The Green Knight: The Uncanny Horror of Masculinity

1 - Look. I know it’s not pronounced “Garwin.” YOU know it’s not pronounced “Garwin.”
But that’s how everyone says Gawain’s name in this movie, and I figured it would be confusing for me to be calling him one thing while the footage calls him another.
2 - It’s weird that the movie arguably blames Gawain for being sexually assaulted, right? I say arguably because you can make a case for it not quite being that. She does get his audible consent, and later when the Lord kisses Gawain, you could argue that he makes his move slowly enough that Gawain could have said something before the kiss, but there is also a definite power imbalance in both of these cases, right? Gawain seems pretty scared during these encounters.
The Lord and Lady read to me as like friendly-but-menacing. Uncanny nightmares of the psyche. Their sex/smooch scenes seemed steeped in that dreamy sort of vibe, the kind of dreams where you behave in a way that you hopefully wouldn’t in real life and then you wake up and go “oh my god, why did I do that?”
But most critics I read seemed to feel that the narrative is blaming Gawain the most here. That the scorn of the Lady and the Lord after Gawain did or didn’t submit to them is how the audience should feel. “Gawain has failed the test of chastity and fellowship” and so on. As if we should agree when the Lady says “You are no knight” and that we too are sad that Gawain doesn’t hook up with the Lord.
Me, I felt like these were more ambivalent touches, tying back to my comments in the video about how there is no consistent narrative karma to give us that kind of moral guidance.
Either way, that blindfolded old lady is there too, who I guess is supposed to either be Gawain’s Mom or some extension of her magic/coven? Sooo that’s just a whole of layer of WTF that I can’t even begin to penetrate.
These events are also in the original poem, and I guess a story about sex-obsessed temptress harassing a man who has explicitly said no multiple times I some rough source material to have to adapt, but it feels like it feels like it plays out LESS consensually in the movie than in the original text. Bizarre, imo
3 - There’s a vague scene after the credits which features a hint that Gawain became king and had a daughter. I guess the implication of her putting on the crown suggests that Gawain maybe possibly hopefully won’t ignore his daughter’s wishes the way he previously ignored Essel and I guess his mother’s?
It stops short of being a happy epilogue and settles for a hopeful one.
4 - So Gawain IS going to live at the end, I think? That moment where the Green Knight runs his thumb across Gawain’s neck, that’s him “returning the blow that was given to me,” right?
5 - For some reason, this exchange always cracks me up:
“Are you ready?”
(Long pause)
“Are you ready?”
(Long pause) “Yes.”
“Then I shall get to hacking.”
I dunno, he seems so bla·sé about it, it’s great
6 - I say fantasy is about empowerment, but I wanted to clarify that I don’t JUST mean individual empowerment. It’s also often about the empowerment of a group of friends or community.
7 - I am mildly paranoid that Gawain’s original portrait does not, in fact, portray him as white. That maybe it’s just lit weird or the brown paint is just faint. I asked a bunch of people and they all thought it looked white, so uh… that’s about as scientific as I knew how to get with that.
Even if it’s accidental, I still prefer my version lol
8 - Okay so last thing I had this fun speculation thing that I at least haven’t seen anywhere else, but like…
I think it’s really interesting that a lot of Gawain’s dystopian future seems to play out from the POV of his Mom. Gawain himself becomes an uncanny character, defined by his own kind of weird ambiguous distance from us. We see a lot of these developments through the eyes of his Mom, who is also the final person to leave Gawain at the end of the sequence.
It’s fun to think about how maybe not only is the Mom still controlling the Green Knight at the end, making the whole dilemma secretly toothless (probably), but that even the vision might be some sort of divination enchantment or memory spell or whatnot. Talk about a big payoff to the “women telling Gawain when he’s screwing up” pattern.
But also interesting to just think that maybe this is all organically going through Gawain’s head, and as his life flashes before his eye… he sees himself through his mother’s eyes, realizes he didn’t want to disappoint her most of all.

Arthur's vague confidence that Gawain will figure it out and save his ailing kingdom reminds me so much of so many conversations I have had with older people who take comfort in their belief that I and my generation can sort the world out in a way that they never could. They offer no advice, no counsel, just trust that I can handle this. they do this to make themselves feel better, not for my sake or really for the sake of the world they feel unable to help save.

I believe it is the fox who represents friendship and fellowship. Gawain falls short of that chivalric ideal in the end when he shouts and drives away the fox who has been nothing but a fine companion to him, angrily insisting ,"[He] never asked for your help!". This is an explicit rejection of friendship and fundamental misunderstanding of fellowship; very rarely does anyone explicitly ask for friendship from someone, it is merely something that develops naturally to the mutual benefit of both. In the end when the fox says things to Gawain that he doesn't want to hear, he wants to pretend that the fox means nothing to him.

He’s not performing for the green knight at the end. He is doing what is honorable under his own standards . He is listening to himself for the first time. .

In regards to Camelot being in flames and pestilent, it ties back into the concept of the Fisher King, where the land falls ill when the king is ill. Arthur is still in high spirits because he knows it's the end of his reign but soon to be the beginning of another bright-eyed young man and that the misery of winter will be blossoming into spring again.
Having said that, great analysis!

I feel like at the end Gawain, by removing the belt, refuses to live the life, imposed on him by the people who surround him - the one that he envisioned earlier. Because this is the life that he will have to live if he returns as a heroic liar. Thus, he refuses to meet the social expectation - to return home as a hero, also refusing to follow the masculine 'knight's path'. He basically decides that he does not want to continue this game of masculinty, and if there are just two alternatives - death and this, he would rather choose death. However, the Green Knight spares him, opening the third option - to lvie outside the masculine game. This is why the ending is open - this is a new path that is yet to be discovered.

Going from the Arthurian lore perspective, I think it's interesting that this Gawain is essentially a portrayal of Gawain from the Prose Tristan and Post-Vulgate eras of Gawain. It has been noted that there's a shift in portrayal of Gawain over time as Lancelot, Tristan, and Galahad become more prominent characters, all functioning to make Gawain essentially serve as a demonstrator of how good these greater knights are. Gawain is weaker than they are, shorter than they are, less courteous, and less noble. He becomes essentially the embodiment of a knight who is always second-best, and is portrayed as an ignoble brute quite often in these tales. The movie to me felt like it took a sympathetic view towards such a version of Gawain; what would happen to a man who felt like he was so lesser to his peers and how did he get that way.
Gawain is selfish and cowardly, but it is easy to see how he would become that way. How could he be anything but, when he has been forced to live in the shadow of great men. It doesn't matter that they are great for reasons that aren't martial (see Arthur being the one to tell Gawain that he shouldn't play the game) or that some of them aren't great at all (the clapping knights), Gawain sets a self-fulfilling prophecy for himself that he cannot live up to this standard. It think it's worth noting that in these later characterizations of Gawain, he is often melded with the character of Mordred, and the dystopian future fantasy feels almost like due to his shame and inability to accept being a big, strong man, Gawain will inevitably become a Mordred figure. A tyrant who will consume the kingdom because what he has will never be enough to satisfy him and who will try to achieve greatness without actually going through the work for it (literally running from his responsibilities and his obsession wit hthe sash as a safety net).
When Gawain yields at the end to his fate, what he is essentially doing is realizing that what makes someone great is not being a big man and killing dudes harder. And from the Arthurian lore perspective, it rehabilitates the Gawain of earlier tales in the Vulgate cycle, where he may not be the best knight, but it did not matter. He was still a good man even if he was not the strongest, and he can be forgiven for not being the strongest.

i am so proud of dev patel. from skins to the last airbender (lol) to starring in a movie produced by freaking a24. love him lots

No one will see this: I thought this movie was about meaning vs nihilism
Gawain goes on the quest because the quest feels like a fairytale, an epic legend with a “good ending” and maybe a “moral of the story”, which represent the meaning that he looks for in life.
I didn’t interpret his interaction with Winifred as him asking for sex as much as it was him asking for a reward, maybe magical assistance, for his good deed like characters in story would get, because he still believes that the world in general and his quest in particular worked like a fairytale story.
When he faced the green knight and asked “is this all there is?” He is asking “is my story going to just end with me dying? Where is the happy ending? Where is the moral of the story?” -and the green knight essentially tells him: “there is no meaning, your life isn’t a story at all”
After being given this answer, Gawain flees from the chapel with a kind of fear that I thought was more than just the fear for his life, but existential terror in realizing that the meaning he sought does not exist at all. He lives the rest of his life unable to escape that terror, he goes through the motions of raising a child, being king, marrying, fighting wars looking but is emotionally numb throughout because he can’t find the idealistic, fairytale meaning of life.
In the end, he takes off the sash which I take to represent his belief that magic is real and by extension that the world works like fairytales say it does, and the green knight praises him for confronting the essential meaninglessness of existence. Whether he kills Gawain or not no longer matters, since death will find him sooner or later. “Off with your head” could mean “now I will kill you” or “you can now leave and take your head with you”-“off” meaning “go away” in this case.

This movie left me and my friend completely winded and speechless. It is ludicrously creative, bold, and skillfully made.
But the dominant thing for me, is that I've never seen a movie that felt as...pagan as this. And by 'pagan' I mean it captures a feeling I've experienced but never seen captured in a bottle. That the earth is old. And powerful. Not strictly threatening, but profoundly unknown. And while not the exact sensation of 'being watched' at this moment, the distinct sense that something IS there, that could begin watching at any time.
....I have this photo, that I took the last time my family was in England. We were hiking in a forest that looks altogether too much like the ones in this movie, when we came upon a tree in a small clearing. It was a different species than all the ones around it, deciduous where the rest were pines. It must have been 150 feet tall. It was stripped of bark, smooth, but it was alive. And I was overwhelmed by the feeling I got from it. It felt foreign, ancient, alien. I was suddenly seized by a gut certainty that this...was not a normal tree in any way a modern person like me could fully understand. I both wanted to get closer, and also distinctly felt like I shouldn't. I took several good pictures, and we hiked on. And even now, that picture blown up onto posterboard and hung in my living room, I still feel strange when I look at it. It's calming, grounding, AND vaguely unsettling. It still has some strange power.
The Green Knight feels like that.

I honestly feel the line, "Well done, my brave knight," as spoken to an adult is more something a mother might say to her son, which would be in line with the film.
You're not wrong that a father might say to his child, but only a young one, not an adult son.

I feel better knowing that everyone has that one mug with a broken handle.

I was not born a man, but I've always wanted to be one. What I loved about this movie was the constant question of 'what would you do then' with every step we take with the protagonist. Yes, I have an idea as to what a man is supposed to be, what nobility should be like, but when the chips are down- wouldn't I flail for my life? yell at a friend while upset? ask what there would be for me if I did something good? Would doing any of these make me a failure, of simply human? Is one lone act going to make your whole life better, even the parts of yourself you hate?
I felt like it was a lot of questions that boiled down to "in the end, if life and death will continue without you, does it matter enough for you to cling like this?" And I sure as hell haven't given myself an answer but I truly love these questions.

Wow this is one of the best video essays i've ever seen. 11/10
This reminds me a lot of the poem "A Generic Husband" by Rebecca Hazelton, she describes a man who fits incredibly specific cliches for the expectation of a middle aged white suburban father. A guy who plays golf, drinks beer, plays the stock market, is into war history, has a bad tattoo, wears whimsical socks, and "who does not dream."
The whole description is incredibly uncanny and even creepy with both it's syntax and repeated mentions that the man "has no questions." It feels like the narrator is trying desperately to convey that something is deeply wrong with this man but instead the whole poem is a list of benign facts. Most of which are regular and okay. The husband is so impossibly archetypical that I began to wonder if a person who is only perfectly what they were expected to be could even be considered human. He is only what he was supposed to be, which eventually culminates in a strange creature that exists more as a vessel than a person.
Also my favorite part at the end:
"Who clips a dog with his car and keeps driving. Who adjusts the mirror."

The way I interpreted the "dystopian future" scene was that it was Gawain having a moment similar to a life flashing before his eyes. He explores the possibility of the choice of running away and ultimately finds himself unhappy and therefore finds peace in the possible death that awaits him. Of course, in hindsight, this wouldn't make much sense given his character.
Another theory I had is that Morgana sends the Green Knight for Arthur, and needs to find a way to protect her son after he takes the challenge instead. The sash is her way of doing so without his knowledge, maybe similar to how (grand)mothers let their children win at games to make them feel confident. I don't know about the level of control she has over the Green Knight as the story progresses, nor about the challenges that lie in between, but my thoughts were that he keeps making the decisions that he, according to her, shouldn't because he never seems to learn. I interpreted the fox as some sort of version of her to communicate with Gawain and guide him. But with her/it's cryptic messages Gawain only becomes frustrated and eventually pushes the fox (his mother) away.
Mothers want to protect their sons, but sometimes it may be best to let them make their own mistakes.

To me that sentence the Greene Knight says "...my brave knight" seemed to me so effeminate and gentle as if it was almost being said by Gawain's mother herself. The affectionate way it was said and the gentle stroke of the finger on Gawain's cheek... Perhaps it was still Gawain's mother controlling and speaking through the Greene Knight. Showing her pride in her son for finally commitimg an act of honor, but the honor that counts. Not the honor as seen and imposed by his fellow legendary and unrealistic knights, but the honor towards his own self. When he took that green sash off in the last moments it was an act of bravery, but bravery that saves no one. No one would celebrate Gawain for his bold standing up to the Greene Knight, he would be beheaded there, alone in that chapel and perhaps a song would be sung of his resolutness, but what has he out of this when he would be nothing but a dead skeleton with no head.
His commitment to this seemingly unnecessary task bears no fruit except his final and complete surrender to the nature of all things: decay and death. And perhaps the ending line of the movie "And now: off with your head!" is quite exactly what it is: Greene Knight announcing the outcome of the quest we all kind of expected. Gawain would simply be beheaded and die in that chapel right then. No matter how "honorable" we live, the end awaits us all, but perhaps we can die knowing that we were fair to ourselves and made peace with the inevitable.

A very interesting essay. Thought provoking. I loved the film despite it being very different from the poem. It is a poem in itself. I particularly liked your comment on how the film subverts the action hero movie tropes. It sparked the idea that so many young men today, like Gawain, are pretty much directionless. They see depictions of heroes in film like Gawain sees King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table, but cannot find a way to match them. He has no story to tell and neither do many young men today. “Is this all there is?” He asks. You go to school, get a job, a career, start a family, check all the boxes of expectation and in the end, what?

This movie hits close to home. I only recently realized the hollowness of my narcissist father's expectations for me.
"What else ought there be?" Truly a question that one must ask before they become their own person.

from the moment i discovered your channel, i've slapped every single one of your videos in a playlist of videos with jacob geller, acolytes of horror, and fredrik knudsen, for when i'm in... *_this_* mood. i think you're absolutely wonderful, and i hope you're having a nice day. whatever it is you're "performing," i'm a big fan of it.

I rarely ever comment on youtube videos but ever since we found you, your videos have become the “drop everything you’re doing and watch” kind of videos for my best friend and I. Keep up the awesome work!

TBH I feel like this essay assumes that the movie is adhering to modern beliefs, and I always got the impression it was trying to frame things in the perspective of the characters in it. Gawain submitting himself to seeming death may be a foolish decision to a modern man, but to Gawain, he’s finally found what he considers ‘honor’. And he wants to stand by it, even if it means dying, because it will at least be on his own terms

These videos are such a safe space. I overthink about everything, especially art that I love. Green Knight blew me away and I could continue to dwell on it for the rest of my life. It’s comforting to know how much this affects others and I appreciate how well you put everything into words. I especially appreciate the Midsommar video for how I was going through deconstruction with christianity when it came out. You might not know the extent of how affecting your work can be to your audience, but please know that you’re great at how you do what you do.

OKAY! Addressing the whole “his mom sent the green knight to kill Gawain” at the intro, I’ve been talking about this in my “age of King Arthur class” and we came to the consensus that she was most likely trying to kill Arthur so Gawain could come to power and she’d be the mother of the king, yada yada. Also my name is Nathan too! We’ve been talking about this movie and the original poem a lot in class and I may continue to edit this comment after I watch the video essay!

I am genuinely looking forward to your new releases! I actually can't handle horror movies, but I'm deeply fascinated by them, so you let me vicariously experience them through these videos. Please continue to keep making these gems!

I love how this movie completely breaks the mold of a male story. For all the talk of female empowerment in media the complete curve ball of a realistic male reality but in the opposition of men needing to be the knight in shining armor. In the end 95+% of any group just want to enjoy life and not lead it.

No lie, in my car on the way home from seeing The Green Knight, I thought about your essay on The Lighthouse and hoped you'd do one on TGK. You're very good at this. Thank you for taking the time to make these essays!

Him: I just described Han Solo
Me: I was going to say Iron Man, but I respect your opinion

I've been meaning to watch The Green Knight since it was available to rent online but I kept putting it off and putting it off. I had other stuff to watch, I wasn't quite in the mood, etc. But when I saw that you'd made a video, I was like "WELP TIME TO SEE HOW MUCH IT IS ON AMAZON", paid the ten bucks, and as soon as I finished it, I started your video. Totally worth it!

As for Gawain and the Lady I think he was definitely attracted to her, but knew of his promise to the Lord, and when she touched his crotch he realised that he didn't want her advances. In that scene I suddenly saw him as a young boy and wanted to protect him from that. Some people argue since he finished it meant he wanted it. I disagree, it was cold and forced and she enjoyed watching him become subdued and wanting it over with.
What I saw in when Gawain kissed the Lord, was that I think Gawain would have much preferred a simple kiss compared to what happened, and in that he was sparing the Lord from what the Lady did to him (even if it seemed like the lord was interested in Gawain- in the poem I simply saw it as Gawain living up to his promise and I saw no 'intimate' relation there, I mean it's implied the couple are fae anyway).
anyway that's my thoughts

Not gonna lie, the part where you tongue-in-cheek repeat the "moral of the story" with your wife was super cute and funny lol

Green Knight at the end of the film: "T'was but a prank, good sir"

The Green Knight Was his mothers avatar.
Thus the maternal speech, "Well done, my brave knight".
The Green Man was a traditional character from European culture. Symbol for death and rebirth etc. Often found in and around churches

This is excellent. I normally don’t do too many “The Green Knight - ENDING EXPLAINED” kinds of videos after I see films like this, but I’m glad I watched this; I left it with so many new things to think about. Great work. ✨
I will just say, that I wasn’t quite as unsatisfied as you were by the ending. To me, it seemed like a recognition of the harm he had done the Green Knight - he’s holding to his word and taking accountability for the mistake he made giving into peer pressure and decapitating the Knight, who had clearly explained the rules and had done him no harm.
He’s giving up his power in the situation and owning his mistake, and that’s what makes it the brave, knightly choice. (To me)

Loved this film. He was trapped by the culture he grew up in rather than anything else. It drove him to his death as surely as an arrow in the eye.

Just discovered your channel this week, binge watched every video; and I already get to see a new one! Your analysis is always fantastic and gives new perspectives on some of my favorite movies.

Thank you for breaking this film down into some of its core elements! It was an interesting challenge and you saying the film keeps us “at an arm’s length” was incredibly accurate.

35:20 I dislike the idea that a movie about non-toxic masculinity would resolve itself in narrative that men need women to guide them. Just like I'd feel uncomfortable about a movie about femininity requiring men. Obviously it's one thing for the narrative to be about balancing the two, but to suggest that Gawain NEEDS his mother or Essell to not make him corrupt is pretty bleak. I think more-so this represents his internalized fear about getting approval from the women in his life. The castle-lady saying "you're no knight" disapprovingly post-sex, seems comically like his worst fear.

I've studied the poem somewhat - while the plot is greatly expanded for the movie and the tone is different, it seems clear to me that the writers were keeping a lot of the major themes of the original poem, such as the artificial and contradictory nature of honor. Also the pagan world and the Christian world being in conflict.
One major difference is that the poem is set at the beginning of Arthur's reign, when the people at Camelot are all very youthful and full of spirits. In the movie Arthur's character and Gawain's character almost switch personalities because in the poem Arthur is the hothead and Gawain is the more diplomatic one.
In the poem the green sash explicitly doesn't do anything (and a different character gives it to him). Gawain has to wear it as more of a sign of his failure and humiliation at the end of the poem.
In the poem the old lady at the castle is Morgan Le Faye. Her actual appearance is very short though.

I was bothered by this movie when I first watched it. It seemed to build and build with its strange and intriguing scenes. None of it being tied together in the same storytelling I had typically seen. It was all loose and dancing individually but I was shocked by the ending. All of that buildup without a satisfying conclusion. I think how I felt about the movie is its own metaphor. How meaningless the mythical quests of manhood are. It’s communicating that everything Gawain did in pursuit of manhood was actually acts of immaturity. He had no sense of manhood because it was simply a myth. At least a myth in the sense that his pursuit of it would actually end in conclusion. He wasn’t pursuing maturity, he was pursuing the myth of maturity. One that everyone around him holds up desperately but fails miserably at it. It’s almost as if his meaningless pursuit could’ve been avoided entirely had he been mature from the start. He wants something that doesn’t exist, hasn’t existed for decades, and is willing to forfeit that which he seeks to acquire to obtain this myth. Had he been mature and refused the illusion he would’ve been obtaining it. He could’ve been something had he not went on a quest to become something. Gawain’s pride was the initial catalyst for all the bullshit

I was just pleased as hell to have such a nonlinear story in theaters. It made it feel like the ancient story that it is.

The last line "Now off with your head" was TGK telling Gawain to leave with his head still attached.

The Mystery of the Grail: Initiation and Magic in the Quest for the Spirit should be read by all who are interested to understand.

The Green Knight is my favorite film of 2021 😭! Thank you for this!!!! I put your video on as background while I slept and proceeded to wake up & spend the morning watching 👀 your Lighthouse, Annihilation & Midsommar videos!!! 🤯 Legitimately some of the best analysis content I've seen in all of KRplus 👑

Man, I LOVED what you did with the ending here. This movie was a godDAMN trip from beginning to end. I loved the performances, the misé-en-scene and the photography! And afterwards I opened the wiki entry on the tale and just tumbled down that hole for A WHILE (so much so I neded up reading a lot about Welsh folklore lmao), it was insane.
So, greetings from Venezuela! Keep up the good work and stay real.

It's criminal that you are not more well known. I absolutely enjoy your videos and really like your perspective on these types of films.

so excited to sit down for the full essay. i really loved the atmosphere this movie produced and am hyped for the takes. let's goooo

It's pretty impressive that videos uploaded to this channel relate in meticulous detail the plots of movies I haven't watched yet and even so I'm left wanting to watch the movies much more than I did before getting the full spoilers, rather than less

Amazing content as always. Keep them coming! 🔥🔥

you’re such an underrated creator

Wow. That head lopping scene was very Sleepy Hollow! I haven’t seen this film, but it looks very dark and gritty aesthetically. Im really looking forward to this analysis, I’ve heard so many conflicting thoughts about this film, and how it adapts the original text. Good to see you Nathan. Thank you for this!

Oh wow, I wasnt expecting this kind of video! Interesting essay as well. Your uploads always feel like Christmas came early!

You are one of the best channels on KRplus, your editing, organization, and delivery rival famous TV documentarians.

awh man i’d know that irish lilt anywhere lol that was a treat, i love when my fave youtubers work together. love the video, always love hearing your takes !! 💗

Hearing Hollingers voice near the end was a fun surprise. Love the content dude

I’m so happy you did the second part. The first felt like you went through the expectations of what a video essay would be, conforming to this ideal, making the material fit the form.
The second, you let go of that a bit, and your conclusion is the better for it.
He never escapes the expectations of honor, there is no conceivable way (in his mind) out of the situation without loosing his head. Till the end, he has not learned to overcome

Commenting for the algorithm gods. Top notch script and editing from the AoH team, as always :D
(also lmao @ the ryan cameo. that was a pleasant surprise)

39:11 Ryan's voice!

This is such an interesting and thoughtful take. It makes me want to watch the film myself, I always love Dev Patel! I particularly appreciate how you talked about gender as a performance, and even the trailer as a performance - it's not something I've thought deeply about before but I think you're absolutely right.

This is one of the better video essays I’ve seen on KRplus. You put a unique perspective on the more subtle motifs.

Your voice, tone, and pacing for these videos are all lovely.
It's a personal bonus to intelligent analysis videos which is very dear to me - vocal delivery is something I've been fascinated with all my life - and to hear these horror narratives delivered in this way is an absolute pleasure and intellectual treat.
This is coming from someone who normally cannot stomach horror and is too scared for much of its content. You've made this genre perfectly palatable for me.
Keep up the good work!!

I absolutely love this film and fiercely hate parts of it. I love how it feels medieval in its uncanny, unsettling glory where ingerpretation is slipperyat best (medievalist here), how it is a dreamscape and doesn't avoid devotion. But I also hate how it short changes Bertilak and the inherent queerness of the original poem, cutting down the masculinity to something modern and narrow, very straight and not at all fluid.
The second conclusion is marvellous and I want to think about it, to really get it. Thank you so much for covering this film.
A few random points:
1) I like to think that the bandit rides on ahead of Gawain, bearing the axe, the belt and his horse. That he arrives at St Winifred's ahead (ahaha) of Gawain and kills her, and then appears at Bertilak's and fails the test set for him as a knight, leaving the girdle there to be returned to Gawain. He is the mirror image of Gawain in a lot of ways - merciless, searching for glory and violence. Thus all the comments about 'was this you or someone else?', etc.
2) The role of the Virgin Mary here. His mother makes him the girdle from pagan power, but a girdle is first and foremost a tool of Mary and blessed to provide protections. As a relic it is paraded around towns. And this is CHRISTMAS, where Mary is at peak Mary. But as he enters the pagan land, we have the bandit shattering the image of the Virgin Mary on the shield, and then Gawain orgasms on the girdle both sullying it completely, but also fertilising it so to speak. There is a balance between the pagan and the Christian here, as well as what sort of man he will be.
3) Then of course the fact that his mum here is Morgan le Fay, which is an upgrade from the myths where she is Morgause and so she is his mother, the blind woman, the fox and also in the end the one playing the 'trick' with the Green Knight and Bertilak. Such a lovely plot twist, because then his two main influences are both the pagan and the civilising force of Arthur, but also the inverse of the virgin Mary while kinda playing the same role. So good.
4) I love Arthur and Guinevere so much here. So, so, so much. Their gaunt, grey fragility. The scene in his dream when Arthur hands the sword to him and retires to bed all worn through but in a shower of light. The dying kingdom and the dying king. So, so, so, so beautiful and precisely the end of Arthur when the decay of the world had set in and forced him to return to the lake.
4) the puppet show! So terrifying and divorced from all reality. As the rumours catch fire and burn out. The escalating stories so detached from reality. Yes.
5) Winifred being forced to marry and not become a saint Gawain's dream ending. To bear children and sacrifice herself, to also be ground down, along with Essel.
4) The knightly virtues are often tied in with the classic virtues of Christianity (and Islam) than we give credit too. Out of the ones you have listed here, they are by and large the classical virtues. Fides (faithfulness), caritatis (divine love as well as charity), justitia (justice or honour). Even the rest are related to subsets of these most complex ideas (honour and humility, And these are complex ideas at best, let alone in terms of Arhurian material, where the 'secular' and the religious often collide.

Personally, I’ve had my fill of this deconstruction of masculinity and the attempted redefinition of the hero. Not to say I disliked the film- I thought it was stunning, but I saw it more as a reaffirmation of chivalry. To the point that Han Solo is the antithesis of an Arthurian Knight, I would argue he is…. Until he’s not. Han slowly develops those attributes (as most heroes do) over time.
The overall message is a Knight’s quest is not about magical weapons or a clear map of the way and that’s why few ever became knights! That is what growing into adulthood is as well. It’s not Aurtur pointing West and telling you that destiny waits where the two roads cross, it’s someone shrugging their shoulders and saying “I have no idea what you should do or how it will turn out, so good luck with all that” and you still choosing to take those steps.

I really love the new editing style of this video with the additional text on the screen and the more cinematic moments!

I watch your videos while I'm driving and respond to your rhetorical questions so I can pretend we're friends discussing a movie we just watched. I drive a lot, so it's nice to have someone to "talk" to. I watch a LOT of video essays, both because I love looking at the deeper meanings in media, but also to pretend I have smart friends who are willing to spend hours talking to me. You're my favorite "friend" because it seems like you always watch movies around the same time I do, and if I haven't seen a movie you talk about, I immediately watch it so I can watch your video. Lol. I'm not a stalker, I swear.

Really interesting analysis that touches on the push and pull between the "higher ideals" of masculinity (honor, mercy, character) and the social pressures of masculinity (domination, impressing others, violence). Great work as always, Nathan. Love your work!

I’ve literally been thinking about this movie since I saw it in July. This is one of the coolest and best takes I’ve seen on it.

This is a fantastic analysis - thanks, man!

Great vid. I really enjoyed the ambiguity of _The Green Knight._ Also, when The Green comes for me, I hope it sounds like cheerful Irish vlogger.

Fun fact: the second shot is not of Camelot on fire, it's the sacking of Troy. In the end credits, you can see the mentioning of Helen and Paris. This is because the manuscript begins "when the siege and assault were ceased at Troy".

I've read the poem in it's original form for my middle English literature courses. It's such a good read.

Your video essays are so good, I don't understand how you don't have many more subs yet, but I'm absolutely certain you will grow immensely 👏

Your video is captivating as usual, always look forward to your uploads !!

I'm so happy you gave a shoutout to Kaz Rowe. They were my introduction to this topic, and their videos are so well researched and engaging. Also, seeing them in that armour... 🥵

Loved the part where Ryan Hollinger reads from “the book thief” another excellent channel I watch.

It’s been too long. So good to see you back.

Very, very well done essay. Great work!

Very interesting analysis, and thank you for the extra part, the "Essel alternative" and the honesty about the ambiguity: I also think that his step towards vulnerabily, by taking off the magic shash, is a performance looking for the father-figure aproval. In my own view, he is in fact surrendering himself to the "manhood" and the toxic concept of honor. And this depicted as a stupid idea, because the "father" in the myths is found in sacrifice his childs, being the young warriors and soldiers of history, and yet today, the most archetypical example of "sending the childs of" that kingdom or country to their certain death by desing of an older generation of more powerful men. "You are a brave, worthy man now. So, die honorably insted of living a life of dishonour and ruin", seems to say the Green Knight with his last words and warmer attitude.
It can be more simple, though, an acceptance of the superior force of nature and time, and back to the theme of insignificance so well pointed in your video, and in the words of the Lady.
Women's role is indeed a powerful one: he seems more confortable and vulnerable in the company of women, lacks of a true father figure, and is clear that, even being Arthur that kind of inspiring reference, they haven't a close relationship. The Green Knight is summoned by the mother, speeks through the queen, and presents the quest for manhood and greatness that a father would request. The mother knows that his child will survive because is protected by the same magic which brought the Knight in the first place, and so the same "green" aspect, the cicles of nature. More confussing are the Lady's role. The theme of social position? - she is acceptable because is rich, cultivated, a true "lady", as a contrast with Essel. Also the Oedipical aspect of her being the one who gives him the shash, using the same words of the mother. She claims to have made it herself, but we know is that her mother and the rest of the coven are the ones who created it
The epilogue seems to be placed in the "dytopian" timeline, to me: the girl is the only heir, since the the prince is dead, and she takes the crown from the floor, I didn't felt a sign of a possible happy return after the final scene in the Green Chapel, but more like the dystopian outcome is more real than the "honorable" one.
A great movie , and great review!

this is an excellent video. i adored your first ending conclusion. That honour is undefinable. The true gift is understanding one's self. Then the "fanfic" was awesome ngl. (im a sap for two people connecting and understanding one another). Your final point of understanding that perhaps the ambigous ending comments on how constently life strays away from patterns, trops, or predictable endings, is genius. I do think there are some flaws in the film itself? Just in how it handles that thematic statement of "there are no rules to life". But your analysis truly highlights all the film's amazing complexities and insights while adding so many of your own thought provoking ideas. I love this video! Well done.

Came here from a reddit post from the community MensLib and I'll be forever thankful to the guy who posted your video there because I absolutely loved your channel.

24:27
The shot that happens from this point, the inversion of ground and sky, feels like it embodies the otherness and uncanny quality of the narrative and Gawain's journey in a perfectly metaphorical sense. It is probably my favorite shot in the film.
The fact that the earth Gawain is walking on and the sky switch positions communicates to me that the ethereal and uncertain sky, the entity that is above and out of reach, which represents the abstract and conceptual, changes to assume the role of the earth, the grounded and familiar, the concrete and the real, is so potently emblematic of the theme of ambiguity and uncertainty.
That shot tells the audience that this world and this story is not primarly focused on any sort of objectivity or certainty, but that this journey, much like many facets of our own lives and our own personal journeys outside of this film, is going to be full of interpretable curiousities which are grey and unclear.
It's such a meaningfully broad and profound implication that can go beyond the scope of the film's narrative, if one desires it to.

full on chills when you describe the uncanny!

Yes I felt the same way about that ending. A kind of doomed if you do doomed if you don’t. The only way I could rationalize it is as him determining that he’d sleep in the bed he’d made for himself, but it’s got all those same problems and contradictions from the first ending. Maybe the point was that he was always going to lose no matter what decision he ultimately ended up making. Or perhaps the creator thought it was a triumph for him to sacrifice himself at the end, even while I too felt such excitement when he ran away because I thought he was rejecting fate and ‘honour’ which is always fun. Maybe there’s something honourable abt being held to task about your own stupid decisions, but there’s no triumph in it. Something something he chased away his fox mom something something.

I’ve been waiting for a new video for so long 😭😭, I wish you’d upload more but thank you for this one

"This film I watched somehow matches exactly thoughts that already existed in my head"
KRplus "journalism" is so, so lost

Love this essay! Funny I read both the ending and epilogue with his presumed daughter as hopeful while my brother thought more negatively.

Reading the actual legend answers all your questions posed here.
His Mom knew he had no purpose so she gave him one, but the sash was to show she utterly doubted him completing it.
The couple who detract him are the Green Knight and an illusion the Green Knight plays to detract him from his path.
And finally, the Green Knight does NOT kill him but rather commends him for following through and actually being ready to die for the cause,
as that Gawain's character arc being fulfilled.
He became a man, regardless of even his own doubt. Thus, finally truly WORTHY of the crown.

Your description of the uncanny suddenly brought the movie "Parents" to mind. Which is either about eating human flesh or discovering that your parents have sex.

I had this sitting in my watch later for a more opportune time and now that I'm watching it I can safely say I LOVED THIS. I was really looking forward to this movie and was a little underwhelmed, but I knew that it was largely due to the fact that I didn't fully understand it. Your video gave me a perspective through which I can now really appreciate the movie beyond its gorgeous visuals. Thank you ❤️

Hey man, my girlfriend and I saw this in theaters and came out of enjoying it but sorta ambivalent on how we felt about it. Because of your video, we put more thought into it, had some great conversation over it, and we both enjoy the movie more because of your take on it.
So, thank you. Really appreciate your work.

Fantastic analysis. All I did the whole movie was question my manhood and masculinity. It was truly unsettling. I loved it so much.
The one thing I wish you mentioned was the scene after the credits. I’m curious on your thoughts of that little girl playing with the crown, as if it were nothing but another toy. Its insignificance, as it were.

One thing that stood out to me after looking into the myths surrounding Gawain was about the scene where saint Winifred asks him if he's sure he didn't kill her. In the tale of the questing beast Gawain plays a somewhat big part... where he acts un chivalrously and accidentally kills a lady who'd been throwing herself on his opponent to beg for mercy. Really felt like that line was a reference to that other Gawain myth... He is a killer of women in at least one version of his story. He eventually begs the pardon of the ladies of the court and becomes sworn to become their champion later in that version of his story.

Absolutely love your take on this movie! Just when I thought i had heard every take on it yours was very different

The algorithm sent me here and I got all excited since when I walked out I finally let out my breath - a feeling I only typically have with horror!
And of note: my mom and I were both: this could have been avoided had he just left a scratch and this was such masculine bs.

Ryan Hollinger making an appearance was great! 2 of my favorite video essay channels colliding. It's a good day.

Joseph Campbell has his hero's journey, David Lowerey has his cowards journey.

How do we get this video an award? Truly incredible.

Read the poem in college, really enjoyed it. The name pronunciation in the movie bothered the shit out of me.

I agree with everything you said here. I saw this movie with my boyfriend and while I was in awe with how it portraited a very human character, scared, confused and eager to please, all my boyfriend saw was a coward and a failure of a man. Kinda show you how men expect other men and themselves to be more masculine and that expectation often lead to toxic masculinity.

This is absolutely the best analysis of this movie that I have seen so far, thank you very much for it

Let’s gooo! New Acolytes of Horror video!!!