Characters / House of the Dragon - Alicent Hightower

House of the Dragon Main Character Index
The Seven Kingdoms of Westeros | Blacks (Rhaenyra Targaryen | Daemon Targaryen) | Greens (Alicent Hightower) | Houses of Westeros (House Targaryen [Viserys Targaryen] | House Velaryon) | Others | Dragons

Dowager Queen Alicent Hightower

"How sweetly the fox speaks when it's been cornered by the hounds."

^{Click here to see young Alicent} "She swore her innocence and I believe her."

Played By: Olivia Cooke (adult), Emily Carey (young)

"Where is duty? Where is sacrifice? It’s trampled under your pretty foot again. And now you take my son's eye, and to even that you feel entitled!"

The daughter of Hand of the King Ser Otto Hightower, Alicent begins the story as a precocious young noblewoman, lady-in-waiting and a childhood friend of Princess Rhaenyra Targaryen. Events, however, would see her elevated as Queen Consort to Viserys I, significantly straining her friendship with Rhaenyra. She eventually bears Viserys children whose existence further threatens Rhaenyra's fragile standing as heir.

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A-L

• Absurdly Youthful Mother: Alicent is already a grandmother at 35 thanks to two generations of Teen Pregnancy.
• Abusive Parents: It's largely unintentional on her part and implied to be the result of having had them at such a young age and spending half her life as queen. That said, Alicent does love her children, regardless of their flaws, but clearly has trouble trying to convey it and balancing politics and family.
  • She shouts at, berates, and even hits Aegon and drills it into his head that he is the rival to Rhaenyra, and nothing more. At his coronation, Aegon, in a rare glimpse of honesty and vulnerability, asks if she loves him, to which she just calls him an imbecile.
  • Olivia Cooke herself stated that Alicent is hyper aware of her shortcomings as a parent, and she is jealous of Rhaenyra and her closeness to her children.
• Adaptational Heroism:
  • Alicent in the show is given multiple sympathetic moments that weren't in Fire & Blood, including a friendship gone wrong with Rhaenyra, which helps to explain her later disdain for her. Alicent doesn't fully turn on her until she is convinced Rhaenyra will slay her sons to secure her claim, and after Rhaenyra made a dangerous careless mistake and lied to her to cover it up, despite Alicent spending years vouching for and defending her. She even strongly argues against and does her best to prevent Otto from getting Aegon II to kill Rhaenyra and her family.
  • After Dyana is raped by Aegon, Alicent's compassion for her (siding with and believing her) is very clear in the show. The Alicent of the books hardly ever showed any compassion to anyone who wasn't part of her family.
  • None of the over-the-top slanders that Mushroom told about her in the books (losing her virginity to Daemon, seducing Viserys while Aemma was still alive, poisoning Viserys, calling Rhaenyra a whore and coldly wishing for her to die in childbirth) make it into the show.
• Adaptational Sympathy: Alicent in Fire & Blood is ambitious and in full support of her house and her son's claim to the throne from the beginning. Here, she's clearly unhappy with her father using her to get a grandson as king and only starts to commit to her house's plans when Otto tells her that either she must crown Aegon as king or hope that Rhaenyra is sympathetic to her, which comes directly after a moment where Rhaenyra lied to Alicent. She only fully commits after Viserys, while on his deathbed, mistakes her for Rhaenyra and mentions Aegon (meaning Aegon I) and the Song of Ice and Fire prophecy, which she misinterprets to mean that their son Aegon is The Chosen One, and even then, when the Green Council opts for killing Rhaenyra, Alicent is strongly opposed to murdering her old friend.
• Adaptational Villainy: At the same time, Alicent in the books never attempts to personally cut out her step-grandson's eye, only suggests it. She is not the one who suggests Rhaenyra get married to her son Aegon, which would have ensured peace. Instead, the line is given to her father, Otto.
• Adaptational Wimp: Personality-wise, at least. Due to her more sympathetic portrayal compared to her book counterpart, the show presents her as a far more conflicted and passive political player whose actions were driven by her father's manipulations as opposed to any ambitions of her own. One poignant example is when the Greens plot to crown Aegon as king against the deceased Viserys's wishes. Unlike in the books where Alicent was one of the primary conspirators in the plot, the show has her Locked Out of the Loop and only went along with the rest of the Green Council when it was too late to turn back.
• Age Lift: Alicent is 9 years older than Rhaenyra in the books. Here, she's roughly the same age (as for the actresses, Emily Carey (young Alicent) is 3 years younger than Milly Alcock (young Rhaenyra), and Olivia Cooke (adult Alicent) is 18 months younger than Emma D'Arcy (adult Rhaenyra)).
• Anger Born of Worry: When she sees Aemond covered in soot after a guard brings him to her, Alicent immediately rushes to check that her son is okay. When she realizes that he has gone down to the dungeons where they keep the adult dragons, she does not hesitate to reproach him. But she quickly calms down when he tells her about Aegon and his nephews mocking him with the pig joke and tries to reassure him that he will surely get a dragon sooner or later.
• Anti-Villain: Gradually falls from grace into this, though only a villain from the Blacks' perspective due to the Grey-and-Gray Morality of the series. Alicent's sympathetic traits she possessed earlier in her life, her Freudian Excuse, and her horror and disgust at Larys murdering his own family help to cement her as this. She is even briefly horrified by cutting Rhaenyra during the eye-for-an-eye incident, and later stops Otto and the rest of the Green Council from going through with a plan to kill Rhaenyra and her supporters without giving them a chance to surrender.
• Arch-Enemy: To Rhaenyra Targaryen. Though the two start the series as best friends, their relationship starts to fall apart when Alicent marries Rhaenyra's father King Viserys, with Rhaenyra feeling Alicent is manipulating her father for power, while Alicent resents Rhaenyra's flagrant disregard for law and tradition, enabled by Viserys's favouritism. When the civil war begins in earnest between their respective factions, the Greens and the Blacks, after Alicent has her son Aegon crowned king rather than Rhaenyra due to misinterpreting Viserys's last words, Alicent remains Rhaenyra's most personal foe despite not being a warrior of any kind because of their shared history.
• Awful Wedded Life: Played with. Despite not being physically attracted to Viserys (and being grossed out whenever they have sex), she clearly cares deeply for him — she becomes irritated at the servants who are unable to bathe him without hurting him and decides to bathe Viserys herself. Even when they are alone, she tenderly kisses and strokes him, despite Viserys being so drugged that he doesn't realize who she is. She is distraught when he dies, and is adamant that no harm comes to Rhaenyra because Viserys would not have wanted her killed.
• Believing Their Own Lies: Downplayed Trope. Viserys tells her that Aegon should be king, and she takes his words at face value, despite there being factors that warrant some skepticism. She knows Viserys espousing Aegon as heir would be a huge and uncharacteristic about-face change for him. She knows that he was dying and not in his right mind at the time. But his words are advantageous to her, and she doesn't scrutinize them.
• Berserk Button: Any perceived unfairness or injustice will send Alicent into a rage.
  • When Viserys cares more about the rumors surrounding Rhaenyra's children than the fact that his and Alicent's own son lost an eye, Alicent furiously attempts to cut out Lucerys's eye.
  • Alicent is shocked to learn that the small council has been plotting against the wishes of Viserys without including her, and when Jasper Wylde attempts to placate her one too many times, she threatens to send him to the Wall if he speaks another word. He promptly shuts up.
• Bookworm: She is very studious and enjoys reading about the history of Westeros, scolding Rhaenyra for ignoring her lessons and bonding with Viserys since they have that fondness for history in common.
• Brainy Brunette: She's a brunette who is depicted as studious and intelligent; she enjoys learning, is politically astute, and skilfully endears herself to King Viserys on her father's orders. It's combined some with Fiery Redhead due to her hair having a reddish auburn tinge to it.
• Broken Bird: Her miserable marriage is wearing Alicent down, and she becomes noticeably more upset, angry, and depressed as time goes on. It becomes worse when she loses her only friend, Rhaenyra, for good this time. As an adult, Alicent gives a raw, emotional motive rant after her son Aemond lost an eye in a fight with Rhaenyra’s sons, which fleshes out her issues in a painfully emphatic way. She reveals the terrible strain that losing her youthful years in marriage to a man decades her senior put her through, as well as the toll of her paranoia over the fates of her children given the political pressures on the succession, all merged with an understandable outrage of Rhaenyra managing to live a less traditionally “lady-like” lifestyle including multiple lovers, lying about important things, and maiming Alicent's children without repercussions, all thanks to her enabler father Viserys.
• Broken Pedestal:
  • Rhaenyra and Alicent become estranged after she learns of Alicent's betrothal to King Viserys. After three years of being queen, she is still distant with Rhaenyra despite her attempts to rebuild their old relationship. However, their relationship becomes a Rebuilt Pedestal as Rhaenyra realizes Alicent had no choice in the matter, and admits she misses their old friendship. Alicent even furiously defends Rhaenyra at every turn, slowly earning Rhaenyra's trust back. However, the pedestal begins to chip once she’s told that the Maester brought Rhaenyra Fantasy Contraception tea at the request of the King, and it breaks permanently when Alicent discovers that, while Daemon didn't take her virginity, Ser Criston Cole did and Rhaenyra had lied to her. This all takes place against the backdrop of her father's warnings that unless she 100% unquestionably trusts Rhaenyra, she better start fending for herself.
  • Alicent follows everything her father orders her to do to the letter, regardless of the fact that she eventually becomes aware that she's being used. The crux comes from her realization that her father doesn't have her best interests in mind when he manipulates her, as he tries to use her son for his own benefit. When Viserys I dies, Alicent is able to get ahold of Aegon before Otto does, clearly stating to him that she does not intend to be a pawn of his anymore.
• Calling the Old Man Out: Alicent calls Otto on his manipulations and vicarious ambition in "The Green Council".
  Alicent: Our hearts were never one. I see that now. Rather, I have been a piece that you moved about the board.
  Otto: If that is true, then I made you Queen of the Seven Kingdoms. Would you have desired it otherwise?
  Alicent: How could I know? I wanted whatever you impressed upon me to want. And now the debt comes due.
• Character Tic: When she's nervous, such as when her eldest brother faces Daemon Targaryen in the lists, she bites her nails.
• Color-Coded Characters: Befitting a queen with Unlimited Wardrobe, her outfits actually serve a significant character purpose.
  • As a teenager, before Queen Aemma's death and her subsequent marriage to the widowed king Viserys, Alicent favored robes of various shades of blue, which symbolized her childish innocence and her calmer, more peaceful personality than Rhaenyra's.
  • During her early years as queen, she mostly wears Targaryen robes which consist of various shades of red, brown, and black and symbolize the beginning of her corruption, due to the manipulations of those around her.
  • Finally, after realizing that she cannot afford to be sure that she can place any trust in Rhaenyra and their friendship when the latter lies to her, swearing on her mother's grave; and indirectly ensuring Alicent's father, Otto, was dismissed as Hand of the King^note who then invites her to think about protecting the legitimacy of his eldest son just before saying goodbye and leaving her, Alicent definitively switches to the color green. In-Universe, it represents a war invocation of House Hightower. More personally, it signals not only her willingness to put the safety of all her children well above her friendship with the Targaryen princess, but also belies her Driven by Envy nature for the benefits and privileges Rhaenyra enjoys thanks to Viserys.
• Commonality Connection: Alicent and Criston's relationship is built on the foundation of their similar trauma.
  • Most obviously, they first bond in the immediate aftermath of both being burned and discarded by Rhaenyra. They each liked Rhaenyra, thought of her as a friend — but that was always kind of a romanticized view of things. She was the royal princess; they were her lady-in-waiting and guard respectively. They served at her pleasure. And then Rhaenyra got cross at them for basically being of their social class — for not having the kind of privilege and options that would allow them to turn down a request from a king, or be protected from the treason that breaking Kingsgaurd vows is.
  • Alicent and Criston share mirror experiences of being sexually exploited by the royal family. First, you cannot say no when you get propositioned by a royal. Second, if you are the lover of a royal, it's not unreasonable to think you might get some benefits out of it, that this royal might use their status to bestow protection or favors upon you. But no, Alicent and Criston don't get that. If anything, their royal lovers seem confused, borderline insulted, they'd even expect that. They're used and discarded.
  • Alicent and Criston alone have chivalric ideals. They're not Wrong Genre Savvy — they know damn well that isn't how their world works, that Targaryen power trumps all — but they maintain that it should be. The two of them basically role-play chivalry with each other; her as the revered, clement queen and him as the loyal, honorable knight. They validate each other in these identities when the world around them won't.
    Alicent: I have to believe that in the end, honor and decency will prevail. We need to hew to that… and to each other.
• Contrasting Sequel Main Character: (Contrasting Prequel Main Character) — to a number of notable characters in the main cast of Game of Thrones and its source books:
  • She started out as a young and somewhat naive but socially very adept girl, not unlike Sansa Stark, capable of emotionally reading and manipulating people at the royal court in a way her tomboyish counterpart could not (Rhaenyra/Arya).
  • Olivia Cooke was asked to read some of Cersei Lannister's lines in her audition. It's interesting the way Cersei's characteristics get split between Alicent and Rhaenyra. Alicent gets most of the miserable parts of being Cersei, while Rhaenyra gets the fiery ones. Cersei and Alicent are both the daughters of controlling and ambitious fathers who treat them as political pawns from a young age and maneuver them into unhappy marriages to kings. Inversely, Alicent is a Shrinking Violet who takes a long time to Grow a Spine, while Rhaenyra gets all of Cersei's spitfire and inborn impetuousness. Rhaenyra gets the incest and the three children fathered outside her marriage, both symbols of sexual freedom and refusal to be controlled or bend to the will of society. But Alicent gets many of the ways life weighs upon Cersei, the paranoia and the vindictiveness. The Aemond-loses-an-eye scene and the Joffrey-bitten-by-a-direwolf scene overtly parallel each other. Cersei and Rhaenyra are the ones who overtly say things along the lines of "if I were a man I wouldn't have to put up with half this shit," yet Rhaenyra—as a Targaryen and Viserys's heir—does get some privileges typically reserved for men. Lacking that, it's Cersei and Alicent who have to play within their roles as women and do things like using sexuality to maneuver the men around them. It's dropped from the show, but in the books, Cersei has sex with several men at court in order to gain their allegiance. Alicent does it far subtly, but much of her power does come from allying herself with powerful men in sexually charged—if not explicitly sexual—ways.
  • Adult Alicent is a somewhat more ruthless version of Margaery Tyrell (Margaery actually was a Hightower on her mother's side, though this went unmentioned in the original TV series). Like Margaery (or her grandmother Olenna) who married into the royal family, and tends to be more focused on Pragmatic Villainy through diplomacy, and isn't a "villain" but a political actor in a world of Grey-and-Gray Morality. Unfortunately for Alicent, she lacks Margaery's social skills and self-control that allowed the latter to manoeuvre her way through the decadent court of Westeros, leaving behind an emotionally unstable woman who has long been embittered by her current position.
  • She's also reminiscent of Ser Addam Marbrand from the books, who is Tywin Lannister's go-to guy for any martial trouble that comes across. Like Marbrand, she's an unquestioning but effective pawn to their leadership (Lannister for Marbrand, Otto and Hobert Hightower for Alicent), both who, obviously, would much rather be doing something else and return to their place of comfort, but are too good/effective at their position to abandon it.
  • Alicent is similar to Samwell Tarly as well. Both rejected the plans their fathers had for them only for both of them to realize that their fathers were right. Samwell discovers that the Maesters are a bunch of fuddy-duddies who only hoard knowledge but never share it so he goes on his own and tries to spread knowledge what he can. Alicent discovers that everything Otto said about Rhaenyra not really considering her a friend is true so she has to cling to him and his influence.
• Corrupt the Cutie: She starts the series as a studious and happy teenage girl who just wants to spend the rest of her days having fun in the company of her best friend Rhaenyra. Then both Rhaenyra's mother and newborn brother die and Alicent's father, Otto, subtly forces his daughter to seduce her friend's father for months until she is married and impregnated by him, so as to give birth to a male heir who can wrest succession from Rhaenyra. Rhaenyra understandably holds a grudge against Alicent for much of their early years as a stepmother and stepdaughter. But when they finally manage to reconcile when Rhaenyra sees how much this whole situation has cost Alicent, Larys Strong's manipulations, Otto's worries that he has instilled in her about the trust she places in Rhaenyra's goodwill and the dubious safety of her children and, finally, the revelations of Criston Cole that Rhaenyra has no qualms about lying to her (even swearing on the death of her own mother, knowing full well that such an oath counts a lot for someone like Alicent, who also lost her mother as a child) all have a great weight on Alicent's psyche and lead her to become bitter and resentful towards both her former best friend/stepdaughter and her husband.
• Courtly Love: Alicent and Criston's romantic relationship is only teased at, but elements of this trope are at play in their dynamic. It's also a Reconstruction. How can divorcing sexuality from desire be emotionally satisfying for the people involved? Well, if they're both sexually damaged people, such a relationship might actually be a good fit for them. Before becoming Alicent's sworn sword, Criston previously served Rhaenyra, who did pull him into her bed, endangering his life for the sake of her own sexual gratification. Meanwhile, Alicent's past sexual experiences involved two different versions of men imposing their unwanted sexuality upon her while she desperately wished she were anywhere else (the first being unwanted marital sex with the much older and ailing Viserys, and then later a grudging Sex for Services setup with Larys). With that in mind, it makes sense that Alicent would see Criston not imposing his sexuality on her as respectful if not romantic even, and Criston would be relieved that Alicent doesn't ask him to break his vows and risk his life by being with her.
• Daddy's Little Villain: Alicent hates doing her father's bidding but everything he has told her about Rhaenyra has come true. This causes Alicent to choose her family's side over her friend and in doing so wins her father's approval.
• Death Glare: She throws a pretty deep one at Criston Cole when he allows himself to openly insult Rhaenyra by calling her a spoiled cunt.
• Deconstructed Character Archetype: She's one for Tough Love and Mother Makes You King — she's using the former to try and mold her son Aegon so that he can become king, and wants to invoke the latter by pointing out that Aegon is Viserys's eldest son, with both actions being motivated by a desire to ensure that her children will never have to worry about Rhaenyra's wrath. The problems with this are as follows:
  • 1) Rhaenyra had set aside her issues with Alicent by the time the latter starts molding Aegon to be king, meaning that Rhaenyra's wrath is only falling on Alicent and her kids because of how Alicent acted on the assumption of Rhaenyra's wrath.
  • 2) Aegon is not the kind of person who should be on the throne, as not only is he The Hedonist, he's also a Serial Rapist and a Royal Brat who was always fine with being the Spare to the Throne.
  • 3) Aegon is starting to ignore Alicent's efforts to whip him into shape. As Aegon had made peace with being the Spare to the Throne, her efforts to force him into the kingship only serve to drive a wedge between them.
• Driven by Envy: A tragic and sympathetic example. Alicent is bitterly jealous and resentful of the comparative freedom that Rhaenyra enjoys. As the favorite daughter of a pushover king, Rhaenyra is allowed privileges that are basically unheard of in their world — namely being made her father's heir and being permitted to take lovers. Meanwhile, Alicent had a less nice, much more controlling father, and while the Hightowers are a powerful and influential family, they don't have the weight of the monarchy and dragons behind them. Alicent has had to play by the rules of Westeros's patriarchal society and spent her teenage years and early twenties pumping out babies. She's spent a lifetime doing everything right according to that handbook of proper conduct for a Westerosi woman, and yet it still hasn't yielded the promised results. Being the Queen is supposed to mean having the King's favor and protection, yet Aemond's Eye Scream incident is a proof-of-concept of a long-held fear of hers: that Viserys will never levy that in defense of her and their brood. Seeing once again Rhaenyra and her children get away with almost literal murder thanks to Viserys's favoritism, this turns into an explosion of the hatred and envy that Alicent constantly feels. Olivia Cooke additionally confirmed another layer of Alicent's resentfulness: Whereas, despite her best efforts, each of Alicent's children has turned out a different type of difficult, Rhaenyra's sons, up until the eye incident, are nothing but pleasant and carefree.
  Alicent: What have I done but what was expected of me? Forever upholding the kingdom, the family, and the law. While you flout all to do as you please.
• Dude Magnet: Viserys, Larys, and Criston are all attracted to her, and her father called her the "comeliest in the court".
• The Dutiful Daughter: Not that she ever had much of a choice to begin with by being the daughter of a minor noble who subtly forced her to become the King's second wife but, especially after she was fully committed to her birthplace House cause following the marriage of Rhaenyra and Leanor, one of the strongest reasons for the contrast between Alicent and Rhaenyra is that while Alicent is 100% committed to her duties both as Queen consort but also as the daughter of the Hand of the King, as well as being extremely devoted to her husband, father, and the whole kingdom, she's basically living an unhappy life as she realizes that all her efforts and sacrifices are never adequately rewarded. Seeing Rhaenyra instead exactly leading a much more comfortable and free life, having the constant approval of Viserys (and is substantially much happier because of it all), it cannot help but understandably make the bitter blood come to Alicent. From marital sex to playing the nursemaid, Alicent bears in all with haunted eyes and not a word of complaint. For the most part, Alicent's efforts go unappreciated, and when Rhaenyra acknowledges and thanks Alicent for her unflagging duty in caring for Viserys at the end of his life, these words seem to fall upon a deep unmet yearning in Alicent. It's enough to usher in a Hope Spot between them.
• Entertainingly Wrong: On Viserys's deathbed, Alicent mistakenly thinks that the king changed his mind and wants Prince Aegon to succeed him; thing is, Viserys thought he was talking to Rhaenyra, and he was referring to Aegon The Conqueror's prophecy of the Prince That Was Promised. This prompts her to make her son Aegon usurp the throne.
• Early Personality Signs: As a teenager, she is shown to be quite anxious and cautious. By adulthood, her anxiety has been warped into full-blown paranoia.
• Establishing Character Moment: In her first scene, she refuses Rhaenyra's offer to bring her along on a dragon flight, establishing that she's a Shrinking Violet and highlighting the fact that she's not a Targaryen.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Minimized as she is not so evil, just only an antagonist with understandable reasons for Rhaenyra's claim to the throne. Alicent dotes on and cares about Viserys, though that might have changed into slight contempt after Viserys refused to act after Aemond lost his eye. She deeply loves her children even if she sometimes feels she has to discipline and yell at Aegon for being an immature and irresponsible alcoholic and Big Brother Bully. Helaena is mysterious, strange, prophetic, and obsessed with bugs but her mother still tries to make an effort to be there for her. This is cemented in a moment when the entire Greens faction faces certain death against Rhaenys, Alicent's last words and actions are attempting to protect Helaena and Aegon, even calmly and silently attempting to shield Aegon with her own body.
• Everyone Has Standards:
  • Thinks and speaks negatively of the Targaryens' incestuous customs and Rhaenyra having sex with a Kingsguard, risking Criston's life as the punishment for breaking his vows is a brutal execution. She did later come to accept Targaryen customs when she had her son Aegon married to her daughter Helaena.
  • She's horrified after Larys informs her he disposed his father and brother. Kinslaying Is a Special Kind of Evil in their culture.
  • Despite her distressing Deliberate Values Dissonance in trying to buy her silence, she's furious when she learns Aegon raped one of Helaena's servant girls, to the point that she outright disowns him after witnessing his casualness about the act.
  • As much as she is continually outraged by Rhaenyra's freer sexual behavior, Alicent still shows disapproval when Criston Cole calls Rhaenyra "a spoiled cunt," and when Vaemond Velaryon openly calls the princess a "whore" in front of Viserys.
  • She's disturbed to find out that her father and the Small Council had been planning on having Aegon usurp Rhaenyra even before Alicent had told them it was, what she believed to have been, her husband's dying wish. She also refuses to go along with her father's plan to have Rhaenyra and her family killed without giving them the chance to bend the knee first.
• Face Death with Dignity: When Rhaenys appears about to burn them all with dragonfire, Alicent silently and calmly accepts her fate, standing in front of her son Aegon in a desperate attempt to shield him.
• Fallen Hero: Alicent was once a kind, dutiful, and loyal daughter and friend. However, a combination of her anxiety, her unhappy marriage to an older man, her abusive manipulative father, and Rhaenyra lying to her about losing her virginity with a Kingsguard, corrupted her into becoming a bitter, paranoid Anti-Villain.
• Flower Motif: She is compared by Larys to the malvales flowers in the Godswood, a foreign plant that should have difficulty growing in King's Landing yet is able to find its roots and take bloom all the same.
• Fanservice Pack: A disturbing example, as she changes her dresses from conservative to more revealing ones to the demand of her own father, in order to seduce King Viserys and become his wife.
• Freudian Excuse: Alicent has become bitter and paranoid (not wholly without good reason). However, she began as a sweet, loyal, and dutiful noblewoman before both of those traits were pressed upon her. Her father ordered her to wed the king, which Alicent felt duty-bound to obey. She endured an unhappy marriage with Viserys. Then right after this, her father — sent away because she took Rhaenyra’s side on her being a maiden — blames her for this and emphasises how if not completely trustworthy Rhaenya would murder her children, that sole friend was proven to have broken her trust and lied to her about having sex with Ser Criston Cole, rendering Alicent feeling utterly alone and isolated, left only with her paranoia and resentment. The saddest part is the fact that most of Alicent's problems can easily be traced back to the manipulations of her own father Otto, which she actually doesn't blame for her situation, blindly preferring to project her grief against Viserys, Rhaenyra, and the princess's children.
• The Fashionista: As might be expected from a queen's closet after her marriage to Viserys, Alicent boasts a collection of gorgeous gowns and jewelry that could easily rival those of the noble female characters of the mother series (Cersei, Sansa, Daenerys, and Margaery).
• Fatal Flaw: Two major ones.
  • Envy, Alicent is deeply jealous of her old friend Rhaenyra's freedoms and tendency to do whatever she wants because her father won't step in to stop her. This leads her to be susceptible to the manipulations of her father Otto, who feeds her jealously until it transforms into a paranoia that Rhaenyra will wipe her and her family out once she becomes queen, even though Rhaenyra has no intention of doing anything like that...well until she's pushed to the brink as a result of Alicent and her family's actions, that is.
  • A highly unrealistic view of the world around her. Alicent grew up believing the stories of chivalry and virtue before her father manipulated her into getting with Viserys for his own selfish ambitions. Even as she grows to learn the world isn't what she thought it was, she still stubbornly clings on to that ideal, and even as she gets in bed with characters such as Larys and Ser Criston Cole, she justifies her deeds as a way to create that world that she wants to believe is true.
• Geeky Turn-On: A less crass example than others, given Viserys's more innocent reaction, but Alicent comforting the king with history books and his stone models of dragons clearly give her an "in" with him.
• Generation Xerox:
  • Her third child, Aemond, took a lot from her both in terms of personality and in the sense of honor and duty, to the point of becoming a Mirror Character of Alicent.
  • Alicent herself as an adult implements the same educational model of her father on her sons.
  • Helaena is sweet, gentle, and generally liked as young Alicent had been.
• God Save Us from the Queen!: Alicent began her early life as The High Queen but a combination of her unhappy marriage, Freudian Excuse, Abusive Parent Otto, and losing her friendship with Rhaenyra slowly corrupted and twisted her into becoming bitter, paranoid, ruthless, resentful, and cruel. This is cemented when she attempts to personally cut out her stepgrandson's eye in full view of the royal court, after failing to get her husband to do it.
  • Best exemplified by her summons immediately after Rhaenyra gave birth to Joffrey, perhaps knowing that Rhaenyra's pride would compel her to endure a humiliating walk to her chambers instead of handing off the newborn to a servant as would be expected. This is to inspect the newborn, suspected correctly by the Queen to be a bastard. This veers into being a Deconstructed Trope in that while Queen Alicent may be relentlessly catty, the matter at the heart of her suspicions about her stepdaughter are merited.
  • It's again played with in the Small Council meeting in that while she is personally antagonistic towards Rhaenyra, it doesn't bleed into general policy and there are cogent reasons for opposing her. She argues that waging war on the Triarchy (again) would be immensely costly, and she has a point, considering it took House Velaryon and Daemon three years with two dragons just to smoke out the Crabfeeder, while Rhaenyra is a War Hawk pushing for an immense investment to annex the Stepstones. Similarly, her refusal to marry Jacaerys to Helaena looks unreasonable on the surface, but both women know all of Rhaenyra's children are bastards, so Alicent feels like she's being swindled into endorsing their legitimacy at the moment when it is most in question.
  • Subverted in the genuine compassion she shows Dyana, the young serving girl Aegon raped, when others in this trope like Cersei would sooner have had the girl killed to silence her.
• Good Girl Gone Bad: In the beginning, teenage Alicent is a sweet, dutiful, and anxious girl who is close friends with Rhaenyra, yet also obedient to her ambitious father (who is more than willing to use her as a political pawn). After being forced to marry the much older Viserys (who is Rhaenyra's father) and giving birth to her first son in her teens (which only worsens her relationship with Rhaenyra due to Heir Club for Men), Alicent becomes increasingly cold and hardened. A series of scandals and tragedies surrounding Rhaenyra completely severs Alicent's trust in her and by adulthood, Alicent is a bitter, scheming woman consumed with paranoia and not above taking petty potshots regarding her stepdaughter. Alicent is increasingly obsessed with placing her own son on the throne (regardless of his wishes) believing it necessary for his survival at first — and then when she starts to come around from this, a miscommunication makes her believe he is a prophesised chosen one who must be on the throne for that.
• Good Stepmother: Played with. Alicent was once loyal, friendly, and dutiful towards her stepdaughter Rhaenyra, defending and vouching for her even when Rhaenyra rebuffed her. Even then, though, Alicent could never be a mother figure to Rhaenyra due to their preexisting relationship as peers. Due to her terrible marriage to Viserys, and Rhaenyra lying to her on her dead mother, Alicent and Rhaenyra slowly became bitter rivals and Alicent herself became a Wicked Stepmother—a role which she actually can fill as a peer.
• Green and Mean: Alicent definitively switches to the color green. In-Universe, it represents a war invocation of House Hightower. In the episodes "The Princess and the Queen" and "Driftmark" she becomes bitter and hateful to Rhaenyra and her children.
• The Heavy: While Otto is orchestrating events from behind the scenes, Alicent outranks him as Queen and is thus the de facto leader of the Greens. This makes her the lightning rod for all the bad things the Blacks attribute to her side, as almost all the vitriol and smack talk is directed to her.
• Hero Antagonist: Alicent is a highly sympathetic character yet she is framed in opposition to the protagonist, Rhaenyra, due to Alicent representing traditional patriarchal values and being in a position of power to enforce them. Rhaenyra's repeated defiance of these values puts them in conflict.
• Hidden Depths: For all the scheming thrust upon her, Alicent happens to be a dutiful and involved queen in government matters. She may have been reluctant to perform the task, but she was certainly raised for it.
• The High Queen:
  • After marrying King Viserys, Alicent continues to have a generous and gentle heart. This begins to be deconstructed, however, in that being forced to become Queen means she is far more Lonely at the Top now—not to mention the inequality in her marriage with Viserys, (especially when it comes to sex), begins to weigh down on her as a woman.
  • Alicent has to take the reins of government once Viserys becomes too ill to do it himself.
• Hot Consort: To Viserys. Her beauty is one of the main reasons he picked her to be his second wife, instead of making a politically advantageous match.
• Hypocrite: Preaches decency and virtue yet protects Criston from both high treason by deflowering the heir to the throne and also his murder of Joffrey Lonmouth, so she can use him as a potential ally against Rhaenyra and Daemon, whom she fears will massacre her sons. Not to mention weaponize his chauvinistic resentment. She is horrified but ultimately unwilling to execute Larys Strong for burning his own brother and father alive, (not to mention scores of others in Harrenhal); so she's also party to conspiracy, arson, kin-slaying, and mass murder — and will look the other way as long as she has another sword in her back pocket. She is willing to disown and cut ties with her own son due to committing rape, but she still goes through with keeping the rape victim silent due to Deliberate Values Dissonance and the fact they are on the brink of war with Rhaenyra. She appears to have a strong distaste for lying, yet kept her relationship with Viserys a secret for months. Subverted in that Alicent clearly had no choice and was forced to do so by her Abusive Parent Otto.
  • Very complicated example with the reveal of her showing her feet to Larys for him to masturbate to for years, in exchange for information. Complicated as this is with a lot of coercion (Larys having proven willing to murder his entire family to get what he wants is not someone that can be refused without great risk) and clear disgust. Made all the more so by how Larys has been both isolating her from everyone else (it’s he who reveals about Rhaenyra’s tea after all) as well as making her more dependent on him since she was young, giving off a heavy grooming impression than any deliberate cognitive dissonance.
• I Have No Son!: In Episode 8, when she learns that Aegon raped Dyana, she tells him that he is not her son.
• Incest Is Relative: She thinks and speaks negatively of Targaryen incest — but engages two of her children to each other later, perhaps to emphasize they are Targaryen in contrast to Rhaenya’s boys more than anything else, as well as prevent Jace as a prospect for her daughter being pushed.
• Innocently Insensitive: Inadvertently talking about the ease of her own birth of Aegon in an attempt to reassure Rhaenyra about going through it herself, with how Rhaenyra’s mother had such difficulty and eventually died to childbirth.
• It's Personal: Alicent resents the fact that Rhaenyra repeatedly lies to her and everyone when it comes to her sexual proclivities and the parenthood of her sons, especially due to the fact that Alicent and Rhaenyra used to be intimate friends. Her anger toward Rhaenyra stems from the notion that she was just left behind to toil in joyless duty, while Rhaenyra was given the privilege of doing whatever she wanted, virtually inconsequentially. As such, Rhaenyra's decisions personally hurt Alicent, even when she may have not intended for this to be the case. It's also implied that Alicent still loves Rhaenyra, making the whole situation even more hurtful.
• Jerkass Has a Point:
  • As cold and unyielding as Alicent is after the time skip, she does have a point when it comes to Rhaenyra's children, as all of them are clearly fathered by her lover Harwin Strong instead of her husband and King Consort Laenor. If word got out about it, it would be detrimental to the reputation of their family, not just Rhaenyra's side, and would call Rhaenyra's children's claim to the throne into question since they're technically bastards. Lyonel Strong's comments also make clear that this kind of fraud is high treason in Westeros and would get Rhaenyra and her children disinherited and exiled at the very least if Viserys actually committed to punishing them like anyone else in the same situation.
  • She refuses Rhaenyra's olive branch to arrange a marriage between Jaecerys and her daughter Haelaena, which puts a damper on any hopes of reconciling the would-be Black and Green factions. While it may come off as unreasonable in Rhaenyra's and Viserys's eyes for Alicent to reject the offer, from Alicent's perspective, she has nothing to gain from it. The first is that marrying Haelaena would not only bolster Jaecerys's claim to the Iron Throne but also give the Blacks a valuable political hostage. And given that Jaecerys's bastard status is practically an Open Secret to everyone, being married to him would only damage Haelaena's image by association.
  • While calling for the maiming of a child is cruel, it wasn't fair that Rhaenyra's child got a slap on the wrist for permanently blinding and scarring her son in one eye (in a fight that they and their cousins started, no less) solely because Viserys', Aemond's own father, took Rhaenyra's word for what happened.
• Kick the Dog: After the 10-year time skip, a very frustrated Alicent no longer has problems with flaunting her hostility towards those she despises in an almost malicious and petty way, even only in the sixth episode:
  • When Rhaenyra is done giving birth, Alicent orders that she be able to see the baby right away to make sure it's a bastard too.
  • She has no qualms about mocking Laenor by telling him to keep trying until she finally succeeds in having a child like him.
  • In "Driftmark", she brings up Laenor being suspiciously absent while Aemond and his "sons" were fighting. Understandable considering that she was trying to deflect Viserys's attention away from Aemond having called the Strong boys bastards. Her making a jape about Laenor's sexuality immediately after that? Not so much.
• Lady-In-Waiting: She serves as this in all but name to Princess Rhaenyra; she's one of her closest companions, accompanies her to formal events and hangs out with her in private, assists in her studies, and helps her dress for the ceremony where the princess is declared Viserys's heir. Alicent herself is highborn and her father is the king's top advisor, though she's not as high-ranking as Rhaenyra. This obviously complicates things when Viserys subsequently decides to marry her and make her queen—which now means she outranks Rhaenyra as her stepmother.

M-Y

• Mama Bear: Otto tries to convince her to embrace this trait in episode 5 pointing out that, with the realm's aversion for a female ruler, Rhaenyra will likely have to kill her children to secure the throne, saying that she can either take a stand or trust in her friend's mercy. After finding out that Rhaenyra lied about having lost her maidenhood, Alicent loses all trust in her friend and more or less declares war against her by wearing a green dress at her wedding feast and puts her full support on her son's claim. She becomes absolutely furious when Lucerys (son of Rhaenyra) cuts the eye of her third child, Aemond, and Viserys refuses to punish both him and her stepdaughter for the umpteenth time, to the point that, blinded by anger, she personally decides to punish them by herself.
  Otto: If Rhaenyra succeeds [Viserys], war will follow, do you understand? The realm will not accept her. And to secure her claim, she'll have to put your children to the sword. She'll have no choice.
  • When Rhaenys appears about to burn them all with dragonfire, Alicent fearlessly steps in front of her son Aegon and tries to shield him.
• Marital Rape License: Dutifully pays marital debt by dissociating.
• Maternally Challenged: Alicent has complex relationships with her children in comparison with the more straightforwardly loving ones Rhaenyra has with hers. A Justified Trope: A traumatized child bride struggling as a mother is entirely foreseeable. Rhaenyra had several advantages as a mother that Alicent lacked: Rhaenyra was several years older before having her firstborn, while Alicent was a teenager. Two of Alicent's kids have special needs (autism and missing eye) which provide extra challenges. We never once see Viserys lift a hand to help raise any of them, except briefly when Aegon was a baby. Rhaenyra's kids were conceived out of a genuinely loving relationship, which helps start things out on the right foot and has Rule of Symbolism benefits, while Alicent had Marital Rape License which forced her to Lie Back and Think of England.
  • With Aegon, she's harshest. How do you raise a child when there's a Sisyphean task — molding him into a decent heir while he lacks both aptitude and ambition — at the center of your relationship? This colors everything between them. Alicent is always frustrated with Aegon for not being what the family needs him to be. On his end, perpetually falling short in her eyes makes him resent her. By his early teen years, Aegon's already an alcoholic Royal Brat, and by young adulthood, he's started raping young servants. But whatever her problems with him, Alicent ultimately tries to shield Aegon from dragonfire in the face of death, proving that she loves him fiercely.
  • Helaena is on the autism spectrum. How do you raise an autistic child when there's a complete lack of information or support about such a condition? Physical affection seems to be important to Alicent, and Helaena is not a fan. Alicent tries her best to bond with Helaena — listening patiently while her daughter talks about her hyperfixation on insects, even though it bores her — but she still struggles to get close to her. Alicent is protective of Helaena, and is particularly angered on her behalf when Rhaenyra asks for her as an Altar Diplomacy Political Hostage, and when Aegon's misbehavior dishonors her.
  • Alicent's favorite seems to be Aemond. For once there's no major hurdle at the heart of their relationship. Aemond is The Dutiful Son and he's down for hugs. Alicent tries to comfort him when he's bullied and his sadness over his lack of a dragon, even though she has trouble fully connecting with him on the topic as she's afraid of dragons herself. When Aemond is maimed and Viserys refuses to punish Lucerys in any way, Alicent goes Mama Bear Rage Breaking Point. In the end, only the words of her son urging her to let it go calm her down enough to stop other attempts. As a young adult, Aemond is the only one of her kids working to protect their family—probably both a cause and an effect of his close bond with his mother.
• Missing Mom: Her mother died when she was young, causing Alicent to latch onto her father. When her father sends her into the King's chamber to "bond" with him, she tries small talk with Viserys about how painful it was for her to lose her mother. She also tries to comfort Rhaenyra with her own experiences of grieving for her mother after Aemma dies.
• Mother Makes You King: Alicent sets the ball rolling on crowning Aegon king in the aftermath of Viserys' death. Subverted in that his grandfather had been plotting long before this, behind Alicent's back, and Alicent ultimately tries to take the peaceful route, in direct opposition to Otto's plan to simply murder Rhaenyra to secure Aegon's succession.
• My Beloved Smother: Alicent is very paranoiac about the safety of her children, especially Aegon for being her first son (making him Rhaenyra's direct rival in her claim to succession to the throne) and Aemond for being the most vulnerable and sensitive of them as a child, and pushed her to become very controlling. These toxic traits were cultivated by her father before departing for Oldtown. She feels her children live in Rhaenyra's shadow and their fate will be decided by her, fearing that Rhaenyra may kill them if she takes the throne. She was used as a political pawn by her father, and she ended up seeing her own children as political pawns for House Targaryen, ironically, arranging a betrothal between brother and sister.
• My Country, Right or Wrong: Alicent is steadfast in her loyalty to her house and father, even at the cost of committing acts she personally finds distasteful, such as visiting the king in his chambers as he mourns his dead wife. She attempts to remain loyal to Rhaenyra, but after she loses faith in Rhaenyra, she fully commits herself to serving the interests of her family.
• Nice Gal: During her youth, Alicent was kind and loyal, and she defended her best friend Rhaenyra at every turn. However, due to her Freudian Excuse and unhappy marriage, Alicent gradually loses this part of her personality.
• Nice to the Waiter: Even as the years cause her to become more resentful and cynical about her shattered friendship with Rhaenyra and her marriage to Viserys, Alicent is portrayed as moderately kind or at least polite to her servants. Not only that, unlike most of the nobles, she sees and treats them sincerely as people with feelings and emotions and as such is able to empathize not only with Dyana by taking her word for it (regarding the allegations of rape suffered by the hand of none other than the son of Alicent, Aegon) but later, even if she paid abundantly and made the girl drink the moon tea and told her not to tell anyone about it, we later see her going to scold Aegon fiercely for what he did to the poor girl.
  • She holds Ser Criston in high regard, a lower-class man and a racial minority who had to claw his way to the respected position he now holds.
• No Historical Figures Were Harmed: Her character is a unique blend of two personages:
  • As the second Queen Consort to Viserys I (himself based on Henry I of The House of Normandy), Alicent's position is analogous to Adeliza of Louvain. However, Queen Adeliza's relationship with her stepdaughter Empress Matilda (the basis for Rhaenyra) was far more amicable and supportive (far better than young Alicent and Rhaenyra's strained friendship)—even to the point of supporting her bid for the throne during the Anarchy. This was likely because she did not succeed in bearing children for Henry I. Alicent, as portrayed in both this show and in Fire & Blood, can be read as the Corrupted Character Copy of what might have happened if she did.
  • Since her son, Aegon II, is generally viewed to be the Stephen of Blois Expy, Alicent can also be read as akin to Matilda of Boulogne, Stephen's own wife and queen consort who was the more pro-active, Lady Macbeth-ish character doing all the political negotiations to succor her husband's rule. This becomes more apparent considering Prince Aegon was initially reluctant (if not disinterested) in actually pressing his claim.
• Not So Above It All: Despite being very sexually conservative and finding Rhaenyra's extramarital affairs immoral, Alicent is willing (though clearly very reluctant) to let Larys masturbate to her feet in exchange for his services, and has most likely been doing it since before Viserys died. She clearly hates it, and it is not clear if she feels safe to reject Larys' services after the things he has already done and suggested being willing to do even without her say.
• The Ophelia: A scene from the trailer for the second season invokes this with Alicent. Wearing a simple white gown with disheveled hair, she gazes serenely at an unknown body of water.
• The Paranoiac: Her father's last words before he left and the discovery that Rhaenyra doesn't mind lying to her shamelessly, even when Alicent clearly demonstrates that she is on her side leads the latter to become extremely worried that Rhaenyra, after Viserys's death, would truly be capable of killing all of Alicent's sons to prevent them from hindering her rise, although before Aemond's accident Rhaenyra herself never shows any signs of hostility towards them.
• Parental Favoritism: Although it is clear that she deeply loves all of her children, Alicent seems to keep an eye on Aemond. He's the easiest child to relate to — Helaena operates locked away in her own little world, and Aegon is a Royal Brat.
• Parents as People: She loves her children but unfortunately, having them at a young age and her own terrible childhood with an awful father means that she herself clearly isn't really sure how to properly do so. Tragically, this has led to her repeating some of Otto’s behaviours (compare him terrorising her about Rhaenyra, to her years later with her son), although it's to a much lesser degree.
• Pet the Dog: Confronting the young servant of her daughter who was raped by her son Aegon and who expected the worst from the Queen herself for her accusations, Alicent not only shows mercy and understanding towards the poor girl but, while driving her out of King's Landing and giving her a cup of moon tea, she also gives her a purse with some money to start a new life elsewhere.
• Pimped-Out Dress: Many of her dresses are candidates for this, but most notably her emerald green dress, worn systematically to send a war message to Viserys and Rhaenyra during the dinner for the engagement celebration between the latter and Laenor Velaryon.
• Platonic Co-Parenting: Viserys is uninterested in his children by Alicent, and has been since the kids were old enough to remember. Criston Cole, her sworn shield, acts as a father figure to her sons.
• Proper Lady: What distinguishes her from Rhaenyra since childhood. Alicent is much more obedient, respectful, and devoted to the patriarchal society of Westeros (thanks to her much more rigid family upbringing than that of the princess), and, as a result, she shows herself to be much more regal and well-mannered in her relationships with others.
• Properly Paranoid: She's terrified for her children's safety. When Aemond is maimed and Viserys is unwilling to do anything about it, this is her long-feared proof that she's right. Rhaenyra also marries Daemon, who has a history of murdering completely innocent people (Rhea Royce and the man passed off as Laenor for a start) for no other reason than his own convenience. Her fear is also Genre Savvy, given the story she lives in.^note The idea of a more brutal ally handling the child murder, unprompted, for a would-be regnant who doesn't have the stomach for it themselves appears in the main series: Robert's Rebellion and the murder of Elia Martell and her children. Tywin says of it: "When I laid those bodies before the throne [...] Robert's relief was palpable. As stupid as he was, even he knew that Rhaegar's children had to die if his throne was ever to be secure. Yet he saw himself as a hero, and heroes do not kill children."
• Rage Breaking Point: As if she wasn't already pushed over the edge when her son lost an eye, when Viserys denied her the chance to take revenge on Lucerys for it, and when Rhaenyra calls for Aemond to be sharply questioned, Alicent briefly has this when Rhaenyra (who is physically holding her back from hurting both her and her sons with a dagger) mocks her for taking off her mask with this act of primal fury, to which Alicent responds by causing a deep slash on her right arm before retreating from her. Even Otto was shocked ide of his daughter.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: She gives a very memorable one to Rhaenyra after charging at her with a dagger. See her image quote above.
• Rebuilt Pedestal:
  • Alicent is forgiven by her old friend Rhaenyra for marrying King Viserys, Rhaenyra's father, after realizing Alicent's pain due to this decision and her lack of choice or agency. Sadly, the pedestal becomes broken again on Alicent's side in the next episode when she learns that Rhaenyra lied to her about losing her maidenhood causing her to lose trust in her friend and, believing that she will turn on her and her children, begins actively plotting Rhaenyra's takedown.
  • The pedestal appears rebuilt once more, as in episode 8, Rhaenyra sincerely apologizes for the past and praises Alicent's sense of duty, to which Alicent is touched and returns the favor by naming Rhaenyra the rightful queen.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: At the start of the story, she's the anxious rule-follower Blue in comparison to Rhaenyra's more free-spirited and mischievous Red.
• Reverse Psychology: In addition to her use of the Geeky Turn-On to get Viserys’s interest, she also deftly applies reverse psychology to get him to turn to her instead of Laena Velaryon, by simply and only praising Laena as a choice, since she can see he doesn’t like the idea and is talking himself out of it already.
• The Rival: To Rhaenyra, who is her best friend, stepdaughter, the King’s eldest child and heir; as The Queen Consort and mother to the King’s first-born son. At first, Alicent opposes this position and agrees with the decision King Viserys makes, any efforts to push Viserys to choose Aegon as heir is done at the behest of her father, but after discovering that Rhaenyra had lied to her and Alicent’s father lost his position as Hand of the King, she subtly severs all allegiances with House Targaryen by showing up to Rhaenyra’s pre-wedding feast in a bold green gown, rather than Targaryen Red or Black.
• Self-Harm: Her finger-picking habit has only gotten worse as her father orders her to seduce her best friend’s father, getting bad enough to draw concern from her father, who's otherwise ruthless in his usage of her. It returns again following the death of Viserys.
• Ship Tease: The latter half of Season 1 somewhat plays up the relationship between Ser Criston and Alicent, especially since they've only grown closer in the years since they've been estranged from Rhaenyra. They have a Lady and Knight Courtly Love dynamic, are Platonic Co-Parenting her children, and Ser Criston has a Violently Protective Girlfriend streak towards her.
• Shrinking Violet: Alicent is shy and quiet most of the time, and whenever she gets anxious, she has a habit of painfully tearing down her cuticle.
• Significant Wardrobe Shift: After marrying King Viserys, Alicent shifted from her trademark blue clothing to the black and reddish clothing with dragon motifs of the Targaryens. After discovering she had been lied to by Rhaenyra and seemingly, King Viserys, Alicent shows up in the middle of Rhaenyra's pre-wedding feast with Laenor in an emerald green gown, which Ser Larys Strong notes is the color of the Beacon of Hightower when Oldtown is calling its banners to war. Alicent wearing green is her subtle way of declaring her allegiance to House Hightower alone and delivering a big "fuck you" to Rhaenyra and House Targaryen.
  Larys: The beacon on the Hightower, do you know what color it glows when Oldtown calls its banners to war?
  Harwin: Green.
• Skewed Priorities: Alicent is so preoccupied with Aegon's birthright, and the debauchery he's engaged in with the servants, that the fact that she caught him buck-naked and masturbating out of a window isn't even brought up in the conversation. That much is normal for them and implies that she's caught him before in even worse situations.
• Sleeping Single: She has her own chambers, from which she is ordered to the king's bed whenever he's in the mood. Truth in Television, as separate bedrooms are a centuries-old custom in European monarchies due to the kings' demanding sleeping schedules and a general lack of romantic affection between royal spouses.
• Slut-Shaming: Subverted. Alicent is upset to learn Rhaenyra might have slept with Daemon, but is only worried for her friend, as such a scandal could destroy Rhaenyra's chances of being accepted as Queen of the Seven Kingdoms and finding the allies she will surely require. However, when Alicent discovers Rhaenyra slept with Ser Criston instead, the pedestal breaks and she comes to believe Rhaenyra is self-destructive and selfish after all—or at the very least, how much she can trust Rhaenyra is limited since she knows that Rhaenyra will lie to her, even while swearing on her mother that she's not.
• Smarter Than You Look: While she is never considered openly stupid within the show, it is still clear that at least Alicent's own father considers his daughter to be easily manipulated (and he's partly right due to Alicent's The Dutiful Daughter trait itself). However, Otto later change his mind when Alicent, as an adult, finally begins to go against his plans. Rhaenys expressly tells this to Alicent when the young woman tries to convince her to ally with her by appealing both she acknowledge that Rhaenys should have been Queen and also that Rhaenys owes no loyalty to Rhaenyra and Daemon as she lost her son Laenor because of them.
• The Social Expert: Alicent is exceptionally good at playing on social mores and expectations. This is especially in contrast to Rhaenyra, who's very blunt and repeatedly snubs nobles who might otherwise be her allies (such as the ladies at Aegon's birthday or the men on her marriage tour).
• Teen Pregnancy: She married and was used as a Baby Factory by a man old enough to be her father (and is the father of her best friend to boot) in her mid-to-late teens. Alicent clearly cares about her children, puts individual effort into each of them... and still manages to be a somewhat subpar mother despite this, in part because she lacked the maturity of an adult woman.
• This Is Unforgivable!: Alicent never quite forgave Rhaenyra for betraying her trust and lying to her face, even though they were as close as sisters up to that point. She also took issue with Rhaenyra's pretensions of legitimacy when it comes to the line of succession, as Rhaenyra's sons are so obviously illegitimate.
• Tomboy and Girly Girl: The Girly Girl to Rhaenyra's Tomboy when they were young, as a more shy, demure, bookish girl.
• Took a Level in Badass: For most of the first half of season 1, Alicent is little more than a playing piece for her father, being used in order to maneuver House Hightower up the political ladder and having very little agency of her own. After Otto's dismissal as Hand of the King, she's forced to act on her own. Once she learns that Rhaenyra lied to her about losing her maidenhood, she loses her trust in her friend she decides to actively make a stand against her, firstly by snubbing her at her own wedding feast and then gathering her own piece by securing Cristan Cole's loyalty.
• Took a Level in Jerkass: She's gotten much colder by the time of "The Princess and the Queen", which takes place 10 years after the events of episode 5. Any feelings of love, trust, or loyalty she once had for Rhaenyra are now completely gone, and she outright chooses to ignore Rhaenyra's attempt to make amends with her when Rhaenyra proposed to betroth her oldest son to Alicent's daughter (which might've helped avert the coming Succession Crisis), as she saw it as Rhaenyra's attempt to gain something from her more than anything else.
• Tough Love: She has this dynamic with her eldest son Aegon in that, as the King's surviving eldest son, he represents Alicent's hopes and dreams of seeing her family permanently safe from the potential threat that Rhaenyra's ascension to the throne would pose to all of her children. But as Aegon grows up, the more he proves himself not only an incompetent and unwilling future king to fulfill his responsibilities, but also an ethically horrible person, Alicent feels it is her duty as a mother to discipline him (not disdaining the use of physical violence) to make him start acting like a worthy heir.
• Tragic Villain: Alicent began as a sweet, dutiful and empathetic noblewoman but due to her Abusive Parent, terrible marriage situation and percieved betrayal by her former best friend Rhaenyra, she is slowly twisted into becoming a bitter, paranoid Anti-Villain.
• Trapped in Villainy: Her confrontation with Otto in the leadup to Aegon II's coronation is essentially her admitting to this, and thus she desires to set her son on her way of ruling things, not Otto's.
  Otto: Whatever our differences, our hearts remain as one.
  Alicent: Our hearts were never one. I see that now. Rather, I have been a piece that you moved about the board.
  Otto: If that is true, then I made you Queen of the Seven Kingdoms. Would you have desired it otherwise?
  Alicent: How could I know? I wanted whatever you impressed upon me to want. And now the debt comes due. A debt you were happy enough to pay.
• True Blue Femininity: In her youth, she tends to wear blue gowns in varying shades, which fit with her characterization as a demure, gentle and charming Proper Lady.
• Undying Loyalty: Alicent is loyal to her family and her children above all. She once felt that Rhaenyra was the rightful queen instead of her son, causing conflicting loyalties within her, but after losing trust in Rhaenyra, Alicent fully committed to her house and her blood.
• Used to Be a Sweet Kid: The first few episodes where she is still a kid explicitly show her this way. This only serves to make her journey from a devoted and innocent girl to a cold queen resentful, vengeful and envious of her old childhood friend (due to both Otto and Larys Strong's manipulations and her own fear for the safety of her children) even more tragic.
• Villainous Friendship: Has one with Larys Strong and Criston Cole. She saved Criston's life twice when they were younger so Criston feels Undying Loyalty towards her.
• We Used to Be Friends: At first, she and Rhaenyra are close to the point of being practically inseparable, sharing a Pseudo-Romantic Friendship. However, when Alicent marries Viserys, and becomes Rhaenyra's Queen—and more to the point, her stepmother—things quickly go downhill, as Rhaenyra is left feeling betrayed, and again, sidelined. Alicent attempts to reengage with her, but the latter is too angry and hurt to be receptive. Rhaenyra forgives Alicent after she realizes Alicent had no choice in the matter, and sees Alicent is only trying to help her, and they become close once more. However, their friendship is finally broken for good after she learns from Ser Criston that he had taken Rhaenyra’s virginity despite Rhaenyra’s insistence that she’s a maiden, Ser Criston’s Vow of Celibacy as Kingsguard, and the warnings from her father about the Succession Crisis that would endanger her son Aegon once Viserys passes away. After the 10-year time skip, their friendship is completely dissolved, leaving a strain on their relationship in its place and one-sided resentment on Alicent's part that Rhaenyra is completely aware of. She also ignores Rhaenyra's attempt to make amends with her for the sake of their family, as she only sees it as Rhaenyra's way of trying to gain something from her and is now more paranoid than anything that Rhaenyra will one day attempt to take down her side of the family to boost her own successors up.
  • Their friendship appears to heal once more in episode 8, when Rhaenyra, spurred on by her father to make peace, holds a toast where she praises Alicent's dutifulness and loyalty towards her husband and sincerely apologizes for past wrongs. Alicent appears to accept this, returns the favor and names Rhaenyra the rightful queen. They even share a gentle moment together where Rhaenyra vows to return on dragonback to spend more time with Alicent.
• Wicked Stepmother: Alicent channels the energy of this trope as an older adult but is also a more nuanced examination of it. On the surface, she is bitter, spiteful, paranoid and petty towards her stepdaughter. However, it is not so simple because her suspicions about Rhaenyra are correct. She is increasingly unhappy and lovelorn in her relationship with Viserys, but is still devoted to him, fussing over him and bearing him three legitimate trueborn children. Meanwhile, Rhaenyra has been lying to her, to her father, and to the realm constantly for ten years, bearing three obvious bastards and having the gall to insult everyone's intelligence by calling them legitimate Velaryon. When she brings the matter to her husband, he tells her essentially to shut up, never speak of it again, and that to do so would be treason. By the time she confides in Larys Strong that she wants — no, needs her father back as Hand of the King, it looks less like a Wicked Stepmother and more like a put-upon wife who needs someone, anyone to believe her when she tells the truth.
• Wise Beyond Their Years: More tragically and terribly than her childhood friend Rhaenyra. Alicent is canny and cunning enough to carry out her father’s orders with arguably more subtlety than he can, and with barely more than some oblique orders on his part… but these orders are to seduce Viserys, her best friend's middle-aged father, into marrying her. Alicent is in her late teens; at youngest 15 like Rhaenyra and at most 18 like her book counterpart. The contrast between her adolescent terror, sorrow, and disgust at this and her pragmatic and successful approach causes her to pick her fingers red.
• Tough Leader Façade: She begins to slowly develop into this after literally becoming the Queen of Westeros thanks to her marriage to her best friend's father and culminates it towards the end of the fifth episode when, after her father's departure, she fully engages in the cause of legitimizing her son Aegon as future King. After the time skip of 10 years, partly thanks to the increasingly weak and sickly state of Viserys, Alicent dominates in his stead most of the court of the royal palace, albeit in the depths the shy and frightened girl who is in her occasionally resurfaces when she finds herself faced with disconcerting events or news over which she has no control, such as when Larys kills his own family for her without her even wanting to.
  Alicent: I like to believe I'm still the Lady Alicent, but all anyone sees when they look at me now is "The Queen."
• Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: Alicent was once a sweet, kind and loyal noblewoman and best friend of Rhaenyra. However her abusive and manipulative father, miserable marriage and paranoia causes her to become a ruthless, bitter, resentful God Save Us from the Queen! lashing out at anyone she feels has betrayed or hurt her, culminating in attempting to cut out her step-grandson's eye.
• Would Hurt a Child: She's willing to take "an eye for an eye" quite literally, that is attempting to gouge an eye of Lucerys for what he has done to her son Aemond.
• Your Approval Fills Me with Shame: When her father Otto congratulates with her for the way she lost control and attempted to attack Rhaenyra and her children in revenge for what they did to Aemond, Alicent is baffled by this.

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