A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms was great! Better than HOD?
A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms has sadly finished. Well, season one has. Season two will be out in 2027 and apparently they have already started filming it.
All of which is great news, as I absolutely loved A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms. Frankly, I enjoyed it more that the last season of House of the Dragon. More on that in a sec.
What I loved about A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms
Generally, I enjoyed that it is a more personal and low-stakes story with likeable characters. No one is playing complex politics in order to win any kind of crown. It is about Dunk – an average (but tall) fellow who is trying to get some respect as a hedge knight, and Egg – a 10 year-old kid who wants to be a squire (who may or may not have an intriguing background).
Then there are the usual Game of Thrones families all of whom are cut from their family’s familiar cloth. Baratheons are boisterous and fun, while being superb warriors; and Targaryens have peroxide hair and a tendency toward psychopathy. You get the idea.
Assuming you know your Game of Thrones, this acts as a bit of a short-cut. There are no info dumps or establishing what is going on as we already know the world and how it all works. We can just immediately focus on story and character. And one thing George RR Martin is good at, is creating unique and memorable characters.
Also, for the first time ever, we have a likeable lead we know will survive. That’s not a spoiler. If you know the books, there are multiple references to Sir Duncan the Tall. But also – the show is based on the first of the novella in The Tales of Dunk and Egg and there are a couple more to go.
(You can check out a compilation of the stories in A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms here. I watched the show and immediately bought them.)
The leads aren’t the only good characters, either. Lyonel Baratheon deserves an obvious mention, but there are others.
The plot is pretty simple, but as always with Martin, the story evolves from the believable characters, their desires, and their actions. And as always, it is compelling. Basically, a guy wants to be a successful knight, and kid wants to be a squire, and lots of people want a violent knightly tournament.
There’s not much more to add except the acting, directing, and general production is top notch. But you’d expect all that from a Game of Thrones show. They are pretty good at this stuff now.
Is it better than House of the Dragon?
I really enjoy House of the Dragon but there are a few things that annoy me about it. The first is that there aren’t any particularly likeable characters. It’s all about the Targaryens, who are mostly batshit crazy, so I guess this shouldn’t be a shocker.
The second is that I really enjoyed season one and was excited about season two as the houses were about to go to war. At the end of season two, I realised that I could make exactly the same statement. Sure some stuff happened, but I didn’t feel like it was eight hours’ worth. The acting was great though.
The third thing is that my brain can’t seem to deal with Targaryen names. I know the faces and characters on screen, but if anyone is talking about a Targaryen, I have no idea who is being discussed. They are have names like Aerys, Jaehaerys, Daenerys, or Aemon, Aegon, and Daeron. This could just be a personal issue though.
However, just as I was writing this and about to conclude that A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms was better, a new trailer has come out for House of the Dragon and it looks awesome. I realised I am invested in the characters and the new season looks full on violent. It will also be a limited series, with four seasons, so we know it will wrap it well.
So I like both. But I think I prefer A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms. Just.
Final thoughts
As I said at the start – I loved A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms. It has a more playful tone, relateable characters, and a short and tight story. Novellas and short books that are produced faithfully, seem to work well on screen. And this definitely does work well.
I haven’t read the books, as I had had a bit too much GoT, but after watching season one, I will now rectify that.
tl;dr – It’s is great.
You can check out the show on HBO or get physical discs here.