Is ‘House Of The Dragon’ Changing Sunfyre’s Fate From the Books?

House of the Dragon fans finally got what they were looking for from season 2, as episode 4 concluded with a dragon fight of colossal importance in the Targaryen Civil War.

The melee between the dragons of King Aegon, Prince Aemond, and Princess Rhaenys probably has a major role to play in “The Red Dragon and the Gold” being rated 9.7 on IMDb, the highest any episode of the show has enjoyed so far across its two seasons. Viewers of Game of Thrones are used to the long-drawn and perfectly executed battle sequences, and the Alan Taylor-directed episode didn’t disappoint.

To recap the events of the episode, Rhaenys volunteers to fly to the Rook’s Rest as a counter to Ser Criston Cole’s plan to cut the Blacks off the Mainland by laying claim to the relatively small but important castle. It is later shown that a trap was laid out by Cole to lure one of the Blacks’ dragons to the battlefield, with Aemond and Vhagar ready to ambush from the woods. However, the scheme goes awry when the King shows up with Sunfyre, ready to fight in his drunken stupor.

Rhaenys and her dragon Meleys, the most battle-experienced dragon on the Blacks’ side, are able to wound Sunfyre with Aegon fighting for his life. Their face-off is then interrupted by Aemond, who takes matters into his own hands and orders Vhagar to engulf both the dragons in flames, with his brother becoming the proverbial sacrificial lamb in the process.

Towards the end, while Vhagar and Aemond win their battle against Rhaenys and Meleys, Sunfyre and Aegon are shown lying unconscious in the woods. As a viewer, it did appear that Aegon’s dragon was drawing his last breath, but it is likely that the golden dragon’s fate will be revealed in the fifth episode.

If Sunfyre is indeed dead, it would mean that the writers of the TV series have made a drastic change to the events of the books, where (SPOILERS) the dragon survives way longer. In the literature, he is responsible for the death of Rhaenyra Targaryen, who is bathed in flames by Aegon’s dragon with no mercy.