Comic Book Camelot!

Welcome to the Rob Lightfield show featuring Rob's revisions.

I bring five decades experience in the world of comic books and entertainment.

I am not some bystander watching the industry go by.

I am a full-blown participant having contributed lasting memorable works to the world of comic

books that have informed the business and the art of this brilliant medium.

If it's happening and streaming in movies, in comic books, in games, we are talking

about it, we're discussing it right here.

Hey everybody and welcome to another edition of the Rob Lightfield show featuring Rob's

revisions.

I am so glad to have you on board.

Thank you for listening.

Whatever platform, Apple Spotify, iHeartRadio, YouTube, the video, Spotify application, whatever

it is, thanks for joining us.

So excited to be with you here today and today we're going to call this one.

This one is for me.

This one is for me.

You know, it's like certain artists, sometimes they'll do like one for the corporation, one

for the masses, but then there's a personal one, one that they just say, you know what?

I just got to do this one.

I'm just feeling this, a perfect example, the most famous example was in 93 Spielberg,

Steven Spielberg did Jurassic Park, big giant mega, all crowd pleasing blockbuster in the

summer and come, you know, award season.

He did Schindler's List, a much more sobering adult tale that was something very close

and very passionate.

It's not a movie that an executive could sell to the board.

Like we should make this.

No, you need an artist of Spielberg's talents, reputation, the leverage and the weight

that he brought to it to make that movie.

And the fact that they both came out in the same year and a few months apart from each

other is even more fascinating, but that's the classic one for you, one for me.

Well, in podcast terms, no, this is not Schindler's List.

I'm using that as an example of how artists sometimes divvy up their priorities.

My one for me today is all about King Arthur Camelot and it's all kind of falling together

into this perfect scenario, this perfect storm where I can share with you a pair of influences

both deeply mired in the lore of the Legend of King Arthur.

They both came out within a year of each other and really defined the culture during that

period.

The first of these, because it came first and I believe reignited the interest and possibly

even contributed to getting the green light to the comic book that we're going to share.

The first of the Arthurian legends, because we are just getting right into it today, that

kicked all of this frenzy off, is the release in 1981, April 1981 of Excalibur.

This has just been released, I'm holding it up to the screen, beautiful.

This has just been released.

This is the 4K arrow entertainment, did this incredible 4K restoration with just all the

goodies, all the extra stuff that they could pack in there, multiple different documentaries,

rarely seen documentaries, interviews, footage.

There's a PBS retrospective on Excalibur that aired, that PBS did in 2013, that they put

on the final disc, it's a three disc set, it's got a great little amazing picture book.

This is the director.

We're going to talk a lot about John Bourman.

John Bourman's another guy and the reason I'm so excited to talk about Excalibur

nowadays, because first and straight up, Excalibur holds a special place in my fan-ish

fandom heart, it is a very cherished work to me.

It is a movie that I adore for multiple reasons.

My beautiful wife, she watched it with me, and she said, what is it that you love the most

about this movie?

She wasn't challenging me, but she said, what is it?

What's like the one great thing that just puts you over the top about Excalibur?

I'm like, I can't, I can give you select scenes, and I did, but it's the whole, the entire

cinematic experience that hit me in 1982.

I was not able to see Excalibur in theaters.

I was able to see it when it hit HBO, my freshman year, Excalibur in April of 1981.

I am in eighth grade junior high, looking to graduate.

I started high school in the fall, and late that year in my freshman year, we get HBO.

And as anyone who was my age at that time remembers, it felt like HBO had about 30 movies

that it was able to access during that time.

And one of them was Excalibur, and they played it all the time.

They played it non-stop, round the clock, just, it was on weekends, twice, three times

a day.

There were times that I would watch Excalibur twice a day.

I'd grab it at 10 a.m., be over by 12.30, that night hanging at home, oh, there's Excalibur

again, watching it from seven to nine.

I would consume this movie like few comic books or movies of its time.

You know, I truly believe Star Wars was essential in getting this set up, especially the young

Arthur, the first 40 minutes of the movie when it's young Arthur, a squire boy, he's very

much in his Luke Skywalker bag.

And Merlin is very much in his kind of somewhere between Yoda and Obi-Wan, and this is, it opened

and came out a year after Empire Strikes Back.

So there's all this kind of familiarity with these type of, you know, student teacher

relationships that is very much on display throughout the entirety of John Bournemont

Excalibur.

I always liked King Arthur growing up, Disney Sword and the Stone was an early cartoon

that I saw, loved it, thought the animation was breathtaking, whenever there was Prince

Valiant comic books or the older Camelot movies, I was always taken by guys in armor and

horseback and lances and maces and swords, very visceral, spoke to all of my inner kind

of machismo, my boyish desires to be the hero, to be the badass, to wear the kick ass armor.

One of that has ever been displayed better than when it was put on display in Excalibur.

I remember seeing the commercials in 1981, I just knew that with an R rating there was

no chance that I could get into a movie, something like Aliens that I had made my way into

and it's the actual release, released, came about in a perfect scenario where you're

over at your buddy's house, all of my friends growing up had brothers.

I was the only one who had a sister, literally, like every single one of them had a brother

that was my sister's age.

They were all about seven years older than we were, but they had their brothers who would

then go, hey, you guys want to go to the movies, I'm going to the movies and we could jump

in the car, me and my adjacent buddies and go and that older brother was the hero, taking

us to the cinema to see movies that we would otherwise not see on a weekend as our parents,

both families would be, or three families, the adults would be going out for a dinner

in a movie and so we were being watched by one of the older siblings because you got

to understand in 1981, I'm 13, so I'm just starting to be able to be left alone all

the time.

But if it was a chance to go and hang out at my buddy's house and that older brother

was like, hey, let's go for a cruise, let's go.

I'm all in.

I was up for the adventure.

That really only led to one really great opportunity with Alien, the original Ridley

Scott, which scared the crap out of me.

But that opportunity did not exist for Excalibur.

I saw the trailer in the theater.

I saw the commercials nonstop.

I knew this was something that I wanted to see, but it really did not become a reality

and then part of my everyday existence until it popped up on HBO.

It is infamously.

And when I mentioned online that I had seen this, that I had seen this on HBO, so many

people on X joined in and said, I watched on HBO 2, I watched on HBO 2, which just made

me laugh because again, we're getting that shared sense.

The art direction in Excalibur is what's going to stand out the most to you, to think

that a director who was making this in 1979, 1980, and in truth, Bourman had tried to make

this forever.

Look, John Bourman is part of a class of directors that is unfortunately not spoken

of as much anymore, not as celebrated and again, as with all artists of a certain age.

They're being, you know, in danger of being forgotten.

And I just go that just, it's sad, Terry Gilliam, John Bourman, John Millius, that these

are directors of that age that helped shape so much of the culture that we grew up, you

know, loving between Conan and Red Dawn and then Terry Gilliam and all of his crazy

Baron Moon Chowzen, and of course, the Monty Python stuff, these, and then 12 monkeys

is like an incredible Terry Gilliam movie directorial experience.

But John Bourman had come up in Hollywood.

He made some Lee Marvin movies.

He most famously, probably one of his most celebrated movies besides Excalibur would

be deliverance with John Voit, with Bert Reynolds.

Before guys go down a river and get into all sorts of crazy hillbilly mess and it's known

for its very adult squealing.

I would say there was some squealing with Ned Beatty, Beatty, that when you see it, it's

on the menu to show to my wife, she hasn't seen deliverance.

But John Bourman met with some very early success in Hollywood and was able to parlay that

into raising money for a movie like Excalibur.

Excalibur made $34 million on an $11 million budget in 1981 on an R rating.

And he had to really utilize every aspect of his budget to his advantage because that

wasn't a lot of movie, a lot of money to pull off the visuals.

But all of these guys, and I'm mentioning of this age, John Millius, Terry Gilliam, John

Bourman, these guys, when they were at their best, they were making visceral, very, I don't

say it, very macho entertainment.

I listen to podcasts that discuss like today's like macho entertainment, whether it's

from Taylor Sheridan or others, and we've talked about Sheridan and his impact on this

show so much.

But I mean, guys at Guillermo Dottoro, guys like Zack Snyder, who, you know, 300 was a

phenomenon.

Before Snyder became, really it was the Batman Superman movie because even Man of Steel,

Zack Snyder was still seen as a significant filmmaker.

The first one was a hit.

Man of Steel just wasn't enough of a hit.

300 changed Hollywood.

It changed the fact that you can open movies in March and get summer blockbuster numbers.

Doubt me.

Just look it up.

300 changed release windows, changed dates, expanded the calendar for Hollywood because no

one saw the success of 300 coming and, and, and it was just a monster.

Zack Snyder identifies Excalibur, John Bourman's work as hugely influential Guillermo Dottoro

and Ridley Scott.

And you can, again, look at, they all did movies kind of in that realm, Sword and Sourcery,

Sword and Sandals, styled films.

And John Bourman made the very best one, like literally.

The thing that blows me away is that the visuals and the set design, the look of the armors,

the castle, the, the beautiful staging of the, the, the, the, the settings, like, like,

like, like the way he shot Ireland, all of the locations.

And I would, I would freeze frame as I was really watching this.

And I, and I would show my family, I go, look at the foreground, middle ground, background,

and look at how it's utilized.

And he always had anchors in the foreground and then utilize the middle ground.

And then there are elements in this movie with the background.

There's a scene where Merlin is walking towards the camera.

He starts off very much in the distance and there, it's in the opening 15 minutes.

And, and if you don't catch him right away, eventually when he gets to the middle ground,

he starts to become more prominent, more prominent, more prominent, more prominent.

And then boom, he's in the scene.

But he's been walking towards us the entire time.

John Bourman is a master director, master storyteller, and it was, and it was under his specific

direction that all of this looked, the way that it looked, in all of the documentaries

and in all of the different interviews through, through multiple different documentaries

and making of the, the, the, the featureettes, John Bourman and they have him talking at 93

years old last year.

He is on record.

He is able to speak like surprisingly, coherently for a 93 year old.

He's a little slow in mustering his ideas in his words, but still like 93 years old he

is giving us his recollections of making Excalibur, but no matter when they interviewed him

through the 80s, 90s, 2000s or just this last year.

He spoke of the fact that he did not want Excalibur, he did not want this world of King Arthur

and the Knights of the Realm and Merlin and, and, and Mojrid and Morgana.

He did not want this to be an identical, an, an, an identifiable point in history.

He didn't want you to be able to say, oh, this take place in that century or what, it

really has a magic, really ethereal, ethereal, essence to it where after listening to his

interviews, you could tell me that this took place in a different planet and it's not

earth-based and I'd believe it.

Much of when, and we look, we don't have time to go through all of the John Bourman Film

ography in, in, in the way that we don't have the time to go through anyone's entire film

ography.

But it is well known that he had tried to get Lord of the Rings off, off the, you know,

off the ground and, and, and rolling in front of the cameras under his direction.

He wanted to do the world of Tolkien and the studios wouldn't have it.

He reformatted much of what he had intended in terms of designs, armors and, and then went

around to get the financing and pivoted off Lord of the Rings into Excalibur and we're

the winners.

We are the winners of this because whether it's Anton Fuqua or any of the other directors

that attempted to bring King Arthur to life post Excalibur, they have all fallen way

short.

None of them.

None of them look, feel the way Excalibur feels that it is like a fever dream.

You are watching a fever dream of these characters.

I love the rise of King Arthur, but I have never seen the story of Uther portrayed in

a more savage and visceral manner in Gabriel Bern, along with Helen Mirren and Liam Neeson

and Patrick Stewart and Syrian Hines, who's barely recognizable.

All five of them will tell you whether they were in bit parts, they will tell you this

was the movie that broke them open.

This was the movie that got them noticed.

This was the most significant role.

Max Stewart begins one of the documentaries saying, well, of course I'm going to celebrate

this.

This is a significant role in my becoming an actor.

This was the biggest exposure I'd ever had and then shortly thereafter he was cast

in Dune.

Gabriel Bern didn't understand why I had to set a ladder for a close-up the day after

he was on horseback because they didn't have access to the horses anymore, but they

had matched up his positioning on the ladder to where his face would be and match up with

the perspective that they would shoot it based on the days of the day before and he's

like, I didn't know anything about filmmaking.

So Gabriel Bern, Liam Neeson, Helen Mirren, obviously Nicole Williamson plays Merlin Nigel

Terry as Arthur, but Patrick Stewart, Liam Neeson, Gabriel Bern, Syrian Hines, Helen Mirren

are five giant names that have spectacular careers following this.

I love Nigel Terry.

I remember when I was a kid, I'm not a kid.

I remember in 2004, that's how long it was.

Okay, since 2004 is now 22 years ago, it makes me feel like a kid.

But seeing Nigel Terry in Troy as the advisor to the king and the suits here and I'm like,

that's Arthur from Excalibur.

Instantly identifiable.

Nigel Terry has since passed rest in peace, he is a great king Arthur, able to play him

as a child.

He was in his 30s when he shot this.

But if you ever, and if you haven't seen Excalibur and after you see this, now that

we're 16 minutes into me praising it and I hope you see it, you'll see what an incredible

piece of art is.

It is a work of art from the opening frame to the closing frame and again, the costuming,

the imagery, the set design, the armor, the weapons, the mood, the lighting.

There is a green light and you'll see in the makings of where they have the giant green

lights blasting onto the set which ricochets and frames and lights, the armors and very

often Excalibur as it's seen in a special light in this kind of lemon, this lime green

light that shines so beautifully off all of the armored surfaces.

One of my favorite scenes is when Lancelot and Arthur meet and they battle in order for

Arthur's men to cross the bridge and Arthur indulges in some pride.

There's a sequence where I'll just say Excalibur, the actual sword is compromised and I

told my wife, that's probably my favorite scene in the entire movie, but it is hard to

pick just one.

It is such a, I keep using the word visceral, but you feel it.

And blood splatters on their beautiful armor and let me tell you something.

The armor looks like they're all from the future, they look like they are futuristic

space nights.

I mean, all that's missing is ROM's mask or helmet and they literally are King Arthur

and his space nights, which I love the fact that John Warman went on record saying I

didn't want you to know when or where this took place, what time, period.

I mean, it always reminded me as a kid, nine years old sitting in the theater watching

Star Wars and the scroll a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away and you're like, that

guy looks like he's a biblical prophet, Obi-Wan looks like he's Elijah or Moses and Luke

Skywalker looks, you know, a little medieval and then there's Han Solo with his cowboy

western gear along with the, you know, stormtroopers futuristic armor.

I mean, it was this, I loved how it juxtaposed many different eastern western influences,

but it was supposed to take place in outer space and then a long, long time ago, maybe,

maybe before Earth, okay, and Battlestar Galactica later on television would play with that same

idea.

So the idea that the Excalibur is timeless is very much part of the execution of this

movie, but these characters, and again, because of Star Wars and the idea of a master in

apprentice with Arthur and with Merlin and then with Morgana, just I think that the culture

had been set up to receive this in the best possible way.

There is a movie called First Night with Sean Connery and I'll tell you why I'm bringing

that up.

I absolutely can't stand it.

It's, I just, as far as King Arthur's movies go, it's one of my least favorite, Richard

Gear is Lancelot and it's just all, I feel like poorly executed, poorly illustrated, but

it speaks to the fact that, you know, Hollywood still wanted to make the King Arthur tales.

The Anton Fuqua, I believe, is the director, the Jerry Bruckenheimer King Arthur in 2004

when they were just, you know, Bruckheimer was just having so much success with the Pirates

of the Caribbean and look, I love Clive Owen as much as the next guy and I loved that they

wanted to make it more realistic, gritty, grounded in their, you know, Roman background.

Just, just had so many more hypes here and nightly, you know, it's more of a warrior,

guinevere, all of those were definitely points of interest on the movie posters, but

when I saw it, again, what am I comparing it to and comparing it to Excalibur, which

is just this incredible movie.

Helen Mirren talks in her interviews, how like there's no special effects in the movie.

It's all practical and there are no dragons.

There's just, there's talk of dragons breath, which comes out of, you know, multiple smoke

machines, but Excalibur was not without its challenges for Bourbon to shoot and whether

it was the weather or the, you know, when he would talk about one hour, they'd, a day

they'd get to shoot this stuff.

It's just amazing that it got made, it got finished, and it looks and feels as great

as it does.

Most guys, my age, dig this movie for a reason, like I said in the end with Mojrid and Bourbon

pulling influences from his other movies, like Zardo's with Sean Connery.

There's definitely costuming kind of shared space just as with any artist, you know, I'm

going to carry influences from one job to the other.

People always tell me, you know, shaft from Young Buddha and Shatterstark could be siblings.

That's right.

I purposely utilized costuming pieces on both of them that I felt were specific to kind

of my bag of costuming and, and, and armoring and, and uniforms that I was doing that set

me apart from everybody.

Bourbon has those same instincts as does Lucas has just so many, as does Ridley Scott.

And it's just, it's just incredible, looking movie at the end on a very tight budget where

you can't pull the camera out.

There isn't a giant crowd, but Lancelot returns, and if you've never seen it, I don't

want to spoil that for you.

He looks dramatically different, Lancelot via almost a Wolverine-esque air about him.

Old man Lancelot is my favorite version of Lancelot, and I love the earlier versions

in his sleek, almost white silver Space Knight armor, but Mojrid, Arthur's bastard son.

His golden armor very much recalls, like I said, some of the influence from Zardos.

And now, when you watch Zardos, if you, if you see it, you probably seen images with

Sean Connery in a weird, kind of, you know, one piece, kind of man-kini, it's a weird

movie.

It's got some great sci-fi elements in the opening ten minutes, and then you're in for

a different sort of drama before the very end, but that being said, Bourbon brings his

very best to this version.

The Bob Peak Illustrated, the Bob Peak Illustrated movie poster is one for the ages.

Let me see if I can, Bob Peak was doing Apocalypse Now, and then of course, he did this incredible

rendition of Excalibur that I'm holding up right now.

This is the, he had such a very definitive way of illustrating that that's Mojrid right

there.

You see Merlin's face above, there's Camelot, Sparkling, even Camelot, the castle, they,

they used a very brutalist minimal design, they used brutalist architectural influences

to make sure that looked, Bourbon talks, you didn't want Camelot, was new, it was fresh,

it was just built, he didn't want ornate things hanging on the walls, he wanted a very

sleek, very space age looking.

This is, I believe, the success of Excalibur, why not a blockbuster, it was the number

18th movie for the year in 1981, it was an R-rated movie, a hard art, nudity it as, you

know, multiple kind of brother and sister romance, I mean, it's got incest for a movie that

is as heavy and, and very nontraditional as it is, powered by people who you were seeing

for the first time, like Liam Mason and Helen Mirren, side note, John Bourbon had wanted

to get Sean Connery or someone of, of note to, to play Merlin or be in the movie of the

budget was restrictive to, to the, to the fact that his own son is the youngest version

of Mojrid, a creepy version of Mojrid in, in, in, in the forests, taunting Percival.

In 1982, it felt like a de facto sequel arrives and here's where I feel terrible that I've

never shared this with you before. On the episode where I named the four greatest comic books

ever illustrated and, and I shared with you these ornate works by Neil Adams and Barry

Winger Smith and Michael Golden. Today we're going to introduce, and, and, and this is what

you can take this to the bank. And if there are any doubts about the art that I'm going to

share with you, pick your favorite artist and sit down next to them and they're going

to tell you that, oh, no, no, this guy is one of the tops of the tops. This was his first

extended, longest work, his first big American job. He's an artist named Brian Bowland

and without him, there is no Camelot 3000. This is my 1988 trade paperback always on the

shelf, always excited to go through with it. I'm going to, I'm going to, I'm holding up the

1988. There have been other printings, but this is the 1988 printing. In 1982, Camelot 3000

is launched. It is a direct market, only comic book. You can't get it at 711 at the liquor

store. The grocery store, all the different outlets that I had been exposed to as a kid.

It was part of DC, along with Marvel's Goodwill Attempts to build up the direct market

to tell stores, we've got stuff just for you. And we're bringing some of the very best.

And in this instance, everybody at the time knew that Brian Bowland from Judge Dread,

from his 2000 AD British magazines that were being imported, imported over here into

comic magazines from his Wonder Woman covers, his Greenland and Greenland and Core covers,

his Justice League covers with Starrow covering their faces. This is the stuff that was coming

out in the late 70s, early 80s from the pen of Brian Bowland, who has seen as one of the

most commercial, most immaculate line artists, the structure, very much photo, photo realistic,

very difficult to pull off to imitate, always in awe, no matter what he drew a profile

of Judge Dread's face, the stubble, the intricate details on the helmet, the lips, to again,

these Justice League covers, Greenland and the Greenland and Core covers of the entire Greenland

accord, you know, swarving that they're all flying in this curve around a planet. I mean,

he was an artist's artist, and the fact that he was going to do a monthly book, Camelot

3000 with Mike W. Bar, Mark W. Bar is a sweet guy. I always talk about all different people

I saw in the convention circuit. I was a kid, Mara Fulfman towards Perez, Dave Cochrom,

Paul Smith or Adams. Well, Mike W. Bar was one of those guys who was always on the scene,

and I was a big fan of everything that he had written. He went on to write a book called

Batman and the outsiders, and I had discussions with him about making a fan club, about Mike, about

Batman and the outsiders, and I had some conversations with him at conventions. It was right

before I broke in. I couldn't kind of bring it to life, couldn't give it the effort that I wanted,

but I was a huge fan of all of his work that he had done on Batman and the outsiders, whether

it was with Jim Aparo or with Alan Davis, those issues are incredible, by the way. And so I was

I had met Mike, always generous, always kind. If memory serves, he did Batman year two with

Todd McFarlane, you enjoyed that from him. He did that along with Todd. Very prolific for DC.

DC was where he did most of his work. That's where I enjoyed most of him. I believe Mike is 73

years old as of this time. And for me, Camelot 3000 was the greatest of all of his achievements.

Apparently he wrote this as a proposal in the 70s and gave it to DC. They rejected it. He took

to Marvel. Marvel said it will serialize it in one of our Black and White magazines. This is the

story that he tells in the forward of the Camelot book. And then eventually DC came back to him and

said we would like to do this. And they secured the services of Brian Bolin. Now this sequence

right here is a shot of a character who is going to be important. But look at that art. I'm holding

up. This is when there is a transformation, the government in the future is transforming people

into worker bots named Neo humans, Neo men and EO dash men. And they all look like this cat right

here. These kind of their mindless broots that can they're stronger that can do slave labor.

The backdrop of Camelot 3000 is that we have been invaded by a giant alien horde that is

ravaging, earth. And we as humanity are on the losing end of it.

But Arthur is answering a prophecy that if London was ever threatened, if England was ever to

come under threat again, he would rise. He would he would be resurrected. And I'm going to show you

the scene where the kid wanders into the tomb. And Arthur is fulfilling that. So it is set in

the near future. There are like space bases like this one outer space bases. One of the places

that the new knights are gathered at is Lancelot. In this time, oh my gosh, look it, look it,

look at Arthur retrieving Excalibur Brian Bowland. So this is one of if not the best illustrated

12 issues you're going to find anywhere. Any one of these issues would jockey onto the top five,

top six best illustrated comic books of all time. Ask Todd McFarlane, ask Jim Lee, ask

Marshall Vestry, ask anyone working in comics, ask the Cubards. And they will go, oh my gosh, Brian

Bowland. Brian Bowland is better known for his one issue of the killing joke, the seminal issue with

Alan Moore defining a very key conflict with with Joker and Batman. He is better known than that

than he is for the entirety of this. And this book took three years to put out because of the

delays. This is a scene that could have been right out of Excalibur, which is again why the lady of the

lake, that exact hand that sword looks like a frame from John Bournemont's Excalibur. If you

watch it, you'll see very much the same. I believe Excalibur helped fast track this in the halls

of DC Comics. Look at these faces. I'm holding up pages from issue one. Look at the immaculate

line work, the detail. There is no angle that Brian Bowland will not draw from. He is a fearless

master of the craft. There is nothing he doesn't draw better than everyone else all the time.

Here is where in the tomb, as the aliens are pursuing our young hero, our young hero,

nox open sarcophagus that is holding. Here comes King Arthur. Now, I'm not crazy about the design

of this King Arthur. A little bit Prince Valiene, very much colorful. But it works. And when it comes

to portraying Lancelot, this is the Lancelot from Excalibur. That is almost identical, slight

futuristic tweaks to bring the John Bournemont armor straight into the comic books.

The key is once Arthur is awakened, the knights have been reincarnated. Many of them, the knights

of the realm, K, Gwayne, Percival, they have all been reincarnated in different bodies. One of them

is the Neo Man that I told you. I believe that's personal. One of the most interesting, and then

this is why it's so forward thinking. But I mean, look at this art. Guys, you're going to want to

look at this just for the art alone. You're like, life felt, why didn't you tell us this for five

and a half years? I have been working up to this for quite some time. It is the recent 4K Excalibur

release that really pushed me over the edge. And so I got to combine these. I got to do John

Bournemont Excalibur because that's an 81 release. And this is an 82 release. I believe you can

draw a straight line to one having, you know, been the rocket fuel that launches the other.

Every comic book artist I've ever met loves Excalibur. And especially the guys at the time,

the Jerry Horde was the Mike X. Guys who will tell you that they were influenced by Brian Bowling.

Look at that Merlin face. Look at that ridiculous. This is some of the most beautiful

lines you have ever seen put on paper. It's not Batman. It's not Superman. It's our

Thurian legend told in the far flung future as we are getting our ass kicked by an alien Horde.

The humanity believes it's the end of the world. We are being attacked. The skies are full of

alien crafts that are attacking England. There's Big Ben. This is how this all begins.

Once Arthur has fulfilled this prophecy of rising again because London and England has been

threatened that he is Arthur Pendragon, King of Britain, Lord of the Roman Empire. And he's like,

hey, this is an avalan. Mike Bart says in his notes that he did so much research into King Arthur

and that there's really no definitive, there's really no definitive accounting for what happened

to King Arthur. He was killed in a civil war. He said there's a lot of contradictions. So he

took all of the notes and all of the references. Excalibur is very much based off Lamortade,

the Arthur, which is a book that Bournemon really relied on. But he still managed to bring his

own Bournemonisms into Excalibur. But here Mike W. Bart talks about all of the different

historical research that he brought to bear in bringing, he writes here, he says, even less

is known about the historical death of King Arthur. One source claims Arthur died in a civil war,

which broke out among the restless Britons after the defeat of the Saxons. The quest for the

camelot is equally as fascinating and as frustrating. In the 1960s, historians began looking for

the site, which for which Arthur would have conducted his campaign and perhaps found it

in a site called Cadbury Castle in a southern England or fortifications were discovered and

dated back to some time after AD 470, the period of Arthur. Despite this dearth of facts,

or perhaps because of them, the character of King Arthur really sees the popular imagination

was quickly established, embellished, with friends, foes, and all manner of spectacular deeds

as have been all popular heroes from Paul Bunyan towards Washington. So this is Mike W.

Bart throwing his imagination into the hat. And after Merlin has reunited with Arthur,

and then they go to this factory where it is here that Merlin realizes it's below in these factory

waters that we're going to find the sword of power and of course then Excalibur is restored.

The knights, the spirit of the knights, their souls have been reborn across the landscape

as has Morgana Lafay. And Gwynnevere is an action hero, freedom fighter battling against,

this is Morgana Lafay, but Gwynnevere has been discovered by Arthur and

Joan Acton is reincarnated. Joan Acton right here is reincarnated and she is Arthur's Gwynnevere.

And so for the first four issues of Camelot 3000, it's a 12 issue maxi series. It was the first

maxi series just like on, you know, there's, I think Rich Man, poor man is the first,

or maybe it's roots is the first mini series. Then there's, then there's extended mini series.

They came on television. This is comic book's first maxi series, extended year-long again,

launch in 82, wrapped up in 85 because the schedule really got so much for Brian Bowen and the

intricacy of the art. It never waivers. There's never an issue in here that looks as if it doesn't

hold up to the previous issues. Incredible detail here again. Gwynnevere will find love in the

arms of Lancelot again. All of the old kind of tropes from Camelot play out, but I'm going to show

you guys one of the most interesting part is the Knight of Tristan is very much still a male,

a man, and yet he is born again in a female's body. This is the spirit of Tristan. The male Tristan

is the reflection mirror. The female is the body with which he is reincarnated in. And this is

so ahead of its time. And as a young little Christian boy, I knew this was naughty stuff, and I

ate it up. This is Tristan realizing that his very masculine soul and spirit is now in this

beautiful female form. And it is something that he wrestles with and struggles with, and eventually

he will find love with another woman. So there are very much subjects that were considered taboo

prior to this. And today would definitely be seen as woke, but we're exciting and a little taboo.

And you're like, wait, so Tristan, one of the most badass of all the knights has been reincarnated.

You guys is Brian Bowen-Cooking. Here's the double-pager with all the reincarnated knights.

K, Gwain, Percival, Lancelot, Tristan, all storming the scene alongside King Arthur. And

here, when Tristan takes Per his form as a warrior knight to serve alongside this reincarnation,

this new battle, Arthur says, I thank you, Lady Tristan. He says, Sir Tristan, Sir Tristan,

if you please. He's like not ready to be identified as a female. He still believes he is a man

inside this female form. Again, this is 1982. It is so ridiculously ahead of its time,

but Galahad is reborn as a samurai. So we've got all manner of race. You've got, I think,

is that K. You've got Gwain. You've got K. All of them reincarnated. We've got all manner of race

and even gender represented as the knights come together to battle the alien invasion.

Brian Bowland never wants, look at all of them jumping out of a spaceship. So once the knights are

gathered, they are going to take on the alien horde that is oppressed and conquered Earth

and of course, and there are only four basic leaders of the world left. And they're all

kind of corporate. It'd be like we were left in the hands of Elon Musk, Steve Jobs,

you know, Bezos. There are four leaders left on Earth and they are bending to the will of the

aliens because they're cowards. Arthur and the knights of the realm in the course of Kamalat 3000

rally to save us. Okay, in this incredibly exciting tale, which has romance, which has reincarnation.

I mean, look again, this is very much the vision of Lancelot straight off the page with this

very specific style of armor that he is portraying. Oh my gosh, this is the alien mother.

So you can see this is one of the, before we meet the alien mother herself in aliens plural

with James Cameron, they were cooking this up in 84. We didn't care about the wait. The first few

USU's came out very much on time Bruce Patterson, the original anchor left the book and he was later

replaced by Terry Austin. Brian Bowen was so concerned because this is the first time he had

ever done a work that he wasn't going to ink himself and because of the schedule someone else had

to Bruce Patterson, an LA native, great anchor and George Perez on Wonder Woman. I would sit next

to him as a kid. I actually paid him to ink some of my pages. So in my figure work, I loved it. Once

I realized that Joe Rubinstein and Bruce Patterson and these anchors were coming out and part of the

thing that they would, they would ink anything you gave them for a fee. And so I would start bringing

my pencils for them to ink so that I could learn what it would be like to have a professional

anchor do my 16-year-old, 17-year-old, 15-year-old pencils because that was the age that I was submitting

them. Bruce Patterson said he had to quit this job because it was costing him time and money. It was

taking him days to properly ink a Brian Bowen page. And we've talked about this, that there were

anchors and Will Sputascio talked about it and the interview that I did with him, there were

anchors that didn't want to ink art items for the same reason because they felt they were losing

money and they needed to pay the rent and to do that, they needed to do six pages a day doing

three, I mean six pages a week and doing the three pages a week was costing them money. Terry Austin

comes on and these are Terry's inks that you see over Brian Bowen in the latter in the latter

chapters to help get it over the finish line. So you're getting like I mean you guys look at this art

and you're like life of why why it wasn't time to talk about Camelot 3000 yet but today it is

and you're gonna you're gonna get this I don't have the singles all I have is my delicious

collected edition my my my my trade paperback. Bruce Patterson did an amazing job. He is a

tremendous anchor and to ink the the pencils of Brian Bowen and Brian Bowen considered having

the bookshot from his pencils. There are indeed two pages in issue two. I'll let you find those.

There are two pages that they tested. Look at this tremendous line work on Lancelot. Look at

these tremendous lines. Brian Bowen is one of the greatest like a Michael Golden like a Barry

Windsor Smith like a Neil Adams level but like all of them and why why are each of them one of the

greatest comic jobs ever drawn and why is this the greatest 12 issue series ever illustrated.

No one's gonna argue with that. No one is gonna bring up their artist and successfully convince

anyone that any run on Spider-Man X-Men Superman Batman is superior to this. It's not it won't be

it can't be. This is way too well illustrated drawn. I am skipping that there's hundreds of pages

in here and I'm skipping over them but good lord almighty. Look at these lines. Look at these

he's clearly got a base of a photo reference that that I think goes above and beyond what we get

from somebody like Alex Ross. And this is the guy that started it. Neil Adams would lavish.

Oh all right so I mean just look at this this dude grappling with grabbing Excalibur. Look at this

closeup on on King Arthur. Just buy the book for the Art Alone. Just watch Excalibur with

sound off for the visuals alone. I could not be more excited to share this with you guys and I'm

sorry that I didn't bring it to you earlier than I then I did here. But here's another one. I mean

bone you can still see bones incredible style. This is issel issel. I sold the the she becomes the

lover of the female Tristan in here. I mean we got very very forward thinking themes might

W bar weaves this incredible tale of romance of treachery of adventure of sci-fi of fantasy of

legend of lore. It is gripping again. Having Morgana Lafay reemerge alongside Mojard who still wants

to screw his dad over his bastard father. Everybody has been re I mean just reincarnated look at that

incredible panel of Morgana Lafay and that's her son Mojard and his again the armor and Excalibur's

golden. I believe Brian Bolland you know really enjoyed Excalibur and was probably looking to

incorporate those elements himself. But yeah having Terry Austin no less you know arrive. I mean

you guys look at the intricacies of these lines. I'm going to show this. Look at this. Brian Bolland

I mean the hair that the attractive characters the the monsters the tentacles. Oh damn oh look at

that shot of Lancelot right there. Look at that look so the prophets claim the king Arthur and his

knights of the round table would rise once more to defend England during its time of great peril.

However the prophets never foresaw foresaw an alien invasion or the strange forms the reborn

knights would take. That is the quick pitch that is the meat on the bone that is Camelot 3000.

I spent most of the 80s not understanding why this wasn't optioned and filmed and made into a big

blockbuster motion picture because it literally takes Excalibur and Star Wars and merges them.

You know again when Lancelot is reborn he is industrialist he is a guy of means

so that they relocate and have their personal is a mute neo man okay so he's a bit of a beast

a bit of a monster but but you know that they all have different personalities.

This is uh I mean look at this look at this look at the beauty of these faces and figures sweeping

sci-fi fantasy epic Camelot 3000. It's not too late James Gunn green light it from John

Bournemon and the incredible work that he took and the vision I mean the vision to have

Liam Neeson be going and Helen more Helen Mirren be more gone and they're and if you go deep

deep dive into this the actor Nicole Williamson who played Merlin and Helen Mirren had bad

bad blood from a stage production they had done together and everyone told them don't cast

them opposite each other as Merlin and Morgana but uh John Bournemon felt like it would be perfect

given their natural dislike for each other they would play off each other spectacularly which

they did uh John Bournemon hope and glory is a more personal film for him equally as brilliant he

continued to make movies into the 2000s but but his I'd say from deliverance to to to hope and glory

and Excalibur right there in the middle is the brilliance of of his of his filmography and and a man

who I mean he talked about people on the set having nervous breakdowns and he said in his interview

in his late age he said even though he was you know filming down the river uh in uh

in deliverance or uh the constraints the studio put on him on his first major motion picture with uh

with Lee Marvin he said that uh far and away he believed that the the wrangling of the horses the

knights uh the armor again the armor the the places in Ireland that they that they filmed this these

lush green uh you know ravines the beaches the cliffs uh just just the wilderness the forests the

poppies uh oh my gosh there is so much beauty and when you put these aren't these these uh these

professional knight armors they they hired a real armor who jokes and his interviews he was

hired to do seven armors then then he was said to expect to do 14 he ended up doing over a hundred

I believe 110 armors he made for Excalibur and you can see in some of the battles when the blood

splirts out on the armor and stains it in the wounds that they that they take on in the grit in the

in the dirt when when Arthur is first trying to prove himself to the other knights to get them to

to follow the boy who pulled the sword from the stone that is a real moat that they are following

into a real river that that that is positioned to be the note at a real castle that they were able to

secure and film it um just an amazing piece of visual art but the story of King Arthur has never

been more inspiring more involving there is tremendous again betrayal romance adventure action

magic in Excalibur and it carries over into what I believe came out one year later

these two and every little fanboys mind were were in twenth Excalibur and Camelot 3000

and while I don't know that the temperature is the same for this nowadays maybe as it would have

been in the late 80s really 90s uh I gotta tell you a long term miniseries uh along the lines of

of what Ronald Ronald Moore does with Battlestar Galatica or for all mankind uh maybe not dressed up

in the crown and the red chain mail and the yellow but but but something that looked a little more like

John Bormons uh vision you know what my wife loved how Nicole Williamson Nicole Williamson looked in

in Excalibur because that Merlin wasn't traditional which this Merlin is very traditional with the

long beard uh favoring the the disneyification the disneyification of of of Merlin uh and and

in Excalibur with his steel helmet I mean this is kind of the way Merlin has always been portrayed

you know the cap the beard the long white beard mustache and in Excalibur Merlin looks a little

little sci-fi with with with the silver cap and the jewel and what a performance but uh now once

in future you're gonna say but Rob what about once in future I bought every issue I buy everything

Arthur to check it out once in future Dan Moira uh came out several years ago I bought it

silencing because it was King Arthur but if you believe for one minute that that work is equivalent

to this it's just like none of the other King Arthur movies first night is not this King Arthur

is not this the 2017 that the the the Jude Law King Arthur which I love the Guy Ritchie I enjoyed it

not this okay not this enjoyed it but nowhere near close to being this I love all the comic book

versions of Excalibur of the sort of power you know uh but nothing nothing comes close you'll want

to read the story because it's great but you're going to pour over over every frame whether it's

the two pages that you can find that were shot from Brian Bowen's pencils I could show you I'm

choosing not to I I believe you're gonna buy this you're gonna go back you're gonna you're gonna

get those back issues you're gonna enjoy this or the Bruce Patterson these are the morons that

run earth by the way these are the figureheads or the Terry Austin inks at the end and I don't

want to spoil the ending because it ends on a really great kind of hopeful uh uh place um but man

let's just say Terry Austin was was made uh both Ian Bruce Patterson were were made to ink

the beautiful line art kudos to Brian Bowen because because in the words of Jeff Lowe who cares how

late it is it'll all be collected one day and you won't remember and that's the truth we won't

remember that there was nine months between the last chapters of hush two we'll just remember that

there's six of them collected just like dark night did just like watchman just like camel out

three thousand there was like a two year wait for the last two issues of this that's why it's

launched in eighty two if it came out every month it would be completed by eighty three it didn't

complete till eighty five and nobody cared because we loved it we wanted it we consumed it we

celebrated it just like we did here today you guys camel out three thousand might W bar genius

concept genius ideas the reincarnation of the the night's souls in the future to to to collect the

nights of the realm again and stave off the alien invasion the most immaculate brilliant beautiful

best drawn twelve issues you're ever going to have collected yes above Michael golden micronauts

okay a step above that's how good this stuff is not traditional not superheroes not toys but just

an incredible new vision of this lore and then do yourself a favor get if you can't get the 4k

get whatever blu ray go on get it on amazon get it on apple you will have a blast it is tight it is

two hours whether it's landslot or the incredible merlin helen miren is morgana you're going to

enjoy lea meeson good luck finding already said his name syrian hinds look so different um gabriel

burn so ridiculously rebelliously macho you're going to dig it um the the wife that gabriel burn

e grain that is john warman's daughter in case you didn't know that till today that's his dark the

whole movie is a family affair like i said young youngest mojard is is his son and yet the voice

is his daughter giving a female voice because in adr he chose to lean all the way in with his

putting his daughter's voice on his son's performance grab it excalibur camel out three thousand

you can't go wrong those are robs recommends uh get on it as fast as you possibly can you will

thank me in the end great art great visuals you will absolutely dig it and there you have it we had a

great day hanging in camel and uh really excited that i was able to finally share the john

bourman love the might w bar love the brian bolan love and hope you guys get to check it out real soon

thank you as always uh for listening this was the one for me you're like oh do we really just

hear him talk about king arthur and ex-calibur for an hour you did and you loved it and you're

gonna and you're gonna get that book and you're gonna pass along along to someone else

when a book that looks as good as camel out three thousand that came out 40 plus years ago

and nothing else looks as good nothing on the market today has looked this good since

again you know and better from killing joke with alan more because of batman because of joker being

these bright shining stars and that that work has only become more important and uh more celebrated

but king arthur is so much more work uh i think a bigger leap in terms of storytelling and in

concepts and so get that out there enjoy that thank you for hanging with me uh if you haven't been

on my live streams get what not download the app follow rob life you'll be alert when i go live

we've got always got new exclusives uh the fact that that that i'm now playing so heavily in the realm

of crater owned is i can give you a diamond crusted cover if i wanted to a steel cover we've done some

of those steel covers glow in the dark covers acetate covers all of them it's on the table uh we do

special editions we do exclusive editions we do enhanced editions that i offer on my live

mostly on what not follow rob life you'll be alert when i go live and lately we've done we've

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watch how i fell for it once again uh instagram rob lifeheld rob li if li f e f e l d rob lifeheld blue

check that's me uh love checking in with you thanks for watching our skits and our interviews and our

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the store i just thank you so much for being a part of the show for supporting the show sometimes

we just dig down and do the really niche stuff like we did today but all i did was promote some great

quality work by artists who may not have their name said as much as they should quite quite frankly

with with the incredible contributions that they've given to the art form so that's what we did

i sure hope you're doing good i hope that your month your your your your your mental emotional

your physical and your spiritual well-being are exactly where you need it to be i mean it

i evaluate myself again every day i wake up i try and really take great pleasure i'm i'm a glass

half full guy the green grass man that looks beautiful the tree all the tree looks beautiful the sky

looks beautiful my family i'm so thankful i try and be a very thankful person uh thankful for the

career that i've been uh given for the friendships i have for the relationships for the great people

i've met that i get to work alongside and uh and that's not to say that that that it it isn't uh

you know a grind that that the work is is burdensome and there are times i just my family will tell

you i just blurred out i'm so tired okay and i'm sure you are too but uh do whatever you got

to recharge go see that movie go out to dinner go to the diner meet your friends for coffee

spend time interact with other people it is such uh to me the tonic that that that that will lift

you up that will redirect your spirits and your energy we are always rooting for you here guys

have a great meal uh you you know all the categories is it Chinese tonight is it Japanese is it

noodles is it sushi is it tacos are we having a hamburger are we grilling up dogs okay some brats

okay i don't know whatever it takes the Reese's big cup diet uh is once a day for me keeps the doctors

away how that works i haven't figured it out yet myself either but it's working so far it's

working so far you guys i am wishing you all the best to boom boom fist bumps into this blue yet

he might go and straight to you be well do well do not leave me behind there i'll be right there

under that shade of that tree pick me up we will most definitely we will inevitably we will

absolutely talk again real soon