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Quest for Camelot · This Film is Lit

• 0:04
  Speaker A: This Film Is lit, the podcast where we finally settle the score on one simple Is the book really better than the movie? I'm Brian and I have a film degree, so I watch the movie but don't read the book.
• 0:15
  Speaker B: And I'm Katie, I have an English degree, so I do things the right way and read the book before we watch the movie.
• 0:22
  Speaker A: So prepare to be wowed by our expertise and charm as we dissect all of your favorite film adaptations and decide if the silver screen the or the written word did it better. So turn it up, settle in and get ready for spoilers because this film is lit. You may kill me, but you'll never destroy the ideals of Camelot. It's Quest for Camelot and this film is lit. Hello and welcome back to this Film Is lit, the podcast where we talk about movies that are based on books. We have every single one of our segments, so we'll jump right in. If you have not read or watched. We're gonna give you a brief summary of the film in Let me sum up. Let me spay. No, there is too much. Let me sum up. This is a summary of the film sourced from Wikipedia. Ser Lionel, a Knight of the Round Table, is killed, foiling an assassination attempt on King Arthur by the evil Ser Ruber, who is then driven off by Excalibur, Arthur's sword. During Lionel's funeral, Arthur informs Lionel's widow, Lady Juliana, and his daughter Kaylie that Camelot is always open to them. Kaylie dreams of becoming a knight like her father, and she trains herself while working on the farm. A decade later, Ruber's griffin attacks Camelot and steals Excalibur, leaving Arthur injured. Merlin, the wizard's pet falcon, Aidan, attacks the griffin, causing it to drop the sword into the Forbidden Forest. When Kaylie learns what has occurred, she plans to search for Excalibur, but gets into an argument with her mother, who fears for her life. Ruber attacks the farm and abducts Kaylie and Julianna with intent of using them to gain access to Camelot. He uses a potion he acquired from witches to fuse his henchmen and a henpecked rooster named Blade Beak with their weapons. River becomes angry when he learns Excalibur is lost in the Forbidden Forest. Overhearing this, Kaeli escapes into the forest, pursued by the Steel Men and Blade Beak. She is saved by a blind hermit, Garrett and Aidan. After learning of the theft, Garrett plans to find Excalibur with Aidan and Kaylie and persuades Garrett to let her join the quest Meanwhile, Ruber learns of this from Blade Beak and decides to follow him to obtain Excalibur. Kaylie and Garrett encounter a wisecracking two headed dragon, Devon and Cornwall. The two dislike each other and dream of being separated. Due to their disagreement, they cannot fly or fire brief fire. After helping them evade from a group of attacking dragons who are taken out by Ruber and his henchmen, Devon and Cornwall join their quest during a night of rest, much to Kaylie's reluctance. Garrett reveals he was once a stable boy in Camelot who dreamt of becoming a knight. While saving horses from a fire, he was kicked in the head which caused his blindness. Following the accident, Lionel still believed in Garrett and trained him personally. Garrett teaches Kaylie more about the forest, including the existence of magical healing plants. The next day, after only finding Excalibur's belt in a giant footprint, Kaylie's frustrated ranting unintentionally distracts Garrett from hearing Aidan's warning, causing him to get injured by Ruber's men. Kaylie saves him by using the sentient trees to trap Ruber and his men. She escorts Garrett to a remote cave where she uses a healing plant to heal his wounds. They reconcile and profess their love for each other. Discovering the scabbard, the group enter a giant cave where a rock like Ogre holds Excalibur, using it as a toothpick. They recover Excalibur and manage to evade Ruber after reaching the end of the Forest. After reaching the end of the forest, Garrett gives Excalibur to Kaylie and returns to the forest claiming he does not belong. In Cavalot, however, Ruber captures Kaylie and takes Excalibur. He melds it to his right arm with his potion before imprisoning Kaylie. In the wagon with Juliana, Devin and Cornwall witness this and inform Garrett who decides to go and rescue Kaylie by collaborating for the first time. Devon and Cornwall are able to fly and breathe fire and they fly Garrett to Camelot. Meanwhile, Blade Beak reconciles with his constantly henpecking hen and frees Kaylie from her ropes. She warns the guards of Ruber's trap, exposing him and his steel men. Garrett, Devin and Cornwall arrive shortly to assist. While Devin and Cornwall save Aidan by breathing fire. At the Griffin, Kaylie and Garrett find Ruber attempting to kill Arthur. Inside the castle, they influence and trick Ruber into returning Excalibur back into its stone stone. Ruber is vaporized by the stone's magic, which reverts his henchmen, Blade Beak And Excalibur to their original forms, heals Arthur and temporarily separates Devin and Cornwall, who decide to be reunited later with Excalibur returned to Arthur, Kaylee and Garrett become Knights of the Round Table, and they ride off into the distance on their horse. There you go. That is a summary of the film. We do have a guess who this week. Let's do it. Who are you? No one of consequence. I must know.
• 5:08
  Speaker B: Get used to disappointment. An old man with a white beard, dressed in a long white robe with a white linen coif over his head. Not a pointed cowl like a monk's, but laid flat over his forehead, and on it a strange jewel. Round his neck hung a small crystal globe and in his hands a long carven staff.
• 5:31
  Speaker A: I mean, I gotta assume that this is Merlin.
• 5:34
  Speaker B: It is Murray.
• 5:35
  Speaker A: I don't even know who else that could possibly be. It's the most quintessential old wizard description I've ever seen.
• 5:42
  Speaker B: His hair, short, bristly and scabby, was jet black. His face was red, flushed, swollen and coarse. His teeth were decayed, and his breath was loathsome.
• 5:54
  Speaker A: This doesn't really track to anybody in the movie, but it's very much, very clearly the description of a villain, I would assume, based on his breath being described as loathsome. The villain in the movie has red hair because they're racist against gingers. But I'm going to assume that this is Ruber or the Ruber equivalent.
• 6:17
  Speaker B: Yeah, it is.
• 6:19
  Speaker A: Yeah. They didn't mention his fucked up fingernails. That's maybe his most defining feature in the movie.
• 6:25
  Speaker B: Maybe the most upsetting thing about him.
• 6:27
  Speaker A: His fingernails are like something really messed up going on there.
• 6:34
  Speaker B: She was wearing leather breeches and doublet, but over them was a coat of rich black velvet trim in the waist and spreading in the skirts. Her long black hair hung loose over her shoulders, whether under the leather cap or the hennin. Anyone with eyes to see could have perceived a strange, intense kind of beauty in her ivory brown face. The clear skin warmed with sunburning and. And in her deep set brown eyes. And there wasn't a good way to work this in. But I also want to mention that she carries a falcon on her arm because I feel like it really completes the badass image here.
• 7:10
  Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, I got to assume that this is whatever our main character's name is. Kaylee.
• 7:19
  Speaker B: That's your guess?
• 7:20
  Speaker A: I.
• 7:22
  Speaker B: Yes, it is Kaylee equivalent. Whose name is Lynette.
• 7:27
  Speaker A: Okay.
• 7:27
  Speaker B: In the book.
• 7:28
  Speaker A: Yeah. I mean, she's clearly like. I don't Know who else it would even be in the movie? It's the only woman character who's not.
• 7:35
  Speaker B: That's true.
• 7:36
  Speaker A: An old lady. I guess her mom's not an old.
• 7:38
  Speaker B: Lady, but she's older, I guess. A tall young man, finely proportioned, but with a strange pale skin.
• 7:48
  Speaker A: Quick question.
• 7:49
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 7:52
  Speaker A: What does ivory brown face mean?
• 7:56
  Speaker B: I don't know.
• 7:58
  Speaker A: I don't know if you. I was. Because I was like, oh, is she not supposed to be white? And then.
• 8:02
  Speaker B: No, I think she's supposed to be like, she's. She. So she's frequently described this way, but some, like earlier in the book, she's described as kind of like pale and sallow. So I think that her getting like a little bit of color in her face is meant to indicate to us that she's like on a better track.
• 8:27
  Speaker A: Okay, interesting. I'm just very confused by the description of her ivory brown face.
• 8:34
  Speaker B: You know, it's not the language I would have went with, but I think she's just supposed to be like a white girl who gets a little color in her skin.
• 8:42
  Speaker A: She has black hair. The beauty of her ivory brown face, the clear skin warmed with sunburning and her deep set brown eyes. Unless the ivory brown face is related to her eyes being brown. Yeah, that's. We. I don't know. That's just a strange description because obviously ivory is white, right? Or it's like an off white. It's like a, you know, like a. Yeah, but I've never heard ivory brown used to describe a skin color before.
• 9:07
  Speaker B: Nor I.
• 9:08
  Speaker A: Very interesting. Anyway, sorry.
• 9:10
  Speaker B: Okay, last one. A tall young man, finely proportioned, but. But with a strange pale skin and mane of ash colored hair. He was naked except for a leather loincloth, which he seemed to wear more as a shield than a garment. As he turned from the fire, she saw his face and it was as beautiful a face as she had ever seen.
• 9:31
  Speaker A: Well, this doesn't track with anybody in the movie, but based on the woman in this being smitten by his. How beautiful he is, I have to assume that this is Garrett, or the equivalent of Garrett.
• 9:45
  Speaker B: Yeah. So Garrett is kind of an amalgamation of two characters, sort of. But I went with this description because it's funnier.
• 9:56
  Speaker A: Yeah, it's something I. Yeah, I guess we'll get into it, but I don't.
• 10:01
  Speaker B: We will. We will, in fact, get into it.
• 10:03
  Speaker A: He's just wearing a leather loincloth and nothing else, but. Yeah, we'll get to that. We'll get to it here very soon. Because I Have some questions to ask in the. Was that in the book?
• 10:13
  Speaker B: Gaston? May I have my book, please?
• 10:15
  Speaker A: How can you read this?
• 10:17
  Speaker B: There's no pictures. Well, some people use their imagination.
• 10:21
  Speaker A: So kind of the inciting incident for this whole story is that we start in several 10 years prior to when the majority of the story takes place. And we're introduced to Kaylie as, like, a young girl and her father, Sir Lionel, who is a knight of the Round Table with King Arthur. And he gets killed. And the reason he gets killed is that one of the other knights at the Round Table, Sir Ruber, hates King Arthur for some reason, which is never really explained, and he attempts to kill Arthur and steal the throne. And Lionel and some of the other knights go to stop him, but Lionel ends up getting killed in the process. And this is what kicks off Kaylie down the path to becoming a knight in, like, following in her father's footsteps. And I wanted to know if that inciting incident came from the book.
• 11:18
  Speaker B: So there is a character called Ser Ruber, the Red Knight in the book. However, he's kind of a minor villain and appears only in a flashback. And in this flashback, he does lay siege to Lynette's, AKA Kaylee's home after her father dies because he wants to marry her sister Leonie.
• 11:41
  Speaker A: Okay.
• 11:43
  Speaker B: There's a different evil knight character, Sir Bagdemagus.
• 11:48
  Speaker A: What a name.
• 11:48
  Speaker B: I know, right? That later in the book expresses some usurpative desires, but he never actually executes them.
• 11:58
  Speaker A: Okay, so Ruber and the assassination attempt, and that being the thing that spurs Kaylie to become. Wanting to become a knight. I guess I should ask even. Does Kaylie want to become a knight? Or Lynette or whatever she. Or, like, a warrior or whatever? I don't. You know, I don't.
• 12:20
  Speaker B: It's a little less direct in the book because in the movie, we're kind of doing that, like, very, like 90s girl power thing.
• 12:28
  Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, the Mulan.
• 12:28
  Speaker B: Yeah, like, yeah, we're doing Mulan. She. Well, it's even less direct in Mulan. Honestly. Here she's literally just like.
• 12:35
  Speaker A: I kind of, like, has to fill in.
• 12:38
  Speaker B: Yeah, she's like. But here she's like, I want to be a knight. That's what I want. And in the book, it's more like Lynette grows up as a tomboy and she's not really good at, like, doing the things that a proper lady is supposed to do. And she ends up, due to a series of circumstances, becoming basically a messenger for King Arthur.
• 13:03
  Speaker A: Okay. But it is not her goal. She's not aspiring.
• 13:07
  Speaker B: No, I would not say that that's really her goal at any point.
• 13:11
  Speaker A: Okay.
• 13:12
  Speaker B: Like, she doesn't want to be a fine lady and, like, sit around and do embroidery. But it's not like she's not. Like, she doesn't dream of becoming. Yeah. She's not like, I'm going to go be a Knight of the Round Table.
• 13:23
  Speaker A: Gotcha. Okay. So then we move forward 10 years. Lionel has been killed. Kaylie has been training to become a knight. And we are back at Camelot, and King Arthur's hanging out in his big. At the Round Table, and a griffin bursts through the glass ceiling and steals Excalibur from King Arthur and then accidentally drops it in a forest because a bird, falcon shows up and pesters him. And I wanted to know. And that's kind of our second inciting incident. The first one was our inciting incident for Kaylie's journey. This one is the actual inciting incident for the story that we are telling here. And I wanted to know if that came from the book, if that is what kicks off our grand quest. Is Sir Ruber using a griffin or some villain using a griffin to steal Excalibur or something like that. I know for our listeners. I know because we talked about in the prequel and stuff, that this is very, very loosely. Yeah. It's always tough with these because I always feel dumb asking questions that I pretty much know or not.
• 14:32
  Speaker B: Right. You know, the answer is going to.
• 14:33
  Speaker A: Be no to, like, all of these, but I still feel like I need to ask.
• 14:36
  Speaker B: But yes. And asking the question is what gives me the segue to talk about the differences.
• 14:42
  Speaker A: Right.
• 14:43
  Speaker B: So you're. The answer is no. None of that is from the book. There are actually no mythical creatures in the book.
• 14:49
  Speaker A: Oh, okay.
• 14:50
  Speaker B: There's not an evil forest. And I. I don't think Excalibur is ever mentioned.
• 14:54
  Speaker A: Yeah, we talked about in the prequel that originally the plan in the movie in the early drafts of the script was the quest was going to be trying to go and find the Holy Grail.
• 15:08
  Speaker B: Right.
• 15:08
  Speaker A: And then they changed that to Excalibur at some point. So even that, like, now I don't know if it's the Holy Grail in the book. My question would be the same as if a griffin burst through and stole the Holy Grail or whatever and took it away. But it. Anyway, sorry, continue.
• 15:21
  Speaker B: Yeah, so I. Honestly, the plot of the book is almost a little more. Episodic is not quite the right word than the movie. But.
• 15:36
  Speaker A: It'S not neatly in screenplay structure.
• 15:38
  Speaker B: It's not neatly in screenplay structure. So the first little chunk of the book is basically almost all flashbacks as we're learning Lynette's, like, backstory. And then we move into the period of time where she's working as King Arthur's messenger. And then we move into a period of time where she has met the Garrett equivalent character and is, like, hanging out with him, basically. And then close to the very end of the book, she. She does go on a quest to find the Holy Grail.
• 16:17
  Speaker A: Okay, but was it stolen by a griffin?
• 16:20
  Speaker B: No.
• 16:20
  Speaker A: Okay.
• 16:21
  Speaker B: It's just being the Grail, and it's hard to find.
• 16:24
  Speaker A: It's just. It's just missing. It's been missing.
• 16:26
  Speaker B: It's been missing. Famous. Nobody knows where it is.
• 16:29
  Speaker A: And. Yeah. Okay, so after he steals Excalibur, it disappears into the woods. I don't even know why this part is a little confusing. Why does he show up at. In the movie? He shows up at Kaylee's house.
• 16:44
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 16:45
  Speaker A: And kidnaps her and. Or is going to kidnap them or something.
• 16:51
  Speaker B: So he wants. He wants to use them to get into Camelot.
• 16:56
  Speaker A: Why?
• 16:57
  Speaker B: How so? After. After Kaylee's dad died, King Arthur says to the mom, he's like, you're. You and Kaylee are always welcome in Camelot. So I guess we are to assume that somehow Ruber knows that. And he knows.
• 17:16
  Speaker A: Oh, right. Because he does use Juliana later to get in. He, like, shows up on the clock.
• 17:20
  Speaker B: He knows that, like, if we sneak in with her, they're gonna let her in.
• 17:26
  Speaker A: Boy, that seems convoluted, because it feels like there's other ways to get in. Because also, why would he know that about.
• 17:34
  Speaker B: Yeah, there's really no reason that I guess he couldn't.
• 17:37
  Speaker A: Tons of people be welcome into Camelot. Like, it's. Ye.
• 17:40
  Speaker B: I mean, honestly, pretty much probably everybody.
• 17:44
  Speaker A: Yeah. Like, he's the only person that wouldn't be allowed in because he tried to kill King Arthur 10 years ago. Yeah. It does seem like I was like, okay, why is he. Whatever. Sure.
• 17:54
  Speaker B: I mean, I guess they make an easy target, being, like, a household of.
• 17:58
  Speaker A: Women, but we don't have the protectors. Yeah, I guess. Anyways, so he shows up there, and while he's there, he then uses Man. The more I think about this, the more it makes no sense. That's fine. It's. It's fine. The. He gets there, and while he's there, he decides this is the perfect time and location to create his weird Mutant army. And he does this by using some sort of potion that he got that literally says Acme Potion on it as like a little gag, I guess, that he dumps into like their well or something.
• 18:37
  Speaker B: I think he just poisons the whole well.
• 18:39
  Speaker A: And then he just starts throwing stuff in and it like combines into weird mutant creatures. He creates like a bunch of like mutant knights that have like weapon hands and stuff. But then he also throws in a chicken and an axe and it creates Blade Beak, which is a axe chicken hybrid creature. And I wanted to know if any of that at all came from the book.
• 19:05
  Speaker B: I am sure you'll be shocked here to hear that none of that comes from the book.
• 19:09
  Speaker A: I'm so shocked.
• 19:11
  Speaker B: I honestly did think this was one of the more unique and interesting choices that the movie made. It's not great. And I didn't love the bit with the rooster. I thought that was kind of odd. But I thought the visuals of the Mecha Nights were at least interesting.
• 19:29
  Speaker A: It's fine. I just thought it was unnecessary. Which again, it's hard to say. Cause like, I understand the idea of wanting these fantastical elements in this children's story that really like get the kids imaginations going. So creating these big scary monster, you know, knight guys. But I'm like, they couldn't. He is like, you have knights, like just send them after. Like, what is the point of. Whatever. It's fine. Like I said, it doesn't really bother. It's not a big deal. I just also, like I said, now the more I'm thinking about the issue, it's like, why did he do it there? Like, why in that moment, why didn't he already have done this? Why was like he goes there to get them and then does it in there.
• 20:07
  Speaker B: He has to sing about it.
• 20:09
  Speaker A: Yeah. It's very strange. Again, I'm overthinking a movie that clearly.
• 20:14
  Speaker B: That should not be overthought.
• 20:16
  Speaker A: Yeah. Should not be overthought for. Because one, it was made for little kids. But two, it was also like clearly 8 trillion different versions of the script.
• 20:24
  Speaker B: Oh, yeah. I mean, you can tell that a lot went on behind the scenes with writing this and none of it was good.
• 20:30
  Speaker A: Yeah, it just kind of. Yeah. Ended up with what we ended up with. Kaylee then is able to escape as her mom is captured. Her mom is like, hey, you're able to sneak through the wall and get away. So she gets away and is able to grab a horse and goes galloping away. They see her and they chase after her and so she's on the run from Ruber's men and she manages to just barely escape into the Forbidden Forest and get away from the guys. Right. But as she gets in there, she like stumbles down a hill or falls off a cliff or something, falls into a lake. And then she sees and meets Garrett, who is a blind hermit who seems to be living in the Forbidden Forest. And I wanted to know if Kaylie, running from the villain, ends up in the Forbidden Forest and finds Garrett the blind hermit.
• 21:26
  Speaker B: So there is a similar ish scene in the book. At one point, Lynette is imprisoned in an underground, like, prison cell, but she escapes and is like running through tunnels and she falls down into an underground cavern and is summarily rescued by a mysterious young man who turns out to be a blind hermit of sorts.
• 21:52
  Speaker A: What does the of sorts mean there?
• 21:55
  Speaker B: Well, I don't know if I would call him a hermit in the same way that like Garrett is a hermit.
• 22:00
  Speaker A: Yeah, Chosen.
• 22:01
  Speaker B: Yeah. Who is like chosen to go and like ostracize himself. This guy lives in the caves because that's all he knows.
• 22:11
  Speaker A: I'm figuring out what's going on here. She decided, what if Gollum was a good.
• 22:17
  Speaker B: Oh, you're gonna steal my thing from me?
• 22:20
  Speaker A: Oh, I'm sorry, is that, is that a thing for. I'm sorry.
• 22:23
  Speaker B: Yeah, no, it's fine. We'll talk about it later. I have it in, I have it.
• 22:27
  Speaker A: In one of my segments very clearly. Seems to me like she's like, what if Gollum was a good guy? Yeah, okay. All right. So they then venture forth to go find Excalibur together. And at some point they end up coming across Dragon Country. And it's maybe my favorite shot in the movie is she's like, oh, dragons, whatever. And then the camera pulls back and they're crossing a bridge that seems to be like branches or tree or something, but then it's revealed to be the giant skeleton of a dragon. I thought that was pretty cool. But I wanted to know if they end up in Dragon country and if they meet a two headed dragon.
• 23:10
  Speaker B: No, there are no dragons in the book.
• 23:12
  Speaker A: I guess you said that earlier and said there's no fan.
• 23:14
  Speaker B: No, And I do want to talk about the two headed dragon, Devin and Cornwall for just a minute because it's really clear to me that they were going for like a genie type comic relief.
• 23:27
  Speaker A: Their music number.
• 23:28
  Speaker B: They do. And we have like the pop culture references.
• 23:31
  Speaker A: That's what I mean. Yeah.
• 23:32
  Speaker B: And the anachronistic jokes, the fourth wall Breaks. So they were going for that type of thing, which is a bold move because I very strongly believe that the only reason that worked in Aladdin was because of Robin Williams.
• 23:45
  Speaker A: Yes. Even as much as I love Genie and Aladdin and how great he is, I think they use him the perfect amount. And anymore, he would have been so annoying.
• 23:57
  Speaker B: Yeah, no, I agree.
• 23:59
  Speaker A: He already borders on a little much, even in Aladdin, but Robin Williams is just so funny that it works.
• 24:06
  Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. And Devin and Cornwall just really don't work for me.
• 24:12
  Speaker A: They. I will say this. I don't think they worked for me in the sense that I didn't find them particularly funny, but I also didn't find them particularly annoying.
• 24:20
  Speaker B: Not as bad as they could have.
• 24:21
  Speaker A: Yes.
• 24:22
  Speaker B: Like, yeah.
• 24:22
  Speaker A: I think if they had tried as hard to go as hard as, like, Genie and Aladdin, it would have been obnoxious.
• 24:29
  Speaker B: And there are certainly comic relief sidekicks in children's movies that are worse.
• 24:35
  Speaker A: Way worse. Yeah. Yeah. I did not find them particularly annoying. I found them, similar to the rest of the movie, to be forgettable.
• 24:42
  Speaker B: Yeah, it was kind of funny. They're not, like, particularly funny, and they're not like, yeah, yeah, just not memorable.
• 24:52
  Speaker A: They're like everything else in the movie. It's just. It's. It's.
• 24:56
  Speaker B: Yeah, it's.
• 24:57
  Speaker A: It's like slight derivations on everything that worked in a Disney movie with the serial numbers ground off. And none of it's bad, but none of it's good. It's all just like, yeah, okay, I get what you're doing. It's fine. You did an okay job of aping a Disney movie, but it's not.
• 25:19
  Speaker B: That's not good.
• 25:20
  Speaker A: Not good. Yeah. So I said, I'll know by now if there is a blind character, which there is. And if so, because there is. Knowing that there is. I wanted to know if he has, like, a hawk friend who helps him navigate by making noise. Because that was one of my favorite details in the entire movie, was that scene where they. They're running from the dragons and they get to this, like, lake of acid or whatever. Know what it is? And there. I guess there's bones or something floating. It's something floating in it.
• 25:47
  Speaker B: It's a dragon country.
• 25:48
  Speaker A: It almost looks like dra. Or turtle shells or something floating in this acid or whatever. But they're. They're hopping across these to escape these dragons. And the. Garrett is able to know where to jump because the hawk is flying in front of him and swooping down and making a noise whenever it passes right over the top of one of the things to jump onto, which I thought was very clever and very neat, and I liked it a lot, and I wanted to know if there was anything like that in the book.
• 26:20
  Speaker B: No, there is not.
• 26:21
  Speaker A: Okay, well, good job, movie, because that was kind of fun and clever and interesting. I thought that was neat.
• 26:27
  Speaker B: The blind character in the book whose name is Lucius, uses a staff, which we also see Garrett do in the movie.
• 26:34
  Speaker A: Yeah. And he does use it to navigate sometimes. It's just. In this particular instance, he couldn't have used it because.
• 26:40
  Speaker B: Yeah, it's Lake of acid.
• 26:42
  Speaker A: Yeah. And so, yeah, I just thought that was really cool. I was like, that is neat. That's like a different thing. And, like, I wish they had done more of it. And they do a couple little other moments, like when he gets close to the cliff, it, like, flies me front of him and squawks. And there's. I think there might be one or two other little moments, but I think they could have done more with it. And I wish it would have come in and more at, like, the end, in the climax. I don't know. I thought that was cool. So. Yeah, so the movie gets points for that because it wasn't in the book. But speaking of Garrett, we then find out his backstory of how he ended up as a blind hermit in the woods, which is that when he was a young boy, he was training to be a knight, or he was a. No, he wasn't trained to be a knight. He was a stable boy, specifically. And there was a fire at one point, and he was trying to rescue the horses from the stables, and one of the horses kicked him in the head, and this made him go blind. And I wanted to know if that's what happened to, I guess, Lucius in the book.
• 27:37
  Speaker B: No, in the book, Lucius is blind because he was imprisoned underground for basically his entire life and went blind because of malnutrition. I guess the text is a little vague on this point.
• 27:51
  Speaker A: I would assume the idea is because he's been in the dark. Like, his eye. Like how animals that have evolved in caves, their eyes kind of. They stop using them. So they. Yeah, the idea would be that, yeah, he hasn't had to use them forever, so they just stop working, basically. And also, maybe malt Nutrition or to some extent. But. Yeah, okay. And that's. Yeah, that's fine. Very clearly. Again, we'll get to it, but see what they're doing there. I also thought it was funny when they were doing the backstory. Of how he went blind. When they explained that Garrett used to be a stable boy, I was like, boy. They're really. They really went back to the well for casting because Garrett in the movie is played by Cary Elwes.
• 28:32
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 28:32
  Speaker A: And I was like. So they're like, okay, we need a stable boy. I don't know Cary Elwes. He's like the most famous stable boy in a movie ever, probably. We have a fantasy adventure movie, and we need a stable boy. Cariolis. So as they're moving forward and trying to make their way to the. To find Excalibur, they end up finding the sheath at one point or the belt or something in this giant footprint. And this leads them to a cave where they discover that Excalibur is being held by a giant rock troll thing, Huge rock troll who is using it as a toothpick. And I wanted to know if there was a giant rock troll creature in the book. Now I'm. I already. You already. That's the problem with writing them as I go where one question early on just ruins the rest of my question.
• 29:26
  Speaker B: No, it's okay.
• 29:26
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 29:28
  Speaker B: There is not a rock troll in the book.
• 29:30
  Speaker A: Okay. I will say I thought I was fairly impressed the movie overall. Not the best looking thing in the world, but I was pretty impressed by. Because this rock troll, giant cave rock troll thing is cgi, is clearly computer generated.
• 29:45
  Speaker B: Yeah. Early cgi.
• 29:47
  Speaker A: Yeah. And it's not bad. It. It blends in pretty well. Like, it. You. You can tell it's cg, but it's not. So, like, obviously, like, it doesn't stick out like a sore thumb. Like, oh, God, that looks terrible.
• 29:58
  Speaker B: I. I agree. I think it looks decent. I think. I honestly even think it's kind of a fun addition.
• 30:04
  Speaker A: Yeah. I thought that whole scene was fine.
• 30:05
  Speaker B: I think if they had used, like, shown more of it or, like, used it more within the film, it probably would have not gone over as well.
• 30:14
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 30:15
  Speaker B: Because it would have looked worse.
• 30:16
  Speaker A: It's a pretty limited. Yeah.
• 30:17
  Speaker B: Yeah. But I think. I think they. They were able to, like, hold themselves back, and they used it just enough that it turned out fine.
• 30:24
  Speaker A: Yeah. So they are able to get back Excalibur, and so they're. They're gonna go return it. But Garrett decides that he can't go return to Camelot because, quote, he doesn't belong in that world. End quote. And I was a little unsure what he meant by that. I was like, I guess because he's blind is the idea. And I wanted to know if any of that came from the book. If Lucius is like, refuses to go back to Camelot or anything like that and what his motivation is and why. Because I. I was like, okay, I guess I don't know.
• 31:06
  Speaker B: Okay, so this is not from the book. And I want to talk about the movie first.
• 31:11
  Speaker A: Okay.
• 31:12
  Speaker B: Because I agree that it is super under baked. Like, so under baked. It's kind of raw. The story explains why Garrett is blind.
• 31:21
  Speaker A: Right. Kicked in the head, blah.
• 31:22
  Speaker B: But he does not why he exiles himself to the forest.
• 31:26
  Speaker A: I think I know why, but go ahead.
• 31:29
  Speaker B: I was gonna say, I think the movie doesn't even know because we see him learning to be a knight despite being blind. But then he just decides that he doesn't belong there and he goes to live in the woods instead.
• 31:39
  Speaker A: But he says in the movie explicitly he was training to be a knight with ser Lionel. He was the only one who believed in him after he went blind. And then Lionel gets killed, so he just leaves. So he has no one to.
• 31:55
  Speaker B: To go live in the woods.
• 31:57
  Speaker A: Well, yeah, I. I think him going to the woods the first time, I get the guy who was training him to be a knight who, like, still believed in him and was, like, including him. The only person who, you know, didn't reject him for being. Because of his disability is dead and gone. So he's like, well, I. And so he. He didn't fit in anymore. So he decided. So I think that tracks. I just don't get why at this point now he has rescued the sword. I guess it's just that he still feels that, like, resentment and being outcast or whatever because of his disability is why he doesn't go back.
• 32:30
  Speaker B: But, yeah, I think that's what we're supposed to assume. But it is, like, way under baked. Yeah, well, especially because earlier in the movie, when Kaylee first tells him about Excalibur, he's like, I'm gonna go get it myself.
• 32:44
  Speaker A: Yeah, seemingly, you would think in order to.
• 32:47
  Speaker B: He would have to take it.
• 32:48
  Speaker A: To take it back and, like, maybe even to, like, prove that. Yeah, he, you know, his worth or something like that. And so then when he does succeed, I'm like, why? Okay, yeah.
• 32:58
  Speaker B: But I think what we're seeing is, like, multiple scripts going on here. Because also at the beginning, it initially to me seemed like we were like. There was the implication that he just, like, didn't want to be around people.
• 33:17
  Speaker A: I. I assume all of the reasons for. And I think the movie should have spelled it out more clearly specifically for the children in the audience, because I think it's a. It's a good message, and I think this is what the movie was going for, but it just doesn't. And as. As bluntly as the movie exposits so many other things, it's. This is left kind of vague and nebulous. I think it is just that because of his disability, he. He doesn't want to be around people because people don't accept him. People don't value him, People don't. They view him as useless as, you know, whatever. And so I think. I think he rejects society because society rejects him. Like, I think. I just don't think the movie does a good job of explaining. I can gather that, but I don't know if a little kid would get that. You know what I mean? Like, I don't know how he does pretty explicitly say the part about, like, nobody. Whatever. He's like, nobody viewed me as a person anymore except for Sir Lionel. Whatever he says, he says some line about how Sir Lionel was the only person who still, like, cared about him or whatever. So I think it's. It's at least a little bit there. But, yeah.
• 34:21
  Speaker B: So I do want to talk about what does happen in the book, though. So in the book, Lynette and Lucius do become lovers. And they are. They're living, like, partly in the caves and partly with the witch of the woods in a section of the forest that's implied to be magically protected by an ancient goddess.
• 34:45
  Speaker A: Sick. Sounds great.
• 34:46
  Speaker B: I know. Pretty sick. So anyway, they're having a grand time being lovers when the witch drops. Lore that, oh, Lucius is actually dying and the only thing that might save him is, of course, the Holy Grail. So Lynette decides to leave and quest for the Holy Grail, but before she does, Lucius is like, hey, while you're out, if you happen to also find a way to restore my vision, that would be dope, because I want to see you, right? And Lynette is, like, not into that because she thinks she's ugly. She's not ugly, but she's like, yeah, sure. So she goes out and she quests, and she does find the Holy Grail. And when she finds it, the Fisher King tells her that the Grail can only grant Lucius one boon, either his life or his vision. You could probably see where this is going.
• 35:45
  Speaker A: Deeply problematic.
• 35:47
  Speaker B: So she takes it back, tells Lucius he can have one or the other, and he immediately chooses his vision, cries about how beautiful Lynette is, and then drops dead a month later. And then Lynette leaves and Goes back to being King Arthur's messenger. And, like, I understand the, like, courtly ideals of romance that we're dealing in here, but also. That's dumb. Yes, that was a dumb decision, my guy.
• 36:21
  Speaker A: It's also wildly problematic from a disability angle of just, like, it's more important that he's able to see her one time. Yeah.
• 36:32
  Speaker B: Then, like, then live with her for.
• 36:34
  Speaker A: The rest of the. And be a valued partner. It clearly seemed like things were fine without his vision. They were together. Yeah.
• 36:39
  Speaker B: They were doing great.
• 36:40
  Speaker A: Like, and so it is, like, you can. You can squint and see the. The, like, the kernel of, like you said, the courtly ideal of romance, of, like, he is so desperately in love with her that he would give up his life to be able to see his.
• 37:00
  Speaker B: That, yeah, that is exactly the idea that we're trading in.
• 37:03
  Speaker A: I get it. Like, I get what they're going for, but, boy, in execution, that ends up just being wildly. One, it's a dumb decision on his part, like, just practically. But two, it's also, like, it says that what it says about disability and being blind is always also deeply up and weird and, like, bad and. Yeah.
• 37:21
  Speaker B: Well, and it's. I mean, it's selfish of him, too, because she doesn't want him to choose.
• 37:27
  Speaker A: Yeah. That's the other thing.
• 37:28
  Speaker B: She even considers not telling him that he can only have one or the other and just being like, okay, we're saving you now. But she's like, no, I can't do that, because then I'm going to be lying to him forever. So she tells him he has a choice, and he just immediately chooses the thing that he wants.
• 37:45
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 37:46
  Speaker B: With no consideration.
• 37:47
  Speaker A: Yeah. It's one of those things that you feel like. It's like, I can see why you're like, ooh, this is the most tragic, beautiful, you know, expression of true love or whatever. But it's like, no, actually, it's just, like, fucked up in multiple different ways. Like, it's just really bad in, like, several different ways. Because, yes, he's robbing her of her choice in this matter. And I guess it's not her choice, his choice to do what he wants with whatever. But, like, you know, he's killing himself essentially, and, and.
• 38:18
  Speaker B: And he's robbing her of a lifetime.
• 38:21
  Speaker A: Of love, their companionship or whatever, in love and this, that and the other. And it's. It's insinuating that the ability to see your partner somehow more valuable than the ways other ways that you could love. You know what I mean? Like, it's just. This is. Yeah, it's fucked in a lot of ways. All right, final question. Anything at the end with. They get into a big fight, they get back. Ruber is able to steal the sword from them at one point, captures them, re. Steals the sword, fuses it with his arm. I know none of that's in there, but basically, I wanted to know. The way they defeat him is they're able to get him. And this is all half baked, too. And just like.
• 39:00
  Speaker B: Sure.
• 39:01
  Speaker A: I guess this whole thing, like, Garrett has been kind of training, which. This doesn't really tie into her overall character, in my opinion, but the journey she has had to go on as a character is to learn to, like, wait till the last second to, like.
• 39:18
  Speaker B: Be more mindful, I guess, is the.
• 39:21
  Speaker A: Idea they're going for. But, like, he's training her that. Like in some combat training that with these weird plants that, like, attack him. Whatever. Sure, fine. It's fine. But she has to wait until the last moment because when they're doing the training, the plants attack you, and he dips out of the way at the last second. And that's how he's like, ah. And he's showing her how to do it, and she messes up and he goes, ah, you moved too soon. Or something like that. And so the idea is that she needs to learn how to, like. Yeah. Be more mindful, be more restrained or something. I don't know. Because there was never really a moment earlier where she was, like, overly.
• 39:59
  Speaker B: I mean, she's a little bit, like, rash, I guess you could say a little.
• 40:05
  Speaker A: But I don't like, when's a moment where that gets her into trouble in the movie. Like, I can't even think of a moment where that gets her into trouble. She gets kidnapped by the people. He just rolls up. It's not like anything she did.
• 40:15
  Speaker B: Oh.
• 40:16
  Speaker A: I guess the one thing is that she's talking that one time and she's like.
• 40:22
  Speaker B: Where. She's like. Again, there's not really a good word for it other than, like, not like, she's not being, like, mindful.
• 40:29
  Speaker A: Yeah. Because that's how she gets. They get. They get found by.
• 40:34
  Speaker B: And then Garrett gets injured.
• 40:36
  Speaker A: Yeah. And Garrett gets injured because she's like. He keeps telling her to be quiet because he hears something or is worried about something, and she's like, ah. She's just like. But that, again, isn't really. Yeah, it's just like.
• 40:47
  Speaker B: Yeah. Kind of connected pretty under bait.
• 40:49
  Speaker A: Yeah. Whereas it would be. It would make much more sense if you had a scene earlier where she, something happens and there's like in a standoff and she brashly like tries to grab a sword and attack somebody and. Yeah, in that, you know, or something. I don't know even that whatever. But at least it would be something this. It's like, well, she was talking too loud in one scene when she shouldn't have been talking. And the result and the art, the completion of that arc is that she should wait longer when somebody's attacking her before dodging like, what it, it's so not really connected. It's so tenuous. But that's how they defeat Ruber at the end is they, they, they, they are standing in front of a big rock. I don't even think it's their plan. It's just like a coincidence that this happens.
• 41:33
  Speaker B: Well, I think, or I guess it was the plan. She, I don't know if it was the plan like all along, but like once they're in front of the rock, I think it's pretty clear that that's what she is going for.
• 41:44
  Speaker A: And so she waits for Ruber to come attack her and she's like. And she says to, to Garrett, like, wait, just wait. And then at the last second they dodge out of the way and rumor stabs the sword into the stone, the titular sword in the back into the stone. Yeah. And gets stuck. And then this undoes the, all the magic he did somehow or whatever. I assume not. But is any of that anything remotely from the book?
• 42:09
  Speaker B: No, there's nothing like that in the book. I think it works fine for the movie.
• 42:15
  Speaker A: It's a fine thing. I just wish they had done figured out a better way to get to that.
• 42:20
  Speaker B: I agree.
• 42:20
  Speaker A: It just feels classic, like random.
• 42:23
  Speaker B: Yeah, I, I, it was going to have to be some big magical thing to get the sword unwelded from his arm. So like, sure. But yeah, I agree that like getting there was very under baked and more.
• 42:36
  Speaker A: So just getting to the point of like how she gets him to do it is like, well, she needs to wait till the final. It's just like what? That's not a, it's, it's so again, it's also tenuous and the message is so, so like what? Because that's what it gets to me. I was like, okay, so again, is, is the message literally just be more mindful, like be more restrained. Like that's a weird.
• 43:00
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 43:00
  Speaker A: Overarching message for a kids movie. Yeah, I guess, like it's not particularly. Like, even if it's an okay message in some instances, like. Yeah, be more mindful of your actions and stuff like that. It is not. I think, that something I would be particularly interested in teaching my children.
• 43:15
  Speaker B: I think it could. I think it could be, like, there's a way that you could do that.
• 43:21
  Speaker A: As a positive message. Yeah, that is true. Yeah.
• 43:23
  Speaker B: I just think in this instance, it's not particularly well done.
• 43:29
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 43:30
  Speaker B: So, like, it's not clear what the message is.
• 43:32
  Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. It's not well developed because it doesn't. Barely connects for, like, the moment where she messes up at it earlier. Barely connects to what she has to do at the end, other than just kind of very, very broadly. And then on top of that, it. Yeah, it's all right. I have a couple more questions that I need to ask in Lost An Adaptation. Just show me the way to get.
• 43:52
  Speaker B: Out of here and I'll be on my way.
• 43:54
  Speaker A: Wow.
• 43:56
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 43:57
  Speaker A: Yes.
• 43:57
  Speaker B: And I want to get unlocked as soon as possible.
• 44:00
  Speaker A: This is just a random thing that I wanted to know if you hadn't thought or knew anything about very early on. I think in the.
• 44:07
  Speaker B: Like in the opening.
• 44:08
  Speaker A: The prologue.
• 44:09
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 44:09
  Speaker A: And. Right. The prologue is before. Right. Yeah, yeah. In the prologue, we get the founding of Camelot, and it is. Arthur pulls Excalibur out of the stone, and then we see Camelot rise around the stone and. Or where the stone was. And the stone appeared to be in Stonehenge.
• 44:30
  Speaker B: Yes. Or.
• 44:31
  Speaker A: Or a very similar Stonehenge, like, ancient stone ruin. And I was wondering if there's anything in the book or in Arthurian legend or anything that you're aware of, of came arising or being built, like, on Stonehenge or short. Or a different stone. Ancient stone ruin. Again, because obviously it can't be Stonehenge, because Camelot, like, there was nothing. Stonehenge is still there.
• 44:56
  Speaker B: So, like, it's just Stonehenge.
• 44:58
  Speaker A: Just Stonehenge. So, like, I'm wondering if. Anyways, is there anything else about that or.
• 45:05
  Speaker B: So I looked this up to be sure, and as far as I could tell, there's no connection between Camelot and Stonehenge arising from the legends themselves. But apparently it's not uncommon for pop culture depictions to sometimes, like, merge the two in some way.
• 45:25
  Speaker A: You can see the idea there.
• 45:26
  Speaker B: Well, the sword and stone, it's both like ancient Britain.
• 45:30
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 45:31
  Speaker B: Myth.
• 45:31
  Speaker A: Well. And. Yes. And it's the idea, like, if you're doing a sword and stone thing, of there's a sword in a stone. Well, there are these very famous stones.
• 45:39
  Speaker B: We know some famous Stones.
• 45:40
  Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. So you're like, ah, we'll just connect them, like. Sure.
• 45:42
  Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, sure. There is something that the movie gets extremely wrong, though, and that is conflating Excalibur with the sword and the stone.
• 45:53
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 45:54
  Speaker B: Because Arthur gets Excalibur from the lady of the Lake, throws a sword out of the stone. The sword that he pulls out of the stone is a completely different and I think, actually nameless sword.
• 46:05
  Speaker A: Surely it has a name somewhere.
• 46:07
  Speaker B: I think so. I was trying to look this up, and as far as I can tell, sometimes it's called Caliburn. But I don't think that comes from, like, the oldest myth. Yeah, yeah. I think it's, like, a more modern addition to the lore.
• 46:26
  Speaker A: Interesting. I know basically nothing about Arthurian legends.
• 46:31
  Speaker B: I don't know as much as I would like to.
• 46:33
  Speaker A: Yeah. The extent of my knowledge is having watched the Green Knight and then this and, like, a few other cartoons and movies from my childhood that I don't remember anything about. So. Yeah. All right. My other question here was. And this sounds like it probably may not come from the book. I don't know. But one of the things I came up with in the movie was just like, man, Ruber desperately. Ruber, the villain, desperately needs more concrete motivation. Because at the beginning, he just, like, seems to want to usurp the throne. And. And I'm like, but why? And the answer can just be, well, he wants power, whatever. Fine, sure. But it just. It felt like we got no. And we just got very little sort of information about what his deal was, where he came from, why he's like. Like, what's going on? Like.
• 47:21
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 47:21
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 47:22
  Speaker B: Well, the movie was clearly going for, like, a Scar type character.
• 47:27
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 47:28
  Speaker B: But Scar in the Lion King has, like, backstory and, like, motivation that we understand.
• 47:34
  Speaker A: Ye, because.
• 47:36
  Speaker B: Yeah, it's Hamlet.
• 47:37
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 47:37
  Speaker B: Well. And, like, he, like, he doesn't get along with his brother, and he's like, I want to kill him and take the throne for myself. But, yeah, the movie really has no answers on this.
• 47:48
  Speaker A: He's just a guy.
• 47:49
  Speaker B: He's just a guy. And then even more questions that I had. Like, immediately I was like, who made this crusty, obviously evil man a Knight of the Round Table?
• 48:03
  Speaker A: Yes.
• 48:04
  Speaker B: Like, what the heck is his backstory that made everybody else who seems to be righteous and noble.
• 48:11
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 48:11
  Speaker B: Let this guy into their club.
• 48:14
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 48:15
  Speaker B: Why is he there?
• 48:16
  Speaker A: Yeah. Well, it almost feels like in this movie, the Knights of the Round Table is almost like a. Like a. It's not like, a thing that Arthur, like, hand picks, like, his most trusted knights or whatever.
• 48:31
  Speaker B: That's what the Knights of the Round Table is like.
• 48:33
  Speaker A: Right?
• 48:33
  Speaker B: Like, famously.
• 48:33
  Speaker A: It's like his council or whatever. Yeah, it's the king's council, essentially. But in this, it almost seems more like it's like the senate or something. And these are like, they're. Or not even that, but it's. It's almost like a House of Lords or something. Yeah, we're like. These are, like, you know, heads of, like, different areas of the kingdom that are, like, automatically become part of this council because they're like, you know, the lord of their region or whatever. Is what it seems like in the movie. Because I agree. Who is this guy?
• 49:06
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 49:06
  Speaker A: Why is he on your thing? Nobody seems to like him, and he just immediately tries to kill our. Yeah.
• 49:13
  Speaker B: Also. Also, was I the only one who initially thought that he was sneaking into the Round Table meeting at the beginning? Because all of the knights are, like, going into the room, and he, like, ducks out of an alcove and joins them. And I thought he was gonna be, like, sneaking in.
• 49:32
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 49:32
  Speaker B: Like a villain.
• 49:33
  Speaker A: Right.
• 49:33
  Speaker B: But then he's actually just one of the Knights of the Round Table. And. And why.
• 49:39
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 49:39
  Speaker B: Why is he there?
• 49:40
  Speaker A: It's one of those things. It's like, I could. Yeah. If a little bit more information I could buy, like, maybe in this version of the story, like I said, it is a thing where it is not a close circle of Arthur's most trusted friends and counselors or whatever, but it is instead, basically like a House of Lords. Everybody who runs a municipality of the kingdom gets a seat at the table.
• 50:03
  Speaker B: Yeah. You, like, call in your banners.
• 50:04
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 50:05
  Speaker B: All of the lords come.
• 50:06
  Speaker A: Lords come. And this is one of the guys. And he hates you. Like, that seems like the idea of what the movie is going for. Like, this is just one of the guys in the kingdom who is a lord or whatever and is one of the banner lords and shows up and has a bone to pick with the king.
• 50:20
  Speaker B: Right.
• 50:20
  Speaker A: X reason.
• 50:21
  Speaker B: But, like, if you have even the slightest bit of knowledge of, like, Arthurian legend.
• 50:27
  Speaker A: Yeah. You're like, well, that's the Knights of the Round Table.
• 50:31
  Speaker B: Who is this man?
• 50:32
  Speaker A: Yeah. Why. Why did Arthur let this guy in? Yeah. Maybe there are different versions of.
• 50:40
  Speaker B: Maybe there are. Maybe there are.
• 50:43
  Speaker A: Maybe in some of them it is more of, like, a House of Lords kind of style thing or something. I don't know. But anyways. All right. Those are all my questions. It's time to find out what Katie thought was better in the book you like to read?
• 50:56
  Speaker B: Oh, yes, I love to read.
• 50:59
  Speaker A: What do you like to read?
• 51:02
  Speaker B: Everything. Okay. My first couple of notes are things that I didn't like in the movie, many of which I removed from this section because we talked about them in your questions. But I was really not a fan of the axe faced chicken character.
• 51:17
  Speaker A: I was indifferent, to be fair, I.
• 51:19
  Speaker B: Was indifferent to, like, everything I didn't really understand. Like, I felt like that was a weird arc of, like, it doesn't really go anywhere with the, like, with the hen that, like, mistreats him.
• 51:32
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 51:32
  Speaker B: And then like, I was like, what are we. Yeah, what are we doing?
• 51:35
  Speaker A: It is underdeveloped. It's. They just wanted an animal sidekick.
• 51:39
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 51:40
  Speaker A: Didn't really have a good thought in.
• 51:42
  Speaker B: A movie that has multiple animal sidekicks.
• 51:44
  Speaker A: Though, honestly, like, or something.
• 51:47
  Speaker B: Why we need that character?
• 51:50
  Speaker A: Anyway, I think the idea is they want. This is the. They wanted. It's their Apu or not Apu.
• 51:56
  Speaker B: It's. It's. He's Iago. Yago.
• 51:58
  Speaker A: Yeah, that's what I meant. Yeah.
• 52:00
  Speaker B: Also, I think it's a boo and not a.
• 52:02
  Speaker A: It is. I meant to say Iago and my brain short circuited to saying Abu, and then it just went to Apu because Simpson. A show I've never watched. So.
• 52:16
  Speaker B: This movie does a particularly bad job of developing the romance between the main characters, especially on Garrett's side, because, like, Kaylie, I can like, squint and be like, yeah, sure. But with Garrett, it's like he suddenly just likes her.
• 52:36
  Speaker A: Yeah. It kind of comes out of nowhere.
• 52:38
  Speaker B: It really does.
• 52:39
  Speaker A: He seems to hate her.
• 52:40
  Speaker B: Yeah. He seems to, like, not be into her at all. And then after he gets injured, he's like, actually, I love you.
• 52:47
  Speaker A: Yeah. And now, to be fair, you go back and you watch some of those Disney movies.
• 52:52
  Speaker B: Sure.
• 52:52
  Speaker A: It is. Your. Your childhood brain was doing a lot of filling in of how amazing those romances were because, boy, they are also pretty undercooked in most of the, like, Beauty and the Beast is one of the better ones. Aladdin is a pretty undercooked. From my memory, the last time I watched Aladdin, I was like, it's a pretty undercooked.
• 53:11
  Speaker B: It's undercooked, but it's not as undercooked as this.
• 53:14
  Speaker A: I agree, I agree. But I'm just saying the bar is already low and they managed to get even under that, which was impressive.
• 53:20
  Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Overall, I thought that the book made more interesting use of Arthurian legend than the movie did. Merlin is a Much more active character in the book. Morgan le Fay appears and causes trouble. One of the knights that Lynette travels with is Ser Lancelot, who tells her all about his doomed love for Queen Guinevere. Overall, I just thought.
• 53:44
  Speaker A: Just a lot more of the stuff.
• 53:45
  Speaker B: Yeah, a lot more of the stuff that, you know, and, like, the recognizable names and even some, like, minor characters that are not super recognizable are appearing in this book, which is a lot of fun.
• 53:56
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 53:58
  Speaker B: The movie, by comparison, did not have a whole lot of that going on. It's pretty much just like King Arthur and Merlin.
• 54:05
  Speaker A: Yeah. Merlin does show up, but that's. There's almost nobody else that is ever mentioned that you're like, oh, that person.
• 54:16
  Speaker B: Lynette is actually officially dubbed the King's Damosel or damsel, I still don't know, by King Arthur. She does act as his messenger for most of the book, which I thought was fun. I wasn't expecting this book to be as heavy as it was Content warning. A big part of Lynette's backstory is that when she's a young teenager, she's sexually assaulted by a knight visiting her home. And a lot of the story is about her, like, grappling with her personal fallout from that. Much of that arc is about her being encouraged to forgive him, which is an assault narrative that I'm not personally a huge fan of. But overall, it was far more emotionally heavy than I was anticipating, which, you know, it. Make of that what you will.
• 55:12
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 55:12
  Speaker B: You know, I mean, definitely depends on, like, what.
• 55:14
  Speaker A: Not something you're including this movie, Right? Yeah.
• 55:17
  Speaker B: And. And how much you're going to enjoy that, I think depends on a lot of different factors.
• 55:22
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 55:22
  Speaker B: But I think it was far meatier than anything that was in this film.
• 55:29
  Speaker A: Yeah. It doesn't sound particularly well handled in this, based on your description here.
• 55:35
  Speaker B: It's handled. There were parts of it that were fine. Overall, the focus on her arc being that she learns to forgive him and let go is, again, not something that I'm personally a huge fan of.
• 55:57
  Speaker A: I think, to be fair, I will say I think there's a difference between let go and forgive.
• 56:01
  Speaker B: But. And it's. I agree with you. And that's. And that's part. A big part of the reason why I tend not to like this kind of narrative, because I think that it tends to conflate those things. And to me, they are very different things.
• 56:15
  Speaker A: There's a difference between not letting something have power over you and, like, letting go of the power it has over you. Or whatever, versus literally forgiving the person for, like, those are different things. But. Yeah.
• 56:28
  Speaker B: And I also think, you know, I think it was just. It's also dated.
• 56:33
  Speaker A: Yes.
• 56:33
  Speaker B: Like, honestly, this was written in the 70s. We're probably getting some, like, brand new, like, second wave feminism ideas here. And it's. And now in. In 2025, it's just dated.
• 56:45
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 56:46
  Speaker B: And now to lighten the mood.
• 56:47
  Speaker A: Well, it was also written by. Sorry. It was also written by an 80 year old woman in the 70s.
• 56:52
  Speaker B: Yes. Yes. That is also true. She was like, 75 when she wrote already.
• 56:58
  Speaker A: Somebody who's from a much older generation already. And then. Yeah.
• 57:03
  Speaker B: Yeah. Okay. A few things that I thought were funny. When Lynette meets Lucius. The title of the chapter was A Dweller in Darkness. And I wrote in my notes, is she about to meet Gollum? Lol. But then it actually did kind of end up being what if Gollum were like, a sexy guy? Fanfic. And it was. It was Chef's Kiss. It was incredible.
• 57:36
  Speaker A: We talked about in the prequel. That's so clearly what's going on. Yes. Author was like the.
• 57:42
  Speaker B: She was like a founding member of the Tolkien Society. Huge fan.
• 57:46
  Speaker A: She, like, has a freaking hobbit name and everything. Like, it's. Yeah. So absolutely. She. She decided to write her Smeagol fanfic into a book, which is amazing. Good for you.
• 58:04
  Speaker B: Second thing that I want to mention, when Lynette finds the Holy Grail, there's a scene that made me think of the thing from Indiana Jones where the guy melts.
• 58:16
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 58:17
  Speaker B: And. Okay, I'm just gonna read this because I don't know enough about.
• 58:25
  Speaker A: When did this book come out again?
• 58:27
  Speaker B: 70. 75.
• 58:30
  Speaker A: That's before even the first Indiana.
• 58:32
  Speaker B: Yeah. So I don't know enough about Arthurian legend to know if maybe this is something that Vera Chapman was pulling from legend.
• 58:42
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 58:42
  Speaker B: And it's just like kind of a common motif that Indiana Jones then also used.
• 58:47
  Speaker A: Yeah. I don't know.
• 58:48
  Speaker B: Or if possibly the people who made Indiana Jones could have gotten the idea.
• 58:52
  Speaker A: From this very well could have been.
• 58:55
  Speaker B: So she stood looking at him, calming her thudding heart and entering into the solemn and sad peace that lay around the dead man. And then she screamed. For the fine marble face was dissolving before her eyes, dropping away, shriveling the neck and shoulders, the arms and hands drying, perishing, becoming a tissue of sinews. The whole body was crumbling into bones and dust. There was the face that a moment before had been so beautiful now, a hollow skull crossed with A few stretched webs of skin and wisps of lanky hair.
• 59:31
  Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah, it could be. So it's interesting because it's funny because the first melting in Indiana Jones is in Raiders of the Lost Ark, which is not the Holy Grail. It is the Ark of the Covenant. When they open the Ark of the Covenant, all the Nazis see the whatever is in it and it like melts them all. But in Indiana Jones, the Last Crusade, which is the one where they're looking for the Holy Grail, when they are finding the Holy Grail. And now what, what, what causes this? So, like, what causes the person to melt like that? She's.
• 1:00:11
  Speaker B: She's. She's on like a magical quest, right? And she goes into this room. Tapers, burned quietly in air that was not stirred by any breath. In the midst of the room, a great bed, a bed of state with curtains drawn back. And in that bed lay a dead man. His calm, noble face was turned upwards in peace, and his hands folded on his breast above a rich pall of black velvet embroidered with silver. An old man, but comely. His hair was white but thick and smooth, and his beard was white but trim. And his neck and shoulders were bare above the velvet pall. And then he rapidly ages.
• 1:00:53
  Speaker A: But nothing instigates that happening.
• 1:00:55
  Speaker B: No.
• 1:00:56
  Speaker A: Interesting. So, and is this the room where the Grail is? Or is this like, where is this? Sorry, I'm just trying to get context. Because this is really tracking with the Last Crusade.
• 1:01:10
  Speaker B: So he ages rapidly, crumbles into bones. And then, in spite of all her self control, she screamed. And then people whom she could not see came up behind her and seized her fast and laid her in the bed beside the dead man. She could feel his bony arm and shoulder touching her own. Someone drew the black cover over her face and she thought to herself, this must be death. Well, if this is death, let it be so. It is hardly as bad as I thought. And she yielded herself to being dead. And in a moment she was lifted up and bright lights shone about her. She was carried away and set on her feet. She was in a great room or hall, like a brightly lighted church. And then the same. It was the. And with a guy comes out. And with awe and terror, Lynette recognized his face. It was the same face as the dead man's that had crumbled into a skull. But this man was alive, though his face was fine, drawn with pain, and his deep set eyes held an awesome light. And he's the Fisher King.
• 1:02:20
  Speaker A: Oh, I don't know Enough about the Fisher King to know what that means.
• 1:02:24
  Speaker B: I was sore wounded in the thigh and can never be healed. But by that, who shall achieve the Grail? You four? Cause there were also some of the knights were with her, have passed through your probations, and now you are near the final step. Behold. And then their procession and the Grail comes out.
• 1:02:44
  Speaker A: Okay, so. Well, it's interesting. So in. In the Last Crusade, when they get to the Grail, they go into the room where the Grail is.
• 1:02:54
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 1:02:54
  Speaker A: And there is an old man knight there. And he was the final knight who was protecting the Grail. He is the. I can't remember his name, but. Or if he even has one in Indiana Jones. But. And which is like, I think comes from the stories of, like, there was these knights who were protecting the Grail, and. And there's this one knight who has lived forever because he keeps drinking out of the Grail or whatever. And so he lives fraternally to protect the Grail in. Wherever this location is in Indiana Jones. They get there, and there are a bunch of fake grails, and that's like, the final test is you have to identify the correct Grail. And in Last Crusade, the guy melts because he drinks. One of the Nazis thinks he knows which one's the right Grail, grabs it, drinks out of it. Oops, it was the wrong Grail. And that is what in Last Crusade, in the Grail story, he melts and, like. And it's very similar to what happens in Raiders of the Lost Ark. But I wonder if that guy laying in the bed is supposed to be that same, like, night the final night could be. Yeah.
• 1:03:54
  Speaker B: Again, like, I don't know enough about Arthurian legend to know, like, what's being pulled from where here.
• 1:04:01
  Speaker A: Interesting. Interesting. Point being, I have always assumed that the reason that the guy melts in Last Crusade after he drinks out of the Grail is more so as a callback to that's Fair, the Raiders of the Lost Ark. Doing it because of the. The arc melting everybody is my kind of. Why I always assumed they did that was just kind of like. Because the second movie wasn't well received. And so they're like, we gotta get back to our roots. We'll melt a Nazi at the end. Like that they knew where their bread was buttered. I don't know. But anyways, that is interesting. Maybe it is. Any. Yeah. I don't know. If anybody knows anything about any of that and where any of that came from, please let us know. All right, Katie, it's time to find out what you thought was better in the movie. My life has taught me one lesson, Hugo, not the one I thought it would. Happy endings only happen in the movies.
• 1:04:54
  Speaker B: Couple little things I. I did like changing the object of the quest to Excalibur. I think the Holy Grail is kind of a weird, heavy concept, especially for a silly, fun time musical kids movie.
• 1:05:06
  Speaker A: It could be tough. Yeah.
• 1:05:08
  Speaker B: I thought it was fun that there were magical creatures in the movie, something that the book sadly lacked. And I liked the continued thematic presence of Kaylie's father in the story. Cause he's obviously also important to Lynette in the book, but pretty much vanishes after his death. Like she doesn't like think about him really or anything. So I liked their relationship being a motivating factor for Kaylee. I thought that was nice.
• 1:05:37
  Speaker A: All right, let's go ahead and talk about a few things that the movie nailed. As I expected, practically perfect in every way.
• 1:05:50
  Speaker B: We talked about a couple of these already. Kaylee. Lynette is a tomboy who is more interested in knightly or boyish pursuits than like proper young lady interests. Ruber, the Red Knight, does lay siege to the household in trying to marry Lynette's sister. And Lynette does have to sneak out and ride to Camelot to appeal to King Arthur for help kicking him out. And there is an important falcon character in both of these stories. I did like the book's version better. The book was. Had a lady falcon named Jean. A strong female character like that.
• 1:06:34
  Speaker A: Yeah, it's Aiden in the movie.
• 1:06:36
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 1:06:36
  Speaker A: And is it Merlin's falcon in the book?
• 1:06:39
  Speaker B: No, it's actually Lynette's falcon.
• 1:06:41
  Speaker A: Oh, right, you said. Yeah. So it's like. Yeah, they should have. That's interesting. I guess. I guess they wanted the falcon to like be with Garrett, but man, that would have been a classic. That's the thing you have her have.
• 1:06:57
  Speaker B: Yeah. The pet falcon and then you don't need the chicken.
• 1:07:00
  Speaker A: Yeah. Anyways, all right, let's get to a handful of odds and ends before the final version. Immediately when the movie started. We actually have quite a few notes here because I had a lot of notes that weren't really related to questions or anything more so about like the movie itself. Immediately I could tell one issue that I was going to have is that the human characters don't have the Disney magic that makes them like really feel alive as. As not an animator. I don't know what it is that I don't know Disney has what it is.
• 1:07:40
  Speaker B: They're putting in the water over there or they were in the 90s because.
• 1:07:44
  Speaker A: There'S other studios have figured it out over the years. It's just that seems to be a recurring thing whenever we watch from the. Especially like the 80s and 90s.
• 1:07:51
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 1:07:52
  Speaker A: When we watch animated projects that aren't Disney very often I'm like, man, yeah. They just don't. They're all kind of like too generic and they just don't have whatever it is that makes you go, that's a real person. Like, you're like, that's a weird cartoon.
• 1:08:08
  Speaker B: First note I wrote was, wow, the animation is so ugly.
• 1:08:11
  Speaker A: It's. I think that's a little harsh, but it's not.
• 1:08:16
  Speaker B: Not incorrect.
• 1:08:17
  Speaker A: It's not completely incorrect.
• 1:08:18
  Speaker B: Well, and I think the thing with Disney, at least during the time period, like particularly in the 90s, was that Disney was really willing to put the money in.
• 1:08:29
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 1:08:29
  Speaker B: To like hire the best people and to like put the time in and to like really make things look like works of art.
• 1:08:35
  Speaker A: Yes. I think that's one of the noticeable things in this is that a lot of the backgrounds, and just not even backgrounds, but just the environment are bereft of detail in a way that makes it look cheap and. Yeah, like. Like a. More like a Saturday morning cartoon.
• 1:08:51
  Speaker B: Yeah. Or like a direct to VHS that.
• 1:08:54
  Speaker A: Got churned out quick, you know, relatively quickly or on a low budget and they just didn't have time to put as much work into the environments and this stuff. And it's just a lot of. It feels, yeah. Underdeveloped. But in particular the characters, again, it's not that any of them are bad, like necessarily. It's just like. Just nothing. Like, I don't know, like when you see Garrett, I'm like, eh, just a guy. Like, it's just like a guy. We're comparing that to, you know, like seeing even. Even seeing Beast at the end of when he turns into a human. Like he has, you know, your specific monster fucker thoughts and not you, the royal you of our audiences. Specific monster fucker thoughts on that movie aside, he looks like a person. Like a real. Like, I don't know, there's like. You're like. I get like, yeah, he doesn't look.
• 1:09:52
  Speaker B: Like a flat cartoon character.
• 1:09:54
  Speaker A: He looks like a human. Like a. There's a. He looks like he has a soul. And all of the Disney characters, you feel like they actually have souls. And something about the way so many of these other animated features from this time period, you're Just like, there's nothing behind the eyes there. They're just.
• 1:10:11
  Speaker B: Yeah, I agree.
• 1:10:11
  Speaker A: Drawings. I don't know. It's so hard to describe. One of the things that cracked me up is when the first song starts playing, I was like, boy, they're definitely not going for a Circle of Life feeling here for their opening number during the credits because it's very. They're doing, like, the style of song feels very reminiscent of Circle of Life to me. That being said, it's a pretty fun song. I thought it had a lot of energy. And for the opening number, I was like, okay, not bad. I was like, I think this is fairly fun. Like bagpipes. And it has that opening song has, like, a kind of bagpipe motif running through it that I thought was fun, but it kind of goes downhill from there. Yeah. Not even downhill. There's a couple highlights, but for the most part, it's. It's not great. Like, because the next note I had was, oh, yeah. So On My Father's Wings is a pretty weak I Want song.
• 1:11:04
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 1:11:04
  Speaker A: Which is Kaylee's big.
• 1:11:08
  Speaker B: Yeah, that's her big number. Yeah. It is kind of her I Want song, definitely. Although it doesn't a good I Want thesis.
• 1:11:16
  Speaker A: No, it doesn't. And that's a. The part problem of it. It's. It. Well, it does, but it's all motivated on, like, following in her father's footsteps in a way that just feels kind of like, okay, sure, I guess. And it's. Yeah.
• 1:11:28
  Speaker B: It also feels too much like a church song for me.
• 1:11:31
  Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah.
• 1:11:33
  Speaker B: Like, On My Father's Wings is, like, very church.
• 1:11:36
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 1:11:37
  Speaker B: Christian coded language.
• 1:11:39
  Speaker A: Yeah. No, you're not wrong about that. That.
• 1:11:42
  Speaker B: A little moment that made me crack up. When the griffin attacks Camelot and steals the sword, he, like, bursts in through the ceiling. And one of the other knights goes, it's a griffin. But he, like, whispers it. He's like, it's a griffin.
• 1:12:01
  Speaker A: Yeah. We both were. We both started chuckling somebody. Yeah. Yeah.
• 1:12:06
  Speaker B: Somebody was worried that the kids wouldn't know what the creature was.
• 1:12:09
  Speaker A: That's 100% why that was because we both chuckled. Like, like, you think the rest of the knights in the room aren't aware of the giant bird that just burst through the. Yeah.
• 1:12:19
  Speaker B: Why does Merlin look super evil in this movie?
• 1:12:24
  Speaker A: I thought that was fun because I.
• 1:12:26
  Speaker B: Had the same feeling, but so evil. I wait. I waited for a late twist villain reveal for, like, the entire movie.
• 1:12:33
  Speaker A: Me too. I 100. Like, when you saw him the first time, I was like, like, we saw him the first time, I was like, oh, who's this evil little wizard who's gonna be a villain later? I was like, oh, wait, that's probably Merlin. And then like when my brain was like, oh wait, that's probably Merlin. And it was. I thought that was fun because Merlin should be kind of shady. Look, I feel like all wizards should have an air of men about them. They're wizards, they're. They're communing with the dark arts, you know, like they should.
• 1:12:57
  Speaker B: Or the pagan forces, whatever.
• 1:12:59
  Speaker A: I don't care. Whatever it is. They should all have a little air of menace. I feel like just a little bit. Except for Radagast. He's different. But like most of them should have, you know, like Gandalf. He has an air of menace to him. Like, you're like, I don't know, like that guy. Yeah, he's very kindly old man. Sure.
• 1:13:16
  Speaker B: But like, you wouldn't want to get on the wrong side of him.
• 1:13:19
  Speaker A: And I feel like Merlin. Yeah, he should look kind of. Now he looks very evil.
• 1:13:22
  Speaker B: He looks very evil in this.
• 1:13:24
  Speaker A: He looks clearly like a villain. Yes. Yeah. So what probably the most well known song from this movie is the song called the Prayer. And, and I was not expecting. The way they use it in the movie is it occurs over when she runs away, she escapes. When after they attack her house and her mom has her run, she escapes and she's on a horse running from Ruber's men or chasing her.
• 1:13:50
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 1:13:51
  Speaker A: And the song plays over that chase scene.
• 1:13:54
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 1:13:55
  Speaker A: And I don't think it remotely works the way they thought it would. I think maybe if they didn't put the sound effects, like if it just. If the sound from the, the, the. The actions we were seeing on screen completely dropped out and it was just the music, that might have worked. I don't know for sure, but that might have worked. But as is, it's so incongruous because it's this very emotional, like, soaring, like, ballad.
• 1:14:27
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 1:14:28
  Speaker A: And then we're hearing like, ah, like a horse. Like G. Like. And. And you're like what. You're hearing that in the background as like Celine Dion is singing about the Mom's Prayer about like her daughter. And then it's just like horses galloping down streets. And like, it's like, oh my God. And you're like, what? It. It makes no sense. And again, I think if the sound had cut out completely and it was just the music and it was like drawn in slow mo, I think it could have Worked potentially. But boy, I thought that made no sense at all. Like how that played out in the movie.
• 1:15:08
  Speaker B: This is another song that has a religious vibe that I didn't personally care for.
• 1:15:13
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 1:15:14
  Speaker B: But I also. I don't remember if we mentioned this in the prequel or not. And this is going to be ironic considering what I just said about the religious vibe of this song. But I also did notice that this lost.
• 1:15:31
  Speaker A: It lost the Oscar for Best original song. To the Prince of Egypt.
• 1:15:34
  Speaker B: To the Prince of Egypt. As it should. Because the Prince of Egypt is incredible.
• 1:15:41
  Speaker A: Yeah, we'll have to do that one day because I still have not seen it.
• 1:15:46
  Speaker B: We're just going to have to read the book of Exodus, I guess.
• 1:15:50
  Speaker A: I have read the book of Exodus. So back in the day in college. But I read the first handful of books of the Bible. I thought the song. If I did. Oh, wait, no, I skipped ahead here. Sorry. Oh, that was. That was another thing I noticed is as soon as Kaylie showed up, I was like, boy, she really has a bad case of bell face. Yeah. It's very, very clear where they're pulling inspiration from here.
• 1:16:20
  Speaker B: And she's kind of a bargain bin 90s Disney princess all around from the way she looks to her. Not like other girls. Motivated.
• 1:16:28
  Speaker A: Absolutely. Which is fine. I understand why they're doing that. But boy, they should have tried to make her look not exactly like Belle in the face and the hair explicitly. It's just like, yeah, that's Belle. And boy, when Garrett gets his first song, which I actually thought this was one of the better songs in the movie. His, like, big number that he has by himself, the guy they got to sing for him sounds nothing like Carrie Elwood.
• 1:16:56
  Speaker B: It's.
• 1:16:57
  Speaker A: It. It's abs. It's one of the most. Most like jarring singing voice versus character voices in one of these movies I've ever seen. Because usually, like, I don't really even notice. Like, it's hard to tell because, like, you know, usually they do a pretty.
• 1:17:12
  Speaker B: Good job with that kind of. Yeah.
• 1:17:13
  Speaker A: And they're singing. So as long as they're not super far apart, it's, you know, your brain just kind of like, ah, fine, whatever. But this one, I was like, that guy sounds nothing like. Well, and I think part of it too is that he's doing like 90s R B style, like singing.
• 1:17:30
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 1:17:31
  Speaker A: And it just doesn't work. I like that song a fair amount. I can't remember what it's called. I Stand Alone, I think, or whatever. That song was fine. But the the tenor of the voice, I just. Or the timbre, whatever, just did not work at all. And. And not remotely. When you listen to Carrie Ellis do the dialogue and then that singing starts, you're like, those aren't the same person.
• 1:17:54
  Speaker B: Fun fact that I just recently learned falcons are not in the same family as other birds of prey, like hawks and eagles. They're actually more closely related to parrots.
• 1:18:06
  Speaker A: I had no idea.
• 1:18:08
  Speaker B: Yeah, I didn't know that either, but I learned that recently.
• 1:18:12
  Speaker A: Well, now, the more. You know, I thought if I didn't have you was another stinker.
• 1:18:17
  Speaker B: Absolutely.
• 1:18:17
  Speaker A: That's the.
• 1:18:18
  Speaker B: The comic Relief dragon song.
• 1:18:22
  Speaker A: It's not good. A lot of the two. I had this issue with a lot of this. The lyrics, the audio mix. It was hard to hear some of the lyrics I thought were not mixed really that well. And I was like, there are times where I'm like, what are you. I can't hear you over the music. Yeah. This was a fun little detail I thought was funny. It just cracked me up. It's. Somebody's having a conversation. I think it's the dragons. And I don't remember the context.
• 1:18:48
  Speaker B: I don't remember the context of this either.
• 1:18:50
  Speaker A: But they just. One of them says, we just broke the number one rule. And then the other one goes, never wear brown shoes with a blue suit. Or something like that.
• 1:18:58
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 1:18:59
  Speaker A: He thinks that's what the number one rule is. And I was like, boy, that's not a rule anymore.
• 1:19:05
  Speaker B: Yeah. This is literally what you wore at Sam's wedding.
• 1:19:08
  Speaker A: Yes. Literally in a wedding about a month ago. And we wore blue suits with brown shoes, which. Yeah, I was like. I guess that was a thing back in the day. It seems interesting because to me, brown shoes almost work better with a blue suit.
• 1:19:22
  Speaker B: I agree. Yeah. Like, I feel like the line should have been, never wear black shoes with a blue suit. Because I feel like that's the actual fashion rule.
• 1:19:31
  Speaker A: Maybe it wasn't back in the day. I don't know. Like, the normal. Now the main thing is just you match your belt to your shoes.
• 1:19:37
  Speaker B: Or maybe it's supposed to be funny that he gets it wrong.
• 1:19:39
  Speaker A: I don't know. I don't know. But, yeah. Because I. I was like, that doesn't make any sense. Because, yeah. Black shoes, especially with, like, a dark blue shoe.
• 1:19:48
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 1:19:48
  Speaker A: Would look terrible. Yeah. This was like. I. This joke is from something else, and I could not. It was driving me crazy. And I. I still can't. I forgot to look it up. So now I'm gonna have to ask our listeners, because I don't want to Google. During the middle of the episode when they get. I think that's when they're in the. The cave with the rock goblin troll thing. Giant rock giant ruber and his. His knights are sneaking in. And he turns around to his knights, and he goes, walk this way. And then he starts sneaking. And then they all do the exact same, like, sneaky walk that he does. Like, interpreting his walk this way to mean, like, literally walk exactly the way I am. And I'm like, that's a joke from another movie. I've seen that in another movie. And I couldn't remember. Remember what it was.
• 1:20:34
  Speaker B: I have no idea.
• 1:20:35
  Speaker A: If you know, you know, please write. Please put it, because I. It's driving me crazy. I thought, though, one of my favorite gags in the movie and, like, kind of little moments was when in the giant rock troll cave when they're trying to get the sword back from him and they're dangling Kaylee down to, like, grab the sword, and then he opens his eyeball, and she's, like, hanging in front of his eye. And then she's like. They start swinging her back and forth, and she's like, you're very sleepy. And it, like, the hypnosis gag, I thought that was pretty funny. I thought that was, like, a fun gag where they lay that I was like, okay, that's actually like, a fun moment. It's like, one of four in the movie that I made a note of. But. And then my final note was that I thought Kaylee's wedding dress at the end was pretty sick. It's a very cool dress. But then I was like, wait a second. It's not a wedding dress. I guess they're not getting married.
• 1:21:28
  Speaker B: It sure looks like it.
• 1:21:29
  Speaker A: Yeah. But also, this whole ending, I was like, man, this movie couldn't wait to be over. Once they get that, they get back. It's just like, get out of here. It's over. I don't know the end.
• 1:21:39
  Speaker B: Yeah, I do.
• 1:21:40
  Speaker A: I feel it doesn't even end on a particularly good final shot. They're riding into the distance. But that's like, can you spend an extra couple days on that? Just, like, fleshing out the sunset and stuff and making it pretty. It's just the most generic, bland, like, countryside drawing. Yeah.
• 1:21:56
  Speaker B: Yeah. I do feel like this movie kind of tried to have its cake and eat it, too, by using some wedding imagery, but not actually depicting them getting married in the end, because that probably would have been criticized in the 90s.
• 1:22:12
  Speaker A: I think I may be thinking of Young Frankenstein. But it is. It's literally such a. It's a. It's so Walk this way is a recurrent pun in a number of comedy films and television shows. It may be derived from an old vaudeville joke that refers to the double usage of the word way in English as both a direction and a manner. I think what I was thinking of may be Young Frankenstein. I think there's a joke in that where he goes, walk this way. And then he like starts. I'm like 99% sure that's what I was thinking of. Was that so.
• 1:22:48
  Speaker B: All right, mystery solved. All right.
• 1:22:52
  Speaker A: Before we get to the final verdict, we want to remind you you could do us a favor by heading over to of Facebook, Instagram threads, Blue Sky, Goodreads, any of those places. Interact with us. We'd love to hear from you, hear what you have to say about Quest for Camelot. This is a childhood favorite of yours. Go to bat for it. We would love to hear why you love it and what your feelings are on it.
• 1:23:09
  Speaker B: Also, if you follow us on Facebook and you would be interested in a Facebook group. Yes, let us know because we're thinking about doing that. Because it seems like more people interact with groups than with pages.
• 1:23:23
  Speaker A: Yeah, we're probably going to do it anyways, but we're still just wanting to get feedback if anybody, because a lot of our listeners are on other platforms. So like some of our listeners, at least I know, I don't know how many on Facebook seems.
• 1:23:34
  Speaker B: It seems like based on the metrics from our posts that Facebook is just not showing a lot of people our posts. So we're wondering if we do a group instead, if maybe that would be better.
• 1:23:45
  Speaker A: Yeah, because it would also drive obviously kind of natural interaction. Like because people can post, people other than us can post in those groups and you can drive conversation and stuff that way and share memes or whatever. So we probably will be doing that. So look out for that. But also let us know if you'd be interested in it. But again, we'll be doing that regardless. I think at some point here. Also, you can help us out by heading over to Apple Podcasts, Spotify. Wherever you listen to our show, drop us a five star rating, write us a nice little review that really helps out. We would appreciate that. And you can Support us@patreon.com ThisFilmIsLit get access to bonus content. We just put out our episode on the Rocky Horror Picture show last month and coming up in a week or so, we'll have our review of Revenge for this month, which is our bonus episode, and you get access to other stuff too, so go check that out at Patreon. Katie, it's time for the final verdict.
• 1:24:33
  Speaker B: Sentence fast.
• 1:24:35
  Speaker A: Verdict after.
• 1:24:37
  Speaker B: That's stupid. I'm not as well versed in Arthurian legend as I'd like to be. It's just kind of something that I never got around to, but every time I interact with it, I like it a lot. That being said, I definitely found the book to be a more satisfying story than the movie. It's a tiny bit meandering, but I enjoyed its use of Arthurian characters, both well known and a little more obscure, and the way that it explored its themes. Even if I didn't always agree with the message, the movie isn't as bad as it could be. It's mostly just boring. It's a pretty surface level plot. A lot of the character motivations are underbaked, the songs are underwhelming, the animation is middling to ugly, and I feel like the filmmakers leaned heavily on the magic of the Forbidden Forest to keep things interesting. But it was far less interesting than similar settings in other movies like FernGully, for example. I would be interested to hear from any listeners who were really fond of this one growing up because I missed it and I'm having a hard time deciding if I would have liked it in 1998 or not.
• 1:25:51
  Speaker A: Real quick, I did. Now I do know for sure. And I should have mentioned this earlier. I did not watch this as a kid.
• 1:25:56
  Speaker B: None of this. Definitely had never seen this before.
• 1:25:57
  Speaker A: None of this rung a bell to me at all.
• 1:25:59
  Speaker B: I don't know that I would revisit either of these properties, but I do know that one left me wanting to read up on Arthurian legend after I finished and and one of them I have already mostly forgotten. And for that reason and all the others I mentioned, I'm giving this one to the book.
• 1:26:19
  Speaker A: Katie, what's next?
• 1:26:21
  Speaker B: Up next, we are doing something that I am so excited about. I'm so excited to be covering I have not terrifying. I have heard a movie that haunts my nightmares. We are going to be talking about 1985's return to Oz I Cannot Wait, which is based on two different Oz books. It pulls from the Marvelous Land of Oz and Ozma of Oz.
• 1:26:52
  Speaker A: There you go. The Marvelous Land of Oz was my mom's preschool. That's what it was named after.
• 1:26:56
  Speaker B: Really.
• 1:26:56
  Speaker A: The Land of Oz was the name of her preschool that she ran forever. Yeah, but No, I am excited because I've heard and I've seen images from the movie, but I don't know anything about it or what. I just know it's notoriously this weird. Creepy, Insane.
• 1:27:12
  Speaker B: Very weird. Very creepy. Like I. Again, a movie that has haunted my nightmares. Yeah, for sure. And I didn't even see it like that. Young, really, but it's. It's pretty creepy, man.
• 1:27:26
  Speaker A: I'm excited. So, yes, look out for that in two weeks time. In one week's time, we'll be previewing Return to Oz as well as seeing what all of you have had to say about Quest for Camelot. Until that time, guys, gals, non binary.
• 1:27:41
  Speaker B: Pals, and everybody else, keep reading books.
• 1:27:43
  Speaker A: Keep watching movies, and keep being awesome. RA.