Arthur 7/14/06

[scarfman]

Here are cartoons from Arthur, King of Time and Space since last Friday. Fanfiction cartoons are on their annual summer hiatus.

Thanks for reading.

Comments

[athelind.livejournal.com]

I've said it before, but one thing I like about the red-border strips are the glimpses we see in the Modern and Space arcs of Arthur, Guenevere and Lancelot, well past the age of Arthur's 25-year reign, having obviously reconciled and living peaceful, happy lives.

If Arthur's fate through time and space was to simply replay the same tragedy over and over, AKOTAS would be immeasurably depressing.

[scarfman]

The three of them in this week's flashforward are definitely older than in any flashforward yet: Guenevere's hair is paler orange, Lancelot's is white over more of his scalp, Arthur's hair has lost all color and his waistline has gotten away from him (which, as the setup for this gag, is why it hadda be set later than any previous flashforward). However, I'd advise noting that no flashforward yet except one is expressly dated. That one is dated as "twenty-three years later [than year two]", and in that one Guenevere's hair is faded from red but still full orange, as it is in all the farthest flashforwards to date except this week's. It cannot be deduced from available data that Arthur is past forty in any flashforward except this week's.

Things will be different in the other two major arcs than they are in the baseline arc. They already are; e.g., Mordred's a squire in the space arc, an infant in the baseline arc, and not yet conceived in the contemporary arc. In the baseline arc, by definition, Arthur won't survive the classical end of the legend. This week's flashforward shows contemporary Arthur shall survive baseline Arthur. But on this point there's no data about the space arc.

[redneckgaijin.livejournal.com]

What really intrigues me is, with the asymmetric retelling of the legends, that Arthur occasionally, and to a limited extent, shows awareness of the timeshifts. I'm not -entirely- certain whether or not that's fourth-wall-breaking, but it makes me wonder if Arthur will be aware enough, when the time comes, to try to change in the future what has gone tragically wrong in the past.

Not asking, just intrigued.