House Of The Dragon Episode Ten Review - 9 Ups & 1 Down

Fans expecting a feel-good conclusion to House of the Dragon’s maiden season must have felt like an ant being hit by a freight train by the events of The Black Queen. In the tidal wave of treason, bloody miscarriages and kin-slaying by dragon that HBO crammed into 61 minutes of television, one instance rather unsurprisingly stood out as the episode’s notably uplifting moment.

Rhaenyra’s impromptu coronation on the cliffs of Dragonstone was arguably a necessity to prevent viewers from dissolving into floods of depressed tears. Erryk Cargyll, fresh off freeing Rhaenys in King’s Landing, pledges his fealty to Rhaenyra, swearing his sword to her new Queensguard. Arryk’s twin does not arrive empty-handed, bearing a crown for the prospective new Queen. Viewers get a sudden lump in their throat when they realize that the crown is the one wore by Viserys, shunned by Aegon in favour of the Conqueror’s Crown belonging to his namesake.

There’s a strong chance that Daemon could snap and murder Rhaenyra without warning based on the events of this week’s episode, but it was a deeply moving sequence watching Daemon place the crown on his wife’s head and kneel before the new Queen. Matt Smith’s longing gaze at the gold circlet coupled with the emotional weight of the fact that Daemon placed the same crown on his dying brother’s head only days earlier, provided a backdrop soaked with raw emotion as Ramin Djawadi’s usual thunderous score hinted at the first rays of elusive light at the end of a seemingly unending darkness.