A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms’ Ending Has a Surprising GOT Franchise First After 15 Years

For the most part, A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms‘ Season 1 finale plays out as you’d expect, even if you haven’t read the book. That’s because it’s quite typical in the Game of Thrones franchise for the penultimate episode to be the one where the biggest shocks happen, and Baelor Targaryen’s death joins the likes of Ned Stark’s beheading and the Red Wedding in that regard. The finales are more about tidying things up, dealing with some of the fallout, and teasing what comes next, which is what we get here. Warning: Contains SPOILERS for the Season 1 finale.

None of that is to say A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms‘ ending is bad. It’s an excellent, character-driven episode, and still finds room for some small surprises, like Rowan’s marriage to Raymun Fossoway, Egg running away from Maekar Targaryen, and even the bees on Humfrey Beesbury‘s coffin. But perhaps the most unexpected and unusual choice in the finale was the end credits song. The installment plays out to the sound of “Sixteen Tons” by Tennessee Ernie Ford, and it’s both surprising and perfect.

A Knight Of The Seven Kingdoms’ Ending Song Is Great (& Has A Deeper Meaning)

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The reason the song is so unexpected is that it’s not something the Game of Thrones franchise has done before. For the most part, the only music we hear comes from the composed score (by Ramin Djawadi for Thrones and House of the Dragon, and Dan Romer for A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms).

Very occasionally, bands have recorded versions of in-universe songs that’ve played over the end credits, such as The National’s “The Rains of Castamere,” The Hold Steady’s “The Bear and the Maiden Fair,” and Florence + The Machine’s “Jenny of Oldstones. Never, though, has real-world music been used in the fantasy series. It makes sense as to why, given that modern music largely wouldn’t fit with the universe these shows take place in, but A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms has already shown it’s willing to break all the rules, and it does that again here.

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While it’s initially jarring to hear the song, it is actually rather fitting. Originally written by Merle Travis in the 1940s, the song is an anthem for the American working class, written about the exploitation of coal miners. There may not be any of those in the show, but the lyrics and themes absolutely relate to Dunk’s story as a hedge knight. These are just a few examples that closely mirror what we see on screen:

“A mind that’s weak and a back that’s strong.”

“You load sixteen tons, what do you get? / Another day older and deeper in debt.”

“I was born one mornin’, it was drizzlin’ rain / Fightin’ and trouble are my middle name.”

A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms is from Dunk’s POV, and very much explores his life as someone who comes from nothing, contrasted with all of the nobles at the tourney at Ashford, and yet he is the truest knight among them all. And what does he get for that? He’ll continue to live as a hedge knight, a tough but honest life where he’ll have to fight to make a living.

That’s the life for Egg now as well: the title “Sixteen Tons” comes from new miners having to do more work on their first day, loading around 16 tons of coal (whereas the norm was 8-10), and now Prince Aegon is going to learn what that is like. That’s very much deliberate, of course, and underscores Dunk’s point to Maekar about his other sons, such as Daeron not sleeping in a ditch and Aerion only eating steak that was bloody. A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms is all about this perspective, and the unexpected song is a perfect way to drive it all home at the very end.

A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms Season 2 will release on HBO and HBO Max in 2027.

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