GRRM Shares More The Hedge Knight Prequel Details

Earlier this week, Warner Bros. Discovery announced that HBO had given a series order for the “Game of Thrones” spinoff prequel series A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms: The Hedge Knight. Written & executive produced by George R.R. Martin and Ira Parker (with Ryan Condal & Vince Gerardis also executive producing), the series is set a century before the events of “Game of Thrones,” when two unlikely heroes wandered Westeros… a young, naïve but courageous knight, Ser Duncan the Tall, and his diminutive squire, Egg. Set in an age when the Targaryen line still holds the Iron Throne and the memory of the last dragon has not yet passed from living memory, great destinies, powerful foes, and dangerous exploits all await these improbable and incomparable friends. Now, courtesy of his latest Not A Blog entry, Martin is sharing new details on the project as well as the creative short-term & long-term plans for the series.

While there isn’t a premiere date or even a filming start date yet, Martin shared that “writing is well underway” and that Parker has “assembled a small but very talented team, and they are at it already, building on the foundations laid down last year in previous creative summits… and of course on the original novella.” Martin believes it will “most likely” be six episodes but that it’s too soon for that final decision. The announced title is currently the working title but could end up being the final title (“It won’t be called TALES OF DUNK & EGG or THE ADVENTURES OF DUNK & EGG or DUNK & EGG or anything along those lines”).

There are three Dunk & Egg novellas currently in play (“The Hedge Knight,” “The Sworn Sword” & “The Mystery Knight”), with the first season set to adapt “The Hedge Knight” (with a pilot script from Parker already penned). As for what the future may hold for the series if its blessed with additional seasons, GRRM explains the writing situation he would then find himself in:

If THE HEDGE KNIGHT turns out as well as we hope it will, our hope would be to go on and adapt THE SWORN SWORD and THE MYSTERY KNIGHT as well. That will take a few years. Then comes the hard part. Before we reach the end of the published stories, I will need to find time to write all the other Dunk & Egg novellas that I have planned. There are… gulp… more of them than I had once thought. There’s “The Village Hero” and the Winterfell story, the one with the She-Wolves, and maybe I need to write that Dornish adventure too to slip in between “The Hedge Knight” and “The Sworn Sword,” and after that there are… ah… more. I just need to finish THE WINDS OF WINTER, and then do either A DREAM OF SPRING or volume two of FIRE & BLOOD, and slip in a new Dunk & Egg between each of those in my copious spare time… and that will keep me ahead of Ira and his merry crew… for a few more years.