u/bl1y

In The Hedge Knight, we learn that Ser Arlan taught Dunk that hedge knights were the truest sort of knight because they could follow their beliefs and not be bound up by the whims of some lord:

>"A hedge knight is the truest kind of knight, Dunk," the old man had told him, a long long time ago.

>"Other knights serve the lords who keep them, or from whom they hold their lands, but we serve where we will, for men whose causes we believe in.. Every knight swears to protect the weak and innocent, but we keep the vow best, I think." Queer how strong that memory seemed. Dunk had quite forgotten those words. And perhaps the old man had as well, toward the end.

But, in The Sworn Sword, we meet back up with Dunk to find him sworn to Ser Eustace. He's a landed knight, but not one of any particular importance. He's also old, obsessed with the deaths of his sons, and showing signs of the cognitive decline of old age. Dunk also knows almost nothing about Eustace and his past -- he doesn't know about Eustace's role in the Blackfyre Rebellion, his feud with Lady Webber, or his lack of standing with Lord Rowan.

So what is Dunk doing being sworn to Ser Eustace?

I know there's a drought, so it may be particularly hard both to find employment and to just live in the hedges. But surely Dunk could get a job without actually being sworn -- just do the same work in exchange for room and board, though free to leave when conditions improve, the lord ser proves himself dishonorable, or there's a conflict and knights are in more demand.

Instead of being free to serve "men whose causes we believe in," Dunk just ends up sworn to a random dude he has no reason to believe in and (duh) ends up in a conflict he doesn't believe in either.

What gives?

I remembering learning the term "closest available cliche" in grad school, but any searches I do for it end just at my own Reddit comment using the term years ago. Yet, I'm certain I didn't invent the term. So, I'm trying to find if there's some other term for this fallacy.

The fallacy takes this shape:

A makes a somewhat nuanced argument.

B, rather than responding to that argument, responds to a similar weaker and very common argument.

Basically, B says "Your argument sounds like it's going in a direction I'm familiar with (the familiar cliche), so I'm going to stop listening and assume that's your argument."

It's a sort of non-sequitur, but a much more specific form. Almost like an inverse of the "thought terminating cliche," except that the cliche is imagined by the responder.

Anyways, this has been bothering me for years after I used the term in a meeting, and later found out that I couldn't find reference to it anywhere.

The tourney at Ashford Meadow was very well attended. There were five Targaryen princes there, as well as nobles from four of the Seven Kingdoms. From the Westerlands there was House Lannister, Marbrand, Parren, and Westerling. From the Stormlands, House Baratheon, Caron, Swann, Penrose, Morrigen, Dondarrion, Estermont, and Wylde. From the Vale, House Harding. From the Riverlands, House Tully, Mallister, Bracken, Blackwood, Darry, and Frey. From the Crownlands, House Cargyll, and Stokeworth. Not to mention the numerous attendees from the across the Reach. And these people wouldn't have traveled alone; there'd be knights, squires, cooks, etc.

In short, we're talking about a ton of people who are going to carry the story of the trial of seven to pretty much everywhere except the North, Iron Islands, and Dorne. At every keep and inn they stop at, people are going to want to hear the story of how Baelor was killed. And surely when telling the tale of Baelor and Maekar on opposite sides of a trial by combat, people are going to want to know why the heck two Targaryen brothers were on opposite sides. Dunk's role in all this is going to come up.

And Dunk isn't exactly inconspicuous. There's other tall knights in the world, but at 6'11, Dunk is going to be the tallest person almost anyone has ever seen. Plus he's using his name, no real attempt to hide his identity. (In The Mystery Knight he does adopt a fake identity as the Gallows Knight, but only after telling a bunch of people his real name.)

Then there's Egg. Sure, he keeps his head shaved. But, a lot of people at Ashford would have learned that Dunk's squire is Prince Aegon Targaryen. And anyone retelling the story over mugs of ale is probably going to include "And get this! Ser Duncan's squire? This little bald headed kid who turns out to be Maekar's son, Aegon!"

Granted, far fewer people would know that Aegon continued on with Dunk after. By the time Dunk has recovered from his injuries, most tourney attendees will have gone home, so few people would see them leave together.

But still, Dunk's name would be pretty well known, and anyone who's heard the story would likely be able to guess that his little bald headed squire is the same little bald headed squire he had at Ashford, especially if they take a moment to look at Egg's eyes to confirm their suspicion.

How were they ever hoping that people wouldn't know who they are?

After Jesse learns about Tomas killing Combo, and the dealers who recruited him, Gus sets a meeting for them to make peace.

But why would Gus ever meet in person with two street-level dealers? These are low level guys, but Gus allows them to learn that he's the big boss. There's a huge risk that they'll eventually be arrested on a street bust, at which points they could potentially flip and give up Gus.

He could have let Mike or someone else run the meeting, or instead of meeting with them, meet instead with whoever is above them in the network.

And why even insist on keeping them? He has a distribution network all across the Southwest. Probably thousands of street-level dealers. He could of had them killed. Could have had them just leave town (so they're no longer involved with Tomas). I know he doesn't like Jesse, but Jesse is worth a whole lot more to the operation, while these guys are nothing.

This just all seems very out of character for the normally extremely cautious Gus.

In Season 3, Bit by a Dead Bee, after Walt confesses to the shrink that he faked the fugue state, he mentions that he's an over-qualified high school chemistry teacher making $43,700 ($67,350 in 2026 dollars, for reference).

However, at the time the average public school teacher salary in New Mexico was just over $45,000. Source So, Walt was making a little below the average pay.

Walt had been teaching there for probably something like 10-15 years (we don't have his exact start date, but iirc, Walt Jr. hadn't been born yet). He's teaching high school, which pays a bit more than average. He's teaching science, which also pays a bit more than average. And he's the chair of his department, which also would give him higher pay.

Not that the detail really matters. I was just rewatching the episode and felt like looking up the numbers.

(There isn't an appropriate spoiler tag for this, but please don't spoil any of the rest of Dunk and Egg.)

First off, I really enjoyed it. I like that it has a sort of old timey feel to it. If I didn't know what I was reading, I might think that this was from the era when the King Arthur or Robin Hood tales were being written. I think that has a lot to do with how much the story gives to theme over plot. That gives it a more fable-like feeling.

I think the language also worked really well. It's much flatter, less lush than ASOIAF, and that fits with this being a less grandiose tale. And, it's fitting for our point of view character, who isn't going to be thinking in poetic terms or purple descriptions. It also makes the story read very quick; it's something you could get through in one sitting, which is appropriate for the small scale of the story.

Baelor and Daeron were the stand out characters for me because so many stories lack anyone just genuinely nice and good among the supporting cast. It's common for the main characters to be likeable, but then for everyone else in the world to be shit, especially the people in power. Baelor though is the paragon of what a lord is supposed to be; he's basically the royal version of Dunk being a true knight.

And yes, I said Daeron the Drunk who falsely accuses Dunk of kidnapping Egg is also a genuinely nice and good person. He's deeply flawed and makes a terrible mistake with his accusation, but he recants and then does what he can to make amends.

I also really liked the concept for the tournament with challengers being able to take the spots of champions. And Dunk's strategy was good too -- wait until a weaker challenger gets lucky and takes out a tired and battered champion. And I like that Dunk isn't actually dumb. His knowledge is limited, but within his element, he's pretty clever.

One last thing before getting into the criticisms, the scene where he explains the armor to Egg was very well done. Most other authors I've read would have given this too us as just an exposition dump. But, having it in dialog with Dunk explaining it to Egg lets the armor details take a back seat to a nice character moment. We're focused mostly on how Dunk is taking on the mentoring role of being a knight with a squire.

Okay, on to the criticism...

The biggest thing is character motivations, Dunk especially. Dunk thinks a few times about how knights who fall on hard times often turn to banditry, an outcome he desperately wants to avoid. And yet, by entering into the tournament, he puts himself into a position where he's very likely to end up destitute. He very easily could have joined the Gold Cloaks or the city watch in Lannisport, Old Town, etc. I get that he needs to enter the tournament for the story to happen, but I think we could have done with some better motivation. Ser Arlan taught him that hedge knights are the truest knights because they are free to pursue causes in keeping with their vows, rather than being beholden to a lord. But what's entering into a tournament got to do with any of that? Maybe he could have been on the fence about joining, and then saw a champion behaving badly (like Aerion) and decide to join to challenge that person. I dunno. Just felt like something was missing here.

Speaking of Aerion. What's his deal? I really don't understand why he intentionally killed Hardying's horse. Is he a second rate fighter who couldn't win any other way? Seems like the story just had him be awful for the sake of being awful. Wouldn't be the first time GRRM gave us someone like that, but I'd have preferred a bit more depth for our antagonist. I think the show did a good job with the crowd turning against him in that scene to help set up his motivation for going after the puppeteers -- the booing gets him mad, so he's going around looking for a way to punish the common folk. Instead, in the novel he's just being awful for no good reason (something about thinking he's a dragon, but then why cheat in the joust and why care about a silly puppet show so much and why assault someone defenseless?).

And Maekar. I like Maekar, especially the talk at the end about how he and Dunk will be blamed for Baelor's death. But what was his motivation for having Daeron be a champion? That decision sets a good chunk of the story in action, but he knows Daeron well enough to know he's just going to embarrass the family. Why not put up Aerion in the first place or insist on giving the honor to Valarr? Or he himself could stand as a champion.

Enough of that now. Onto the inn.

Dunk arrives at the inn the evening of the third day before the tournament. And yet, the inn is empty other than Daeron. We're told everyone has gone to the tournament, but at this point, wouldn't people still be traveling to get there? If the inn is just a day from Ashford, and the tournament won't begin for a few days, wouldn't some people want to stay there and wait another day or two to travel? We know that the princes haven't arrived yet, so wouldn't other people also still be on their way? Especially since it's been raining recently, slowing travelers down. I know the inn needs to be empty for Daeron and Egg not to be discovered, but it really seems like the inn should be bustling.

And where's the stable boy? Surely the inn had a stable boy before Egg got there. And the inn's going to need one in a few days when people are traveling home from the tournament. Again, seems illogical, but just had to be done so the story could happen.

But that's about it for my criticisms. Oh, wait. Lances. Dunk doesn't have a lance and never thinks about acquiring one. Does the tournament provide them? I guess they would since competitors have no idea if they're going to need one or thirty (a champion who keeps their spot could realistically need that many over three days). Not really much of a criticism, just a detail I'd like to have seen mentioned.

Anyways, that's all I've got. Looking forward to reading the next two stories.

I've just started a rewatch, and I'm wondering why with Jimmy's absolute beater, he wasn't just borrowing Chuck's car?

Big caveat: I don't recall Chuck's car ever being mentioned in the series. But surely he had one before his condition. The show starts about 18 months after that, and Jimmy was doing all his errands for him during that time.

Why didn't Chuck ever offer to loan his car to Jimmy (or sell it for a marginal amount)? Chuck wasn't going to be using it, Jimmy does a ton of errands for Chuck, and at this point in the relationship I can't imagine Chuck being okay with Jimmy driving around in a death trap.

Even bigger caveat: I assume it's just because Jimmy's beater is a great bit of visual story telling.