A pair of sex scenes in the show’s latest episode put female pleasure at the centre

House of the Dragon introduced something new to the Game of Thrones universe: intimacy. Far from the bombastic, violent and amoral misdeeds in Westeros, this week’s episode, “King of the Narrow Sea”, saw the series at its most surprisingly tender.

In the royal chambers of Princess Rhaenyra (Milly Alcock), she and the knight she’s been eyeing, Ser Criston Cole (Fabien Frankel), finally resolve all that tension that’s been simmering between them in longing gazes. After a moment of hesitation on Ser Criston’s part – as he stops at the edge of her bed and looks to the door – they make the leap, slowly. They carefully disrobe, Rhaenyra delicately removing his armour. She laughs. The camera stays on the looks of ecstasy on their faces.

This scene comes after Rhaenyra’s escapades with her uncle Daemon (Matt Smith) to a brothel. The nudity is minimal, the focus remains on their faces, and Rhaenyra has agency. It’s noteworthy that Daemon seems taken aback by how tenacious Rhaenyra is in pursuit of pleasure, as she repeatedly leans back in for more. As a note, we’re just going to have to put the incest aside for a second, but the effect is the same. There’s an overwhelming sense of intimacy that’s foreign to this world.

There’s been a lot of chatter online this week about Game of Thrones finally having good sex scenes for once. In part, it’s because sex is used to progress the story: the implications of Rhaenyra hooking up with Daemon put a strain not only on her bond with Viserys (Paddy Considine) but her rekindled friendship with Allicent (Emily Carey). But by the very low standard of Game of Thrones, what also makes these moments rather remarkable is that female pleasure is centred. In the brothel, Daemon tells her that pleasure is “for the woman as it is a man.”

It’s a world of difference from the original Game of Thrones, a series so controversial for the gratuitous sexual violence inflicted on women. Beginning from Daenerys’ assault on her wedding night in the very first episode, women have always been the victims of sex, not the partakers. It went so far as to go off-book, such is the horrific case when Ramsay Bolton rapes Sansa Stark. There have been a few exceptions, like the tenderness shared between Missandei and Grey Worm – but in Game of Thrones, sex is more often than not conflated with harm.

These violations apparently seemed to translate off-screen too. Actors tried their best to make their scene partners feel comfortable, but the environment didn’t always facilitate that. During the filming of season one, writer David Benioff reportedly tried to convince Jason Momoa to remove his modesty covering and go completely naked. “That was because David had been like, ‘Momoa, just take it off!’” he told author James Hibberd for the oral history book Fire Cannot Kill a Dragon. “You know, giving me shit. ‘Sacrifice! Do it for your art!’ I’m just like, ‘Fuck you, bro. My wife would be pissed. That’s for one lady only, man.'”

Others have also spoken about the show’s sex scenes. Iwan Rheon called filming Sansa’s rape scene “the worst day of my career.” Esmé Bianco, who played prostitute Ros, recalled being “super uncomfortable” with the scene in which Joffrey forces her to slap another prostitute due to her PTSD from her own domestic abuse. “It was pretty tense and everyone was squirming a bit,” she told HuffPost. “But violence like that had been sort of normalised for me and, because of my experiences with intimate partner violence, I dealt with it and probably minimised it a lot more than I would have otherwise.”

A lot has changed since then. For one, House of the Dragon has pared back on the nudity that was once the franchise’s hallmark. Emily Carey (who uses she/they pronouns) also praised the show’s intimacy coordinator for making her feel comfortable during Alicent and Viserys’ scene in bed. (Their rigid, unenthusiastic copulating is juxtaposed against the intensity between Rhaenyra and Daemon.) “Still being 17, the first scene that I read from the show was my sex scene and my intimacy scenes, that includes the scene where I’m bathing the king,” they told Newsweek. “Anything that felt intimate was considered an intimacy scene, which I thought was great. Having that outlet of the intimacy coordinator, to be able to talk everything through and not be shunned, or not feel awkward, or not feel like ‘Oh, this isn’t your job. I don’t want to make you feel uncomfortable but can I ask you…’ it was never any of that, it was just that open dialogue.” Comfort and safety are finally being prioritised.

Notably, this week’s episode was directed by a woman, namely, Clare Kilner. The female gaze is an elusive thing but it feels as if you can see it. Here, sex is portrayed with more emotional dimensions beyond lust. There’s care and tenderness, and remarkably, fun. There’s something wholly refreshing in Rhaenyra’s joyous giggles as she falls into bed with Ser Criston. Royal hierarchies aside, their dynamic feels more like a balanced partnership than what we’ve seen before – of men claiming victory over women.

This isn’t to say it’s all sunshine from here for the women of Westeros. This is the show that began with brutal, bloody childbirth, and former showrunner Miguel Sapochnik has said that “you can’t ignore the violence that was perpetrated on women by men in that time.” But House of the Dragon is still improving on Game of Thrones by moving away from that relentless onslaught of sexual violence. In this iteration, horror and beauty can co-exist.

House of the Dragon is streaming on Sky and Now. New episodes air Mondays at 9pm on Sky Atlantic.