Mordred
509 - 5-year-old Mordred begins traveling the world, rallying an army of barbarians to destroy Camelot.
517 - 13-year-old Mordred assaults Camelot. Merlin forges the 2nd Shadowpact, cutting Morgaine Le Fay off from her power. Mordred & Morgaine are cast into the Paths Beyond, trapped in an ageless realm along with the fey folk banished by Merlin.
1943 - Mordred’s mother Morgaine Le Fay escapes the Paths Beyond during the 3rd Shadowpact, but has lost all her power.
35 years ago - Mordred's mother Morgaine Le Fay attempts to free him from the Paths Beyond, but is stopped by Jason Blood & Zatara.
22 years ago - Mordred's mother Morgaine Le Fay uses the Rhongomyniad to open the Paths Beyond to free him. She is stopped by Sir Ystin.
2 years ago - Mordred escapes the Paths Beyond when Morgaine Le Fay steals an artifact from Themyscera to force the doorways open. He begins forming his armies to take over the world, and they are stopped only by the Justice League, with their magic stripped from them.
One of the fun little details about big shared narrative worlds like DC is that they often have adaptations of public domain stories in them. DC characters have been interacting with Arthurian Legend practically from the beginning, and while there's actually a fairly surprising consistency to what's been presented, there's at least a few different takes we can consider before we create our version of one of the most infamous villains in fiction, Sir Mordred.
Just as a quick refresher; it's believed that there truly was a Sir Mordred, historically, but of course the legends of Arthur and his knights has been told and retold for centuries, and lots of elements have been added in that time. In the classic tale, Mordred is the child of King Arthur and Morgan Le Fay (who is also his sister, in later versions of the story). He became one of the Knights of the Round Table, and eventually rose up to murder his father and destroy his kingdom. This has taken a lot of different shapes in a lot of different interpretations, and now we get to take a look at some of the ones that have turned up in DC!
Just as a quick refresher; it's believed that there truly was a Sir Mordred, historically, but of course the legends of Arthur and his knights has been told and retold for centuries, and lots of elements have been added in that time. In the classic tale, Mordred is the child of King Arthur and Morgan Le Fay (who is also his sister, in later versions of the story). He became one of the Knights of the Round Table, and eventually rose up to murder his father and destroy his kingdom. This has taken a lot of different shapes in a lot of different interpretations, and now we get to take a look at some of the ones that have turned up in DC!
Mordred's Animation HistoryI've actually talked to other comic fans who simply had never heard of Mordred at all before he appeared in the Justice League animated series. Here, Morgaine Le Fay is already an known enemy of characters like Etrigan the Demon, so when it came time to introduce her son, they came up with a very particular visual that really drove home the idea that he was Morgaine's son: they actually made him a child. They really played up that he was an insolent little brat, and used him to great effect in some of the best stories in the series.
While you don't usually see Mordred depicted as a child, this is definitely something we can play with in our timeline. |
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Mordred's Comic HistoryDepictions of heroes interacting with Arthurian Legend go all the way back, whether it's Superboy time traveling, or Batman & Robin having a hypnotic journey. One particularly notable appearance happens in a Shining Knight backup story of Adventure Comics #153 in 1950. It's a pretty simple story, where Mordred & Justin wind up dueling on flying horses.
This is noteworthy, I think, because this actually establishes a baseline appearance for Mordred that seems to hold right on through. Whether it's in the pages of Swamp Thing, or even in John Byrne's Superman, Mordred seems to have maintained some version of this appearance. Modern appearances, like in the very good Matt Wagner Madame Xanadu series, do seem to be influenced to some degree by the young Mordred of the animated series, and of course, special mention has to be made of Brian Ballard's fantastic work in the non-canon maxi series Camelot 3000. |
Our Mordred StoryOur take on Mordred is pretty simple, as he's not really a character doing things, but rather functions more as the goal that Morgaine is trying to achieve. She wants to place her son on the throne, even though doing so will empower him to basically destroy the world, because he's motivated entirely by hatred and a lust for violence and death. Having this character actually be a child, we think, is pretty chilling, so we went with that in his initial appearances as he's amassing the forces he will lead against Camelot, but we wanted him to be a little older once the actual assault happens.
From that point forward, after he and his mother are defeated by Merlin's treachery and the 2nd Shadowpact, he actually is going to remain lost in the Paths Beyond for much of our story as Morgaine tries to free him. We do eventually want him to escape and confront the Justice League, because that will be a very cool story. He'd be 13 at the time, but we actually do love the golden armor worn by Mordred in the Camelot 3000 series with it's ostentatious plumes, and we'd love for him to wear this when he fights the league. We end the timeline with Mordred and Morgaine stripped of their magic, but we happen to think there's something really promising about the idea of the two of them somehow retreating into space where they can acquire some sort of alien fleet. Camelot 3000 isn't canon to any part of the DC universe, but there are some visual concepts there that are just too fantastic to not imagine happening at some point in the future of these characters. |
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