House of the Dragon: Corlys Velaryon & Alyn of Hull (EW Interview)

I'm gonna disagree here. First forcing your clearly gay son to have sex with a women is not any better than cheating on your spouse. Second his race is irrelevant to whether or not he cheats black men cheat on their wives as much as white men do. Also people cheat for all sorts of reasons. People can be in a loving marriage with someone and still cheat. I just think the whole argument that we cant have this black character cheat on his spouse because he's black is silly. Also the man isn't that honorable he plots like all the others (like trying to marry his CHILD daughter off to a man forty years older than her just so his blood can be on the throne). Corlys doesn't need to be the epitome of righteousness because they chose to make the character black.

Even in Fire & Blood, it always made more sense to me that Alyn and Addam were Corlys' bastards. The points made in text for why they "accepted" Laenor's was that they were Valyrian looking, and that Laenor was known to frequent Marilda's shipyard. There's a very logical explanation for that I don't often see being discussed: the reason Laenor was visiting there somewhat regularly was to check on Alyn and Addam, most likely on Corlys' orders. The text suggested Corlys only revealed them after Rhaenys died, even claiming them to be Laenor's, because he feared her reaction, since she inherited the Baratheon anger from her mother, so him going to check on them himself would risk Rhaenys finding out. It's kinda like a less tragic version of Domeric Bolton checking in Ramsey.

I really hope we get more character building with action and especially with Corlys knowing how the story goes seeing him beginning to feel the strains and costs that came from his ambitious gambits will be a good change.

Judging from the age of the actors, they are definitely Corly's sons!!

The ability of someone being able to get into character is so important accent wise. As you said with Data I have so much respect for Brent Spiner it had to be extremely difficult to be emotionless but to be also striving to become human

I saw an interview Grace Randolph did with him. What a super nice guy he is. Just down to earth, super happy about what he does. I wish I could remember what he was promoting. I think it was a comic book he wrote. I just remember how much I really liked him.

Just going by how old they look and their skin tone, I’m assuming Corlys is their dad. They can just handwave it as Mouse being a Targ too. Plus HBO probably doesn’t want to deal with any gay erasure claims.

never thought I'd be watching this early from school

I'm more interested in seeing the dynamics between Addam and Alyn. The chad sons of Lady Marilda ❤

He will outgrow it. LMAO

They are very obviously (NOT) trying to make it ambigious at all. It’s quite OBVIOUS

I've always suspected Addam and Alyn are Corlys' bastards, not Laenors (this makes the most sense imo given the insane life Corlys had: he has been all over the known world and has seen/done a lot of things, plus he's a restless, ambitious adventurer). What exactly happened could be an interesting story ànd it further develops Corlys as a character. Interestingly, Aegon III and Viserys II are younger than in the book while Addam and Alyn are a lot older - I'm curious how this will affect the feel/actions of these characters (I definitely prefer their book ages/actions, but maybe/hopefully the showrunners are able to win me over🙏).

Assuming the boys are Corlys' sons, how is Adam able to claim Seasmoke? I always believed them to be Colrys', but Velaryons are no Dragonlords & as far as I know, Matilda is no dragonseed. Help y'all I'm strugglingggggg😅😂

First of all, this guy looks older than Leanor, so definitely not his son. But second, they are casting this family as if there's no rhyme or reason to how black and mixed race people look. We're not randomly interchangeable. This guy doesn't look like he would be Leanor's son.

While your version of events sounds maybe more interesting in some of ways, the thing Corlys was implied or suggested as doing were written before his character was chosen to be black.

I bet he has wild, flowing locks if he doesn't shave. Both parents are gona shine thru in the eyes and hair. Or did they lose a battle and he had to shave like a Dothraki would? It is one of these things. Corlys..he probably wasn't sick for 6 years. In show and in text Rhae and Laenor DO try to have children. They CAN'T. That doesn't mean Laenor doesn't have children. He simply does not have any with Rhae.

A reveal about him forcing his son to have kids is interesting but I feel like it would take me out of the flow of the story. Having him monologue something like that to Alyn and Addam just doesnt have the same emotional intensity imo as having him reveal that he is their father. I think that feels more emotionally tense and intimate since all characters involved in the conflict would be present. The audience hasn't seen Laenor in a long time, it would be harder for that to hit emotionally.

I think Laenor will return after Rhaenys death and bond with his bastard brothers then in season 3 he will die during the battle of the gullet and Adam will ride Seasmoke after his death during the same battle

Wow there's a lot to unpack here - 1. In Fire and Blood it is said that Corlys was 37 when he married the 16 year old Rhaenys. 2. He tried to marry his 12 year old daughter to a man old enough to be her father. 3. Love doesn't keep someone faithful. Everyone agrees that Tywin loved Joanna but he still slept with other wome. And what was Steve Toussaint's placeholder dialogue? Tywin's. 4. In that same episode Corlys is telling Rhaenys that Laenor will outgrow being gay and that there's nothing more pleasurable than bedding a woman. Doesn't sound like a man who would have already had to try forcing his son to sleep with a girl and seen that he didn't like it. 5. If Corlys was played by a white actor would you be this upset? 6. We don’t know how much Targaryen blood is needed to bond with dragons. Brown Ben Plumm is presumably the descendant of Elaena Targaryen and Aegon IV who lived over a century before GOT starts. As for Corlys he could have been much closer. Valaena Velaryon's mother was Targaryen. If we assume that Daemon Velaryon is her brother that would make Corlys the great-great grandson of a Targaryen. (https://awoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/Corwyn_Velaryon)

Another thing- Is it possible you're assigning too much significance to young Laenor's line about "not for lack of trying"? Is it not possible for that to have been a simple response to being embarassed in front of the crown princess? He might be gay, but he's still a man and wants desperately to be seen as masculine; so when Rhaenyra made her comment it wounded his pride a bit and he likely just clapped back with a defense that sounded sensible. To each their own but I do wonder if you're giving more significance to that line from Laenor because of your reluctance to accept Corlys as the Hull brother's father. Anyway, nice video.