One HotD Character Could End Dance of the Dragons Before It Even Started
The Dance of the Dragons is a somewhat odd name for what was, in reality, a brutal and bloody civil war lasting two years.
It was a war that divided the land, split the family down the middle and led to thousands of deaths. But it could so easily have been avoided had Rhaenys Targaryen been so inclined.
Rhaenys Targaryen came to the fore as a force to be reckoned with in The Green Council (episode 9 of HotD season 1), but fans were wondering why she didn't end the Dance of the Dragons before it had even started when, following the impromptu coronation of Aegon II, she emerged from below the dragon pit sitting aside Meleys.
This situation provided the perfect opportunity for her to destroy the opposition and make sure civil war never needed to begin – at least not on the scale that it did. Of course, others may have then made their own quest for the Iron Throne. But there can be little doubt that the main threat lay firmly with Team Green.
And yet, Rhaenys merely took out a whole load of innocent onlookers – choosing to spare the lives of those that would take the fight to her and her family. Had she wanted to, having dropped into the coronation completely unannounced, she could have taken out the likes of Otto Hightower, Alicent, Ser Criston Cole, Aemond and others.
Instead, she left them all standing as she flew off on Meleys to inform Rhaenyra what had happened. And this decision went largely unmentioned as the war expanded and alliances were forged. Daemon challenged her during the following episode (The Black Queen), to which Rhaenys simply said it wasn't her war to start.
The question, though, is whether her inaction at this crucial moment was in fact part of the catalyst for the war that followed.
Of course, as with all ifs, buts and maybes of TV shows, there is always the issue of what would have happened if the writers had included this pretty obvious twist. After all, a show where everything that happens is expected, is not really a show at all.
But this did seem like a moment in time when the writers dropped the baton. Something that made her flee would have been pretty easy to write into the script – and it would have prevented anybody from asking why Rhaenys didn't stop the Dance of the Dragons before it started when there was such a simple opportunity to do so.