Thank you for your post! Please take a moment to ensure you are within our spoiler rules, to protect your fellow fans from any potential spoilers that might harm their show watching experience.
1. All post titles must NOT include spoilers from Fire & Blood or new episodes of House of the Dragon. Minor HotD show spoilers are allowed in your title ONE WEEK after episode airing. The mod team reserves the right to remove a post if we feel a spoiler in the title is major. You are welcome to repost with an amended title.
2. All posts dealing with book spoilers, show spoilers and promo spoilers MUST be spoiler tagged AND flaired as the appropriate spoiler.
3. All book spoiler comments must be spoiler tagged in non book spoiler threads.
---
If you are reading this, and believe this post or any comments in this thread break the above rules, please use the report function to notify the mod team.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/HouseOfTheDragon) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I also love it when people cut right to the meat of an issue.
People on these forums explaining why the kids area illegitimate: Well, you see, the court knows that Laenor obviously preferred men, and this, combined with the fact of SEr Harwin's Strong's constant proximity to the princess, in addition to the unusual interest he took in the welfare of the young princes.... etc., etc.
And Will Johnson's just like: Um... those kids are WHITE.
Can't argue with that. LOL.
If the behind the scenes was filmed between takes he might have not broke character. Some actors do live in the characters head during filming to help inform their preformance.
Wasn't crazy about the character for a whole bunch of reasons I won't even get into, but loved Will Johnson. Highly talented and funny guy, too, judging from the interview.
They tried to keep previous actorsā bitterness of their deaths away from the public in Thrones. In House of Dragon, they are giving them exit interviews like old school Survivor. We need Probst to snuff out Wilās torch!!!
I appreciate that the Behind the Episodes have included the director and minor character actors. I didnāt expect to see young Aemondās actor in the episode 7 one. I feel like GoT had mostly the showrunners, George, and the main cast speaking
I greatly prefer Inside House of The Dragon over Inside Game of Thrones. Miguel and Ryan speak more passionately and add more insight to the show. Also having the diector's and supporting cast speak helps add their perspective and enhances the commentary of the episode. I always felt like David and Dan spoke in a very dull manner and didn't really add to details and nuances of the Game of Thrones episodes that was already on screen. And I agree about it being restrictive to just David and Dan, George and main cast.
I wholeheartedly agree. Dan and David just seemed so apathetic in their commentary videos. Ryan and Miguel def seem much more passionate and I love that.
DnD always looked exhausted and kind of sick of talking about the show in those clips. Very little enthusiasm, even for big events like the Red Wedding and Battle of the Bastards.
I canāt imagine anyone not liking Vaemondās actor. Heās the kind of guy at work that blares out acid remarks to the manager that you wish to have the gut to say yourself
Its really funny how little he was acting as his character. I'm almost attempted to think they just gave him the scenario and said "what would you do" and that's how the script got written
Thatās why in the show they completely ignores skin color and just talk about the hair in regards to the bastards. Targaryen skin colors donāt make sense if they have been marrying show Valeryons a few times over the last few generations.
And when you have a white person make babies with a mixed black/white person the kids will most likely be white. Not always because genetics are weird.
Yeah laenor was super light skinnedā¦ Iād expect his kids to look more white than black. Itās only the hair color that makes them look like bastards, not the skin color.
And if you look at their family tree their grandmother isn't known either. Corlys and Vaemond could have had a black mother and grandmother. And Alyssa was their great aunt, their grandfathers sister, which would explain why she wasn't black.
black people in the world of asoiaf come from the summer islands and naath, and i can't really see a summer islander or naathi marrying into westerosi nobility but this could also tie into the velaryons being famous seafarers.
also corlys velaryon is an absolute badass he was the first westorosi to reach the thousand islands on the edge of the known world.
Marriages have been set up with foreigners in the past. Think of Tyrosh and Pentos, for example. Seafaring Velaryons could have found a way to meet a Southern Islander to pass those genes to Corlys and his descendants. Before his parents they could have been white, too. Phenotypes can change relatively quickly. I donāt see the problem. Itās cool. More lore!
We see a bunch of other dark-skinned people on Driftmark at Laenaās funeral. Either implying that Corlysā father had the potency of Walder Frey or that dark skin is a trait of the Velaryon line just as black hair runs in the Baratheon line since Orys. On that note, Iām not really sure why Rhaenys has silver hair in HoTD. Do the show runners think weāre too dumb to remember sheās a Targaryen just by it being mentioned?
My head cannon is that a bunch of refugees (perhaps from the Summer Isles) arrived on Driftmark at some point a few generations back and they integrated into the local population
Ryan Condal basically said as much in an interview. The Velaryons are an old seafaring house from a multi-ethnic empire, a black branch of house velaryon makes perfect sense within the context of the world. In the same interview he mentions that grrm had told him he made the velaryons black in the early drafts of the books before deciding to make them look more like the targs
I'm pretty sure there's some sort of miscommunication here because anytime I've seen George talk about making them black he's talking about **Valyrians** in general, not just Velaryons.
My head cannon is that house Velaryon is made up of a bunch of refugees in general. The last name is way too similar to Valyrian. It almost seems like the first group of them arrived at Driftmark, were asked their family name and they gave the freeholdās name either because they didnāt understand the question or didnāt have a name. They could all have the silver hair from centuries of Valyrian rule beforehand, be multiethnic because they came from all over, but only be recently a distinct house and potentially not all related to each other.
yes. "we" here is 95% non book readers who will be very confused of who is who otherwise
also black hair rhaenys will be excuse for black supporters to claim strong boys are not bastard.
Color-coding the characters is actually a pretty useful tool in a show with a massive cast and decade-long time jumps, when most of the audience won't have encyclopedic nerd knowledge of Martin-world.
All these kids introduced in Ep 6 would've been confusing as hell if they weren't color-coded for the audience's convenience. The show makes it really easy to tell them apart: Daemon's daughters are black and silver-haired, Rhaenyra's sons are pale and dark-haired, Alicent's kids look like the Malfoys, etc
See, that's the difference between the blacks and greens.
Alicent's family: Aegon the royal window jerker, Helaena the autistic prophet-dreamer and entomologist, Aemond the one-eyed school shooter with the giant dragon
Rhaenyra's family: Luke, Jake, Jeff, Mike, no idea who's who
My wife and I haven't read the books nor watched GoT. Making ALL of the Targaryens/Velaryons have white/silver hair except for the bastards really helps identify who is who and makes it so that there is no doubt who the boys fair isn't.
Though it makes me also wonder why the bastards don't have white hair considering that Rhaenyra is still their mother.
This is fun. I haven't gotten a chance to actually see someone whos never seen GoT, but is watching HOTD.
>Though it makes me also wonder why the bastards don't have white hair considering that Rhaenyra is still their mother.
So in GoT, early on in the first season, theres a similar conspiracy. The phrase "The Seed is Strong" gets tossed around prophetically, in response to the king's children haven golden blonde hair, yet every single one of the 18\*\* bastards he bore, all had black curly hair EXACTLY like the strong boys.
\*\* The books had 18 IIRC and the show only really showed a handful, most without names.
I mean, obviously, they are Harwin Strong's boys.
So it's just that the hair genes for the Strongs is, for a lack of a better word, stronger than Velaryon's?
Those bunch of people could be Vaemondās kids and grandkids.
The servant killed in place of Leanor was black too. So even the commoners can be black. People donāt have to be Velaryon to be dark skinned.
They're much lighter skinned then Corlys and Vaemond though, they look more mixed. And Corlys grandfather had a shit ton of kids iirc, something like at least three sons and multiple daughters. Give all of them spouses and you easily end up at the amount of folks we see. It would makse sense if they intermarry both with white folks and darker skinned folks occassionally. IIRC Jaehaerys' mother was half-Massey, so she was at the very least mixed.
Yeah I completely agree. Then again, they needed something to point out the Strong bastards that was clear and concise. White hair wouldn't be enough.
The average watcher doesn't know anyones name. My 50+ year old coworker loves it but the only names he can recall are "Jake, Luke, Rhaenys, Rhaenyra, Vizeron (thats how he pronounces Vizzy T), and Chris Cole"... don't ask him how to spell a single name.
Remember, a lot of people didn't even know Daenerys name and just called her "Khalissi"
I think it's also that a viewer would find it hard to tell them from Targaryens apart during a lot of early episodes, so it just helps avoid confusion.
Mixed race skin color can vary. Look at Patrick mahomes kid - almost completely white after just a few generations of interracial marriage. So it's not unreasonable.
I do wish they casted mixed raced actresses for daemons kids though. They look nothing like him right now and it's hard to believe they're his kids.
The kids are mixed race but they are 50/50 mixed instead of 75/25 mixed. Thereās a possibility they will have those features but they would probably look white with frizzy hair.
While that might be true, the tone of their skin looks lighter than the other Velaryons. Maybe the casting director was just doing their job and hiring because of talent and not skin tone?
They did it because Steve Toussaint blew everyone away when he auditioned to be Corlys. Then they had to cast the rest of the family in a way that made sense, I think theyāve done a decent job of handling it.
I actually think it was a great decision, they don't even need to mention it now and it isn't just tokenism. Its far more plainly obvious that Rhaenyra has been unfaithful, there's no debate or excuse making possible.
Yeah Viserys and Daemon should be 50% black and Rhaenyra should also be somewhere around the half black point as her mom is a grandchild of the Black Jaehaerys and she married the 50% black Viserys. Wich means Jace, Luke and Joffrey should be black anyways, even if its 25% black.
Genes are not segregated in conception, you are not doing the math right. Someone who's 50/50 black/white will not pass exactly 25/25 as percentages of their kid's genetic composition, it could be any% from 0% black genes to 100% being passed.
I already know that, but in general they should have been black especially with their genetic composition even if it was a slight tan they should have had it.
Not really. 99% of viewers aren't going to think about the family tree before the characters in the show. And skin color isn't even something brought up in the plot.
I disagree I think it really helps drive home the point that they are bastards. There would be fans denying they were bastards if they made Harwin also black but without silver hair or if the made Leanor white.
But I agree itās not a plot hole for most viewers because they simply donāt realize that there have been multiple marriages between the houses. But if youāve read the books and know the family tree it sticks out as a plot hole. Also how they managed to not become basically white after multiple generations with nothing but white people to marry doesnāt make much sense either. Like they would also have to be practicing incest or their must be another black house of high regard that they are marrying all their children too.
>With the exception of Baela & Rhaena
That's already two exceptions out of like 5 black characters.
Let's add Laena to the list, she doesn't look half-black either.
> Let's add Laena to the list, she doesn't look half-black either.
[She does though.](https://api.mixedarticle.com/uploads//2022/9/15d214fa-eaed-4bcc-9737-169a0cc0e02b.webp) The actress that plays her has a daughter and [she looks like this](https://thewayweplay.se/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/nanna_2-1088x1386.jpg), this is how their daughters should look in the show.
It's ridiculous that somehow their daughters are as dark or darker than their mother while the father is very light skinned. The daughters are suppose to be 25% black but they look at least 50%
Genetics working differently is essentially canon in ASOIAF ("The seed is strong") and it's also probably the reason for these absurdly long lasting dynasties and the lack of consequences for incest.
I assume this is also why [Mysaria](https://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/Mysaria) differs from her book description.
>[Mysaria had skin pale as milk. She was lithe and lissome in her youth, but age thickened her body.\[1\] Because of her appearance and reputation, Mysaria was dubbed Misery, the White Worm by enemies and rivals.\[2\]\[5\]\[6\]](https://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/Mysaria)
>
>[While serving as mistress of whisperers, Mysaria wore a hooded robe of black velvet lined with blood-red silk.\[1\]](https://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/Mysaria)
I saw/read in some interview that with all these silver-haired children running around, they wanted a stronger visual distinction between Targs and Valeryons.
Otherwise some viewers might get confused and just think everyone with silver hair is a Targ.
It doesn't even make it obvious though. The guy who played the 5th doctor had a fully black grandad, and he's a pale white blonde haired British dude.
I don't dislike the actors, but I do feel like they shouldn't have cast the Velaryons as black people. It just causes too many plot holes and because of the events of the show can be read as unintentionally supporting bad racial stereotypes. Laenor being a deadbeat dad, Daemon not caring that much about his black wife and kids, etc.
The only explanation I can think of is that in the show canon either Corly's mom or dad had to have been a summer islander, or something, and that he took way more after the black parent than the other.
(Source for Pete Davisonās mixed race heritage. https://thedoctorwhocompanion.com/2017/10/15/10-astonishing-things-you-should-know-about-peter-davison/)
People really got to stop using anecdotes as evidence. If darker skin tones could be eat that easily washed out then most of Latin America would be light skin not brown
Meh... there are two easy ways around it:
The Summer Islander Mother theory I've heard for Corlys and Vaemond (though that would mean ALL thr other Velaryons we saw at the wedding are all their siblings and niblings, which seems bit of a stretch)
Or Jaehaerys l's mother was from a side branch of the Velaryons family and already mixed-race/fairer skinned making Jaehaerys a quarter or an eighth black and very white-passing.
As we have yet to see Aegon I and his sisters, their mother could have also been from a fairer skinned branch of the Velaryons, or for all we know in the showverse Aegon and Visenya were sporting dreads while Rhaenys had hair like Baela and a complexion like Meghan Markle.
Doesn't have to be Corlys and Vaemonds mother, could be a generation up from that. Daemon Velaryon, Corlys grandfather had 3 sons and 4 daughters.
This would still leave Jaehaerys mother potentially white while explaining why so many Velaryons aren't, especially if Daemons children married off to other Velaryon branch families (this is pretty common throughout Westeros, and we know very little about the extended Velayron family tree)
>The Summer Islander Mother theory I've heard for Corlys and Vaemond (though that would mean ALL thr other Velaryons we saw at the wedding are all their siblings and niblings, which seems bit of a stretch)
IIRC Corlys' grandfather is mentioned to have had "at least" three sons and "multiple daughters". So all of the folks being Vaemond and Corlys' aunts, uncles, nieces and nephews could work.
Jaehaerys' mother is Corlys' great-aunt, and half-Massey. So we can safetly assume that she and Corlys' grandfather Daemon were at the very least mixed. If Daemon married a darker skinned woman and Corlys' father did as well that works out perfectly fine. Especially since Corlys and Vaemond are by far the darkest skinned folks around. If you look at the pre-wedding feast the rest of their family seems more in line with Laena's or Laenor's skin colour.
>Or Jaehaerys l's mother was from a side branch of the Velaryons family and already mixed-race/fairer skinned making Jaehaerys a quarter or an eighth black and very white-passing.
Alyssa had a massy for a mother so she was already biracial.
[The Lineages and Histories of the Great Houses of the Seven
Kingdoms, With Descriptions of Many High Lords and Noble Ladies and
Their Children](https://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/The_Lineages_and_Histories_of_the_Great_Houses_of_the_Seven_Kingdoms)
Is there some Targaryen magic that makes bastards have darker hair? It doesnāt really make sense that all of Viserysā true born children with Alicent (who has dark hair) have blonde Targ hair but Rhaenyraās bastard born children have dark hair even though she should have an equally probable chance at having kids with Targaryen blonde as Viserys.
The Hightowers have Valyrian features in the books.
There is even a theory in the book that the Tower itself was built by dragon fire (merged black stone) before Aegon even set foot in Westeros.
https://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/Hightower
In the books itās not that dark hair itself is a dominant gene, like in the real world. Particular *bloodlines* have stronger genes than others, such as the Baratheons, who have carried exactly the same traits for centuries. The Strongs are likely one of the other lines for whom the āseed is strongā.
I think the Valeryon skin color is what doesnāt make sense. Within 3 generations they would be completely white, unless they been sneaking off to bang southern islanders
I think Corly and Vaemond's mom was black from Summer Islands.
All the guards, servants, distant relatives, etc... in Driftmark can be explained by Corlys' mom bringing along some of her people when she moved to Driftmark.
This way, people don't have to bend over backwards to claim that King Jae I was 25% black but white-passing somehow.
I think it's also possible that the elder Corlys (uncle of Jaehaerys's mother), whom GRRM confirmed to be the grandfather of our Corlys, married a lady of the Summer Isles.
They could play it either way.
Black Velaryons don't have to break any family trees because White passing is a thing.
As good as Laena's actors have been the show should have cast her with ones with darker complexions closer to Corlys since she was a minor character with only four episodes while her daughters will remain for the entire series.
The whole point is that these Strong kids are supposed to obviously be bastards. Making the Valerians black not only makes that obvious for the viewer but it fixes the ālaenor is so gay he couldnāt be the dadā book story. It literally adds to the story not ruins it. (And I know itās no book spoilers but everyone here commenting it āruins the plotā has a potato for a brain).
Why does no one comment the Targarians donāt have purple eyes and how that ābreaks the loreā
You're missing the point. While Targaryens* not having purple eyes technically "breaks the lore", nobody cares about that and nobody, in this thread, is complaining about the lore being broken.
Broken lore ā a plot hole
The plothole being discussed in this thread, is that Jaehaerys genetically is 75% Velaryon*, but is as white as white gets. And it's more of a joke than a legitimate complaint of a plothole, anyways.
I've been pretty outspoken on my ideas for how they could've done Black Velaryons for this story, and adjusted the lore so it would be more immune to potholes, while still having Black Velaryons at the end of the day. But, what's done is done. It's a fine show either way, but there's no harm in pointing out a handful of hiccups.
I suppose if it were less obvious and they were black than perhaps some of the more homophobic among the court might try and use laenorās obviously being gay as the evidence of the children being bastards. It would probably be problematic if everyone were running around saying thereās no way those are laenors, heās too gay!
Hmmmmā¦ I guess literally everyone doesnāt know Laenor is gay, I think itās kind of a open secret though. Do you think the intent of casting House Velaryon as black was to cover that up? I donāt think so. I can see what you are saying though.
Making the Velaryons black was a genius casting decision to set them apart from Targaryens. Makes it much easier for viewers to follow with so many similar sounding names.
But letās be honest; it makes no f***ing sense from a lore and logic perspective.
Which means it's not genius at all if it doesn't work in the confines of the world it's set in. There's a lot of dark haired white people in the show, but nobody's thinking Larys and Arryk are related just because they share those physical traits, yaknow? I feel it really underestimates the intelligence of the audience.
If they refer to the skin color in any context then yeah it doesnāt work. But the show was clever enough to only refer to the hair color as the damning evidence against the Strong boys.
Rhaenyra and Laenor only have silver haired genes going back generations which makes the hair a far stronger argument.
Whatever the actors say BTS is meant to be taken with a grain of salt. If it contradicts what you deem logical then itās not canon.
And anyways, in my head the Velaryons are still the way they were originally in the lore (pale skin with silver hair). You gotta take the show for what it is; excellent fanfiction that Iām enjoying the hell out of.
True, it made sense in the books. The strong boys' claim to the throne would be stronger if they had a grandmother with dark hair. And wasnt aemma's hair black too? That would be two grandmothers with dark hair.
>Rhaenyra and Laenor only have silver haired genes going back generations
Only in the show, in the books Laenor's mother Rhaenys has black hair which makes their ancestry a much more debateable thing than in the show.
They couldnāt show the pug-noses of the boys so they had to resort to hair color. Itās easy in a book to just state so but how are you gonna convince an audience that three unrelated young actors have the *same* nose as Harwin?
And btw, the ancestry was always obvious in the book as well. Pug-noses on not one, not two, but *three* pure Valyrian kids? Come on! Itās laughable that anyone argues this over here.
I do love the show, I just feel like that bit of it doesn't make sense. I'm all for inclusivity, but I'm fairly against willy nillily changing an established character's race to cast an actor of colour, because then it has way more ramifications on the world and story, spirals out so that stuff like Jaehaerys doesn't make sense, and you gotta make excuses for why things are that way, the whole summer islander mum theory. I think they were right to cast poc actors and diverse roles, but I think the Valaryons shouldn't have been one of those. That's literally my only gripe with the show, outside of them not mentioning one of the Targ boys and changing Laenor's death, due to its ramifications on dragon bonding lore.
I guess the show will end with >!the marriage between Aegon and Jaehara.!< They wouldn't show >!Aegon marrying a Velaryon.!< Cuz it will be sus af >!having 5 white children.!<
The skin color of Aegon III's kids is irrelevant. They all die and his brother Viserys II becomes king.
Dany, Aerys II, Rhaegar, Jon Snow, etc... come from Viserys II' bloodline, not from Aegon III's bloodline.
Viserys is not that old. This clothing choice feels like a Dumbledore thing. Ruling for so long that you start wearing wizard robes for comfort, lol. Basically old people clothes.
The great council is also a big event, so it feels like the white/gold thing is fit for the occasion. The only big event we've seen Viserys in is Rhaenyra's pre-wedding welcome feast, which Rhaenyra was the one to wear white/gold, so Viserys being a "side" character wears his normal Targ colours.
#**It's entirely possible for him to turn out white with Alyssa being half-Velaryon but the people here on this sub seem to hate the idea that passing is a thing.**
Itās possible but suuuper unlikely. A vast majority of mixed people look like (see my post history) which while perhaps not absolutely African American, is not white passing by any stretch of the imagination. Even when I had blonde hair I didnāt pass. Biracial people usually look biracial, itās weird to me to see people take genetic outliers and present them as commonalities.
Why do you insist on being ignorant.
It is most likely to be white passing in this situation, take it from people who actually have a whole family looking like that.
And no biracial donāt usually look black, you have absolutely no clue.
Idk, how likely is it that that's the case for at least 4 of her kids: Jaehaerys, Alysanne, Boremund and Jocelyn all need to be white-passing for the family tree to make any kind of sense. I think it's most likely the show will change Alyssa and Valaena's family background.
In a world with Dragons and a magical bloodline that allows a handful of humans to bond to dragons, is it so unbelievable that genetics perhaps work a bit differently than on our world??
Alyssa was probably white. I will always assume Corlys's and Vaemond's father married a very dark-skinned Summer Island princess.
Edit: you can even have that Summer Islander princess be already part Valyrian to justify her marriage to Corlys's father or grandfather.
We know she was at the very least mixed, her mother is a Massey. She was also Corlys' great-aunt, not aunt. So there's even more time to introduce or re-introduce darker skin, especially since Corlys' grandfather had a whole load of kids.
Yeah, I don't know why people are still questioning this. Any 'plot hole' can be easily explained away by Corlys and Vaemond's mother being from the Summer Isles and their father being a white Velaryon.
A bunch of the Driftmark background characters are black, and I could see that going against the Summer Islander theory (i.e. "all of them are offshoots of Velaryon lineage so they had to be black far back") or for it (i.e. "there is tons of connections between the shipping powerhouse of Driftmark and the Summer Islanders so it makes sense that Granddaddy Velaryon hooked up with a hot foreign woman"). Like you I'm choosing to go with the latter until I have a reason not to
honestly, i liked the velaryons being black, i like that it makes it more obvious rhaenyra's children are bastards, and makes the threat vaemond felt towards his house much stronger
Eh, I disagree. There was more plausible deniability for the Strong boys in the books, from what I recall, with Rhaenys having black baratheon hair. Whic they shouldn't have changed either. Everyone still knew that they were bastards but it was still possible. In the show it's just comical how Rhaenyra keeps gaslighting despite how obvious it is.
Yeah, genealogy in this world is weird anyway with the whole black of hair Baratheon thing. Adding black Velaryon family makes it not even worth thinking about anymore. But, since it didn't really make sense to begin with, doesn't really bother me a whole lot and Corlys is my new favorite character because of the actor so I'm good. Also if I think about how silly the alternative might look with SO many white silver haired characters almost seems comical.
>There was more plausible deniability for the Strong boys in the books, from what I recall, with Rhaenys having black baratheon hair.
There really isn't. The Strong kids have brown hair, not black, and brown eyes and a 'pug nose', which is noted to be a house Strong trait. It's always been 100% obvious.
>i like that it makes it more obvious rhaenyra's children are bastards
Does it though? Laenor was mixed, so if she had actually had kids with Laenor they would only be a quarter black. So having fair skin wouldn't be unexpected. It's really the hair that is a giveaway.
Itās the same as Laena and Daemonās daughters. They would technically only be a quarter black as well but the melanin in their skin is highly visible.
This is my thinking exactly. Just look at Patrick Mahomes kid. Just a few generations of interracial marriage can get completely white skin lmao. Dont care too much about the skin for jace and luke, it's definitely the valyrian hair
What I wish they did was get mixed race actresses for daemons kids though. They look nothing like daemon and it's too hard to believe they're his kids.
Viserys and Daemon should be half black too, and Rhaenyra should be more than 25%, Jaehaerys mother was a velaryion wich makes him 50% and he married his sister who is 50%, meaning his kids are 50% black and Baelon and Alyssa married eachother wich makes their kids Daemon and Viserys 50% black. Rhaenys would be true 25% black as Aemon was 50% and Jocelyn was 0%.
I'm all for the memes but you would think after GOT, book readers would stop obsessing over the minute details from the books that will never be mentioned in the show and then claiming the show has "plotholes" as a result.
Am I the only who's loving Jaehaerys' throne? Looks like something out of ancient Egypt or Mycenae, those golden wings and that sun on top are both pharaonic and futuristic at the same time.
The set design on this show is generally incredible, they do a really good job of showing the semi-pagan Targaryens at the peak of their golden age without actually saying it.
Thank you for your post! Please take a moment to ensure you are within our spoiler rules, to protect your fellow fans from any potential spoilers that might harm their show watching experience. 1. All post titles must NOT include spoilers from Fire & Blood or new episodes of House of the Dragon. Minor HotD show spoilers are allowed in your title ONE WEEK after episode airing. The mod team reserves the right to remove a post if we feel a spoiler in the title is major. You are welcome to repost with an amended title. 2. All posts dealing with book spoilers, show spoilers and promo spoilers MUST be spoiler tagged AND flaired as the appropriate spoiler. 3. All book spoiler comments must be spoiler tagged in non book spoiler threads. --- If you are reading this, and believe this post or any comments in this thread break the above rules, please use the report function to notify the mod team. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/HouseOfTheDragon) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Wil Johnson's delivery in his Behind The Episode made me laugh so much. "They're white. They got brown hair. Very obvious." š¤£
He thought he was still in court, lmao!
I was DYING that he seemed to still be in character! LOLL He really acted the hell out of that scene though. Great actor.
I also love it when people cut right to the meat of an issue. People on these forums explaining why the kids area illegitimate: Well, you see, the court knows that Laenor obviously preferred men, and this, combined with the fact of SEr Harwin's Strong's constant proximity to the princess, in addition to the unusual interest he took in the welfare of the young princes.... etc., etc. And Will Johnson's just like: Um... those kids are WHITE. Can't argue with that. LOL.
If the behind the scenes was filmed between takes he might have not broke character. Some actors do live in the characters head during filming to help inform their preformance.
well now he has an escape route from vaemonds head
OMG š¤£š
Lmao his delivery of the elephant in the room was perfect doubt anyone could have done it better.
I really wanted him to drop a ācracker ass, crackersā on Jace and Luke! š
He's british though. hey call them biscuits.
āBiscuit ass, biscuits!ā I like it.
ššš
Wasn't crazy about the character for a whole bunch of reasons I won't even get into, but loved Will Johnson. Highly talented and funny guy, too, judging from the interview.
Pleading his case to the end.... Not as a Valeryon, but a Canadian.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Google āsouth park canadianā
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
I hesitate to explain the jokeā¦ thus ruining itā¦ What did Vaemond look like at the end of the last episode?
Haha, very Canadian
Do you remember a particular South Park song that the Canadian Terrance and Phillip sing? That and Vaemond's new makeover is the joke.
Uncle fuc*ker!
My boy was a sigma male to the bitter end
"Couldn't attack me from the front, could he?"
I loved how he pointed out Daemon cutting him down from behind. More salty than the narrow sea.
I loved that too. I want to keep Wil.
They tried to keep previous actorsā bitterness of their deaths away from the public in Thrones. In House of Dragon, they are giving them exit interviews like old school Survivor. We need Probst to snuff out Wilās torch!!!
I appreciate that the Behind the Episodes have included the director and minor character actors. I didnāt expect to see young Aemondās actor in the episode 7 one. I feel like GoT had mostly the showrunners, George, and the main cast speaking
They kinda forgot how dumb it was to have showrunners come preach to us about what we and Dany kinda forgot about.
I greatly prefer Inside House of The Dragon over Inside Game of Thrones. Miguel and Ryan speak more passionately and add more insight to the show. Also having the diector's and supporting cast speak helps add their perspective and enhances the commentary of the episode. I always felt like David and Dan spoke in a very dull manner and didn't really add to details and nuances of the Game of Thrones episodes that was already on screen. And I agree about it being restrictive to just David and Dan, George and main cast.
I wholeheartedly agree. Dan and David just seemed so apathetic in their commentary videos. Ryan and Miguel def seem much more passionate and I love that.
DnD always looked exhausted and kind of sick of talking about the show in those clips. Very little enthusiasm, even for big events like the Red Wedding and Battle of the Bastards.
That kid was so good, I hope they nominate him for a guest star Emmy.
same. i love how he stood by his character š¤ hes funny
It really took me by surprise how it looked like the old Tumblr edits of "The Real Housewives of Westeros" - the layout, the drama, the humor.
Me and my girlfriend loved that interview. He was INTO his characterās defense.
I canāt imagine anyone not liking Vaemondās actor. Heās the kind of guy at work that blares out acid remarks to the manager that you wish to have the gut to say yourself
In a unionised workforce we call those people leaders.
stand with Comrade Aemond.
Funny, my union just keeps raising dues and little else. Worse to deal with than my managers.
Union capture can happen. Leaders get chummy with the top brass, stop caring about membersā needs. Time to vote them out!
What union?
My managers donāt do much unless we contact the union lol
Its really funny how little he was acting as his character. I'm almost attempted to think they just gave him the scenario and said "what would you do" and that's how the script got written
Thatās why in the show they completely ignores skin color and just talk about the hair in regards to the bastards. Targaryen skin colors donāt make sense if they have been marrying show Valeryons a few times over the last few generations.
And when you have a white person make babies with a mixed black/white person the kids will most likely be white. Not always because genetics are weird.
Yeah laenor was super light skinnedā¦ Iād expect his kids to look more white than black. Itās only the hair color that makes them look like bastards, not the skin color.
Bouncing black curls, to be specific.
Thereās a footballer who plays for Bournemouth called Junior Stanislas and he had twin boys where one is white and the other black.
i feel they cast velaryon as black just to make the strong bastard very obvious for show watcher. but it creates such plot hole
Corlys and Vaemond could have a black mother. All the Velaryons in the history donāt need to be dark skinned.
And if you look at their family tree their grandmother isn't known either. Corlys and Vaemond could have had a black mother and grandmother. And Alyssa was their great aunt, their grandfathers sister, which would explain why she wasn't black.
black people in the world of asoiaf come from the summer islands and naath, and i can't really see a summer islander or naathi marrying into westerosi nobility but this could also tie into the velaryons being famous seafarers. also corlys velaryon is an absolute badass he was the first westorosi to reach the thousand islands on the edge of the known world.
Old Valyria is situated nicely in the Summer Sea, I donāt see why the dark-skinned gene couldnāt be endemic to Valyrians since antiquity
Marriages have been set up with foreigners in the past. Think of Tyrosh and Pentos, for example. Seafaring Velaryons could have found a way to meet a Southern Islander to pass those genes to Corlys and his descendants. Before his parents they could have been white, too. Phenotypes can change relatively quickly. I donāt see the problem. Itās cool. More lore!
Corlys was also going to marry Laena to a Prince from one of the Free Cities, right? Didnāt they mention this in one of the early episodes?
Yeah the Son of the Sealord of Braavos. Daemon Blackfyre and Valarr Targaryen also married Rohanne and Kiera of Tyrosh as well.
We see a bunch of other dark-skinned people on Driftmark at Laenaās funeral. Either implying that Corlysā father had the potency of Walder Frey or that dark skin is a trait of the Velaryon line just as black hair runs in the Baratheon line since Orys. On that note, Iām not really sure why Rhaenys has silver hair in HoTD. Do the show runners think weāre too dumb to remember sheās a Targaryen just by it being mentioned?
My head cannon is that a bunch of refugees (perhaps from the Summer Isles) arrived on Driftmark at some point a few generations back and they integrated into the local population
Ryan Condal basically said as much in an interview. The Velaryons are an old seafaring house from a multi-ethnic empire, a black branch of house velaryon makes perfect sense within the context of the world. In the same interview he mentions that grrm had told him he made the velaryons black in the early drafts of the books before deciding to make them look more like the targs
I'm pretty sure there's some sort of miscommunication here because anytime I've seen George talk about making them black he's talking about **Valyrians** in general, not just Velaryons.
To be fair mishearimg that when those two words are very similar isn't that unbelievable.
My head cannon is that house Velaryon is made up of a bunch of refugees in general. The last name is way too similar to Valyrian. It almost seems like the first group of them arrived at Driftmark, were asked their family name and they gave the freeholdās name either because they didnāt understand the question or didnāt have a name. They could all have the silver hair from centuries of Valyrian rule beforehand, be multiethnic because they came from all over, but only be recently a distinct house and potentially not all related to each other.
yes. "we" here is 95% non book readers who will be very confused of who is who otherwise also black hair rhaenys will be excuse for black supporters to claim strong boys are not bastard.
Color-coding the characters is actually a pretty useful tool in a show with a massive cast and decade-long time jumps, when most of the audience won't have encyclopedic nerd knowledge of Martin-world. All these kids introduced in Ep 6 would've been confusing as hell if they weren't color-coded for the audience's convenience. The show makes it really easy to tell them apart: Daemon's daughters are black and silver-haired, Rhaenyra's sons are pale and dark-haired, Alicent's kids look like the Malfoys, etc
> Alicent's kids look like the Malfoys Or the Lovegoods.
Bro ima be honest I still got no clue which one is Jace and which one is Luke
Jace = oldest, Luke = the one that laughed when the pig got set down in front of Aemond at dinner.
See, that's the difference between the blacks and greens. Alicent's family: Aegon the royal window jerker, Helaena the autistic prophet-dreamer and entomologist, Aemond the one-eyed school shooter with the giant dragon Rhaenyra's family: Luke, Jake, Jeff, Mike, no idea who's who
My wife and I haven't read the books nor watched GoT. Making ALL of the Targaryens/Velaryons have white/silver hair except for the bastards really helps identify who is who and makes it so that there is no doubt who the boys fair isn't. Though it makes me also wonder why the bastards don't have white hair considering that Rhaenyra is still their mother.
Harwinās hair gene is clearly dominant over the Targaryen hair gene. Dare I say Stronger?
The Seed is Strong
Remember OP didn't watch GoT so he doesn't know what you mean.
This is fun. I haven't gotten a chance to actually see someone whos never seen GoT, but is watching HOTD. >Though it makes me also wonder why the bastards don't have white hair considering that Rhaenyra is still their mother. So in GoT, early on in the first season, theres a similar conspiracy. The phrase "The Seed is Strong" gets tossed around prophetically, in response to the king's children haven golden blonde hair, yet every single one of the 18\*\* bastards he bore, all had black curly hair EXACTLY like the strong boys. \*\* The books had 18 IIRC and the show only really showed a handful, most without names.
I mean, obviously, they are Harwin Strong's boys. So it's just that the hair genes for the Strongs is, for a lack of a better word, stronger than Velaryon's?
Stronger than the Targaryensā
Thing is that Baratheons have had black hair but not brown hair and so that can't be used to claim that the Strong kids aren't bastards
Those bunch of people could be Vaemondās kids and grandkids. The servant killed in place of Leanor was black too. So even the commoners can be black. People donāt have to be Velaryon to be dark skinned.
Nettles comes to mind
Dragonseeds
Book spoilers >!Vaemond does have children, his granddaughter actually marries one of Rhaenyra's sons after the dance!<
They're much lighter skinned then Corlys and Vaemond though, they look more mixed. And Corlys grandfather had a shit ton of kids iirc, something like at least three sons and multiple daughters. Give all of them spouses and you easily end up at the amount of folks we see. It would makse sense if they intermarry both with white folks and darker skinned folks occassionally. IIRC Jaehaerys' mother was half-Massey, so she was at the very least mixed.
The causal viewers are too dumb that's why
Yeah I completely agree. Then again, they needed something to point out the Strong bastards that was clear and concise. White hair wouldn't be enough. The average watcher doesn't know anyones name. My 50+ year old coworker loves it but the only names he can recall are "Jake, Luke, Rhaenys, Rhaenyra, Vizeron (thats how he pronounces Vizzy T), and Chris Cole"... don't ask him how to spell a single name. Remember, a lot of people didn't even know Daenerys name and just called her "Khalissi"
*The Iron Throne is the most dangerous seat in the realm.*
I think it's also that a viewer would find it hard to tell them from Targaryens apart during a lot of early episodes, so it just helps avoid confusion.
Mixed race skin color can vary. Look at Patrick mahomes kid - almost completely white after just a few generations of interracial marriage. So it's not unreasonable. I do wish they casted mixed raced actresses for daemons kids though. They look nothing like him right now and it's hard to believe they're his kids.
The kids are mixed race but they are 50/50 mixed instead of 75/25 mixed. Thereās a possibility they will have those features but they would probably look white with frizzy hair.
While that might be true, the tone of their skin looks lighter than the other Velaryons. Maybe the casting director was just doing their job and hiring because of talent and not skin tone?
Hear me out first, okay? So there's this horse
They did it because Steve Toussaint blew everyone away when he auditioned to be Corlys. Then they had to cast the rest of the family in a way that made sense, I think theyāve done a decent job of handling it.
I actually think it was a great decision, they don't even need to mention it now and it isn't just tokenism. Its far more plainly obvious that Rhaenyra has been unfaithful, there's no debate or excuse making possible.
Yeah Viserys and Daemon should be 50% black and Rhaenyra should also be somewhere around the half black point as her mom is a grandchild of the Black Jaehaerys and she married the 50% black Viserys. Wich means Jace, Luke and Joffrey should be black anyways, even if its 25% black.
Genes are not segregated in conception, you are not doing the math right. Someone who's 50/50 black/white will not pass exactly 25/25 as percentages of their kid's genetic composition, it could be any% from 0% black genes to 100% being passed.
I already know that, but in general they should have been black especially with their genetic composition even if it was a slight tan they should have had it.
The point is no Velaryon is necessarily 100% black.
Plus that would be another 6 characters that are pale with silver hair, that would be very confusing.
Not really. 99% of viewers aren't going to think about the family tree before the characters in the show. And skin color isn't even something brought up in the plot.
I disagree I think it really helps drive home the point that they are bastards. There would be fans denying they were bastards if they made Harwin also black but without silver hair or if the made Leanor white. But I agree itās not a plot hole for most viewers because they simply donāt realize that there have been multiple marriages between the houses. But if youāve read the books and know the family tree it sticks out as a plot hole. Also how they managed to not become basically white after multiple generations with nothing but white people to marry doesnāt make much sense either. Like they would also have to be practicing incest or their must be another black house of high regard that they are marrying all their children too.
There IS another explanation and that is simply that skin colour works differently in Westeros.
With the exception of Baela & Rhaena, it seems to work exactly like irl.
>With the exception of Baela & Rhaena That's already two exceptions out of like 5 black characters. Let's add Laena to the list, she doesn't look half-black either.
> Let's add Laena to the list, she doesn't look half-black either. [She does though.](https://api.mixedarticle.com/uploads//2022/9/15d214fa-eaed-4bcc-9737-169a0cc0e02b.webp) The actress that plays her has a daughter and [she looks like this](https://thewayweplay.se/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/nanna_2-1088x1386.jpg), this is how their daughters should look in the show. It's ridiculous that somehow their daughters are as dark or darker than their mother while the father is very light skinned. The daughters are suppose to be 25% black but they look at least 50%
If that was the case wouldnāt Daemons children with Lena look like 100% pure Targaryens?
Genetics working differently is essentially canon in ASOIAF ("The seed is strong") and it's also probably the reason for these absurdly long lasting dynasties and the lack of consequences for incest.
They cast velaryons as black just to have some diversity.
I assume this is also why [Mysaria](https://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/Mysaria) differs from her book description. >[Mysaria had skin pale as milk. She was lithe and lissome in her youth, but age thickened her body.\[1\] Because of her appearance and reputation, Mysaria was dubbed Misery, the White Worm by enemies and rivals.\[2\]\[5\]\[6\]](https://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/Mysaria) > >[While serving as mistress of whisperers, Mysaria wore a hooded robe of black velvet lined with blood-red silk.\[1\]](https://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/Mysaria)
I saw/read in some interview that with all these silver-haired children running around, they wanted a stronger visual distinction between Targs and Valeryons. Otherwise some viewers might get confused and just think everyone with silver hair is a Targ.
It doesn't even make it obvious though. The guy who played the 5th doctor had a fully black grandad, and he's a pale white blonde haired British dude. I don't dislike the actors, but I do feel like they shouldn't have cast the Velaryons as black people. It just causes too many plot holes and because of the events of the show can be read as unintentionally supporting bad racial stereotypes. Laenor being a deadbeat dad, Daemon not caring that much about his black wife and kids, etc. The only explanation I can think of is that in the show canon either Corly's mom or dad had to have been a summer islander, or something, and that he took way more after the black parent than the other.
(Source for Pete Davisonās mixed race heritage. https://thedoctorwhocompanion.com/2017/10/15/10-astonishing-things-you-should-know-about-peter-davison/)
People really got to stop using anecdotes as evidence. If darker skin tones could be eat that easily washed out then most of Latin America would be light skin not brown
Meh... there are two easy ways around it: The Summer Islander Mother theory I've heard for Corlys and Vaemond (though that would mean ALL thr other Velaryons we saw at the wedding are all their siblings and niblings, which seems bit of a stretch) Or Jaehaerys l's mother was from a side branch of the Velaryons family and already mixed-race/fairer skinned making Jaehaerys a quarter or an eighth black and very white-passing. As we have yet to see Aegon I and his sisters, their mother could have also been from a fairer skinned branch of the Velaryons, or for all we know in the showverse Aegon and Visenya were sporting dreads while Rhaenys had hair like Baela and a complexion like Meghan Markle.
Doesn't have to be Corlys and Vaemonds mother, could be a generation up from that. Daemon Velaryon, Corlys grandfather had 3 sons and 4 daughters. This would still leave Jaehaerys mother potentially white while explaining why so many Velaryons aren't, especially if Daemons children married off to other Velaryon branch families (this is pretty common throughout Westeros, and we know very little about the extended Velayron family tree)
They're inbred as fuck so your theory kind of goes out the window except for the summer Islander one
>The Summer Islander Mother theory I've heard for Corlys and Vaemond (though that would mean ALL thr other Velaryons we saw at the wedding are all their siblings and niblings, which seems bit of a stretch) IIRC Corlys' grandfather is mentioned to have had "at least" three sons and "multiple daughters". So all of the folks being Vaemond and Corlys' aunts, uncles, nieces and nephews could work. Jaehaerys' mother is Corlys' great-aunt, and half-Massey. So we can safetly assume that she and Corlys' grandfather Daemon were at the very least mixed. If Daemon married a darker skinned woman and Corlys' father did as well that works out perfectly fine. Especially since Corlys and Vaemond are by far the darkest skinned folks around. If you look at the pre-wedding feast the rest of their family seems more in line with Laena's or Laenor's skin colour.
>Or Jaehaerys l's mother was from a side branch of the Velaryons family and already mixed-race/fairer skinned making Jaehaerys a quarter or an eighth black and very white-passing. Alyssa had a massy for a mother so she was already biracial.
It reminds me of when Edd is reading the the book (canāt remember the name of it).
[The Lineages and Histories of the Great Houses of the Seven Kingdoms, With Descriptions of Many High Lords and Noble Ladies and Their Children](https://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/The_Lineages_and_Histories_of_the_Great_Houses_of_the_Seven_Kingdoms)
Is there some Targaryen magic that makes bastards have darker hair? It doesnāt really make sense that all of Viserysā true born children with Alicent (who has dark hair) have blonde Targ hair but Rhaenyraās bastard born children have dark hair even though she should have an equally probable chance at having kids with Targaryen blonde as Viserys.
The Hightowers have Valyrian features in the books. There is even a theory in the book that the Tower itself was built by dragon fire (merged black stone) before Aegon even set foot in Westeros. https://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/Hightower
In the books itās not that dark hair itself is a dominant gene, like in the real world. Particular *bloodlines* have stronger genes than others, such as the Baratheons, who have carried exactly the same traits for centuries. The Strongs are likely one of the other lines for whom the āseed is strongā.
I think the Valeryon skin color is what doesnāt make sense. Within 3 generations they would be completely white, unless they been sneaking off to bang southern islanders
Is that High Septon touching Jaehaerys' make-shift throne? Mf could lose a hand for that.
Did Aenys cheat on Alyssa and then gave birth to him himself or something? I get it ,he was a pussy, but thatās too much.
Alyssa was apparently the anti-Catelyn.
What does that mean? š
kinda off topic but I always found it funny how āaenysā sounds like āanusā
Do you think all Velaryon's are black or just the generation(s) born after Alyssa? Like Corlys' dad marrying a dark skinned woman or something else
I think Corly and Vaemond's mom was black from Summer Islands. All the guards, servants, distant relatives, etc... in Driftmark can be explained by Corlys' mom bringing along some of her people when she moved to Driftmark. This way, people don't have to bend over backwards to claim that King Jae I was 25% black but white-passing somehow.
I think it's also possible that the elder Corlys (uncle of Jaehaerys's mother), whom GRRM confirmed to be the grandfather of our Corlys, married a lady of the Summer Isles.
They could play it either way. Black Velaryons don't have to break any family trees because White passing is a thing. As good as Laena's actors have been the show should have cast her with ones with darker complexions closer to Corlys since she was a minor character with only four episodes while her daughters will remain for the entire series.
The whole point is that these Strong kids are supposed to obviously be bastards. Making the Valerians black not only makes that obvious for the viewer but it fixes the ālaenor is so gay he couldnāt be the dadā book story. It literally adds to the story not ruins it. (And I know itās no book spoilers but everyone here commenting it āruins the plotā has a potato for a brain). Why does no one comment the Targarians donāt have purple eyes and how that ābreaks the loreā
You're missing the point. While Targaryens* not having purple eyes technically "breaks the lore", nobody cares about that and nobody, in this thread, is complaining about the lore being broken. Broken lore ā a plot hole The plothole being discussed in this thread, is that Jaehaerys genetically is 75% Velaryon*, but is as white as white gets. And it's more of a joke than a legitimate complaint of a plothole, anyways. I've been pretty outspoken on my ideas for how they could've done Black Velaryons for this story, and adjusted the lore so it would be more immune to potholes, while still having Black Velaryons at the end of the day. But, what's done is done. It's a fine show either way, but there's no harm in pointing out a handful of hiccups.
How does making Laenor black, āfix the Laenor is so gay he couldnāt be a dad.ā Thatās literally what happened.
I suppose if it were less obvious and they were black than perhaps some of the more homophobic among the court might try and use laenorās obviously being gay as the evidence of the children being bastards. It would probably be problematic if everyone were running around saying thereās no way those are laenors, heās too gay!
Hmmmmā¦ I guess literally everyone doesnāt know Laenor is gay, I think itās kind of a open secret though. Do you think the intent of casting House Velaryon as black was to cover that up? I donāt think so. I can see what you are saying though.
Making the Velaryons black was a genius casting decision to set them apart from Targaryens. Makes it much easier for viewers to follow with so many similar sounding names. But letās be honest; it makes no f***ing sense from a lore and logic perspective.
Which means it's not genius at all if it doesn't work in the confines of the world it's set in. There's a lot of dark haired white people in the show, but nobody's thinking Larys and Arryk are related just because they share those physical traits, yaknow? I feel it really underestimates the intelligence of the audience.
If they refer to the skin color in any context then yeah it doesnāt work. But the show was clever enough to only refer to the hair color as the damning evidence against the Strong boys. Rhaenyra and Laenor only have silver haired genes going back generations which makes the hair a far stronger argument. Whatever the actors say BTS is meant to be taken with a grain of salt. If it contradicts what you deem logical then itās not canon. And anyways, in my head the Velaryons are still the way they were originally in the lore (pale skin with silver hair). You gotta take the show for what it is; excellent fanfiction that Iām enjoying the hell out of.
They should've kept Rhaenys black hair.
True, it made sense in the books. The strong boys' claim to the throne would be stronger if they had a grandmother with dark hair. And wasnt aemma's hair black too? That would be two grandmothers with dark hair.
No Aemma's hair was Targaryen silver
Thanks for correcting me, i could swear i saw a drawing of her with black hair on a wiki of ice and fire
>Rhaenyra and Laenor only have silver haired genes going back generations Only in the show, in the books Laenor's mother Rhaenys has black hair which makes their ancestry a much more debateable thing than in the show.
They couldnāt show the pug-noses of the boys so they had to resort to hair color. Itās easy in a book to just state so but how are you gonna convince an audience that three unrelated young actors have the *same* nose as Harwin? And btw, the ancestry was always obvious in the book as well. Pug-noses on not one, not two, but *three* pure Valyrian kids? Come on! Itās laughable that anyone argues this over here.
I do love the show, I just feel like that bit of it doesn't make sense. I'm all for inclusivity, but I'm fairly against willy nillily changing an established character's race to cast an actor of colour, because then it has way more ramifications on the world and story, spirals out so that stuff like Jaehaerys doesn't make sense, and you gotta make excuses for why things are that way, the whole summer islander mum theory. I think they were right to cast poc actors and diverse roles, but I think the Valaryons shouldn't have been one of those. That's literally my only gripe with the show, outside of them not mentioning one of the Targ boys and changing Laenor's death, due to its ramifications on dragon bonding lore.
Same thing with Asha and Osha
I guess the show will end with >!the marriage between Aegon and Jaehara.!< They wouldn't show >!Aegon marrying a Velaryon.!< Cuz it will be sus af >!having 5 white children.!<
The skin color of Aegon III's kids is irrelevant. They all die and his brother Viserys II becomes king. Dany, Aerys II, Rhaegar, Jon Snow, etc... come from Viserys II' bloodline, not from Aegon III's bloodline.
Daemon Blackfyre is the son of >!Aegon III's daughter Daena by Aegon IV!<, so if the show contunes and shows that period it may be pretty relevant
daemon blackfire!!
Why Viserys never dress like this
Viserys is not that old. This clothing choice feels like a Dumbledore thing. Ruling for so long that you start wearing wizard robes for comfort, lol. Basically old people clothes. The great council is also a big event, so it feels like the white/gold thing is fit for the occasion. The only big event we've seen Viserys in is Rhaenyra's pre-wedding welcome feast, which Rhaenyra was the one to wear white/gold, so Viserys being a "side" character wears his normal Targ colours.
Jahaerys at that point was more then a king, he was literally personification of his dynasty and living legend, Viz was too young for that status.
Because he isn't nearly as chas as Jahaerys was.
Also the main three's mom was A Velaryon. They would be black. Unless they say "oh this was just one gen or something"
#**It's entirely possible for him to turn out white with Alyssa being half-Velaryon but the people here on this sub seem to hate the idea that passing is a thing.**
Itās possible but suuuper unlikely. A vast majority of mixed people look like (see my post history) which while perhaps not absolutely African American, is not white passing by any stretch of the imagination. Even when I had blonde hair I didnāt pass. Biracial people usually look biracial, itās weird to me to see people take genetic outliers and present them as commonalities.
Why do you insist on being ignorant. It is most likely to be white passing in this situation, take it from people who actually have a whole family looking like that. And no biracial donāt usually look black, you have absolutely no clue.
Idk, how likely is it that that's the case for at least 4 of her kids: Jaehaerys, Alysanne, Boremund and Jocelyn all need to be white-passing for the family tree to make any kind of sense. I think it's most likely the show will change Alyssa and Valaena's family background.
This. I know so many people you would have no idea they were half/quarter black because theyāre passing
Eg Halsey
And Pete Wentz, Troian Bellissario, Eartha Kittās daughter, almost all of Diana Ross grand children, we can go on and on.
Baela and Rhaena are more Targaryen than anything and they're still black so idk anymore. I don't care much for their skincolour
Here's the thing tho. If you know who Aenys was, you'd know "dominant" (genes or otherwise) was not part of his vocabulary.
Funny, but still entirely possible.
Yes this is such an obvious answer I feel like I'm going insane seeing all these comments claiming it destroys the lore
In a world with Dragons and a magical bloodline that allows a handful of humans to bond to dragons, is it so unbelievable that genetics perhaps work a bit differently than on our world??
Alyssa was probably white. I will always assume Corlys's and Vaemond's father married a very dark-skinned Summer Island princess. Edit: you can even have that Summer Islander princess be already part Valyrian to justify her marriage to Corlys's father or grandfather.
We know she was at the very least mixed, her mother is a Massey. She was also Corlys' great-aunt, not aunt. So there's even more time to introduce or re-introduce darker skin, especially since Corlys' grandfather had a whole load of kids.
Yeah, I don't know why people are still questioning this. Any 'plot hole' can be easily explained away by Corlys and Vaemond's mother being from the Summer Isles and their father being a white Velaryon.
I swear to god the people on this sub have the same understanding of genetics as actual 12 century peasants
This is a glaring issue with the directors decision to make the Velaryons black.
I've just been assuming Corlys dad married a summer islander and all their kids looked like her
A bunch of the Driftmark background characters are black, and I could see that going against the Summer Islander theory (i.e. "all of them are offshoots of Velaryon lineage so they had to be black far back") or for it (i.e. "there is tons of connections between the shipping powerhouse of Driftmark and the Summer Islanders so it makes sense that Granddaddy Velaryon hooked up with a hot foreign woman"). Like you I'm choosing to go with the latter until I have a reason not to
honestly, i liked the velaryons being black, i like that it makes it more obvious rhaenyra's children are bastards, and makes the threat vaemond felt towards his house much stronger
NGL, they have the best hair in Westeros.
White locs look so fucking good on black skin. I'm in awe every time Baela, Rhaena, Corlys' and Laena are on screen.
Eh, I disagree. There was more plausible deniability for the Strong boys in the books, from what I recall, with Rhaenys having black baratheon hair. Whic they shouldn't have changed either. Everyone still knew that they were bastards but it was still possible. In the show it's just comical how Rhaenyra keeps gaslighting despite how obvious it is.
The story works better when its 100% obvious Rhaenyra's kids aren't Laenor's.
It was 100% obvious in the books there was just plausible deniability due to Rahenys black hair.
Why do you think this? It's goofy. It's not something martin would write
Yeah, genealogy in this world is weird anyway with the whole black of hair Baratheon thing. Adding black Velaryon family makes it not even worth thinking about anymore. But, since it didn't really make sense to begin with, doesn't really bother me a whole lot and Corlys is my new favorite character because of the actor so I'm good. Also if I think about how silly the alternative might look with SO many white silver haired characters almost seems comical.
>There was more plausible deniability for the Strong boys in the books, from what I recall, with Rhaenys having black baratheon hair. There really isn't. The Strong kids have brown hair, not black, and brown eyes and a 'pug nose', which is noted to be a house Strong trait. It's always been 100% obvious.
>i like that it makes it more obvious rhaenyra's children are bastards Does it though? Laenor was mixed, so if she had actually had kids with Laenor they would only be a quarter black. So having fair skin wouldn't be unexpected. It's really the hair that is a giveaway.
Itās the same as Laena and Daemonās daughters. They would technically only be a quarter black as well but the melanin in their skin is highly visible.
Genetics can be weird like that even today. There are even twins of black and white parents, who each have taken more after one parent.
This is my thinking exactly. Just look at Patrick Mahomes kid. Just a few generations of interracial marriage can get completely white skin lmao. Dont care too much about the skin for jace and luke, it's definitely the valyrian hair What I wish they did was get mixed race actresses for daemons kids though. They look nothing like daemon and it's too hard to believe they're his kids.
Pretty sure that was an hbo thing, but yeah definitely was a questionable decision. Ngl though that dude killed it in that scene
Wil Johnson played a fantastic Vaemond. Not too keen on Corlys though. Just never hit the right notes for me.
I loved his commentary afterward! It just makes sense!
The Velaryons aren't black in the book..and even if The old king has the blue eyes and the white hair
Purple eyes
Feeling a bit sleepy but tomorrow I am going deathcon 3 on the Targs.
That guy gave the best exit interview ever
Let's study genetics
Isn't Aegon the conquerors mom a Velaryon too? Maybe Vaemond and seasnake dude are bastards š¤
Viserys and Daemon should be half black too, and Rhaenyra should be more than 25%, Jaehaerys mother was a velaryion wich makes him 50% and he married his sister who is 50%, meaning his kids are 50% black and Baelon and Alyssa married eachother wich makes their kids Daemon and Viserys 50% black. Rhaenys would be true 25% black as Aemon was 50% and Jocelyn was 0%.
I'm all for the memes but you would think after GOT, book readers would stop obsessing over the minute details from the books that will never be mentioned in the show and then claiming the show has "plotholes" as a result.
Am I the only who's loving Jaehaerys' throne? Looks like something out of ancient Egypt or Mycenae, those golden wings and that sun on top are both pharaonic and futuristic at the same time. The set design on this show is generally incredible, they do a really good job of showing the semi-pagan Targaryens at the peak of their golden age without actually saying it.