not, so far, getting quite the same feel from Dragon. Paddy Considine is wasted as a feeble, uncharismatic king. His advisors, meanwhile, seem largely devoid of personality. Apart from bringing an unexpected black face to the King’s Landing court, for example, what exactly is the function of Steve Toussaint’s dreary, cipher Corlys Velaryon? Even the normally excellent Bill Paterson (Lord Lyman) comes across like he’s only there because the casting director had exhausted the list of British screen stalwarts who weren’t in the original Thrones.

So far, it has been left to Matt Smith (out of Doctor Who) to be the character you can’t stop watching. He’s the ailing king’s ambitious brother Daemon Targaryen and he’s properly evil, with long silvery hair (like one of the elves from Lord of the Rings turned bad), a mischievous, seductive smile, and a delightfully sadistic streak. He demonstrates this in the lists (in a scene far too violent even for my normally unshockable tastes) where, in his Loki-esque winged helmet, he mashes various knights’ faces to a pulp. And also in his role as Commander of the City Watch, where he punishes wrongdoers with his cadre of gold-cloaked thugs by chopping off their limbs and genitals. Still, he’s got a soft side: he appears fond of his niece Rhaenys (Eve Best).

Rhaenyra (by crikey, George R.R. Martin’s torturously spelled names are tiresome!) is there to fill the spot left vacant by her 170-odd-years-later successor Daenerys Targaryen. Played by Milly Alcock she has blonde hair and flies around a lot on dragons, which respect her and obey her commands. You can be sure, for these reasons, that she is not one of those key characters likely to be killed any time soon for gratuitous shock value. I think we will come to like her, while praying all the while that she does not become as priggish and irritating as the Mother of Dragons eventually did.

The other thing we shall pray for, of course, is that House of Dragon is not allowed to descend into rushed, intelligence-insulting chaos and stupidity like Thrones did in its final seasons. Presumably the showrunners are aware of this imperative (fool me once etc). But on the basis of this first episode it’s hard to call things either way. It’s not even clear how much of the Seven Kingdoms we’re going to see: this first episode remained resolutely, almost claustrophobically stuck in King’s Landing, with nary a glimpse of Winterfell, or the Wall, let alone far flung regions such as Dorne. I’m hoping that this is just because they’re keeping it in reserve, rather than because of budgetary restrictions.

Verdict so far (and didn’t I do well not giving away any spoilers?): nothing much to grumble about but nothing to get excited about either. But I don’t half miss the Imp, the White Walkers (not to everyone’s taste I know but the Hardhome battle was one of my favourite episodes) and the pert female buttocks which, though still present are, I suspect, going to be rationed more stingily than they were in Thrones.