‘House of the Dragon’ star Ewan Mitchell thinks Aemond could take Daemon in a fight

But Rhaenyra’s latest trump card — three new dragon riders — has put him in a precarious position. Those dragons tilt not only the balance of power, but challenge the idea that Targaryens are particularly special.

“That kind of puts House Targaryen, and also Aemond, in a very precarious position,” actor Ewan Mitchell told Business Insider. “And Aemond, it’s a hard one for him to swallow.”

In the finale, Aemond pleads with his sister Helaena to ride with him into battle on her dragon, Dreamfyre. She refuses and instead delivers a cold, hard truth that she’s foreseen: Their brother, Aegon, will once again sit on the throne. Aemond, however, will be dead.

Mitchell spoke with BI after the season two finale about Helaena’s premonition, Aemond’s tricky relationship with his mother Alicent, and the tortured bond that the prince shares with Daemon Targaryen.

I want to work backward from Aemond and Helaena’s conversation on the balcony. Aemond feels so vulnerable in that scene, and your eyes are shining with tears from the start — can you walk me through where he’s really at in that moment?

Episode eight is the first time that we see Aemond’s face fracture that little bit, and you kind of see that boy, and that desperation simmering beneath the surface. That’s always been there all along, he’s just managed to keep a lid on it.

Obviously, Helaena rebukes Aemond, and she shares knowledge that kind of puts into question everything that he always saw himself to achieve later on. The information and the foresight that Helaena gives him — on one hand, it could make an enemy out of Aemond, but on the other hand, it could also prove Helaena to be a tremendously valuable ally if that power of foresight was able to be harnessed in some capacity. That would be very valuable to the Greens, to know when a blow is coming before it lands.

But in that moment with Helaena, for Aemond, it’s heartbreaking, and it’s quite scary. And Aemond feels that small.

Do you think that Aemond believes Helaena’s claim that he’s going to die? Without getting into spoilers, how do you see that shaping the way that you approach him going forward?

I think he does believe her. He just really doesn’t want to.

With Aemond, we have talked about the legend of the Cyclops in Greek mythology, and how he traded one of his eyes to Hades in order to see the day that he would die. Aemond’s always kind of possessed this bulletproof ego. He very much has an idea of how everything will pan out.

From the moment that he had his eye taken from him, he saw that as motivation to develop himself into a lethal weapon, and keep his steel sharp and his mind sharper. He’s always had this idea of how everything will pan out. He will be known as the war hero, and he’ll be sat on a Dornish beach far from Westeros, sipping on piña coladas with his mom, Alicent.

The knowledge that Helaena gives him, that challenges all of that, and that breaks his heart. He doesn’t want to accept it. The idea that he is a very small player in this bigger machine, that in fact he can’t be the captain of his own destiny, it kind of fractures him a little bit. And I think Aemond, he’s got to sit down and sit on that information for a minute.

But as we know from Aemond, he can’t sit still, he’s going to be back up on his feet and he’s going to retaliate ASAP.

With regards to Alicent, once Aemond gains power, it feels like he almost has to take down his mother before he can take down Rhaenyra. What was it like shaping that relationship and working with Olivia Cooke in the back half of the season?

Growing up, I think Aemond never really felt that unconditional love from his mother. He had to seek surrogates elsewhere. He partly found it in his dragon, an older she-dragon, a nice parallel there. He also found it in the madame of the brothel.

But it raises the question of whether or not that’s good enough, whether or not that’s a worthy surrogate. Kids, they need that unconditional love growing up, and if a child is not embraced by the village, they’ll burn it down to feel its warmth instead. And so Aemond will instead seek validation and, ultimately, attention through all the means, through war.

In the moment when he sends his mother away from the council chamber and off the council, I think it’s that kind of idea of the kid in the schoolyard bullying his crush, but he doesn’t want other people to know. And Aemond, in that moment, he doesn’t want his mom at work. He’s like, “Mom, just leave me alone. Let me do my job. I’ll win this war. And then I’ll see you on the beach, sipping piña coladas.”

I want to ask about Daemon and Aemond’s cosmically terrible relationship, even though you and Matt Smith really don’t share the screen this season. How do you think about Aemond being haunted by Daemon and vice versa, and how does it inform how you’re approaching the character?

I think that’s a really interesting question. After that sequence when Blood and Cheese infiltrate Aemond’s bed chamber, you have that scene in episode two where Aemond finds the coin. And that coin, I actually carried with me for the rest of the shoot. I put it in my shoe.

James Gandolfini, for Tony Soprano, he would often put stones in his shoes whenever he felt like he wanted to feel that kind of building tension or anxiety in a scene. And similar to Aemond, I wanted to just remember that everything that coin represents very much lives in Aemond’s head rent-free. The idea that Daemon got this close, and ultimately Aemond’s nephew paid the ultimate price, that’s something that does haunt Aemond.

But there’s also quite a romantic element about it as well, because it’s like, “Well, if Daemon wanted to do the job properly, he should have done it himself. He shouldn’t have put his trust in two people he didn’t fully understand.” Is he too afraid of Aemond? Does he think he wouldn’t win in a one-on-one fight? And that’s the case. He would not win in a one-on-one.

On the flip side, Daemon is haunted by Aemond as well, to the extent that he sees himself dressed as Aemond while he’s at Harrenhal. What was your reaction to seeing Matt do you-as-Aemond?

I think he did like a little soft pout in that moment when he turns around over his shoulder. I was like, “Yeah, he nailed that.”

The parallels between these two characters, their names are anagrams of each other, and the relationship and the platform that Aemond puts Daemon on — the fact that he idolizes him — so much of what Aemond embodies, it’s in homage to his hero. What’s that saying? Never meet your heroes, kind of thing. If Aemond met his, it wouldn’t be pretty for Daemon.

Aemond lives in Daemon’s head rent-free as well. You see that in Harrenhal when Daemon’s chasing Aemond. I think that’s definitely something that Aemond would want to be living in Daemon’s head rent-free.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

“House of the Dragon” season two, including the finale, is now streaming on Max.