Westeros

A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, the new show from HBO set 90 years prior to the events of A Game of Thrones, takes that setting’s focus on the high lords and ladies of Westeros and turns it on its head. It brings viewers into a narrow focus on the life of a lowly hedge knight, Dunk – or Ser Duncan the Tall – and his young bald squire, Egg. Adapted from George R.R. Martin’s World Fantasy Award-nominated 1998 novella “The Hedge Knight”, the much-loved story and its characters are brought to life with real warmth, while adding some new elements that at times work very well and at other times… well, mileage may vary.

Peter Claffey as Dunk and Dexter Sol Ansell as Egg.

I have a very vivid memory of when I first encountered “The Hedge Knight”. Linda and I had already become fans of A Game of Thrones and were eagerly awaiting A Clash of Kings. But before that, Robert Silverberg’s anthology Legends: Short Novels by the Masters of Modern Fantasy came out, and among the stories from many big name authors was “The Hedge Knight”. I remember picking it up at my university bookstore as soon as it was released, and quite literally walking home (in sweltering, humid August heat) while turning the pages of this massive book at the same time. The characters popped from the page, the spectacle of the tourney was vividly rendered, and it made the expectation for the next novel all the greater. I’m happy to say that in most ways (especially those that matter), this show is exceptionally well-adapted.

Bertie Carvel as Prince Baelor Targaryen.

The casting is a particular triumph. Peter Claffey inhabits Dunk with a performance that balances his essential good nature with a naivete that leaves him barely keeping his head above water as he’s plunged into danger. Dexter Sol Ansell portrays Egg as a bright, questioning boy; his dedication is clear, having plunged headlong into getting his head shaved for the part shows his dedication. Other standouts include Bertie Carvel as Prince Baelor, Sam Spruell as Prince Maekar (almost unrecognizable from his role as Munch on Fargo), Tom Vaughn-Lawlor as the steward Plummer (his role is somewhat enlarged with the introduction of an interesting subplot) and Youssef Kerkour as the smith Steely Pate, the casting has done a great job.

One name in particular stood out for us: Daniel Ings’s Lyonel Baratheon. “The Laughing Storm” is presented in the novella as a quintessential Baratheon: quick to laugh, a powerful warrior, bold and fearless. In A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, this is all there but given a distinct flavor: he laughs, but there’s something madcap about it; he’s larger-than-life, but in a way that one could classify as eccentric. It works well, conveying the character as if seen through a funhouse mirror in scenes that George R.R. Martin himself has praised.

Peter Claffey as Dunk and Daniel Ings as Lyonel Baratheon.

The writing delivered much of what we hoped for, with many lines and scenes faithfully represented from the novella. The first episode, in particular, really won us over with its charming fealty to the text, down to its final coda which quite literally brought a tear to my eye.  That’s not to say the show has limited itself to transcription – there are definitely new scenes and sequences. Including a few that give a very different flavor to the inherent humor of the novella, a mixture of black comedy and very “low” humor that has precedent in the kind of humor one can read in medieval English and French sources. They were definitely surprising, but it seems Ira Parker has a peculiar sense of humor and it serves a structural purpose in the narrative, repeatedly employed to undercut inspirational or grandiose moments so as to bring things back to earth.

Regarding the broader lore, the show integrates the Blackfyre Rebellion, an event George had not yet conceived when he wrote the original novel.  But after introducing it in A Storm of Swords and the second novella, “The Sworn Sword”, as a major event that took place a decade in the past, it made sense to us that they would try to work it into this new adaptation. They do so successfully, but maybe almost too much so, as they collapse the factional lines in a way that we find not particularly plausible and overly simplistic. To say more would be getting into the weeds, so we’ll save that for after the season is done. There are other, niggling things – a scene that we would have liked kept, a different choice made at a key moment that undercuts a minor character, and a very different choice that we think (in the moment) very strongly undercuts a less minor character for the benefit of another one – that we were not happy with, but I think we can squint and see the purpose behind them. Including the purpose behind something that’s hard to talk about without spoiling in some way.

Sam Spruell as Prince Maekar Targaryen.

It’s an HBO show, in the Game of Thrones universe, so one cannot say anything about the production value other than to praise the breadth and richness of the depiction of the festivities and markets that take place at a tourney that draws many great knights and lords. Following in the footsteps of House of the Dragon, a medieval advisor is noted in the credits, and we feel that his advice must have helped add some character to the sequences. In particular, there are moments glimpsed, details of aspects of camp life that have the air of verisimilitude, like the fact that a prostitute might mend garments on the side. Of course, there can’t be a tourney without jousting, and the spectacle of that is certainly featured in exciting sequences that really display the colorful arms and armor described in the novella. Seeing five simultaneous jousts on screen is something that I don’t think has ever been done before… and that’s just the start.

Last but not least, we enjoyed the musical score by Dan Romer, which definitely has a very different cast – adventurous at times, jaunty at others, wistful at yet others – from that of Ramin Djawadi. The opening of a late episode, well, the music that opened that did not work at all for us paired with the scene, but we think this may be one of those oddball-humor inflected things especially given the ending of the previous episode. And since we mention Djawadi, he is not entirely absent, as there are call backs to the main Game of Thrones theme… and he is credited with having provided some music in the very first episode, in fact. Wonder how that came about?

On the whole, we think A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms’ first season has been a great success.  I put to Linda the question of where she’d rank this in her pantheon of Game of Thrones-universe of seasons, and we both agreed it was somewhere in each of our top 5*.

A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms premieres on 6PM Pacific/9PM Eastern time, Sunday January 18th, on HBO.

(Note: I stopped watching Game of Thrones after the 5th season, so bear that in mind!)