(Warning: The following contains MAJOR spoilers for The Dragon House Season 2 Episode 4, “The Red Dragon and the Gold. »)
This is the time when every Fire and Blood As the Targaryen civil war reached the point of no return and the Greens attacked Rook’s Rest, the home of Team Black ally Lord Staunton (Michael Elwyn), Rhaenys (Eve Best) offered to travel to the Crown lands on behalf of Rhaenyra (Emma D’Arcy).
Aboard her beloved dragon Meleys, Rhaenys reached Rook’s Rest, but was ambushed by Aegon (Tom Glynn-Carney), Aemond (Ewan Mitchell), and their dragons. The fearsome Rhaenys refused to back down and charged with Meleys into a brutal battle across the sky. After Aegon and Sunfyre fell (thanks to Aemond), Rhaenys and Meleys were caught off guard by a sneak attack from Vhagar and Aemond.
As Vhagar viciously attacked Meleys, Rhaenys must have watched in horror. When it became clear that Meleys was going to die, Rhaenys let go of her saddle and stared at the clear sky above as she plummeted to her death alongside her dragon. Below, Best spoke with TV Insider about Rhaenys’ sacrifice, his final advice to Rhaenyra, and why the Queen Who Never Was never afraid of death.
When Rhaenys offered to go to Rook’s Rest, was she ready to die?
Eve Best: Absolutely, and actually, more than that, I think she knows full well that this is a kamikaze mission. But more to the point, I feel like for her, it has to be a sacrifice. Of all the characters in Season 2, from the moment she chose not to start a nuclear war at the end of Episode 9 (of Season 1), she has campaigned and kept everyone away from the Dragon War as best she could. She has done everything she could. She, of all people, knows this from bitter life experience. She and Corlys are the only adults left in the room at this point, and they are the only ones who truly understand the weight of what they are on the brink of. The younger ones simply have no experience of it. This kingdom has known 70 years of total peace. No one has any idea what it really means to go through that. No one knows the extent of the horror that the dragon war/nuclear war will unleash. She has done everything to prevent it, and now, at this point where it is inevitable, it is the only measure that can be taken.
She knows it because she has this knightly code. Someone described her as Lancelot. She’s like Rhaenyra’s Lancelot tonight. It seems so right that she has this code of a knight or a samurai. She knows that the only person who could really push that red button is her. She knows it as a tactician because she’s the most experienced. She’s the one who’s going to have the least bloodshed. It’s going to be the most effective and immediate way to do it if it has to be done. She’s the only person who can do it effectively. And more than that, the importance of that act, of pushing the red button, by its very nature, has to be a sacrificial act because you can’t live after you do it. You can’t live with yourself, and you can’t walk away from it. She knows she’s going to have to take one for the team. I think she takes it lightly, like, “Don’t worry, I’ll be back in time for tea.” But deep down, it’s the most important decision she can make. She knows it has to be a sacrifice. I think the only being she can share that with is her dragon.
Did anything change during the filming of episode 4?
When she introduced herself to Rhaenyra and the council, her line was originally, “Send me.” Jace wants to go. The younglings are all fighting. Rhaenyra kind of wanted to go, but she didn’t have enough experience. In the original, Rhaenys said, “Send me,” which is great, but there’s something a little open-ended about it. Sara[Hess]the writer, suggested, “Why don’t you try, ‘You must “Send me,” which is brilliant. It’s final, and it’s also an instruction; it’s like her last piece of advice to Rhaenyra. It’s her last piece of advice before they all go into the abyss. She’s saying, “Look, this is how you lead. This is how you reign.”
Ollie Upton / HBO
At Tower’s Rest, Rhaenys is caught off guard by the arrival of Aegon and Sunfyre. When it was just them, do you think Rhaenys thought she could kill Aegon and get away with it?
I think that’s absolutely true. When Aegon comes along, she doesn’t want to do it because, after all, he’s a nephew. He’s a relatively innocent idiot. It’s like, “Okay, we could take care of him, take him out, and then this would be over.” It would be relatively simple. But then when Vhagar enters the fray, it all takes on a whole new dimension. That’s when it gets out of hand. She has this moment where she could leave, but it’s the noble warrior in her. She turns around and says, “No, I have to go back.” Not for herself. She knows there’s almost no way she’s going to survive this, but she has to do it because she’s programmed as the noble warrior. It’s the honorable thing to do. She has to do whatever she can to stop this, and if there’s a chance to stop Vhagar, then she has to take it.
Aemond tries to kill Aegon during the dragon fight. Do you think Rhaenys recognized what Aemond was doing at that moment?
I think so. I think it also plays into another reason why she’s coming back. It’s just more fuel to try to separate these two and deal with Vhagar. It’s like watching a rabid dog maul a smaller dog. There’s just something in her that says it can’t happen. It’s not a fair fight.
After Rhaenys and Meleys fight Aemond and Vhagar in the air, there is a moment of respite. Rhaenys and Meleys head towards the water. Was she going back to Dragonstone? I feel like Rhaenys knew full well that Vhagar was still there.
I think it was just a momentary idea, let’s get out of the immediate arena and regroup. But it doesn’t go far enough to be a full-fledged idea, let’s go back and escape. Even though there was an initial instinct to just get away from the red zone, it very quickly turns into diving back into the zone because that’s the morally right thing to do.
Vhagar immediately tried to kill Meleys. While Vhagar was killing Meleys, Rhaenys knew exactly what was happening. Given their bond, do you think Rhaenys accepted her fate when Meleys was dying?
I think she accepted hers. I think the hardest thing about the whole sequence, the whole season, the whole moment, was watching her dragon get shredded and die in front of her, knowing that she couldn’t do anything, feeling like it was her fault and that she had kind of let Meleys down. Throughout Season 2, she lost the one person who was her rock. She and Corlys went through loss after loss after loss in Season 1. They went through it as a team. And then in Season 2, with the re-emergence of this old relationship of Corlys, which is so painful for her. He was her rock, and now he’s starting to crack. She’s become more and more isolated and more and more base, until her only ally and her only friend is Meleys. It was really important to me to capture that as much as possible, like those little moments right before they leave for Tower’s Rest. She says in High Valyrian, “It’s time to go into battle, old maid.” They share that moment together because there’s such an intimacy. It’s like an umbilical cord between them. I think at that moment, her own fate matters less. It’s what’s happening with Meleys that’s the agony. It’s the ultimate devastation. In a way, it’s like it’s happening to Rhaenys too. It’s like the life is being eaten away from her. I felt like when she lets go, because she’s holding on to Meleys’ saddle, and in the moment that she lets go, there’s this peace and this acceptance that we’ve done the best we can.
There’s a beautiful stoicism in Rhaenys’ face when she lets go. There’s a certain freedom in that. She’s not afraid to die.
Absolutely. It was such a surrender, and it felt like such a release and such a relief because she’s been carrying everything since season 1. Right from the beginning, this terrible injustice of what happened to her, and then the continued deluge of loss after the grief, after the death, after the abandonment, and everything that she’s had to hold on to. In season 2, she’s also holding on to everyone, as everyone else is falling apart around her, with absolute grace and stoicism. It’s this very, very heavy burden that she’s carrying because no one has ever seen anything else for a second. She’s always put her own stuff aside, and she’s just held on so tightly. I felt like letting go was the most incredible relief. Finally, she was free.
Do you think Rhaenys died believing that Rhaenyra would be able to win this war?
I think she lets that thought go. I think it’s no longer important at this point.
It depends on the gods.
It’s up to the gods to decide. That’s part of letting go. It’s like whatever happens happens. It’s letting go of any sense of control or any idea of controlling the outcome. It was very similar to my experience as an actor shooting this movie. There was a lot of pressure on that moment and a huge buildup in terms of time and emotion. It turned out to be the very last shot I shot, other than one tiny thing we had to do, but it was the last major moment I shot. So it was my last day on set, and Ryan[Condal]had made a big speech. The pressure was really building. By the time we got there, I was like a pressure cooker about to burst. I thought, “Oh my God, we have to hope that there’s time to dedicate to this moment and make it as big as it needs to be and work on it. I really have to deliver on my promises. “All these kinds of things go through your mind. We just went for it and it was over in a flash. We did two takes and the director said, ‘Yeah, I’m happy with it. This is good.’ It felt like a microcosm of Rhaenys’ experience: ‘Well, this is literally out of my control. I have no control over this anymore and thank God.'”
The Dragon HouseSunday, 9 p.m./8 p.m., HBO, Streaming on Max