It was the dragon chomp heard ‘round the world—a world encompassing both the enraptured audience watching House of the Dragon’s season one finale, and the in-show world of Westeros on the brink of war. As season two nears its premiere on HBO and Max, star Ewan Mitchell gave some insight into what’s next for the survivor of that mid-air brawl: the very complicated Aemond Targaryen.
In season one of House of the Dragon, we saw how Aemond chafed at his status as the second son of the late King Viserys Targaryen and Alicent Hightower. He was bullied as a kid, then became emboldened after he forcibly acquired Westeros’ biggest dragon, a maneuver that led to the cousin-on-cousin fight that cost him an eye. Heading into the new season, Aemond has a somewhat elevated role in the Red Keep—younger brother to King Aegon II—but he’s still dealing with the reverberations of having caused the death of Lucerys Velaryon and his dragon Arrax.
“The second son, it’s a prominent theme throughout our our show,” Mitchell told a group of journalists, including io9, at a recent House of the Dragon press day. “You know, Aemond, similar to Daemon [Targaryen], he’s a prince who stands to inherit nothing. And so he recognizes that what he wants in life, he’s going to have to go out and get it for himself—[he] has a lot to prove—and to what lengths he will go to achieve that.”
House of the Dragon fans have seen a glimpse of Aemond’s worst qualities already, thanks to his arc in season one. But in the finale, there’s also a sense that he’s not completely rotten at the core. “For season one—in a show full of morally compromised gray characters—I wanted to present a character who at this point in his life was just complete darkness … I wanted to lean into it, only to contradict that theory at the end of the season,” Mitchell explained. “That last shot you have of Aemond is that face of regret. He made a mistake. And he’s just as shocked as the audience.”
That very well might change, Mitchell teased. “Going into season two, he’s now pitted with a choice. He can return to King’s Landing, admit that it was a mistake, and be at the hands of Rhaenyra’s mercy. Or he can claim the kill, so to speak, and become the most wanted man in the realm. He’s very conflicted. Aemond’s a very conflicted character, for sure.”
What’s more, Mitchell added, “I think one of the beauties of Aemond is that you don’t necessarily know what he is thinking, but you know that he is thinking—the cogs are turning behind his eyes. It’s an interesting one at the end of season one, that moment after he kills Luke and Arrax, because it’s only a moment that the audience and Armond share. Whether or not he he goes home and tells his mom and confesses that what he did was a moment of weakness is another thing. But if he doesn’t, it will remain a little secret between Aemond and the audience, which I find quite interesting, so to speak.”
House of the Dragon season two arrives June 16 on HBO and Max.
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