MY BELOVED KITTENS.

It’s been around 18 months since we last ventured into Westeros, and to be honest, it’s somewhat nerve-wracking to go back.

Can a world in which ego drives politics, where money talks and corruption reigns, where good people are trampled and the worst kind of people have all the power … still be relevant?

Whether you think Westeros is a hell hole or a preferable reality to our own, after Season One, Episode 1 of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, I think we have found something on which we can all agree.

Something we can unite behind.

Someone we must PROTECT AT ALL COSTS.

*I pledge my vow to this knight, for all the nights to come.*

Going in with only a basic understanding of the Dunk and Egg source material, I thought it would be the scrappy lil’ kid we’d all be cheering on. You know, in the grand tradition of Arya Stark, Lyanna Mormont, and to a lesser extent, young Lucerys Velaryon, until he got munched out of existence by Vhagar.

I did not expect to immediately pair bond with a big, boofheady, heart-of-gold hedge knight with gastric distress.

But here we are. And it’s got nothing to do with the fact I saw Dunk’s Donut twice.

Well, three times if the opening salvo wasn’t a well-placed prosthetic.

Much will be made, no doubt, of the trouser-less trumpeting that opens - quite violently as it were - A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms.

It’s a nice little thumb at anyone tempted to call the latest A Song of Ice and Fire spin-off a pile of crap - before you can even write the words, Captain Critic, we’re going to shit on you first.

That the explosive Dunk-can interrupts a quiet swelling of the familiar Game of Thrones theme is the fece-de-resistance.

Here’s a guy who wants to be a proper hero, and has just decided to enter a tournament, and the hope of making it is inspiring - but the realisation of what it might take to get there is bowel-shakingly terrifying.

But for me, the moment that truly signifies both Dunk’s desire for greatness and his generally good soul comes a little earlier in the scene, when, having buried his beloved(?) mentor Ser Arlan of Pennytree in soaking rain, he weighs up his career options.

Brandishing his master’s sword, he imagines himself an officer of the King’s Landing City Watch and barks a practice order.

“Stop raping, ser!”

It’s hilarious, but also slyly instructive. This young man thinks a well-delivered order at the right end of a sword will be enough to correct such an injustice; that a man in the midst of a sexual assault will scamper away like a monkey caught stealing an apple.

Oh, you sweet summer child.

Beyond that, I think the choice of words is insightful. I never had a problem with the depiction of sexual cruelty to female characters in GoT; I always felt it was an accurate reflection of the brutality of that kind of world and generally well-handled (particularly as the series responded to the wider reactionary social media push-pull of the late 2010s).

But many did, and that’s fair, and for me this is a little mission statement from AKotSK (my attempt to make “K7K” happen is not looking good) that they do want to keep something pure. Dunk will hopefully be a non-problematic fave.

Our first encounter in this episode is rightly with the titular Knight of the Seven Kingdoms. It means we’re right with him as he then has a series of first encounters.

An opening episode generally does have to do a lot of heavy lifting when it comes to world-building. Here it’s kept simple - Dunk meets Egg, then a range of other strange, gross, funny, mysterious and rude characters, before circling back to meeting Egg again. It’s nothing fancy, but delivers the goods with a deft touch - rather, I suspect, like Dunk himself.

Season 1, Episode 1: The Hedge Knight

Eschewing the epic opening titles of its predecessors in favour of a simple title flashcard is an appropriate separation of this show from the great houses whose dramas have ruled our lives for 15 years.

It’s ironic though, as the first living person Dunk encounters is a Targaryen.

Now I haven’t read the novellas, and haven’t dropped into a Wiki-hole reading up on the backstory of these characters. Once again, I enjoy coming into the world somewhat naively, so that you know my reactions are fresh, real, and not affected by hours of spoilerific YouTube content.

But my dearly missed podcasting partner-in-crime Stuart Layt relayed the basic facts long ago - that the “Egg” of “Dunk and Egg” was a Targaryen princeling who travels incognito as the squire of a hedge knight, having adventures and - one assumes - learning valuable lessons that will serve him in good stead as a leader.

I don’t know which number Aegon Targaryen this is, or how the incest works to relate him to the Greens and the Blacks of the earlier-set House of the Dragon, or to Daenerys Targaryen in the latter-set Game of Thrones.

I do know that he’s the younger brother of Aemon Targaryen from GoT - on his deathbed in Season 5 Aemon cries “Egg! I dreamed that I was old!”. We know Aemon passed on his birthright and joined the Night’s Watch, so it’s a safe assumption that the little bald stable boy we see emerging out of the darkness will one day sit the Iron Throne.

*The CanvaAI prompt was “A cartoon rendering of an egg sitting on an Iron Throne”*

But for now, he’s a curious and determined lil’ tike, zeroing in on Dunk immediately as A Big, Dumb, But Probably Safe Opportunity.

Dunk is mostly interested in getting oats for his three stunning horses and pretty much all the food the tavern lady has to offer for himself.

“You’re big enough for it,” she quips as he takes a seat.

One assumes it’s his first hot dinner since burying Ser Arlan, the beloved(?) knight who adopted him as a young’un and taught him everything he knew about chivalry - and beating children.

I don’t mean to insult Dunk but it’s possible his guileless nature has something to do with the amount of head trauma Ser Arlan inflicted upon him, as depicted in a series of rapid flashbacks.

“Only when I deserved it,” he eulogises, immediately launching into a lengthy anecdote about the time he very much didn’t deserve it.

The only other person Dunk encounters at the tavern (bad Yelp reviews?) is a drunk but well-dressed fellow, who, while more of a dirty blonde, does drop a shiny coin emblazoned with the three-headed dragon sigil to pay for his ale. So he’s either a Targaryen or an associate with the goods.

What’s interesting was his sombre warning “I dreamed of you - stay the f*** away from me”.

Dunk’s confused face mirrored my own. There are occasional crazy psychic Targaryens like Heleana in Hot D, and of course Daenarys had her own weird dreams. Heck, wasn’t the whole reason the Targaryens got the hell out of Valyria because some wacky blondie foresaw the Doom?

It’s likely this is a Chekhov's Targaryen, ready to be deployed later in the series.

Heading back to the stable to collect his horses and push on to a tournament he hopes to enter, Dunk is outraged to find the stable boy defiling his beautiful mare while pretending to be a knight riding to battle.

“He’s a war horse, not a boy’s pony!” he objects.

I lost track of how many times Dunk threatened Egg with a clout about the ear, but it definitely happened here. I guess old habits instilled by the beloved(?) Ser Arlan die hard.

Egg, a remarkably precocious child with university-level training in rhetoric and oratory, offers to squire for this clearly sub-par knight of questionable qualifications.

“Every knight needs a squire, and you look like you need one more than most,” Egg declares, after pointing out Dunk is wearing a rope belt.

Dunk pretends to be outraged by the suggestion and threatens to clout the boy again. He’s more honest when he admits to Egg that he’s better off “not squiring for the likes of me”. At the very least, he knows he’s unlikely to offer much of a life on the road.

Dunk saddles up and heads off to ride through the night to get to his tourney, flicking a coin to the seemingly uninterested Egg as he goes.

I haven’t mentioned the cinematography yet, but clearly Northern Ireland is getting another fantastic tourism boost with gorgeous establishing shots of hills and dales, and green fields alive with tournament preparation.

Dunk is suitably impressed with all the goings-on, and sets about seeing the Master of Games so he can sign up for the competition. There’s more head trauma as Dunk’s natural enemy appears to be low door frames.

The Master of Games (whose name I didn’t catch) is a gloriously grotty piece of work, hocking up spit and snot at an alarming rate.

But it’s this Master of Games who clarifies something that had been brewing in my mind since Dunk’s anxiety started brewing in his colon.

Is Dunk actually a knight?

He introduces himself as Dunk, then hastily corrects himself to Ser Duncan. The story goes beloved(?) Ser Arlan knighted Dunk just before he popped his clogs. As we learned from Jamie Lannister knighting Brienne of Tarth, any knight can create another knight.

But Dunk has no witnesses save his horses, and they’re not about to be… neigh-sayers.

(I’m sorry, I’m sorry, it’s been ages, you’ve got to let me get it all out.)

The Master of Games has some fun with the gormless Dunk, threatening him with the “Ashford Chair”, the effect of which may be most politely described as “deeply therapeutic”.

*“The Spanish Donkey”. Did anybody else go through a medieval torture fascination period in their teens or was that just me?*

The Master of Games points out that the tournament is expensive to enter, and even more expensive to lose, as you forfeit all your good stuff to whomever beats you, and have to stump up big money to ransom it back.

But the right to gamble on this level is limited to those who can actually afford it. Letting random talk-the-talkers in if they can’t walk-the-walk just embarrasses everyone. After all, there are princes about.

Dunk thinks he has an answer - he and Ser Arlan served a Dondarrion back in the day, and he might be able to wrangle a character reference out of it.

“You do that,” spits the Master of Games, sending Dunk off to delightfully bash his head on the door frame again, cursing “Seven f—” before the edit cuts him off.

Unfortunately Ser Manfred Dondarrion seems to be too busy either napping or tapping to receive guests.

It’s up to his two camp whores to explain for us that “hedge” doesn’t mean something more glamorous like “he’s hedging his bets between masters”, but the more earthy and boring “he has no home so lives in hedges”.

It’s the ladies that suggest he try the ginger menace at evenfall, which is such a fancy way of saying “sunset”.

Dunk is rather discombobulated by his interaction with the women, who weren’t backward about slagging off his present occupation.

“I’m not sad,” he protests later to his white horse, in one of the funniest exchanges of the show. “Ser Arlan said hedge knights were the purest knights.” As Dunk’s attention is captured by men practice fighting in a yard, his horse seems to silently remonstrate him for even thinking about taking them on.

While we may see a badonka-Dunk a few times, the real arsehole of this episode is someone called Ser Stefan Fosseys.

My apologies, it’s actually Ser Stefan Fossoway, who as far as I can tell is not related to the 20th century Australian department store Fosseys. It’s just I can’t see the letters “FOSS” in anything and not be reminded of the once popular competitor to Best & Less that was eventually bought by Coles Myer and rebranded as “Target Country” by 1999.

It’s just one of those words. Go on, say “Fosseys” over and over. You’ll feel ridiculous. You’ll feel strange. You’ll feel like you want good value polycotton body shirts.

Ser Simon Fosseys (it’s probably just going to stick now) considers himself a proper knight, and demonstrates this by being a right c*** to everyone around him. He thrashes his young cousin/squire Raymun around, then demands a dumbstruck Dunk to come and have a go if he thinks he’s hard enough. If it wasn’t for the fact I don’t think the Maesters have invented synthetic drugs, I would say he’s on the ‘roids. Either way his testicles are probably the size of Malteasers.

Both men are bedecked with apple-inspired tunics, and if you think my punning is bad, Raymun busts out three in one sentence “I may not be ripe, but my cousin is rotten to the core. Beat the seeds out of him!” We are in The Reach after all, the fruitbowl of Westeros, so maybe all the children are taught appropriate house-based gags as part of their broader education.

Exhausted by travel and village travails, Dunk finds himself some more attractive accommodation - a hedge just outside town. It’s got everything he needs - a cold pond to wash his body and clothes in, rocks to beat the stank and the fleas out of his clothes (clearly needs a trip to Fosseys) and a secure hidden location for his trio of stunning equine companions.

There’s no getting away from the shining star that is Dunk’s full moon, on vigorous display here as Dunk spruces himself up as best he can.

Somewhat more presentable, he makes his way back into town, where Ser Manfred Dondarrion is still napping. There’s a great perspective shot of one of the ladies of the night standing in front of a pantsless man - but a change of camera angle shows there’s nothing nefarious happening; rather, she’s just mending his trousers.

Dunk wanders into a nearby tent and witnesses the end of a verbatim theatre piece featuring a beautiful poet and a kick-ass fire-breathing puppet dragon. Did they get a grant for that? Because that definitely took up most of the production budget. Was the show bought in, or is the company on a cut of the door with the venue? Who’s doing the marketing? Is it organic or paid reach on socials? Does the Westerosi Times have a cultural criticism section, and if so, could we convince them to do a review?

Sorry, I think I just disassociated. I’m a small independent arts producer and that whole campsite looks like a fringe festival.

Luckily, the affable Raymun Fosseys, sorry, Fossoway is on hand to help Dunk find his way to some much-needed dinner in Lord Lyonel Baratheon’s tent.

Lyonel, aka “The Laughing Storm” shares his descendant Robert Baratheon’s love of self-aggrandising, but I swear someone mad-scientist mixed in Tyrion’s quick mind and early-days licentiousness with Bronn’s humour and lust for life.

He’s an utter delight, but the only reason I don’t completely distrust him is the way he undercuts his own proclamations, one way or another.

He hushes the room so he can attempt some grand philosophy, but his ruminations on the murky origins of jousting don’t land the way he hoped, so he resorts to “Fuck it, 100 gold to the man, beast or god who sticks me best!”

Dunk, whose been busy chomping on giant meat steaks and cherry pies, is startled to be called over to the head table.

Lord Lyonel wants to know if he slouches to avoid getting punched, and reassures a nervous Dunk that “the seven above have given you tallness, so be tall!” Of course he then threatens to burn him as a heretic, demand a shiny gift for seeking his favour and dunk on Dunk’s name.

He spins on a dime, this dude.

“Why the f*** are you in my tent?” he demands of Dunk. Stumped, Dunk can only reply “Supper?”

Lyonel’s laugh eases the tension, and he winds up inviting the hedge knight to the dance floor, where the two proceed to get busy impersonating Victoria Beckham at her son’s wedding.

Lyonel teases Dunk on the dance floor, forcing him to play fast feet to avoid being stomped on. Eventually Dunk stomps back, and it seemed for a moment like he was about to end on the pointy end of Lyonel’s giant stag antler crown.

Instead, he winds up wearing it, as the two end the night in the sort of drunken deep & meaningful that can only happen after a night of reckless abandon.

Dunk is full of admiration for this noble lord, whose training and bearing allow him to avoid fear. He agonises so much he agonises about agonising and GIRL, I’ve been there.

He wants Lyonel’s advice. He needs to make a name for himself in the lists, but a first round loss and instant en-poorification is a huge risk. What is he supposed to do?

“I don’t know,” Lord Lyonel replies. “I’m really quite drunk.”

And with that, Lyonel jumps over the table, knocks the chandelier, apologises to it, and stumbles off into the dark.

Dunk is not quite so blind, and when he sees Ser Manfred Dondarrion heading off with his lady friends, follows to get his all-important two-factor verification.

“Nope, no idea who you are,” comes the retort, with Dunk devastated to learn the gory wound his beloved(?) Ser Arlan took in service of the Dondarrions made zero impact. “We’ve forgotten many who suffered more,” came Ser Manfred’s reply, once again proving why we should kill the rich, I mean, free the proletariat, I mean, promote open and democratic elections.

Having had his hopes all but dashed, our hedge knight returns to his cosy little hedge for the night - only to find it’s now got a side of Egg.

Dunk is astounded to see what the orphan stable boy’s done in a matter of hours - after following him in a lamb cart, he’s made a fire, caught and cooked some fish, and searched in vain for a pavilion to raise.

Dunk points to behind him. “That’s a tree,” Egg deadpans. “It’s the only pavilion a true knight needs.”

The pair finally make introductions, and while Dunk may think his day has been wasted, we know better. For when Egg questions whether Dunk is short for Duncan, Dunk agrees, pulls his shoulders back, and says “Ser Duncan… the Tall”.

It’s a little moment of self-assuredness that remains lodged in our brains even after Egg says he’s never heard of him, and he knows all the good knights.

He wouldn’t say it himself, but Dunk is captivated by this strange little lad, so confident and knowledgeable despite his lack of years. No doubt Dunk also has sympathy for a fellow orphan, and sees an opportunity to be a better master than his own beloved(?) Ser Arlan of Pennytree.

“If you prove worth your keep you’ll have clothes on your back and food in your belly,” he promises Egg, whose face quietly lifts in happiness. Whatever he’s been searching for, we can tell he has found it in this big, gormless, flea-ridden fellow, particularly once he addresses Dunk as “my lord”.

“Ser,” Dunk firmly replies. “I’m only a hedge knight.”

But after the day we’ve had meeting the kinds of people who normally haunt these tournaments, both we and Egg are very glad that’s all he is, and that maybe he will turn out to be the purest kind of knight.

Yay! Best Moments

Dunk throwing awkward shapes on the dancefloor and having a D&M with Lyonel Baratheon are absolutely stellar scenes.

The final moment of wishing upon a star with his little Jiminy Cricket was delightful, as Dunk realised the little boost of hope Egg was giving him by suggesting the rich dudes would be tucked away under silk curtains and not able to see the good omen.

But my favourite was an exchange Dunk had with the two Dondarrions camp whores who’d been sassing him so savagely. “Why do you have to insult me?” he protests as they arrange another woman as a corpse, for what purpose I do not know, but daren’t think about it too much in case it’s sexual.

The two women soften just a little at Dunk’s anguish, realising a tender heart resides in that broad chest. They even compare their two professions - the knight and the whore both put their body on the line for money.

“Take care of your body,” they warn him. “Last one you’re likely to have.”

Of course Dunk then immediately gets trashed, but hopefully that message has stuck in there somewhere.

Zing! Best Lines

Frankly I don’t know if Peter Claffey will be able to match the delivery of “Stop raping, sir!”, but it’s so strong it basically gives him a free pass for the rest of the season.

Ew, gross

Projectile pooping is going to be hard to beat, but the Master of Games’ long-draw loogy-hocking was almost more off-putting. I really want to see a behind-the-scenes of the foley work on both effects.

Boo, sucks

There’s nothing to boo about this episode. It was beautiful introductory story-telling, establishing our heroes and at least part of their objectives while building a world full of earthy purpose. I cannot wait for the next one!

Thank you so much for reading, kittens! Remember you can find my Patreon here should you wish to support this writing. A huge thank you to my wonderful existing subscribers - I couldn’t do it without you.