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George R.R. Martin isn't always such a big fan of his books' adaptations. He had a few choice words for changes made in House of the Dragon season 2, for example, but he's been nothing but supportive of new spin-off A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, according to showrunner Ira Parker.
"George has been such a wonderful partner in this," he says during a roundtable interview attended by GamesRadar+. "I spent a week in Santa Fe with him and some of his favorite writers, and we were just breaking ideas and breaking stories for what season 1 of the show could look like. And there were a lot of surprises that came out of there, just some really wonderful ideas, things that George gravitated towards that we were doing, that we were introducing."
A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms is based on Martin's novella The Hedge Knight, which follows Dunk (Peter Claffey), a new hedge knight trying to make a name for himself after the death of his master. He enters a tourney, and finds himself with an eager wannabe squire in the form of Egg (Dexter Sol Ansell).
"I think he really loved the idea of the Baratheon tent and meeting Lyonel Baratheon in that capacity, which was wonderful," Parker continues, referring to the introduction of the audacious Lord of Storm's End.
"I think something really cool with the design of our puppetry came out of those meetings, you know, this big, sort of, almost like War Horse-style puppetry, rather than the smaller hand puppets in the novella," he adds. "It's such a rich creative experience, any time that you get to have him [and] can pull him away from all his other writings, so we got along very well, and he's only been a benefit to the show."
A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms premieres on January 18. Stay up to date with our A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms release schedule, or look ahead with our guide to the other upcoming Game of Thrones shows and movies in the works.
