'House of the Dragon' Is a Troubled Heir

Back in 2013, Game of Thrones created a vast televisual world. Much of that world it populated with useful bodies. Dozens of undifferentiated, naked bodies of women, writhing around as an occasion to explain the complexities of the plot or demonstrate the relative virtue of the men put within striking distance of them; thousands of undifferentiated, nearly naked bodies of brown men, ready to be slaughtered or set free; thousands more men in armor, differentiated only by the crests on their shields and flags, ready to get mowed down by dragons and swords or to do the mowing themselves. The ultimate threat of the series—the White Walkers, who wanted to turn all of Westeros into nameless, undifferentiated ice zombies—was not really a threat to these heaving masses of bodies, who, within the universe of the show, were already just as nameless and undifferentiated as the Armies of the Night.