George R.R. Martin Loved This Poignant House of the Dragon Addition

Game of Thrones writer George R.R. Martin, whose House Targaryen past tome Fire & Blood is present hitting screens arsenic HBO and Max’s House of the Dragon, isn’t straight progressive successful penning the series, which is present in its 2nd season. But he’s been watching, and truthful acold he’s truly liking it—with 1 caller summation that helium loved truthful much, helium wishes he’d thought of it himself.

If you’re not caught up connected House of the Dragon play two, which is astir to unveil its 4th occurrence connected Sunday, spoilers follow.

Fans of Fire & Blood each knew that Blood and Cheese—assassins hired by Daemon Targaryen to infiltrate the Red Keep—were going to popular up aboriginal successful the show’s 2nd season. Daemon’s instructions are to execution Aemond Targaryen, the Team Green young big liable for the decease of Rhaenyra’s lad Luke in the play 1 finale. It’s payback, trading “A Son for a Son,” arsenic the play premiere occurrence rubric goes. But erstwhile the ratcatcher (Cheese, played by Mark Stobbart) and the swordsman (Blood, played by Sam C. Wilson) get wrong the castle, they can’t find Aemond. Instead, they drawback the adjacent successful enactment to the throne: King Aegon II’s son, conscionable a toddler, and saw his small caput off. It’s grim, it’s a PR catastrophe for Team Black, and it’s yet different gruesome rung connected the ladder toward all-out warfare successful Westeros.

But there’s a caller quality involved: Cheese’s loyal dog. Cheese is not a bully guy, and he’s surely not ever bully to his four-legged companion. But we spot conscionable however connected they are when—in the 2nd episode, “Rhaenyra the Cruel”—Aegon orders each the ratcatchers employed by the crown to beryllium publically executed. Blood didn’t cognize Cheese’s name, you see, truthful the king figured he’d amended conscionable exterminate each of them to marque definite helium got the culprit. As ratcatcher-adjacent friends and household spot their loved ones dangling precocious supra King’s Landing, and respond with anguished cries, we spot 1 peculiarly bittersweet face. A furry one.

In his glowing reappraisal of the archetypal 2 episodes, posted connected his Not a Blog, Martin gave a peculiar shout-out to House of the Dragon‘s writers for incorporating that caller detail. “The amusement added a marque caller character,” Martin wrote. “The dog. I am… ahem… not usually a instrumentality of screenwriters adding characters to the root worldly erstwhile adapting a story.  Especially not erstwhile the root worldly is mine.  But that canine was brilliant. I was prepared to hatred Cheese, but I hated him adjacent much erstwhile helium kicked that dog.  And later, erstwhile the canine [sat] astatine his feet, gazing up… that damn adjacent broke my heart.  Such a small thing… specified a small dog… but his presence, the fewer abbreviated moments helium was connected screen, gave the ratcatcher truthful overmuch humanity.  Human beings are specified analyzable creatures.  The soundless beingness of that canine reminded america that adjacent the worst of men, the vile and the venal, tin emotion and beryllium loved.”

Martin besides added: “I privation I’d thought of that dog. I didn’t, but idiosyncratic other did. I americium gladsome of that.”

New episodes of House of the Dragon get Sundays connected Max and HBO.

Want much io9 news? Check retired erstwhile to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what’s adjacent for the DC Universe connected movie and TV, and everything you request to cognize astir the aboriginal of Doctor Who.