Sir Gawain and the Green Knight follows King Arthur's youngest knight through the most transformative year of his life, from the New Year's Eve arrival of a green giant at Camelot to a bleeding neck at the Green Chapel. This episode treats the late 14th-century poem by the anonymous Gawain poet as a biography, tracing how a knight whose shield bears the pentangle of perfect virtue accepts a beheading game, journeys through the freezing wilds of North Wales, and lands at Bertilak's castle, where the real test unfolds in his bedroom rather than on a battlefield.

The discussion breaks down the three parallel hunts, the impossible clash between chivalry and courtly love, and the green girdle Gawain hides out of fear of death. It then covers the reveal that Bertilak is the Green Knight, Morgan le Fay's role in orchestrating the plot to frighten  ...