House of the Dragon

 So the spin-off of the (especially the earlier seasons) acclaimed Game Of Thrones!

Would it be as bloody and politically intriguing as the first seasons of it's parentseries, or a messy mish-mash like the latter?

Well, to be honest, neither.  I just found the whole thing bloody boring.

Set to be about 200 years before the events of Game of Thrones, the Westerosi elect Vicerys Thargaryen as the new king of Westeros, even though his sister Rhaenys was first in line.  Nine years into his reign, he organises a jousting tournament as he believes his wife to be pregnant of a male heir.  But he is forced to kill his wife with a C-section to get his child out, but the baby Baelon dies shortly after, leaving Vicerys broken.  He appoints his only living child, princess Rhaenyra, heir to the Iron Throne after he learns that his brother Daemon mocked the dead baby, banishing him from King's Landing.

daemon occupies Castle Dragonstone, from where he fights the Crabfeeder, a pirate lord harassing the shipping lanes of the Stepstones at the behest of the Essos Triarchy.  Ser Otto Hightower, the Hand of the King, sends his daughter Alicent to comfort and seduce the grieving king.  Otto as well as Rhaenyra travel to Dragonstone to force Daemon to return a dragon egg that he stole upon his banishment.  Together with Lord Corlys, the Sea Snake of House Valerys, he then goes to battle the Crabfeeder for three long years, a time in which Vicerys married princess Alicent who gives birth to the male heirs he always wanted, Aegon and later Aemond.  Ailing with sickness, he asks Rhaenyra, seventeen now, to seek a good husband and form a strong alliance to protect her lineage.  In the end she choses Laenor Valerys, the son of lord Corlys, but also a man attracted to other men.

Ser Hightower however schemes to make Aegon the successor to the throne, as Vicerys finally decides to send forces to aid in the battles at the Stepstones, where Daemon takes the victory in order to try and redeem himself with his brother.  They reconcile, but when he nearly seduces Rhaenyra during a night in the belly of the city he is exiled to the Vale, while Rhaenyra seduces her King's Guard, ser Criston.  She is later bethrotted to ser Laeron, as Daemon marries his wife Lady Royce.  Rhaenyra and her new husband strike a bargain that she will produce heirs, and he can then pursue his own lovers, while ser Criston feels betrayed as she doesn't want to elope with him to Essos, preferring their current sexual state of affairs indeed.

During the wedding, Queen Alicent appears wearing green, the signal for the House Hightower to take up arms.  Daemon also attends, confronted by the niece of his former wife denying he murdered her but laying claim to her lands.  When Laenor's lover surmises ser Criston is Rhaenyra's lover, the latter kills him to prevent the chance of being blackmailed.  Ser Criston, now disgraced, wants to commit suicide but the queen stops him.  

Jumping forward ten years, Rhaenyra now has three sons: Jacaerys, Lucerys and newborn Joffrey.  While they lack the valyrian platinum hair, King Vicerys rejects all the claims saying they are not fathered by Laeron.  Daemon and his new wife Laena Valerys visit Pentos with their daughters, where they are offered a lordship in exchange for an alliance against a resurging Triarchy.  As Laena feels she won't make it through the birth of her still child inside, she orders her dragon to incinerate her.  Ser Criston, now serving the queen, lures ser Harwin in attacking him by claiming he is the father of Rhaenyra's children instead, and he returns with his father, the current Hand of the King as Otto has been lifted from the post, to Harrenhall.  But the castle is then set on fire, killing both of them, by assassins hired by the queen, allowing ser Otto to be reinstated by the queen's wishes.

Out of safety, Rhaenyra moves her household to Dragonstone, away from the rumours and dangers of King's Landing.  At the funeral of lady Laena, the brothers fail to reconcile, but daemon and Rhaenyra do and are intimate.  In a struggle between Rhaenyra and Alicent's children, Lucerys slashes out Aemond's eye with a knife, and sparks the rift between the houses.  Amidst the claims, a set-up is made to fake Laenor's demise, allowing him off to war with his lover as Rhaenyra and Daemon ally against Alicent and her family.

Jumping forward again, this time six years, Lord Corlys is gravely wounded at the Stepstones.  His brother, sir Vaemond, petitions to name him heir, claiming Lucerys as illegitimate.  King Vicerys by now is so far taken by illness that the queen and her father, once again Hand of the King, oversee matters though.  But Viserys does declare Lucerys the heir, and as Vaemond states Rhaenyra a whore, he is beheaded by Daemon.  While reconcilation is in the air, Aemond declares Rhaenyra's sons bastards and incites a fight as such, as Alicent overhears a dying Viserys mutter parts of Aegon the Conqueror's tale, interpretting it as him wanting her son Aegon to claim the Iron Throne.

After the king's death, which is kept silent, the small council led by ser Otto creates a scheme to put Aegon on the throne, forcing nobles to toss loyalty or be killed.  They discuss wether to kill or exile Rhaenyra, as Alicent persuades Aegon to put down his claim to the throne at last, which his aunt Rhaenys refuses to support.  She is imprisoned, but escapes on her dragon.  She informs Dragonstone of the king's death, as they prepare for the conflict to come.  House Valyrion pledges for her, but when she sends her sons to hear if the other noble houses still support her, Lucerys is devoured by Aemond's dragon after an aerial battle in which the beasts of both riders refuse to obey their riders, enraging Rhaenyra as news reaches her...

So, politics enough in this first season, but somehow it didn't pop out as much from the screen as the original series did in it's first years.  Still, I'm awaiting season 2 to see if it picks up the pace, and not by making time-jumps so often.  And we know from the source material, the book Fire and Blood, the young prince's death put aside politics and sparked the war known as The Dance of Dragons...