Sunday’s new episode of the Game of Thrones prequel series House of the Dragon, titled “The Princess and the Queen,” jumped 10 years into the future and replaced two of its stars. Emma D’Arcy replaced Milly Alcock as Princess Rhaenrya Targaryen and Olivia Cooke took over the role of Queen Alicent Hightower from Emily Carey. Why did the cast change? The short answer is that it happened to accommodate the time jump, but that wasn’t always the plan. Showrunner Ryan Condal explained to The Hollywood Reporter that the original plan was to begin House of the Dragon after the death of King Viserys, meaning Rhaenyra and Alicent would already be adults. However, this left out a lot of the backstory, too much of it necessary to understand the series and too complex to backfill as the series continued. This led to Ryan Condal reworking the series into the decades-spaning story playing out in the show’s first season.
