(Warning: Spoilers for Episode 5 of House of the Dragon ahead.)

Things in Westeros are spinning out of control. The Greens and the Blacks have officially declared dragon war, which no one is prepared for—but that’s not stopping anybody.

With Rhaenys (Eve Best) and her dragon dead, the Blacks have just lost two valuable assets, as well as one of the only things standing in the way of open warfare. King Aegon (Tom Glynn-Carney) isn’t quite dead from the encounter, but he’s nearly there, and the Green Council is about to make a huge mistake out of desperation (and, let’s face it, sexism). Both sides lost more than they gained at Rook’s Rest, and the fallout is going to be uglier than Aegon’s dragonfire burns.

War is a trap. No one knows this better than Alicent (Olivia Cooke), who basically spent her adolescence dooming herself to a life of dissatisfaction and frustration. She was queen for a while, but she barely got to enjoy it before her power was usurped by her own sons and her Small Council, all of whom dislike the optics of allowing a queen to sit the Iron Throne now they they’re waging war against the very person who once attempted to do that. It’s no wonder she spends half the episode’s council meeting with a loud whooshing in her ears.

Aegon is in bad shape, secretly spirited back into King’s Landing during the ill-advised Meleys parade (more on that in a second) so the smallfolk wouldn’t see that........

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