Spoilers for the first few episodes of House of the Dragon Season 2 ahead! If you're not caught up, you can watch the episode with a Max subscription, and make sure to catch new episodes every Sunday at 9 p.m. ET as part of the 2024 TV schedule.
When it comes to characters in House of the Dragon, there are some that wield great influence from the background. One such character is Larys Strong, and with the shake-up of Aegon's council, there's a lot that Strong could do now – and the actor, Matthew Needham, referenced one of my favorite characters from Game of Thrones as to how Strong is going to approach it.
The world of House of the Dragon is vast, but the one character who always seems to know what's going on at all times is Larys Strong. Beginning the show as the Master of Whisperers and continuing that into Aegon's reign, Strong has remained a powerful player, making his moves. Ser Criston Cole is suddenly promoted to Hand of the King by Aegon in the third episode of Season 2, and now, the chessboard of Westeros is looking a lot different for Larys.
I had the chance to speak with Matthew Needham about what he believes Larys' intentions for this season might be with this shake-up – and in return, he said that while Otto's removal is big, Larys sees it as the board shifting – and he also happened to reference one of my favorite Game of Thrones characters ever:
I mean, getting rid of Otto is big. He's such a power player and the board looks very, very different with Otto gone. The fact that Criston is replaced is interesting, but Criston is dangerous on his own, but he's dangerous in a different way. And he's also off fighting numerous battles. So, he's not as cautious of his own safety as Otto was. So it's good that Criston's the Hand. I don't think Larys is resentful at all. I don't think he's sort of, 'No, it should have been me' or anything. I think it's just that the board has changed, and now you can play it from here, but everything is up for grabs. The war is chaos, and chaos is a ladder, and it's time to start moving to the next rung.
For those who don't remember, "Chaos is a ladder" is a famous quote from Littlefinger, otherwise known as Petyr Baelish. This character was really the mastermind behind many of Game of Thrones' most shocking moments. Like Strong, he stayed in the background of the most powerful players, giving advice to others to make them see his way.
While we can agree that Baelish in the later seasons wasn't as clever as the first few, it's still enjoyable to rewatch Game of Thrones and see all of the details that we missed that showed just how smart and clever he was. And now, with Needham referencing Baelish, I can't help but wonder what is going to happen next – and how much Strong's influence is going to impact the war.
There are still plenty of storylines that we are going to bear witness to in the upcoming season – from the teasing of the Dragonseed storyline to learning more about Aegon as an exciting and complex character – but I have a feeling that Strong is going to be a heavy part of them. We're going to see another creator of chaos behind the scenes.
