Dunk and Egg

I've been doing a slow turtle paced reread of the first two stories and I'm currently enjoying the third for the first time. I find reading Martin at such a slow leisurely pace allows me to absorb all the details which he writes with and tries to hide in the corner.

What struck me about the stories when I first read them, especially The Sworn Sword, was that it was TV writing. Very blatantly Baby Boomer TV writing. When I think Baby Boomer TV writing, I think of such "gems" as:

Captain Planet
Law & Order
The Simpsons
etc.

In other words TV series that thrive on subverting social expectations that were status quo circa 1960, but are so long gone that the expectation of subversion is there already and you can figure that out in a heartbeat. They have clear moral messages and agendas, are neat and well-packaged, etc.

The same style of writing can be seen in Baby Boomer film making as well.

It feels like they're still fighting against social expectations that no longer exist or hold any actual sway anymore, and they are unaware that they are now the majority or new power, but still write as though they're still edgy and not mainstream.

Of course Rohanne Webber wasn't going to be an Old Widowed woman, like Dunk thought. Dunk still thinks in the old conventions of storytelling.

Martin lays that hint early by having Ser Eustace say that Lord Wyman's daughter and his son Addam were fond of each other and grew up together, and we know that Lord Wyman's daughter inherited. Ergot, anyone can figure out that Dunk's assumption of "survived 5 husbands? must be an old woman" is faulty from the get go.

Of course Dunk isn't going to win anything on the tourney grounds of Ashford or get to kiss Tanselle Too-Tall, showing up the aristocracy by proving his might on the lists, those are the old conventions which must always be subverted!

Martin is subverting tropes so old, that no one really considers them to be tropes except out of some sense of tradition. Instead the anti-tropes have become the new tropes, and Baby Boomers just haven't realized it yet--and likely never will at this point.