Ewan Mitchell Wanted Aemond’s Nude Scene In HOTD To Shock You

Spoilers follow for the third episode of The House of the Dragon second season, premiering on HBO on June 30.

Google Ewan Mitchell and the second result, just below his bio, is an Instagram fan account dedicated to the actor, with the bio “Ewan Mitchell can crush me, respectfully.” When I suggest to him that thirst messages like these will reach drought levels after his nude scene in this weekend’s episode of Dragon House, he smiles. “Well, I’m not on social media, so I can’t really see those fan pages,” he said. Listen to this, The House of the Dragon The fans ? He doesn’t see one eye or two.

But Prince Aemond, the character, is acutely aware of the reaction his nudity will provoke in this room in a King’s Landing brothel, even if Ewan Mitchell, the actor, ignores it. Mitchell says the dragon rider demonstration, a subject of much discussion between him and the creative team before filming, was a move “coded into Aemond’s DNA” – a shock tactic designed to demonstrate that this boy once bullied will never allow himself to be chastised again.

I don’t remember the exact wording, but I remember seeing someone post a GIF of Prince Aemond’s sapphire eye and say, “That’s the most cartoon-like son of a bitch to ever appear on live television.” There’s something otherworldly about him.
Much of the work is done through the costume, the long hair and the eye patch – thanks to the talents of makeup artist Amanda Knight and our costume designer, Caroline McCall. Just by looking at it, you can roughly assume that he’s probably going to be the bad guy.

But for me to bring that otherworldly texture to Aemond, I’ve never looked Game Of Thronesbecause I wanted to present something new. I took inspiration from other aspects of pop culture, with 80s horror icons like Michael Myers: a character who walks so slowly but always catches up with Jamie Lee Curtis. Aemond hijacks the series and turns it into a horror sequence in the sky above Storm’s End at the end of episode ten of the first season.

It’s this idea of ​​inevitability, something that’s more like an energy than an actual human being. This is the image that Aemond wants to co-opt, namely that he resembles God. He operates on another level. It comes from that cold exterior he’s cultivated over the years, right down to the sapphire stone in his eye socket. You don’t know what’s going on behind his eye.

There is really something very “Final Fantasy wicked” about him: elegant but frightening.
You don’t know what he’s thinking. People who sit and smile, don’t talk much – these are people whose brains you want to pick, but at the same time you don’t know where you stand.

My favorite Aemond moments are the ones where you get a glimpse of how he feels. In this chase sequence above Storm’s End, Aemond is truly upset when his dragon kills Lucerys Velaryon. During this season, he talks to the sex worker he is seeing about how this happened to her.
I agree. Between episodes seven and eight of season one, he turned into a weapon. He has this code that keeps him from being hurt again, like he was when he was a kid. has to be seen as this armored, untouchable, ethereal presence that no one can grasp.

He also talks about his childhood in the brothel, and how his brother and younger uncles bullied him for being different. Is all this in the back of your mind, even when you’re doing cool things with sapphire eyes?
Yeah. This is partly due to seeing Aemond’s young actor Leo Ashton in episodes six and seven of season one: the boy beneath the veneer. This kid was bullied day after day because he didn’t have a dragon egg like the other kids in the family. He realized early on that he was going to have to go out and get what he wanted. I always had this idea in mind in season 2.

So he ended up claiming the biggest, meanest, oldest dragon in the known world in Vhagar. It’s so huge it can’t fit within the confines of a castle wall. Aemond can relate to that.

What do you mean? Bullying didn’t make him feel smaller?
It’s the story of the underdog. I have this theory that it’s not so much the person who claims the dragon, it’s the dragon who claims the person as well. I don’t think Vhagar is someone you just stumble upon. Although Aemond must have been looking for her, she must have seen something in him that he himself hadn’t yet seen.

Aemond is the kid who held on. When he realized he wouldn’t get a dragon egg like the rest of the kids, he held on. When he was bullied for being different, for not having a dragon, he stood his ground. And when Vhagar took off over the beaches of Driftmark in episode seven, he held on tighter than ever before. I don’t know if any of the other characters would have held on as strong, since they were gifted dragons as children.

It is a tremendous feat of courage to approach Vhagar. This is one of Aemond’s redeeming qualities: he has dynamism. Maybe this child is still underneath that fabricated exterior.

Honestly, I was surprised to see that Aegon and his cronies were still bullying Aemond during the brothel scene in this episode. Historically, bullying Aemond hasn’t worked out very well for people.
Aegon catches Aemond in a vulnerable place. Picking up the storyline for the first time and seeing those brothel scenes in episodes two and three, I saw a brilliant opportunity to offer a rare glimpse into her vulnerability. You only see him in his Targaryen blacks, so seeing him in this world – not only that, but then humiliated by his brother – is pretty shocking.

When he gets up and walks out without bothering to dress, so sure of himself even in the face of this humiliation, he seems scarier to me than when he rides Vhagar.
I love this quote from Michael Mann Heatwhen Bob De Niro’s character says, “Don’t get attached to anything that you wouldn’t be willing to give up in 30 seconds flat if you feel the heat around the corner.” » This is the code his character uses to be able to maneuver in this world without getting caught by Al Pacino.

Aemond has a similar code that prevents him from being hurt like he was when he was a child. This is why he is able to leave the madam in this scene. He’s humiliated by his brother and his entire team, and it’s like a switch flips. The madam is no more. All these people in front of him? They don’t want to say anything. He gets up, he assumes responsibility. “Yeah, I’m bulletproof.” Everything you say won’t work. » As you say, it’s scary.

Many comparisons are made between Aemond and Daemon, but this is one big difference: Daemon is intensely attached, whether to his late brother King Viserys or his niece and wife Queen Rhaenyra. We’ve seen him leave difficult situations, but he storms out, he doesn’t storm out. It’s Aemond.
One hundred percent. He is rarely seen losing his temper. The moment you start raising your voice and yelling, you lose power. That doesn’t mean Aemond isn’t just as angry as everyone else hiding behind his smile. He probably is. But he is able to keep control and channel anger in different ways.

It’s also a nude scene, and I feel like you’re about to have a reaction to a volume that few people in this series have seen before. Did you have that in mind when you were shooting it?
Scenes like this start with a conversation about how far you’re willing to go. This is not a choice we made lightly. But it is true for Aemond that he shocks the public. Weakness is not part of Aemond’s vocabulary.