One of the most exciting surprises that awaits fans in Dragon House Season 2 was the reveal that Aegon II (Tom Glynn-Carney) wasn’t actually cut from the same sociopathic mold as game of ThronesThe mad boy king, Joffrey Baratheon (Jack Gleeson). Sure, we knew from season 1 that the eldest son of Alicent Hightower (Olivia Cooke) and Viserys (Paddy Considine) was not a paradigm of virtue. However, the Aegon we meet at the beginning of the new season of the HBO hit seems to seriously want to improve. He adores his son and heir, Jaehaerys, and attempts to satisfy the requests of the common people who come to make requests of him. Furthermore, there are times when “Aegon the Magnanimous” is simply fun.
Whether we laugh at or pity Aegon II this year, it’s a testament to the layered and nuanced work that Dragon House is doing star Tom Glynn-Carney in Season 2. By making Aegon more human, even more likable (?), Glynn-Carney is making the HBO show’s rapid descent into apocalyptic violence even more electrifying. see. But, like us, you might be wondering: Did Tom Glynn-Carney intend to make Aegon so funny?
“Well, look, I find it quite manic.” Dragon House Star Tom Glynn-Carney admitted to Jugo Mobile during a recent roundtable interview. “And I think instead of playing humor, which is always a terrible idea because it always ends up not being funny when you play humor, I want to bring this kind of frenetic energy from him and the kind of nonchalance to his approach to being king. in this days”.
“I think it’s important to find lightness at the beginning of something. You know, we have to give him a place to go. And I actually think it’s pretty funny.”
Only in the first two episodes of Dragon House In season 2, Aegon has certainly had a lot of places to go, emotionally speaking. We’ve seen him giddy over his little boy’s antics at the Small Council, confused as to why he can’t just give some poor guy his goats back, and completely destroyed by the murder of Jaehaerys. In Dragon House Season 2 Episode 2, Aegon is consumed by fury. He destroys his father’s massive replica of ancient Valyria as he shouts, “I DECLARE WAR!”
“The loss of Jaehaerys is enormous. It’s transcendental and it’s one of those things that just stains. It affects you on an atomic level now. It’s something that’s never fully digested, made sense of, or let go,” Glynn-Carney said. “So, yes, it influences a lot of his decisions in the future.”
Jaehaerys, of course, was killed by two lowly assassins hired by Daemon Targaryen (Matt Smith) in the Dragon House Season 2 premiere. The assassins sneaked into the Red Keep with orders to assassinate Aemond Targaryen (Ewan Mitchell), but if they couldn’t find him, any male Hightower would do. “A son for a son,” was the order.
While Daemon might have seen Jaehaerys’ murder as revenge for the death of his stepson Lucerys Velaryon (Elliott Grihault) at the end of Season 1, the vile act of beheading a young child in his bed has much more insidious reverberations. In addition to portraying Rhaenyra (Emma D’Arcy) as a heartless villain, he destabilizes Aegon at the worst possible moment.
“I think he saw a part of himself in Jaehaerys,” Glynn-Carney said. “I always had in my head that he was rebuilding the person he would have wanted to be through him.”
The actor explained that Aegon wanted to give Jaehaerys the “love and attention” that perhaps his parents didn’t give him. “He saw elements of himself in [Jaehaerys] And in a way it was kind of a new beginning for him. And now it has been taken away from them.”
Without Jaehaerys, Aegon gives in to his worst impulses. He takes out his pain on the murderer of his son by gleefully beating him to death and ignores the pain his sister and wife Helaena (Phia Saban) is also going through. Aegon accelerates war plans, hanging all the rat catchers in the Red Keep in hopes of catching the one who instigated Jaehaerys’ death and dismissing his cautious grandfather Ser Otto Hightower (Rhys Ifans) as Hand. Ser Criston Cole (Fabien Frankel) will now be Hand, ensuring more blood is spilled.
However, Tom Glynn-Carney’s descent into Aegon’s dark state of mind is never without a touch of humanity. You understand that it is pain that drives these decisions. Grief for Jaehaerys, Aegon’s son and heir, grief for the “good” king Aegon could have been, and grief for the way his family has failed him.
One of the most chilling scenes in Dragon House Season 2 so far arrives when Alicent finds Aegon sobbing by the fire. Instead of comforting her son, Alicent abandons him without saying a word.
“There’s a great poem: ‘They screw you, your mom and your dad. Maybe they don’t want to do it, but they do it.’ She continues with that. But yeah, it reminds me of that,” Glynn-Carney said, quoting Philip Larkin’s comment: “This be the verse.”
It is a poem that, like George RR Martin’s books, laments that “man gives misery to man.” Trauma begets more trauma, a theme Dragon HouseThe interpersonal drama is digging this season.
“Of course yes [Alicent]I had shown up more and given him the love and time,” Glynn-Carney reflected. “And again, it’s about communication. That moment when she comes out of that scene where he cries in front of the fire says it all. It’s just that it’s a silent scene with no dialogue. She says everything you need to know about that relationship.”
Whether you are working without words, in a quiet seat on the Iron Throne or Dragon HouseIn the intense, profanity-filled dialogue, Tom Glynn-Carney knows how to make Aegon II a different kind of disaster. game of Thrones character. One that is incredibly fun to watch unfold.
