Screenwriter Charles MacArthur once asked Charlie Chaplin how to get a laugh out of the overused gag of a person slipping on a banana peel. Chaplin told him to start with the person walking down the street, cut to a shot of the banana peel, and then the person stepping over it—before falling down a manhole.
A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, which aired its Season 1 finale on February 22, puts that screenwriting principle to good use. But, it is not just subversion of expectations that has delighted viewers, it is also the tonal shift. After two seasons of House of the Dragon, the first prequel to Game of Thrones, the fandom may have thought that the franchise had exhausted its capacity to surprise. But, AKOTSK delivers by deviating from the tried-and-tested devices of the fantasy genre.
It starts with the titular knight.
He is referenced twice in the eight seasons of GoT. In Season 1, Episode 3, Old Nan (Margaret John) tells a bedridden Bran Stark (Isaac Hemstead-Wright): “I could tell you [a story] about Ser Duncan the Tall. Those were always your favourites.” Then, in Season 4, Episode 1, as King Joffrey Baratheon (Jack Gleeson) flips through the Book of Brothers—a tome detailing the feats of the knights of the Kingsguard—he remarks: “Four pages for Ser Duncan. He must have been quite a man.”
Twelve years after we heard that, the man himself came to our screens. By the time the series, based on George R.R. Martin’s novella The Hedge Knight, premiered, it was widely known that it had a smaller scale than the other stories in the franchise. Nonetheless, the chance to see the legendary Ser Duncan aka Dunk was ample cause for excitement.
The first episode shows him as a vulnerable, albeit towering, young man burying the old knight he served. It is rather bleak. But, soon there is a thrilling moment when the iconic GoT theme plays as Dunk resolves to test his skills at a tourney. The swelling music is abruptly ended by the hero having diarrhoea—shown in graphic detail.
Subverting expectations is all fine, but did the eager audience really need to see that? Even Martin was surprised. But, showrunner Ira Parker defended the bathroom break heard around the world saying that fear of coming challenges had turned Dunk’s guts to water. Within the setting, it makes sense. Dunk has been sleeping by the road, and probably had unsafe water or food somewhere. His reality is not glorious and that is laid bare for all to see.
And see it, people did. After the penultimate episode, the six-episode season averaged around 13 million viewers per episode, across all platforms (post-finale numbers are yet to be released). The series has 93 per cent critic approval on Rotten Tomatoes—GoT currently has 89 per cent and HotD 87. AKOTSK’s Episode 5—‘In the Name of the Mother’—even sparked a fan war between the GoT and Breaking Bad legions. The episode briefly had a 10/10 rating on IMDb, the same as the legendary Breaking Bad episode ‘Ozymandias’. However, it was soon hit by a torrent of one-star reviews, pushing the rating down (now 9.5). In retaliation, ‘Ozymandias’ was downvoted till it fell to 9.9 for the first time in more than a decade—it is also now down to 9.5.
What about this series revitalised the fatigued GoT fanbase so? Probably the fact that it is closer to peak GoT than the final seasons of GoT. The original, though still a cultural phenomenon, had rushed to its end at the cost of in-world logic. People and armies started to go across the map at impossible speeds to move the plot forward and combat scenes abandoned strategic sense for spectacle, like a shock-and-awe cavalry charging into an army of the dead, who cannot be shocked or awed.
HotD, though technically excellent, repeatedly reminds viewers of the much-hated ending of GoT. Also, Season 2 felt like it was stretched out, with the court intrigue becoming less intriguing by the episode.
AKOTSK goes back to solid fundamentals—such as characters who are engaging and internal consistency. It helps that the protagonist is an everyman. He dreams of being an honourable knight, but his more immediate challenges are food and water. It is the antithesis of the ‘epic epidemic’. This shift in perspective, from lords and kings to the common folk, does not diminish the world of Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire. It feels as large as ever, because the characters we follow are so small within it.
As the endearing and clumsy Dunk, played by Peter Claffey, asks lords to vouch for him so that he may compete, we know he has to be careful—a wrong word to one of those high-borns could be a death sentence. Moreover, his death will have no world-ending stakes. As a result, when he makes it out of a dicey situation, it does not feel like plot armour, but rather fortune favouring the brave. A simple, honest man trying to do the right thing in a cynical world, getting poked full of holes for it, refusing to give up and finding his path. As Parker put it: “Dunk has no superpowers. He doesn’t have a name, an inheritance, or good training. He only has grit and an ability to pick himself up and put one foot in front of the other.”
The grounded tone of the show is supported by its masterful pacing. Season 1 is fully focused on one event. So, even as the plot unfolds slowly, not one second of the 30-minute episode runtime is wasted. The chemistry between Dunk and his young squire Egg (Dexter Sol Ansell) is one of the highlights. As the duo walks around the tourney grounds, we are shown the textures around them. The cinematography and sound are immersive and allow the story to breathe. There are no unnecessary high notes to tell us something important is happening.
When the GoT theme is finally used with intent, at the end of Episode 4, it hits hard, heralding a worthy crown prince—Baelor ‘Breakspear’ Targaryen (a subtly brilliant Bertie Carvel)—riding out to save our lowly knight. In the next episode, reality hits back in vintage GoT fashion—the prince gets his skull caved in. Doing the right thing gets him killed. Choices have consequences, unlike terminal-stage GoT.
Everything in this show—from the eminently unpleasant to the mundane—radiates creative confidence. Its success is proof that the world built by Martin can sustain radically different stories. It is the antidote to the still lingering bitterness of the end of GoT and the perceived stagnation of HotD Season 2. Simplicity, it turns out, is not weakness, but a sign of knowing that you are good enough.