House Of The Dragon Season 3 Just Teased A Fix For George R.r. Martin's Biggest Criticism

Ollie Upton/HBO

Like winter, spoilers are coming. This article discusses plot details from "House of the Dragon" Season 3, Episode 4.

It's fair to say that "House of the Dragon" has taken a somewhat circuitous route to its biggest and darkest season yet. The long-delayed civil war has only just recently broken out in earnest, thanks to the actions of two rival queens reluctant to cross the point of no return. From a logistical standpoint, that's the result of cost-cutting measures imposed upon Season 2, which have inevitably made their presence felt early on in Season 3 as well. But even these structural ripple effects in the "Game of Thrones" prequel feel obsolete next to the biggest question mark hanging overhead like the sword of Damocles: What peeved original author (and series co-creator) George R.R. Martin so much that he essentially disowned this entire adaptation, and how does showrunner Ryan Condal intend to address it?

We may have just seen the answer to that. For a refresher, Martin publicly called out the HBO show during Season 2. His main point of contention? During the infamous "Blood and Cheese" sequence, where Queen Helaena Targaryen (Phia Saban) is held at knifepoint by assassins and forced to watch the brutal murder of her youngest child, the series neglected to include another of her sons who witnesses the atrocity and factors into the story later on: Maelor. This was explained away as an attempt to simplify the narrative, but the novelist warned about the butterfly effect this omission would cause.

In yet another delayed reaction, however, the latest episode of "House of the Dragon" just teased a possible fix. Notice that strange interaction between Alicent Hightower (Olivia Cooke) and Helaena late in Episode 4? Helaena certainly seems to be pregnant — potentially with Maelor "the Missing."

Ollie Upton/HBO

To fully understand George R.R. Martin's problems with "House of the Dragon" (which may or may not have been referenced in a recent Season 3 episode), one must first go back to the pages of "Fire & Blood." The source material, written as an in-universe historical text documenting the events of the Dance of the Dragons, has more freedom to delve into the minutiae of the Targaryen family tree and how even the most minor character can go on to play a significant role down the line. Enter Maelor, a toddler during the early stages of the Targaryen civil war. His encounter with those hired assassins is as traumatizing as it gets, but his standing as Helaena's last remaining male heir to the Iron Throne turns him into an invaluable target.

To this point in the series, the writers have excised him entirely and earned the wrath of George R.R. Martin in the process ... but better late than never, eh? When we see Alicent and Helaena in their bedchambers, the awkward interaction between the two appears to confirm what some fans have been speculating about online for weeks: Helaena is in the early stages of pregnancy, and noticeably so. Unless "House of the Dragon" is going extremely off-book, the most logical candidate for this baby is Maelor. The timeline no longer matches "Fire & Blood," sure, but it's fairly easy to see how this could unfold in the episodes ahead and (more or less) line up with subsequent events as told in the book.

But is this last-minute addition too little and too late? Possibly. To discuss that, we'll need to enter full-blown spoiler territory.

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Warning: Spoilers for "Fire & Blood" and potential spoilers for Season 3 of "House of the Dragon" will follow.

Do I even need to state the obvious that pretty much none of the characters involved in the Dance of the Dragons get happy endings? That applies tenfold to the unfortunate figures at the center of this sordid little family affair. Technically, we already knew that about poor Helaena, considering that George R.R. Martin straight-up spoiled her death that's destined to arrive sometime in Season 3. But her youngest son doesn't fare much better, as his grisly fate marks one of the absolute lowest points of the war. Forced to escape from King's Landing out of fear for his safety, Maelor and his bodyguard are set upon by an angry mob and (quite literally) torn apart. Helaena dies by suicide not long after.

Will "House of the Dragon" recreate these events exactly as they go down in the book? Not likely. After all, why would Martin even raise the issue in the first place if it aligned with his original intentions? On top of that, there's the pesky problem of Maelor not even being born (yet) in the show. A two-year-old fleeing on horseback before having his identity revealed to smallfolk looking for blood is one thing — doing so with an infant complicates matters exponentially. And that's assuming the show decides to incorporate a time jump to allow Helaena to carry the baby to term, which would throw off the show's timeline even further.

No, "House of the Dragon" has something else in mind with this storyline. One thing's for sure, though: It can't be leading anywhere good. New episodes hit HBO every Sunday.