Critic’s Rating: 2.5 / 5.0
2.5
Sometimes, we don’t need so much time spent in the past, and A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms Season 1 Episode 5 is an example of that.
We just get started with the Trial of Seven, when we’re thrown unnecessarily into the past.
Sure, we do get back to the battle, and we do get to see how Dunk survives this, but there’s a lot of time wasted that could have been spent on the action.
(Photograph by Steffan Hill/HBO)
We Didn’t Need the Backstory
I’ll start with the bad, because it did take up a good half of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms Season 1 Episode 5.
Just as we get started with the trial, with Prince Baelor making it clear that the Kingsguard can’t harm him because of who he is, we’re thrown into the past.
Now, I do like that we get to see how Ser Arlan took Dunk in, but we didn’t need much time spent on a forgettable young girl.
There are some pieces that tell us why Dunk becomes the knight — well, not quite a knight, as we do get answers to that question — that he does.
(Photograph by Steffan Hill/HBO)
He wants to protect the innocent because of what happened to him and his friend in the past, and the first knight he encountered who did so was Ser Arlan.
Ser Arlan was a drunk, so it’s no wonder he didn’t really make much of a name for himself as a knight, but he wasn’t stupid. He had to have known that Dunk was following him, so it wasn’t surprising to see that this was how he took him in.
We could have just skipped a lot about Dunk, hoping his mother (who had died) would come back for him.
The show didn’t really need to give us everything, unless it’s going to come up in the future. I just have a feeling that A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms Season 2 will forget about all of this.
(Photograph by Steffan Hill/HBO)
Too Little Time on the Fight
Because of so much time spent on the past, A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms Season 1 Episode 5 didn’t spend that much time on the trial.
I understand that this is all told from Dunk’s POV, and for the most part, that has worked for this series. It’s helped to simplify the story.
However, I would have liked to see the others fighting. There were snippets here and there, but I would have loved to see Lyonel Baratheon, Prince Baelor, and Ser Raymun fighting for their man, especially with how things ended.
What I will say is I appreciated the time spent on Dunk and Aerion. We got a good look at the type of fighter Dunk is, and it was a chance to really understand his mental state.
(Photograph by Steffan Hill/HBO)
There was this moment when he was ready to give up, and who can blame him? He was stabbed multiple times.
Yet, he got up. And sure, this was where the past came into play, because it was the friend of the past urging him to get up. She is the reason he wanted to become a knight and protect the innocent.
So, she was the one to get him back up and continue the fight, leading to Aerion having no choice but to withdraw the claim.
It’s a little anticlimactic with Aerion withdrawing the claim, but it was an entertaining moment of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms. There were certainly some Joffrey from Game of Thrones vibes thrown in there.
(Photograph by Steffan Hill/HBO)
Of course, the penultimate episode wouldn’t be a good penultimate if it didn’t leave us on some sort of emotional cliffhanger, and the episode certainly did that with Baelor’s arc.
Baelor is a man who believed in Dunk. He could see the goodness in him, and Dunk reminded Baelor of what it really means to be a knight.
In fact, I could have seen Baelor being a good King of Westeros, so for him to die after the battle was somewhat heartbreaking.
It’s the way it happened that got me, because you just knew the minute he took that helmet off, he wasa goner. The helmet was the only thing keeping his brain in place.
(Photograph by Steffan Hill/HBO)
My thoughts now are all about what this means for Dunk’s future.
Could he be blamed for the death of the heir to the throne?
Probably not, considering the reason for the fight, but with Maekar delivering the blow that killed Baelor, he’s sure to want to blame someone other than himself.
This sets up for an exciting season finale, and it makes me even more disappointed in so much focus being on the past.
A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms Season 1 Finale will air on Sunday, Feb. 22 at 10/9c on HBO.
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