Hello everybody and welcome back to another episode of NerdSoup.

I am Bo Oliver and I am here today to review the HBO original series House of the Dragon

Episode 4, The King of the Narrow Sea.

Here by myself today, so I'll do my best to hold down the fort before we release our

spoiler discussion a little later in the week.

But I thought this was another terrific episode and at this point I've enjoyed every episode

so far.

Some wondering if my own bias is getting in the way, but man, this one in particular evoked

feelings of watching Game of Thrones in its prime.

The dialogue was so crisp and layered, there's so much great foreshadowing for book readers

to pick up on and just a lot of stuff for everyone in general, man.

It just continues to be a good show, continues to develop these relationships in a messy

but smart way and just can't say enough positive things about this episode.

But you know what stood out the most I think about this episode 4 was the struggle between

duty and desire, specifically regarding the roles of Ranera and Alicent as Princess and

Queen.

There was even a moment of reconciliation between the two friends after years of tension

and that caught me off guard, you know, I thought moving forward every scene between them

was just going to be very tense and icy without much warmth or friendship.

But you know, they kind of tell each other, hey, I missed this.

I missed when it was just us two and we didn't have to worry about making sense of you being

my mother-in-law and your children being my siblings.

...