Comic Book Review: Once & Future Volume One: The King Is Undead written by Kieron Gillen, illustrated by Dan Mora
Stories are true. If told often enough, if they resonate with enough people, stories have power in the waking world. And one of the most popular stories, especially in Great Britain, is the tale of King Arthur. It is said that the true king will return in Britain’s darkest hour…but it’s never actually been said he’d be there to save it. Whan a Fifth Century artifact that is the sheath of Excalibur (or close enough for magic) surfaces, a cult steals it to perform a ritual to bring King Arthur back in the present day to drive out the foreigners.
What most of these bigots don’t realize, though the “Elaine” that talked them into this stunt does, is that the earliest version of Arthur was Welsh, and the invaders he fought against were the Anglo-Saxons. The “Anglishmen” pay dearly for their mistake.
At first, contemporary literature major Duncan McGuire is unaware of these events. He’s just trying to have a first date with a woman he likes, Rose Chandra, and it’s already going poorly when he gets the message that his grandmother Bridgette has escaped from her nursing home. “Escaped” might be a strong word given she was there voluntarily, but she’s disappeared without leaving any notice.
When Duncan meets his grandmother in the middle of nowhere, she’s digging up a weapons cache, and then they’re attacked by a monster. It can’t be killed just yet, but can be warded off. Then Bridgette holds him at gunpoint to take her to Glastonbury.
Turns out that when Gran was younger, she was a vampire hunter, with a sideline in other monsters. When she and her companions succeeded in killing all the vampires, Britain was free of mythical beasties and she could retire. But there’s always someone who wants to bring the stories back, so she raised Duncan in a particular way, including the middle name Percy, so he could become a Grail Knight should that ever be necessary.
And now King Arthur’s back and that could mean huge trouble for everyone.
In this horror-adventure series, stories do indeed have power. Accepting or being forced into a role within that tale’s outline can give you immense power within that story, but also locks you into certain actions and consequences. You maybe don’t want to get stuck with the role of “knight who dies to prove how awesome Lancelot is” for example.
Complicating matters is that due to the many different interpretations of King Arthur in media over the centuries, there are more than one of him running around. Plus other stories have also made it back to the living world, ones that Bridgette hasn’t studied so well.
Rose also gets called in to assist, first as Duncan’s lifeline, and later taking on more “story” roles.
This volume ends with Duncan firmly stuck in the family business, but on the outs with Bridgette due to her manipulations.
The series has a good match of writing and art; the various supernatural beings have spooky designs. There’s enough twists and turns to keep things moving despite the relatively small protagonist group.
Duncan’s deliberate isolation from all things supernatural as a child makes him a good target for expository explanations of what’s going on, though Bridgette keeps back information as much as she can.
Content note: frequent gory violence, mutilation, suicide. Later in the series there’s a political moment that may not sit well with all readers. Senior high readers and up should be able to handle it.
Since the series is about to end, now might be a good time to start from the beginning. Recommended especially to Arthurian mythos fans.
