Who Deserves To Get Burned On 'House Of The Dragon'?

Three notes before we begin:

This is a list of characters in House of the Dragon ranked by how much I — me, Brian — want to see them get lit up by one of the show’s many dragons
I have not read any of the books this series is based on and am barely able to follow what is happening in the show itself, what with all the various blond people swinging swords about and brunettes scheming about various lines of succession, but I do love its commitment to unnecessary drama
Make your own list if you think you’re so great

Here we go.

14. Ser Harrold Westerling

He seems like a good dude. He’s always standing there in full body armor looking like the only reasonable person in the kingdom. He has a cool beard. Leave him alone.

13. Laenor Velaryon

I don’t know if any single event on this nasty little show has made me happier than the thing where this guy faked his death and shaved his signature blond braids and hopped in a boat to row himself to a gay paradise far away from the collection of monsters he had dealt with every day of his life. Part of me hopes we get a standalone episode in season two that just shows him thriving and happy with umbrella drinks in both hands. Part of me hopes we never see him again, just because seeing him increases the odds of dragon-burning. Much to consider here.

12. Various royal children whose names I do not know yet

A few things here:

It is my general position that children should not be burned alive by a dragon or any other source of projected flame
All of these children are currently being raised by Daemon and Rhaenyra, so I feel like their odds of becoming decent adults are somewhere between slim and non-existent
With all the time jumps and recasting we’ve seen so far, I can’t keep any of them straight and would not be deeply heartbroken to lose one or two of them just for the sake of efficiency

This is tough but I stand by it.

11. Corlis Velaryon

To be honest, I do not actually remember if this guy is still alive or if he died in between one of our time jumps, but I like his vibe and style and feel more people — athletes, especially, but also maybe bloggers who do dragon-related rankings no one asked for — should be nicknamed “The Sea Snake.”

This is all much more of an art than a science.

10. Rhaenys

I have two things against this woman, neither of which are fair in any way:

She just had all of her enemies lined up and defenseless in front of her while she was riding a dragon that breathes fire and she chose to just kind of stare at them a little and fly off into the clouds, which was very frustrating for a person like me who is watching this show mostly for the messy drama and senseless acts of violence
We already have a Rhaenyra and having a Rhaenys too feels unnecessary, so, unless one of them wants to change their name to like “Kelly Targaryen” or something else I can remember, we could stand to lose one

Tough cookies, lady.

9. Daemon

I am very torn on this because I kind of love Daemon and his commitment to introducing chaos into every interaction he has ever had in his entire smirk-laden life, but I also feel like he is always five or six seconds away from doing something unforgivable that will make me want to heave my glass of iced tea into the nearest wall. That’s a problem. I’ll be cleaning up tiny little shards of glass for weeks. Too risky. Cook him now and send him out before things go too sideways.

8. Mysaria

I still do not have a good read on this lady. She seems to be diabolical and always up to something and I would not in a million years want to cross her even a little. This sentence somehow represents both the case for sending her out in a ball of flames and the best reason to protect her at all costs. We will continue to monitor this situation to see how it develops going forward.

7. Rhaenyra

The tricky thing about Rhaenyra is that sometimes she seems like a decent person in a weird spot and then other times she makes sexy eyes at her devious uncle during her own wedding and then stands by and does very little when her secret boyfriend murders her husband’s secret boyfriend in the middle of the reception. Which, I guess, is a lot of stuff that can be blamed on her situation and the adults around her who should have known better, but I feel very strongly that the whole thing is going to get worse before it gets better.

Also, I do not think it will ever get better.

So there’s that.

6. Alicent

ON ONE HAND: Showed some concern and backbone recently when she realized the people around her were scheming weasels, even if she didn’t, like, actually do anything about it, which still somehow represents progress for a character on this show.

ON THE OTHER HAND: As recently as two episodes ago, she ordered a knight to carve out a child’s eye and then, when the knight refused, she grabbed a dagger and stormed ahead to do it herself, only to be intercepted by the child’s mother — her former best friend and current stepdaughter, because family trees on this show are tangled like grape vines — who then received a gash in her forearm in the ensuing melee.

It’s a lot.

5. Larys Strong

Putting aside his assorted quirks and fetishes (no thank you at all, but to each his own), he did kill off his father and brother in a castle arson and he seems like maybe the least trustworthy person on this entire show, which is really saying something when you consider all the other things I’ve typed here.

Torch him.

4. Otto Hightower

There are exactly three things Otto has going for him in my book that kept him out of the top three here:

I like the little thing he does where he arches one eyebrow a little when the gears start grinding in his evil little brain
He is played by Rhys Ifans, who played the kicker in The Replacements and gave an all-time historically great line reading of “I’m wiry”
A character from this show could walk into my kitchen and throw my entire lunch on the floor and they would still have trouble cracking the top three

Number four it is.

3. Aemond

It dawns on me as I type this out that a number of the characters on this list are Targaryens and the Targaryen clan is allegedly fireproof. This complicates matters a bit, as the whole point of this is to engulf people I do not like in flames and wipe them out of existence by turning them into a pile of ash and waiting for a stiff breeze to blow them into the atmosphere.

Eh. Let’s try it with this kid anyway.

2. Aegon

The only good thing this little snot ever did is hate the idea of being king so much that he had to be dragged out from under a table to go to the ceremony. That was relatable. It is my position that anyone who actually seeks higher office should be disqualified from having it and governments should be staffed only by people who reluctantly agree to serve out a single term. But then there’s the thing where he’s running around assaulting chamber maids and the thing where a crowd started whooping and cheering for him and he started thrusting his sword skyward at nothing and you could see the evil lust for power wash across his entire face. Nope. No thank you.

Cook him.

1. Ser Criston