House of the Dragon season 3 review: HotD finally lives up to Game of Thrones' legacy

The prequel is delivering everything that made fans fall in love with Westeros

The most disappointing thing about the House of the Dragon season 2 finale was the lack of action. The war between Queen Rhaenyra (Emma D’Arcy) and the Hightower-backed Targaryens ruling King’s Landing was painstakingly set up in council meetings and secret negotiations, but the fighting hadn’t begun when the final credits rolled on a season hampered by Hollywood strikes and budget limitations. Showrunner Ryan Condal immediately remedies this in season 3 by dedicating much of the premiere to The Battle of the Gullet, one of the most awe-inspiring sequences ever pulled off in a franchise known for wild battles.

The Battle of the Gullet works on every level. The naval conflict between the fleet led by Lord Corlys Velaryon (Steve Toussaint) and the pirates of the Triarchy led by the ferocious Admiral Sharako Lohar (Abigail Thorn) is well lit, removing one of the perennial issues that has plagued the franchise. It’s a far better version of Daenerys’ fight against the Greyjoy fleet in Game of Thrones in that it makes the power and vulnerability of dragons very clear. Director Loni Peristere juxtaposes breathtaking shots of burning ships with brutal close-quarters fighting. The stakes are real for Rhaenyra’s claim to the Iron Throne, but also for the individual combatants, providing powerful catharsis for Lord Corlys and his bastard son Alyn of Hull (Abubakar Salim).

Meanwhile, in the Riverlands, rather than overcompensating and going too heavy on the action, Condal then largely abstracts Daemon Targaryen’s (Matt Smith) campaign against the Lannisters and other Hightower allies, instead picking up with its bloody aftermath. Game of Thrones has delivered plenty of big clashes between armies and Condal is reserving his budget while still delivering the tense battlefield negotiations that feel quintessentially Game of Thrones. Every victory feels fragile and seems to sow the seeds for future defeat as Daemon disappoints allies and underestimates enemies.

If the House of the Dragon season 3 premiere is Game of Thrones at its most epic, episode 3 is a perfect example of the intrigue and character studies that make it so compelling. Daenerys’ abrupt mad queen turn in Game of Thrones felt rushed, if inevitable, but Condal lays plenty of groundwork to show Rhaenyra fracturing. Her eyes are perpetually red, as if she hasn’t slept in days, and discordant music provides an ominous undertone as she struggles with the demands of leadership and the personal losses that keep stacking up. Game of Thrones has often made a point of how hard it is not just to grab power, but to retain it. There’s a dark humor in Rhaenyra being forced to juggle big problems, like how to best utilize her dragons, with petty ones like a rat infestation. The toll the civil war is taking on every aspect of life in Westeros is felt far from the actual battlefields.

Prequels can feel dull because the end of the stories is already known, but Condal has always excelled at turning House of the Dragon into a Shakespearean tragedy where every step in the pyrrhic war between the Targaryens feels inevitable. King Viserys (Paddy Considine) was viewed as weak in season 1, but characters now look back on him fondly as they recognize his miraculous ability to maintain peace and stability. The weight of history in the show’s early seasons could be overwhelming, but it’s paying dividends now as dragons die and great houses falter, making their loss feel devastating.

That Shakespearean quality is further enforced by the intensity of the show’s performances. Daemon is back to his cocky self after his strange journey in Harrenhal, though he finds himself perpetually sparring with Mysaria (Sonoya Mizuno), his former mistress who has become Rhaenyra’s spymaster. Alicent Hightower (Olivia Cooke) continues to feel like she’s barely keeping her head above water as she desperately tries to exert some control over her ruthless son Aemond (Ewan Mitchell) and rebuild her relationship with her childhood best friend Rhaenyra. The fraught dynamic between Alicent and Rhaenyra was one of the best parts of season 1, and largely absent in season 2, so watching the two women try to navigate the distance of so much loss and betrayal is another way of demonstrating the cost of this war. The new dragonrider Ulf White (Tom Bennett) provides needed levity and serves as a bit of an audience stand-in who requires education on the difference between noble status, but beneath his drunken uncouthness is a character more in tune with the smallfolk than Mysaria, who claims to be their advocate.

As big a cast as House of the Dragon has, it’s remarkable that new characters can still have so much impact. The addition of the Lord of Oldtown Ormund Hightower (James Norton) feels as momentous as when Oberyn Martell (Pedro Pascal) strutted into King’s Landing in season 4 of Game of Thrones. Norton’s performance is magnetic as a wildly unpredictable new player whose cunning represents a dramatic new threat in an already unstable realm.

It may be impossible for anything House of the Dragon does to live up to the hype of Game of Thrones, which transformed television and fantasy to unite a fracturing TV audience for one last monocultural moment. But Condal has the benefit of wisdom, building a show that can channel the best of its forebearer while avoiding some of its most notorious mistakes. House of the Dragon has already been renewed for a fourth and final season, offering a chance for something akin to redemption for Game of Thrones if Condal can bring the tale of the Dance of the Dragons to a satisfying conclusion. Until then, it’s well worth watching to enjoy the same mix of cutthroat intrigue, spectacular action, and gutting drama that made the world fall in love with Westeros.

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House of the Dragon season 3 premieres on HBO on June 21. New episodes release Sundays through Aug. 9.