Series 2 - Episode 10
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Oh. the disingenuous concern!! "Oooooooooh nasty! A new threat guards the Great Corridor of the Catacomb! Careful, team! We don't want Stuart mashed, do we? Heh heh heh heh..." Wow, Treguard really was a nasty b*stard in the first couple of years wasn't he?
"So, we meet at last, Stuart!"
"I am Mogdred the all-powerful!"
"Thwart me, and I cr-r-r-r-r-r-r-rush you into a particle of dust!"
"Forget them, Stuart! They cannot help you against the dark magic I command!" etc.
Strewth, did Mogdred ever come up with a line that wasn't a comic-book bad guy cliche? Even Mumm-Ra's dialogue in Thundercats had more colour in it. And yet, on a dark evening, with the lights out and the volume turned up, John Woodnutt's performances have so much unashamed gusto that they're still irresistable. It's a bit like watching Japanese episodes of The Transformers; if you can just switch off the bit of your brain that feeds on clever wordplay, you can even find Mogdred strangely entertaining.
"Those who arm themselves with the weapons of their enemies are ever likely to fail." Treguard's closing remarks at the end of Stuart's quest possibly refer to two choices the team made, not just one. Explicitly, they're a reference to the dagger they took from the Level Two Clue Room (yet again, your dungeoneer can't see to fight, so why bother with an offensive weapon when you've been given no clue that you should take it?) but implicitly it may also be a reference to the 'deal-with-the-devil' they struck. Even had the team found a way past the Dungeon Roundabout, they were almost certainly going to lose anyway, especially if they cast the spell Mogdred gave them. It's quite obvious that making a deal with Mogdred defeats the whole object of the game - if it's a quest for truth and justice, why do a deal with some tyrannical megalomaniac who, far from championing truth, appears determined to silence anyone who might give the dungeoneer advice contrary to his own e.g Treguard.
It's interesting to speculate why exactly Mogdred offers deals to dungeoneers, and what effect the spell would have. It could be that if POWER is cast, Mogdred might feed off the power unleashed, although what's not clear is why he never casts it himself. Maybe he can't for some reason, and so he's trying to trick others into casting it for him? Or maybe it's a trap, and the effects of the spell are the opposite of what the name suggests?
Next, Jamie's team. As the Clue Room and various scenes in the next episode demonstrate, they need far too much prompting from Treguard to have any serious hope of winning. Even so, their eventual defeat is strikingly noble and unlucky.
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Tom41, it's the 6-8 logo, not the 5-8 logo
A great moment today where Mogdred was disguised as Cedric- bet no one sar that coming! And the animation of the pendulum room was great, although it's difficult to see how they would have handled it if a dungeoneer had charged right in front of it. Possibly a life force damage. It was silly of them to take that 'silly dagger', as weapons are usually avoided. As for the death, well, I imagine they COULD have got through it by sheer guesswork, just they took the wrong door, and from then on any door they took returned them to the same room. At least they didn't use the POWER spell, though, as dark magic is never to be trusted!
Pity they didn't use that line from the book when they took the silly dagger. "What you gonna do with that, embroidery?"
The bees freaked me out as an 11 year old though.
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Does anyone else hear a watch beeping at 2:30? I'm guessing one member of the team forgot to remember that it wil was still active....
And continuing on with the "forgetting to remember" theme, I quite agree that the team didn't recall that they should never take the weapons of their enemies, unless advised to do so. As a result, it produces what I think is undoubtedly one of the most unusual deaths in Knightmare - Treguard tells them at the beginning of the room that they're already screwed, but when Stuart is guided through one of the doors, it looks like he's leaving fairly normally until he re-emerages at a different exit in the same room! This process carries on until the team's life force runs out.... No other death quite like it.
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Do we know for a fact that the "weapons of your enemies" rule was there from the beginning?
I know that the adventurer's code changed over time. I'm curious as to whether that particular statement was always present. Or, indeed, if the adventurer's code was always present.
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Do we know for a fact that the "weapons of your enemies" rule was there from the beginning?
I know that the adventurer's code changed over time. I'm curious as to whether that particular statement was always present. Or, indeed, if the adventurer's code was always present.
Yup, it was there from the start. Treguard made the same pre-quest speech throughout Series 1: "You will have read the rules of ritual and the Adventurer's Code..." "Choose cautiously, and use the magic or the weapons of your enemies with care."
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hm, clearly I need to re-watch series 1. I don't recall him mentioning the weapons of your enemies.
However, it's worth noting that the rules of ritual weren't present in series 8.
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The first Knightmare book, Knightmare: Can You Beat The Challenge?, states thus:
Beware the weapons of your enemies. Unless there are other indications, it is best to assume that all the weapons you discover fall into this category.
So it's certainly in the Code, as far as the books are concerned. However, CYBTC? came out immediately following series 2, so there's no indication as to whether the Code is lifted from the programme or not, but since none of the Code is specific to playing an adventure gamebook (and if DM had written it speficially for the gamebooks I imagine it would have had some such instructions), I'm guessing it was an adaptation of whatever Code they were using in the programme at the time.
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Silly team taking the danger, I wanted to see what Mogdred power spell was all about, guess we'll never know. But im surprised they didn't try it when trying to escape that room. 2nd death from starving. And the first time I think Modgred was seen in the flesh if you know what I mean.
Bit disappointed in the next team getting a really big clue with the Noah riddle, also surprised they went for the food in the bomb room "you're in a bomb" as one says. They're not very speedy that's for sure.
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A non death-related 'ooh nasty' - how many of those were there?
I love that death - really simple but strangely disturbing. I do, however, have a slight problem with the fact that they were very probably in losing status and that it was impossible for them to guess their way out. The part of me concerned with gameplay does feel that this is cheating slightly. Makes good TV though...
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The team made a schoolboy error by taking the dagger. The death was a bit boring though. They were doing ok before then. I did like the scene with Mogdread but it was only meant to hinder the team by giving them the POWER spell. I guess if they tried to use it, Treguard would have intervened.
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I thought it was a logical and justified death, it had already been set up rather than the producers throwing in a bomb room or a character wanting an item the team hadn't picked up, this room would have always been in the game I think so it was a cool death. Not boring at all, painful certainly. Treguard seemed to enjoy it.
They only tried two doors, and Treguard wouldn't let them use the door they came in (probs because they didn't want to have to keep re-starting the room maybe) but it could suggest it's an identical but different room... a maze, so finding the correct door by luck or guess would should be unlikely.
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I thought it was a logical and justified death, it had already been set up rather than the producers throwing in a bomb room or a character wanting an item the team hadn't picked up, this room would have always been in the game I think so it was a cool death. Not boring at all, painful certainly. Treguard seemed to enjoy it.
They only tried two doors, and Treguard wouldn't let them use the door they came in (probs because they didn't want to have to keep re-starting the room maybe) but it could suggest it's an identical but different room... a maze, so finding the correct door by luck or guess would should be unlikely.
It's just my opinion. I found boring because Stuart was just wondering around. So visual wise for me, it was a boring death. If the Automatum came in to chase Stuart that would have been a better death for me. More scary and more believable.
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I thought it was quite opposite, the panic and desperation of the dungeon and team fighting against their life force clock. knowing one of theses doors must be correct but life is draining away. Might have been better if the team were able to see their life force ticking away maybe.
Also I feel it adds variation then just falling, or being bonked on the head or taking away. I love theses unusual deaths.
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I thought it was quite opposite, the panic and desperation of the dungeon and team fighting against their life force clock. knowing one of theses doors must be correct but life is draining away. Might have been better if the team were able to see their life force ticking away maybe.
Also I feel it adds variation then just falling, or being bonked on the head or taking away. I love theses unusual deaths.
Maybe 'donked' sounds better!!
I do like unusual deaths too but for me visual wise, it has to look good.
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No it's differently "bonked" lol it's the term used on the Trapdoor when Berk bashes some nasty creature on the head.
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Mogdred dressed as Cedric - not the last time that an evil wizard dresses as a monk.
Poignantly, John Woodnutt's last on-screen role saw him wearing a habit as a friar in Dragonheart II.
The team made a schoolboy error by taking the dagger.
Ah, the folly of youth (no pun intended). I made schoolboy errors when I was a schoolboy too.
While it was unfortunate that the team didn't know a divining rod when they saw one, and careless of them to take a weapon, they were also unlucky to face a Level 2 clue object choice when so many Series 2 teams did not, including their invincible immediate predecessors.
The life force 'ran out' there and they died, even though they were still trying to direct the dungeoneer!
Stuart's advisors clearly don't know that his Life Force has finally run out until Treguard essentially tells them. This must have made at least some 1988 viewers aware that the Life Force clock was added afterwards.
So, no sooner has Jamie started than he dies in the bomb room. Obviously they were supposed to head straight for the exits rather than being diverted by the food they didn't need yet that was sitting right under a huge, active bomb, and the team paid the price for their mistake. Ooh na... What's that? They survived? The flame danced back down the fuse at least 28 times while Jamie sauntered around like the Pink Panther taking a morning stroll, making a thorough mockery of the bomb room and its intended tension? That doesn't seem just. I can only hope that later in the quest, the team will be given a challenge that emphasises the importance of quick manoeuvrability.
Up until Jamie's quest, Quest 9, the Level 1 clue rooms had alternated and Igneous had only been seen in even-numbered quests.
This episode's end theme music sounded slightly extended.
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The team made a schoolboy error by taking the dagger.
Ah, the folly of youth (no pun intended). I made schoolboy errors when I was a schoolboy too.
So, no sooner has Jamie started than he dies in the bomb room. Obviously they were supposed to head straight for the exits rather than being diverted by the food they didn't need yet that was sitting right under a huge, active bomb, and the team paid the price for their mistake. Ooh na... What's that? They survived? The flame danced back down the fuse at least 28 times while Jamie sauntered around like the Pink Panther taking a morning stroll, making a thorough mockery of the bomb room and its intended tension? That doesn't seem just. I can only hope that later in the quest, the team will be given a challenge that emphasises the importance of quick manoeuvrability.
Up until Jamie's quest, Quest 9, the Level 1 clue rooms had alternated and Igneous had only been seen in even-numbered quests.
This episode's end theme music sounded slightly extended.
Ha,I think we have all made schoolboy errors, and not just at school either!
I believe speed will be the downfall of Jamie but we shall wait and see!
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[quote=Drassil]
careless of them to take a weapon [...]
[/quote]
It's worth wondering whether the dungeoneer's code was always in that final state. Or, indeed, if there was even one in series 2.
The choice of clue objects is rarely a rushed one. It seems quite possible to me about not picking up the weapons of your enemies came in at a later date.
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