A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, GRRM & The Price of Adaptation (Patreon)

Things have been tense in the extended universe that is Westeros.

On the positive side, we have gotten A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, which seems to be a massive success. On the other hand, we have the interview with George R.R. Martin, which paints a grim picture of his relationship with House of the Dragon showrunner, Ryan Condal. I want to discuss the article and the adaptational changes made, then go into A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms.

No spoilers for the book because I haven’t read it.

Huzzah.

I. Word of God vs Actions of God

The world of Westeros began in 1996 with A Game of Thrones, and as of 2026, the series has expanded into multiple projects—many of them unfinished.

The main series is unfinished, the novella "Dunk & Egg" series is unfinished, and there is still a second volume to be had of Fire & Blood, which is—you guessed it—unfinished.

Despite that, the Game of Thrones series and spin-offs have been a major money maker for HBO and Warner Bros. Not since Harry Potter (bleh) have they been able to capitalize so well on an Intellectual Property that only half of the fanbase truly understands.

As a result, they are milking every single inch of the world of Westeros. Thankfully, there is—generally—a lot of material there, especially in the early years of the world. However, what remains concerning is that when it comes to adaptations, what the company wants matters more than what the creator wants.

In that sense, G.R.R. Martin has put his creative brainchild in the hands of people who want to exploit it.

While he has collaborated with all the showrunners at some point or another, we now have two incidents of creative splits.

Earlier this month, in the cover story for The Hollywood Reporter, we got this bombshell:

I ask Martin carefully: I know you can’t say much about this, but I was wondering how your relationship with Dragon showrunner Ryan Condal got so rocky?

“It’s worse than rocky,” Martin says, looking miserable. “It’s abysmal.”

Without getting into spoilers, Martin’s gripes about Dragon stem from disputes over changes to his book’s characters that impact key plot points.

“I hired Ryan,” Martin says. “I thought Ryan and I were partners. And we were all through the first season. I would read early drafts of the scripts. I would give notes. He would change some things. It was working really well — I thought.”

“Then we got into season two, and he basically stopped listening to me,” Martin says. “I would give notes, and nothing would happen. Sometimes he would explain why he wasn’t doing it. Other times, he would tell me, ‘Oh, OK, yeah, I’ll think about that.’ It got worse and worse, and I began to get more and more annoyed. Finally, it got to a point where I was told by HBO that I should submit all my notes to them and they would give Ryan our combined notes.”

One night in 2024, while the second season was airing, Martin wrote a blog post, “Beware the Butterflies,” which publicly revealed some of his gripes. When he woke the next morning, it was as if Martin had unleashed his own Red Wedding. An upset HBO exec had called Martin’s manager, who phoned Martin’s assistant, who took down the post — but not before entertainment sites (including THR) picked up Martin’s comments. “I would’ve put it back up, but then I would’ve looked like an idiot,” he says. “And 80 percent of it was praise, but that’s not what people focused on.”

Still, the post was meant to be just part one of six detailing the author’s issues with Dragon.

Martin says he can’t say anything beyond this. But sources say Martin and Condal’s relationship deteriorated further and came to a head during a Zoom call with the show’s producers and some HBO executives. The purpose of the call was for Condal to present his vision for season three. After Condal spoke, Martin detailed his many objections and allegedly declared, “This is not my story any longer.”

For those who do not remember that “Beware the Butterflies” post, it spoke about the omission of the third child shared between King Aegon II and his queen-sister-wife Helaena—Maelor Targaryen.

Maelor’s fate is directly tied to multiple important moments in the last breaths of the Targaryen civil war, and Martin found the omission to be narratively problematic.

Without going into full spoiler territory. I agree with Martin’s assessment and while I understand what Ryan Condal and his team have said explaining why they made this change—it feels short sighted.

Still, we have to remember that since the first season, which Martin did praise, the series made massive changes to the source material.

Included, but not limited to, making Alicent and Rhaenyra childhood friends of the same age, having Daemon kill his first wife (not book canon), aging down Cristian Cole, and making his relationship with Rhaenyra more explicit. The fact that Alicent thinks that King Viserys genuinely wanted Aegon to succeed him, rather than it being the political power grab she’d been planning for decades.

All of these changes, small in some ways, massive in others, have led to many of the complaints fans already have. Most of the changes made in season two are rooted in the rewritten personality of Alicent Hightower—something that began in season one.

I don’t doubt the validity of the concern, but where was it when all of this was already going in a very different direction?

We literally saw in the main series the complete white-washing of Tyrion Lannister's character, including his murdering of his former lover, and that was lamented—but it would take many more seasons before the show would be considered “in decline.”

Considering how polarizing the ending of Thrones was, I would also have expected GRRM to have some more power in his contracts—but it might be too late for that at the end of the day. After all, his approval means something, but he is still getting paid a lot of money. The kind of money most authors wish and hope for, but does not come.

I do wish that GRRM would use his voice more to defend the actors behind these projects. Right now, House of the Dragon is the most diverse production in terms of lead characters of color, and I’ve hardly seen him come out in defense of Emma D’arcy, the actors who play the visibly Black Velaryons, or any of the queerness, etc. Whatever any of us think of the writing, the cast is talented, and because it is a heavily female/femme-presenting leaning production, the amount of sexism and gross comments that have been received is disheartening.

But it is why things are the way they are. The fandom was already sexist and racist before the adaptation, and the adaptations have only given them actual humans to harass. For all of my many complaints about House of the Dragon, the reality is that part of why it is as toothless as it is sometimes is because of how the fandom treated its previous cast of women.

They lament “dark” and “cruel” Rhaenyra and Alicent, yet they dislike female characters all the time for being “dark,” “cruel,” and “obnoxious.” This fandom has blamed a 13-year-old for her own father’s execution.

I feel the biggest issue is that Martin is, by his own admission, “so far behind on everything.”

Part of why the ending of Game of Thrones was so bad was that the series wasn't finished. D&D, for all their sins, did not know how certain strings would connect and therefore never even spooled that thread. Lady Stoneheart was a fan favorite, Young Griff is clearly going to be important, but we don’t know how those narratives would pay off, and most actors don’t want to just be married to such a massive project for 9+ seasons. Especially when they have this new fan capital.

If there was a true ending in mind, things might have been different, but that isn't what happened.

What made House interesting for adaptation is that we already have everything that happened and its aftermath in print. However, there is no single true canon for events, since Fire & Blood is inherently misleading in some ways. House attempting to be the "truth" doesn't mean it is being accepted as such.

II. A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms of the Ring

Recently, I saw The Fellowship of the Ring in theaters, again, and it was a majestic experience. Not only because it is the best film and the best extended edition, but also because it has a gentle quality.

Amidst the epic stakes, a band of brothers comes together, protects each other, and forms a friendship no one expected. While some are nobles, our protagonist is truly Fordo and through him, Sam, and the other Hobbits—we see examples of bravery, loyalty, and friendship that are not often given to men.

As I watched, I was thinking about A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, the latest installment in the Westeros world, about Hedge Knight, Ser Duncan “Dunk” the Tall, and his squire, Egg. Within the first 5 or so minutes, we see Dunk take a massive, wet shart right after the swelling of epic music.

What sets the "Dunk and Egg" novellas apart from the other Westeros stories is that they are not concerned about the whims of nobles, but the bravery of common folk. It is going to deliver some of the most grounded realities in the series. From the start, we are shown that Dunk was a squire to an emotionally capricious knight who sometimes abused him. Once he dies after off-screen allegedly “knighting” Dunk, the Hedge Knight goes to join the Tourney at Ashford Meadow, an event that will have great consequences for the future of Westeros.

But right now, it is a chance for Dunk to have some money and security.

If he wins.

While writing this, I have just finished watching the latest episode, with its snug 30-ish-minute runtime. Without getting into spoilers, what works so well in the this reminds me of what works about Fellowship as an adaptation: it knows that the average person wants to be seen. So many of the changes made to characters (like Aragorn) are to make them more identifiable to the average person.

Between everything that happens in the show, we see people drinking, playing, shitting, etc. It also doesn’t hide away from the fact that while the bloody events are a distraction blood sport for the common folk—it doesn’t change the cost of eggs. It is also why Feasts for Crows is the best book.

Right now, due to the chemistry of the leads, the story's limited scope, and the grounded stakes, we have a recipe for a collection of things people like about Westeros. Of course, the novella series is incomplete, so only time will tell.

III. The Future of Westeros

The question of entitlement comes up quite often when you talk about what audiences “deserve” from George R.R. Martin. Do fans deserve the finished series? I’ve gone back and forth about it because there is a really macabre segment of the fanbase that is pushing for his Death in a meme-like way. It is cruel to be only concerned with his health and mortality for the sake of delivering more books.

He would not be the first author to die without completing his work, and that has nothing to do with age. Plus, yes, he’s in his 70s, but so is Stephen King, and Margaret Atwood is in her late 80s.

At the same time, I think there is just a general eyebrow raise warranted when he is working on so many other things, but this next book is in what is his magnum opus. Yes, we are not entitled to anything, but I can certainly say that if I’d known that it would have been 15 years between the fifth book and a sixth book, I wouldn’t have started reading the books.

Just to put it in perspective, when the book A Dance With Dragons came out, that was in 2011—the same year the first season of the show came out. There was no reason to think the show would have ended before the book.

There have been series I’ve not started because they are unfinished, regardless of the author's age. Melanie Rawn has an interesting sci-fi trilogy that she said she would complete in 2014 after finishing her Glass Thorns series. Well, that series ended in 2017, and the final installment in that trilogy is still not out.

A trilogy that started in 1994. I know that depression is a major reason for the delay—which is why I’ve read her other work—but not that.

I haven’t read The Kingkiller Chronicle by Patrick Rothfuss because it's not done.

As a writer, I suffer from anxiety and fear. I am always worried about being a disappointment and if what I put on the page will not be as good as what is in my head. I can only imagine what it must be like to have seen an ending to your series come out before your own—and if it was what you originally intended, seeing it torn to shreds.

I am rooting for GRRM, the man and the writer. As a man, I just want him to have peace. He is having the height of his career later in life and with all the years he has put into this work it is a bright spotlight. I hope he is building something fantastic with it.

But, as a fan of the series, I do wish that he would either be more transparent about where he is or be quieter. If only because throwing water on the electric fire that is House of the Dragon is only going to hurt the most vulnerable in the cast, and they don’t deserve that.

What do y'all think?