HBO released the long anticipated first episode of House of the Dragon to great acclaim, with it quickly becoming the most watched HBO premiere of all time — but as usual for anything Game of Thrones related, it hasn’t been without controversy.
In the episode, (spoiler alert) King Viserys (Paddy Considine) — desperate for a male heir — makes a quick decision to perform a Caesarean section on his wife, Queen Aemma Targaryen (Sian Brooke), without her consent. This leads to both her death, and the death of their son.
With the recent issues surrounding a woman’s right to choose, the forced birth scene immediately stirred up a heated debate among fans.
The showrunner, Miguel Sapochnik, has since broken his silence on the controversy, defending the creative decision to show the forced birth intercut with a violent war scene.
He told PopSugar that the scene underwent strong debate and various edits before they decided on the final cut.
“It seemed important to highlight something that was the kind of the most traumatic event … it’s what breaks that family apart. And more importantly than anything, Viserys doesn’t give his wife, Aemma, a choice, and that’s something that seems really important.”
He noted that they showed it to as many women as possible before making a final decision, noting that they asked them all, “Was this too violent for you?” And the feedback they received was unanimously that it needed more, not less.
“It’s raising a point that . . . hits a real trigger for women, which is this idea of choice and that she doesn’t get to choose. She’s effectively murdered by her husband. And that is a good indication of the state of play in this world that we’re inhabiting.”
The choice to have the birth scene parallel with the bloody tournament fight was made by editor Tim Porter. “It seemed like this is an appropriate time to draw that parallel visually between the two, the male and the female struggle,” Sapochnik said. “One’s fighting on the battlefield, the other’s fighting for survival, sometimes from the person closest to her.”
He went on to note that the death of his wife and son, Baelon, “profoundly affects” Viserys throughout the show. “There are regrets about decisions, there are regrets about serving the realm and being a king.”
The showrunner also revealed there will be several more birth scenes in House of the Dragon Season 1, each with different meanings behind them.
“We gave themes to the births, and that theme for that birth was torture,” he said. “Then there’s a birth where the theme is the agony and the ecstasy. There’s a birth where the theme is impasse, and there’s a birth where the theme is a battle. So we are trying to look at them in different ways.”