House Of The Dragon Fans Are Not Holding Back About The Season 2 Finale

Contains spoilers for "House of the Dragon" Season 2 Episode 8 — "The Queen Who Ever Was"

Fans of "House of the Dragon" eagerly tuned in on Sunday, August 4 for the Season 2 finale, "The Queen Who Ever Was," and apparently, a lot of them were completely let down by the episode.

This is, to be frank, understandable. The Season 2 finale of the massively popular, critically acclaimed spin-off and prequel of "Game of Thrones" was pretty uneventful. After Season 1 ended with a shocking sequence — the death of Lucerys Velaryon (Elliot Grihault) at the hands of his own uncle, Aemond Targaryen (Ewan Mitchell) — it sure felt like war was inevitable on Season 2. Unfortunately, aside from the Battle at Rook's Rest, which claims the life of Rhaenys Targaryen (Eve Best) and grievously injuries King Aegon II Targaryen (Tom Glynn-Carney), there's not a whole lot of action, as fans pointed out on X (formerly known as Twitter).

Some, like @AmeriKraut, simply expressed shock and indignation over the lackluster episode: "[S]urely there is more episode in the back?" User @itslevie agreed and expanded upon that, writing, "['House of the Dragon'] really wasted a whole season with filler episodes." As for @GioMuyFrio_, they were quite blunt, declaring, "I may have just witnessed the absolute WORST season finale for a [TV] show."

"House of the Dragon" fans weren't quiet on X about the Season 2 finale; as @phrozenthunda put it, "This was by far one of the most uneventful season finales I've seen in a while. This entire season was one long ass filler episode because we could have made it to this exact same point in the story by episode 4." @Rubmuncher felt like they could have done without the season as a whole, saying, "I could have skipped that entire season of ['House of the Dragon'] and been perfectly up to speed. What a boring 8 episodes that was." @DECAFVoka pointed out that, on top of everything else, fans will have to wait a very long time for the next installment: "Wow, we just watched a 70 min trailer for a season that will come in 2 years."

User @SamexCat simply posted a photo of Emilia Clarke's Daenerys Targaryen from "Game of Thrones" with a furious expression on her face, adding the caption, "The feeling after watching the finale of 'House of the Dragon' Season 2." Others, like @Masongham, pointed out that the buildup just went nowhere: "Bro how are you going to make an entire season of ['House of the Dragon'] leading up to an epic battle in the season finale only for the season finale to build more set up with no battle." Overall, this was a pretty popular sentiment; @55mmbae wrote, "I'm tired of things being put into motion. BE IN MOTION" alongside the official hashtag for "House of the Dragon," and @batsdune put it pretty plainly: "['House of the Dragon'] Season 1 ending: 'Now the war begins.' ['House of the Dragon'] Season 2 ending: 'Now the war begins.'"

Fans on Reddit didn't really like the episode either, as it turns out. In a thread titled "That was...bad, right?" Redditor @blubell1329 wrote, "Woof, what a let down. Why did they end it here? It's a two year wait and the build up itself was drawn out and boring." 

In response, @Shaenyra pointed out that the episode order was reportedly cut down, preventing two major plotlines from appearing in Season 2. "I think that episode 8, if you except the [nonsense] with Alicent and pretend they never existed, was a very good episode..... for episode 8 of a [10-episode] season," they wrote. "Imagine if the season was 10 episodes, and this was the 8th. Nobody would b*tch. NOBODY. Because it would have been great preludium to two final episodes where major battle and the aftermath would have taken place. Episode 9 a major battle and episode 10 the aftermath." Another Redditor, @GRVRush2112, referred to their own copy of George R.R. Martin's "Fire and Blood" and made a jarring discovery: "This season started on page 412 (Hardcover version) and ended about 2/3 of the way through page 445. Just barely over 30 pages for a whole season [...] Season 1 picked up towards the end of page 352 and goes all the way though page 412. That's nearly twice the page count season 2 got through." It was @DarknDustyStacker, though, who had the funniest and most on-brand take: "Literally 'the season that never was.'"

Ultimately, aside from the Battle at Rook's Rest, fans will have to wait quite a while to see more fire and blood on "House of the Dragon," especially because the Season 2 finale directly sets up two major events from the book: the Battle of the Gullet and the Fall of King's Landing. In a fascinating twist, though, the show does add something new to the latter by having Alicent Hightower (Olivia Cooke) secretly visit her stepdaughter and former close friend Queen Rhaenyra Targaryen (Emma D'Arcy), begging for an end to the family's devastating civil war. Rhaenyra says it can only end if Aegon is dead, and Alicent, amazingly, agrees ... and this will almost certainly be a huge part of whatever happens in Season 3.

At the end of the day, fans have a right to feel frustrated over the fact that "House of the Dragon" Season 2 is conspicuously light on action and ends in a pretty abrupt manner ... and it'll be a long wait until they can see what happens next. Over on X, user @misha_loves_you summed it up pretty beautifully, simply writing, "That season of ['House of the Dragon'] could've been an email."

"House of the Dragon" is streaming on Max now.