HotD Would've Changed Drastically With These Deleted Scenes Included
Most shows have their share of deleted scenes. House of the Dragon is no exception. There is a number of scenes which were planned but never filmed, or failed to make the cut due to screentime constraints.
Some of them were relatively unimportant, or even excessive and removed for all the right reasons. The scene of Daemon giving a final toast to King Viserys at the family dinner in Episode 8 was extraneous after the (improvised by the actors) scene of Viserys' crown falling and Daemon picking it up.
Even more brutal shots of Queen Aemma dying during a C-section, as well as the scene of Viserys receiving the news about their newborn son's deaths while sitting on her blood-soaked bed were really not needed, the whole sequence already was devastating enough.
The important scene of Viserys hinting to Daemon about the prophecy of The Prince That Was Promised and the need of a Targaryen on the Iron Throne was removed for all the right reasons.
First, as Paddy Considine, who played Viserys, said: "The tone of the scene was never quite right. There's no way that Daemon would even connect to that — he'd laugh Viserys out of the room." (via New York Times)
And second, the fact that the prophecy was only supposed to be passed from king to heir, and Daemon never received it, ended up quite important for Daemon's character and relationship with Rhaenyra – helping to turn that relationship ugly at a climactic moment.
Other could have helped to establish characters, who ended up as little more than moving props, such as the scene with Daemon's daughters, mourning for their mother, or scenes, showing, well, any interactions whatsoever between Rhaenyra Targaryen and Harwin Strong, before we meet their kids (and before Harwin dies at the end of the same episode in which we meet their kids).
And other deleted scenes were actually quite important for developing key characters of the show. The scene of Criston Cole's entry into the Kingsguard, including his recitation of Kingsguard vows, could have better explained the motivation for his change of allegiance.
More interactions between young Alicent and young Rhaenyra could have added context about their feelings for each other, which end up so monumentally important to their characterization and decisions in the last two episodes.
Overall, House of the Dragon Season 1 might be quite different with all the deleted scenes, which we are likely to see in a Blu-ray release, planned for December 20.