How did Sunfyre survive in House of the Dragon? The director's answer also spells trouble for Rhaenyra

Spoilers for House of the Dragon season 3, episode 7 — and, further down, for Fire & Blood. You've been warned twice, which is once more than Rhaenyra will get.

Team Green's golden retriever of mass destruction is back. Sunfyre — last seen plummeting out of the sky at Rook's Rest looking extremely dead — turned up in episode 7 to barbecue Rhaenyra's bannermen just as Aegon was preparing to die with something resembling dignity for once. Scarred, limping, magnificent. But hang on: didn't we all watch that dragon die?

No, says the director. Nearly, though.

Nina Lopez-Corrado, who directed the episode, gave Entertainment Weekly the official explanation, and it's less "resurrection" and more "very long lie-down". Per Lopez-Corrado:

"I think Sunfyre was very close to being dead." — Nina Lopez-Corrado

Close, but not actually. The dragon spent the gap between seasons dormant, rejuvenating where he fell, while everyone — including his own rider — treated him as a large golden corpse. The show even had Aegon visit him in episode 4 and fail to wake him, which in hindsight was less a farewell and more a snooze button.

The mystical bit is where it gets properly Targaryen. Lopez-Corrado credits the bond between dragon and rider for the timing of the comeback — she's said it "100 percent has to do with the Targaryen line" and its connection to dragons. Aegon was about to die; Sunfyre felt it; Sunfyre got up. Matching facial scars, matching trauma, co-dependency measured in tonnes. It's the healthiest relationship on the show, which says a great deal.

Now, the bad news for Rhaenyra

Here's why Sunfyre's survival is not just a cute reunion:

• In Fire & Blood, Sunfyre survives Rook's Rest too — battered, half-flightless, but alive;
• George R. R. Martin did not keep that dragon alive for sentimental reasons;
• the book version of Sunfyre has one more very famous appointment in the Dance of the Dragons, and Rhaenyra is on the guest list;
• if the show is following the book's logic — and the director's "he was never dead" answer suggests it is — then the queen's storyline now has a large golden shadow over it.

We'll say no more, except: if you're Team Black, perhaps don't google "Sunfyre Dragonstone" before the finale. Or do. Suffering builds character.