A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms Season 1 Episode 2 Review: Hard Salt Beef

Critic’s Rating: 4.5 / 5.0

4.5

To achieve greatness, sacrifices must be made, and it’s something Dunk learns on A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms Season 1 Episode 2.

However, before he can even get started as a knight, he needs to find someone who can vouch for him, and it means reliving a difficult part of his life.

While keeping the story light, there is a heaviness to the grief Dunk feels, especially since he hasn’t really had the opportunity to fully feel the death of Ser Arlan of Pennytree.

Dunk Is Trying to Remain Strong

As we open with Dunk telling the story of Ser Arlan to find lords who will vouch for him, it struck me that Dunk hasn’t really had the chance to grieve yet.

He’s focused on the journey to become a knight, and the only way to do that is to prove himself at the tourney.

Of course, to get into the tourney, he needs to find a lord to vouch for him, since nobody saw Ser Arlan knight him — and I do have doubts that Dunk was truthful about that.

To find a lord to vouch for him, Dunk has to relive his time with Ser Arlan, and while there are some happy moments, he also has to relive the man’s death.

Egg points out that he has to face his grief with each retelling, but he’s not really had that time to grieve. In fact, there are times when you have to wonder whether he feels the loss.

There’s a heartbreak to that, thinking about who he is and the time period A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms would be set in if this were based on real life.

He can’t grieve. He can’t show emotion because that would make him weak, and so, he sadly just has to get on with things.

While doing so, he realizes that no one knows who Ser Arlan is. This was a man who fought for lords and helped them win battles, and yet, nobody remembers him.

He didn’t have a castle, and he didn’t have a lot of servants. It seems this man didn’t even have friends.

Ser Arlan was everything to Dunk, offering him food, companionship, and life lessons, but Dunk realizes that Ser Arlan didn’t matter to anyone else.

It brings up that fear for many people. 

The whole reason a lot of people fear death is that they fear they won’t be remembered, and we can do everything we can to be remembered, but even then, it doesn’t mean that we make a difference.

Dunk is starting to realize that, and we see him start to doubt himself.

A Sacrifice to Make

In the end, Dunk ends up in front of the Targaryens, Baelor Targaryen to be more precise. It’s from here that things start to change.

It’s in this moment that there’s a glimmer of hope. Baelor says he remembers Ser Arlan and decides to vouch for Dunk after all.

It’s a shock for many, and I have to wonder if there’s more to this. Baelor has no reason to lie about remembering a knight, so does he sense some sort of connection with Dunk?

Baelor has some important words for Dunk as well: he needs to find his own sigil.

While Dunk may have been like a son to Ser Arlan in many ways, he wasn’t the man’s biological son. That means he can’t carry the house sigil or name, and so, Dunk has to start afresh.

This is a good thing for Dunk, though. It’s a chance to reinvent himself, and isn’t that something we would all love to have the chance to do?

This does lead to a hard sacrifice. As well as a sigil — which Tanselle agrees to do — he has to get new armor.

The problem is, he doesn’t have much money, but there is a man who seems to feel sorry for him. There is a sadness about Dunk that makes it hard to say no to this man.

He still needs some money, though, and his only option is to sell one of the horses — the white one, because that would likely sell for more.

Dunk is losing more on this journey of becoming a knight, and you can’t help but root for him because of all these sacrifices that he’s making. Now, I just hope he has the money to get his horse back!

The three horses are his family. He’s grown up with them, and this isn’t an easy decision, but he has to do it if he wants to succeed.

A Tease of Egg’s Identity

When the Targaryens show up, there is a tease of Egg’s backstory that is still to come. 

I said it during my review of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms Episode 1, and I’ll say it again. I love the way the show is slowly hinting that there’s more to this boy.

We know he is well spoken and educated. He knows what a shooting star means, and he understands duty and honor.

Those who have read The Hedge Knight books will know what’s to come, and when it happens on the show, those who haven’t read the books will kick themselves for not realizing the reveal.

Egg is scared when he sees the Targaryens ride up, and there is a mention between the Targaryen princes that two princes have gone missing on the way to the tourney. 

All these clues tell us who Egg is, and it could have made for some great theories had the answer not already been revealed in the books. I think of it a little like the R + L = J theory from Game of Thrones.

However, despite his fear at the start when the Targaryens show up, Egg is still happy to get stuck in with the tourney. He’s cheering everyone on in the night tourney, even asking to be put on Dunk’s shoulders so that he can see. 

There is a contradiction in his attitude, and I think that says a lot about his age. While he knows what could happen when he’s caught, he also just wants to have fun and fit in, and he’s finding that balance.

Only having a 30-minute episode works for this episode, and I’m sure it will for the rest of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms.

The story remains focused on Dunk, with a few teases of other characters here and there, so it stays simple for a man wanting little.

A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms airs on Sundays at 10/9c on HBO and HBO Max.

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