Mordred’s Daughter Takes Center Stage: Prince Valiant Volumes 24 and 25, 1983-1986

The Prince Valiant saga continues with two of the most significant volumes to date in the series from Fantagraphics. While most of the Prince Valiant strip encompasses individual episodic stories, these two volumes constitute a larger story arc.

One of my favorite things about the Prince Valiant strip has been watching Prince Valiant’s children grow up, and that remains true in these volumes. We begin with Valiant and Aleta’s youngest child who has been kidnapped and is eventually rescued. Nathan, as he ends up being named, is little more than an infant, while his older siblings range in age from Arn, now fully grown and old enough to achieve knighthood by the end of these volumes, to Karen and Valeta, the twin girls who are busy chasing after young men, and then Galen, whose age isn’t certain, but is probably about ten to twelve. All of the children provide plot lines relative to their various ages which helps to keep the humor of the strip going amid the more serious adventures.

But Arn is the child at the center of the most serious adventures in these two volumes. Earlier, he had met and fallen in love with Maeve, but he did not know that Maeve is Mordred’s daughter. In these volumes, he learns of her unfortunate parentage, but he continues to love her. Maeve also proves herself to be her father’s daughter only biologically. As Mordred plots to overthrow Camelot, she turns against him, resulting in him imprisoning her and Arn eventually having to rescue her.

The first volume ends with Mordred successfully capturing Camelot and taking over Britain. Arthur and his court flee first to France and then to Thule, which for the first time is depicted on a map, showing it is clearly modern-day Norway. Valiant father’s, King Aguar, willingly takes in King Arthur, since once upon a time (when the strip first opened), Arthur had provided shelter to Aguar and his people. Once in Thule, Arthur and his knights plot how to regain control of Britain. Along the way, there is an exciting plot involving a competition between two brothers for the throne of Lappland.

Eventually, Arthur makes an agreement with the Saxons of Saxony to let them settle in Britain in exchange for their assistance in overthrowing Mordred. Earlier, Arn had made an agreement with some other Saxons to guard parts of Britain. Arthur is slowly becoming used to the idea that Britain will no longer belong solely to the Britons, and he notes how the Romans and Britons’ blood mingled in the past, and now Saxon blood will mingle with them also. In the October 23, 1983 strip, he states that the Britons and really all peoples are mongrels and then, “if we must be mongrels, let us be mongrels in peace.”

Arthur is not so open-minded when he learns Arn is in love with Maeve, but once Maeve proves herself loyal to Arn and Arthur and not Mordred, he is more accepting of her and will eventually surprise everyone by his graciousness.

But first, Arthur, with the aid of the Saxons and the Viking Boltar, has to invade Britain again. Battles ensue. Arn rescues Maeve from Mordred’s prison, only to have her recaptured by Mordred, and then rescued again. After Mordred discovers Maeve’s escape through dungeon caverns, he is captured by the Dawn people, a diminutive people from ancient Britain who then help to save Camelot.

Once Arthur is back in power, he asks the Dawn People what became of Mordred. They tell him they do not know—that he must have escaped from them—but in truth, they want to bring about their own form of justice by sentencing him to life in a pit. It seems unlikely Mordred will ever escape, but given that he doesn’t die, I wouldn’t be surprised if he resurfaces later.

Of course, in the traditional Arthurian legend, Arthur and Mordred die while fighting together at the Battle of Camlann. Mordred’s effort in these volumes to conquer Camelot might be Prince Valiant’s take on Mordred’s treachery. Still, I suspect we will see more of Mordred, rather than just have a happy ending now, but for the time being, he has been vanquished.

All is now well and plans begin for Arn and Maeve’s wedding. Valiant gives Arn his mother’s ring to give to Maeve. However, it keeps falling off her finger, so she puts it in a cabinet for safekeeping. Aleta has some difficulty adjusting to the idea of having a daughter-in-law, and at first, there is some tension over the wedding planning, but in the end, it seems like Aleta and Maeve will get along. The most surprising moment comes when Arthur declares that since he has no children and Maeve is his relative (his niece since Mordred is his brother), that Maeve and Arn’s child shall rule Camelot after him, and should he die before the child is old enough to rule, Arn will be regent. And so the bloodline of Arthur and Valiant is mingled.

I was expecting the strip to end in 1986 with Maeve and Arn’s wedding, but it did not. Instead, it ends with the wedding ring disappearing. Fears it was stolen lead to Galen doing an investigation and discovering the cabinet Maeve placed it in once belonged to Merlin, so it must be a magical cabinet. The mystery of where it disappeared to will apparently be solved in the 1987 strip. Volume 25 ends with a preview of Volume 26 for 1987-1988 that says the strip celebrates its fiftieth anniversary with the marriage of Arn and Maeve, which suggests the wedding might not take place for a while yet.

Volume 24 is accompanied by an opening essay by Stan Sakai, a Japanese-Hawaiian cartoonist who writes about the blend of history and fantasy in the Prince Valiant strip and how it influenced his own work. The volume ends with an essay about the creation of Prince Valiant miniatures in Germany, where the strip has been popular, and numerous photos of the miniatures. Volume 25 includes an essay by Cullen Murphy who did the writing for the strip under his father John Cullen Murphy. His essay is about his mother and how she helped inspire some of the artwork, especially being a model for Aleta, and it is accompanied by his mother in several photographs in poses similar to those in the strip. The volume concludes with an essay by Meg (Murphy) Nash, John Cullen Murphy’s daughter, about her work helping her father with the lettering and coloring for the strip, which really made me appreciate the level of detail the strip required in the days before everything went digital, even down to making sure the newspapers used the right colors when reproducing it.

As Prince Valiant has progressed, at times the stories have become cliché and felt somewhat repetitive, but these four years reflect some of the finest storylines since the strip’s earliest years because of the larger arc to the story they provide. They make me want to continue on to see Arn and Maeve wed and their children grow up and to find out whether we have seen the last of Mordred.

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Tyler Tichelaar, PhD, is the author of The Children of Arthur series, which includes the novels Arthur’s Legacy, Melusine’s Gift, Ogier’s Prayer, Lilith’s Love, and Arthur’s Bosom. He has also written the nonfiction scholarly works King Arthur’s Children: A Study in Fiction and Tradition, plus works on Gothic literature and historical fiction, history, and biography. You can learn more about Tyler at www.ChildrenofArthur.com, www.GothicWanderer.com, and www.MarquetteFiction.com.

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Prince Valiant, Vol. 9: 1953-1954 – Aleta Wins the Day

This latest Fantagraphics reprint of Hal Foster’s wonderful strip begins with an insightful article by Mark Schultz, which says about everything I’ve thought that makes this strip so worthwhile. I have to admit the plots tend to become repetitive, and as wonderful as the illustrations are, the soap opera feel of the storyline becomes a bit tedious, but Foster shined for two things in particular—the breathtaking landscape scenes he did and the way he could draw a face and convey expression in it.

I’ve always liked to draw since I was a kid, but I have never been able to pull off realistic-looking faces. Foster was a master at this and someone we could all learn from. In this opening essay, Schultz talks about how Foster depicts Valiant and Aleta’s relationship through his ability to show their feelings for each other, as well as how they mask those feelings. Schultz says Foster was unique in this ability to reveal the characters’ internal lives through their expressions and body language, and I very much agree.

This particular volume picks up with the end of Valiant’s efforts to bring Christianity to Thule—and with rather alarming results. Valiant is shown destroying Pagan idols, something that in the twenty-first century I found upsetting and disgusting because we tend to be more open to diversity in these days, and while I was raised a Christian, I couldn’t help but feel the unfairness of this behavior, and when the destruction of these idols infers that they are false because they do nothing to avenge themselves, I can’t help noticing that Foster has the Pagans burn the Christian church down next, and the Christian God doesn’t intercede either, which leaves the reader wondering whether either God is real or exists, at least from Foster’s viewpoint. Of course, the Christian church is rebuilt, and then Valiant and Aleta go off on adventures, leaving the religious theme behind for now until later in the volume when Valiant ends up in Ireland and meets St. Patrick.

Valiant and Aleta part ways early in the volume because Aleta wants to go visit the Misty Isles, but Val ends up being called to help King Arthur in fighting against the Saxons who have allied with the five kings of Cornwall. By the time these battles are done, Val has introduced the idea of using stirrups for the knights, which is often introduced as a reason why King Arthur was successful and able to hold back the Saxons in several Arthurian novels that have been published since then, though I’m unsure who first introduced this idea into Arthurian literature—perhaps it was Foster.

But the real highlight of the volume, as Schultz remarks, is how Aleta manages as a woman to gain control in the Misty Isles, putting down a possible rebellion in her kingdom through her female presence and her cleverness. One of the things I really love about Foster’s storytelling is that while there are battles and swordplay and violence, many of the conflicts are resolved through Aleta or Val’s trickery and cleverness. It’s always more fun to trick or outsmart an enemy than to have to kill him. Bullies and cowards then end up showing their true colors and getting what they deserve.

A trip to the Holy Land, although not overly dramatic, but again with a little trickery to save the day, rounds out the volume along with the introduction of a girl character, Diane, who becomes friends with Valiant and Aleta’s son, Arn. Arn seems to have really grown up in this volume and transition from being a toddler to now a young boy; the strips from his viewpoint are refreshing, plus Diane appears to be a clever young version of Aleta.

The volume concludes with an essay about the 1954 film version of Prince Valiant starring Robert Wagner. The essay puts the film in context with what was happening in Hollywood at the time and changes in the movie industry, as well as discussing the film’s reception. It was rather a flop of the film, but it’s still a film I find entertaining (see my previous review of it at https://childrenofarthur.wordpress.com/2012/02/22/prince-valiant-in-glorious-technicolor-a-review-of-the-1954-film/), though it takes a lot of liberties with the strip. Apparently, Foster wasn’t too crazy about the film either, according to the article.

Volume 10 has just been released this month, so watch for my next review soon. In the meantime, Volume 9 has plenty to entertain.

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Tyler R. Tichelaar, Ph.D. is the author of King Arthur’s Children: A Study in Fiction and Tradition and the new Children of Arthur series, available at www.ChildrenofArthur.com

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Prince Valiant: Vol. 1, 1937-1938

Prince Valiant Vol. 1: 1937-1938 by Hal Foster

Because it’s the 75^th anniversary of the Prince Valiant comic strip this month, I thought I would summarize and review the first volume of the series, now reprinted by Fantagraphics Book, which covers the first two years of the series in print. Fantagraphics is planning to reprint hopefully the entire series, but so far the first five have been released (the 5^th is coming in March actually).

The Prince Valiant strip is subtitled “In the Days of King Arthur” and consequently some people have been skeptical about whether it really belongs in the Arthurian canon. In truth, it is often marginal as Valiant goes off on adventures on the Continent, far from King Arthur’s court, but Camelot remains home base throughout the series. Following is a summary of what occurs in this first volume. I usually don’t like to give away full plots, but since this volume is the beginning of the story, it’s important to clarify just how much of the strip is relevant to King Arthur.

The story begins with the King of Thule and his family being forced to flee from their country. They go to Britain, fighting the locals to land on the shore. At this time, Prince Valiant is just a boy. He looks to be between about ages six and eight in the strip. King Arthur, to keep the peace, allows the King and his faithful followers to settle in the Fens, a marshy area where the people live on islands in a swamp and make their way through the swamps on boats and rafts. Lizard type monsters are also hiding in the Fens.

Valiant grows up in this environment until he approaches manhood. One day, after fighting one of the monster lizards, Valiant sees a mysterious light far off in the Fens and is determined to find its source. In the process Valiant is attacked by a monster who turns out to be a “huge misshapen man, horrible in his deformities.” Valiant wounds the man but then cares for him and takes him home to his mother, who turns out to be the witch Horrit (the first time she is mentioned her name is Horrid, but Hal Foster must have decided to change the spelling in subsequent strips). This meeting is significant because Horrit makes a prophecy that will haunt Valiant for the rest of his life.

As the witch makes her prophecy, Val gazes into the fire and becomes dreamy until he has visions of castles and armies, knights in armor, and then a king and queen, whom the witch says is “Stupid Arthur and his flighty wench, Guinevere.” She goes on to prophesy, “And you will confront the unicorn, the dragon and the griffon, black men and yellow. You will have high adventure, but nowhere do I see happiness and contentment,” and she tells him already his greatest sorrow awaits him.

Valiant leaves the witch to discover his greatest sorrow—that his mother has died. After grieving, Valiant decides it’s time to set off to seek his fortune. Soon after, he meets Sir Lancelot and his squire, and when the squire is rude to him, Valiant pulls him off his horse and beats him to give him a lesson. Lancelot is good natured but stops the fight and then rides off with his squire. The incident makes Valiant determined to become a knight. Eventually, Valiant finds a horse, learns to ride, and then saves Sir Gawain from another knight who attacks Gawain. Soon Valiant and Gawain have formed a lasting friendship.

Gawain takes Valiant to Camelot where two conspirators soon after decide to kidnap Gawain and hold him for ransom. They trick Valiant and Gawain to visiting the Castle of Ereiwold where Gawain is captured and becomes a prisoner. Of course, Valiant eventually rescues him. After the rescue, however, Gawain gets wounded in a fight with another knight, and Val has to take his place to go on his first quest to rescue the fair maid Ilene’s parents, who are being held prisoner in their castle by an ogre.

Once he sneaks into the castle, Val soon realizes the ogre is a fake with makeup to make him look frightening. Val decides to use fear, the same weapon, to conquer the ogre, disguising himself and appearing like a flying demon in the castle’s hall. In time, Val defeats the ogre and his men, and he rescues Ilene’s parents.

Val is in love with Ilene by this point, but she is already betrothed to the King of Ord. Val wants to stay and fight for Ilene, but Gawain has gotten in trouble again, kidnapped by Morgan le Fey, half-sister of King Arthur. Val goes off to rescue his friend, making the mistake of confronting Morgan le Fey, who puts him under a spell, but in time, he realizes his food is drugged and he quits eating so he’s in his right mind. Then he is able to escape from the castle. Val goes to Merlin, who works his own spell to scare Morgan le Fey into freeing Gawain.

Gawain is freed in time for Val to be invited to a tournament to celebrate the marriage of Prince Arn of Ord and Ilene. Val is determined to challenge Arn, but the challenge occurs on a bridge, resulting in Arn falling and nearly drowning and Val saving him. They plan to fight again nevertheless, but when they begin, a Viking raid occurs and instead, they become allies against their enemies. Before the battle with the Vikings, Arn gives Val the famous Singing Sword, which bears a charm and of course helps him to defeat his enemies. Despite his success, Val is captured by his enemies and he and Ilene are taken over the sea, while hoping Arn will rescue them. In time, Val and Ilene are separated and Ilene ends up on a ship that sinks, leaving Val and Arn heartbroken.

Once Val and Arn return to Camelot, Lancelot tells them they are fortunate Ilene drowned because now they are friends whereas otherwise there always would have been strife between them and Ilene would have blamed herself as the cause of it all.

To deal with his grief, Val returns home to the Fens. As this first volume ends, Val overcomes his grief and decides it’s time he lead his father’s people to return and re-conquer Thule, but before they can act on their plan, a major Saxon invasion threatens England. Val returns to Camelot to fight beside the Knights of the Round Table.

In addition to the strip itself, which is in its brightest glorious color because it’s reprinted directly from Foster’s colored plates, there is an essay in the back by Kim Thompson about the reproduction of Prince Valiant and the various plates, which is quite interesting to read, and even mentions a few of the more gruesome scenes in the story that were censored out. The book also contains a biographical essay about Hal Foster and an interesting interview with Foster.

The plot of Prince Valiant is more like a soap opera in terms of its cliffhangers at the end of most strips and its constant continuation with no end in mind. Foster reputedly was usually ahead in creating the strip by several weeks, but one wonders if he ever imagined when it began that the strip could run not only for many years but many decades and encompass all of Prince Valiant’s life basically. He had no need to plot it in a specific direction, yet there are still certain arching points to the story, including the prophecy that Valiant can never know happiness and the basics of the King Arthur story as well.

For people still uncertain whether they would enjoy Prince Valiant, I recommend getting a copy of this first volume and trying it out; then you can determine whether you want to continue to read the successive volumes, which would be quite a time commitment, but there are far worse ways to spend your time than with Prince Valiant in the Days of King Arthur.

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