Tamzin Merchant’s ‘Carnival Row’ Performance Offers a Glimpse of What Her Daenerys Could Have Been After the Scrapped ‘Game of Thrones’ Pilot

Once upon a time, long before a fantasy show called Carnival Row premiered on Prime Video, actress Tamzin Merchant was supposed to star in another little show about sex, politics, and magic called Game of Thrones. Merchant was originally cast as Daenerys Targaryen, but only appeared in the notorious disaster of a pilot. Emilia Clarke would slide into the role and become the legendary Khaleesi, while Merchant would go on to projects like Salem, the aforementioned Carnival Row, and writing her own genre fiction. 

Now it’s long been the consensus that this case of casting “Sliding Doors” was for the best. Clarke went on to universal acclaim and several Emmy nominations while Merchant recently revealed that she, too, is happy with how things shook out. In 2021, Merchant revealed to EW’s James Hibberd that it wasn’t in her heart to play the iconic role.

“It was a lesson that if my guts are telling me a story isn’t something I’m excited to tell, then I shouldn’t try to be excited just because other people are telling me that I should be excited,” Merchant said. “I didn’t have any training as an actor, I only have my instincts. And what excites me and what drives me is a compelling story and a compelling character. So for me, Game of Thrones was never that. I think it’s a testament to Emilia Clarke for making that role iconic—she was obviously excited to tell that story, and she was epic and excellent. But for me, it wasn’t in my heart to tell it.”

Here’s the thing: after watching Merchant’s work in Carnival Row Season 2, there’s a part of me that sort of wishes she had stuck with the role. I’m not saying Clarke was terrible, more that the complexity of Merchant’s performance in Carnival Row‘s final season makes me super curious to know how she would have tackled the contradictions of Daenerys’s character. I’d particularly be keen to have seen Merchant in the later seasons, juggling Dany’s desire, yearning, fear, ambition, and rage. Because that’s precisely the emotional tightrope she so elegantly walks in Carnival Row Season 2.

In Carnival Row Season 2, Tamzin Merchant’s Imogen Spurnrose has happily run off with her wealthy faun lover Agreus Astrayon (David Gyasi). However, the couple’s love cruise is interrupted when their ship is commandeered by a communist uprising known as New Dawn. The rebels have overtaken a foreign city called Ragussa and built a society where humans and pix live in harmony.

While Agreus is immediately horrified by New Dawn’s brutality — as he narrowly avoids death by firing squad — Imogen is intrigued. Working in a factory turns out to give the pampered heiress a sense of purpose and she especially loves the fact that she and Agreus can openly carry on their romance.

Tamzin Merchant deftly flits between Imogen’s conflicting emotions in this strange new world and, as the season goes on, will start to reveal deep-rooted darkness in her character. In fact, the closer we get to Carnival Row‘s endgame, Merchant’s performance made me think, “Whoa, what would she have done with Dany’s ‘Mad Queen’ moment in ‘The Bells’?”

Again, this isn’t to say that Clarke whiffed in the later seasons, but that I wish I could have a peek at the alternate timeline where Merchant had to tackle Daenerys’s evolution from naif to tyrant. Judging by Imogen’s journey in Carnival Row Season 2, Merchant’s Daenerys could have been fabulous indeed.