- "You want Daphne? Go get her!"
- —Mordroc, Dragon's Lair II: Time Warp
Mordroc is a recurring character in the Dragon's Lair series, who first debuted in Dragon's Lair 2: Time Warp as Dirk's main antagonist, and reprised this role in Dragon's Lair 3D. Mordroc was originally introduced as an evil wizard, the brother to a metallic Time Machine (their backstory never elaborated). Fixated on kidnapping Princess Daphne in order to force her into marriage using the Death Ring, Mordroc is also the master of many minions such as his pet Singe the Dragon.
In Dragon's Lair 3D: Return to the Lair, his backstory was somewhat retconned into a magician who aspired to collect all the powerful Dragon Essences for the purpose of freeing himself from banishment in an alternative dimension so that he can wreak havoc again upon the world. This version of the character kidnaps Daphne for the purpose of manipulating Dirk into bringing him the Essences, but also casually mentions his eventual intention to make her into his bride as a secondary objective.
Throughout the franchise, Mordroc is confirmed to be a relative to two other characters: an evil sorceress sister named Mordread and his benevolent brother the Time Machine.
Appearance and Abilities[]
Mordroc is an elderly wizard with grey skin, a football shaped head, a long nose covered with warts with a root-like branch at the end, thin & bony hand covered with warts, long sharp fingernails, yellow eyes and two very long hair strands of hair that extend down to his knees. He wears a long black cloak that covers over his body, a red hood that covers both his head, a shoulder cloak with square pattern around its perimeter that covers the large hump on his back, and large purple shoes. In his character model sheet for Dragon's Lair II, he is identified as simply "THE WIZARD."[1]
As a sorcerer, Mordroc has magical abilities. This includes shooting enhanced lightning, teleportation, generating force fields and generating fire through his staff. While Mordroc appears extremely scrawny and decrepit in his physique, he has toughed out being impaled through the arm with Dirk’s Sword to continue battling and berating his nemesis.
Mordroc also possesses the ability to transform on command as seen when he impersonates Princess Daphne to fool Dirk and lead him into traps. Most notably, if he has enough channeled energy through the Dragon Essences, Mordroc can transform into a powerful Black Dragon capable of sustained flight and magical energy projectile attacks.
Dragon's Lair[]
Although Mordroc neither appears nor is named in the first Dragon's Lair, he exists as a behind-the-scenes, unseen figure: the intro narration mentions that the game's setting is in fact "the castle of a dark wizard who has enchanted it with treacherous monsters and obstacles". Several home console ports and adaptations of the game would identify Mordroc as the castle’s wizard by name in their game manuals.
According to Superscope's Tele-Story Book, the ghostly apparition that emerges from the cauldron in the room with the Acid Creature is "the spirit of the evil wizard."
Dragon's Lair: Escape from Singe's Castle[]
The ReadySoft version has a leaflet with some backstory; an old storyteller tells about an Evil Wizard of Nor who sends Singe to abduct Daphne during the great fair and tournament where she fell in love with Dirk.
Dragon's Lair II: Time Warp[]
Mordroc is first encountered in the Prehistoric Stage, atop a rocky plain rising out of boiling mud with an exhausted Daphne in his grasp. As Dirk makes his way to them, Mordroc calls upon a legion of pterodactyls. He screams and taunts at Dirk (who is able to take back Daphne for a brief moment only to lose her again to Mordroc's minions), then teleporting away with the princess to another time period. In their second meeting in Lewis Carrol’s England, Mordroc immediately forms a force field around Dirk that distracts him long enough for the wizard to escape into the looking glass with the spellbound Daphne. As the chase continues into Wonderland, Mordroc once again taunts Dirk riding away on a giant Rook. The sorcerer escapes again leaving the large Jabberwocky to fend off Dirk, with Daphne still held captive. He appears again attacking Dirk on a piano with Beethoven playing his Symphony. While Dirk is distracted by Beethoven’s cat Karl attacking him, Mordroc manages to escape with Daphne yet again. In Ancient Egypt, Mordroc disguises himself as Daphne and mummifies his seemingly feminine figure, misleading Dirk and the Time Machine into believing it was the real princess, until Mordroc unveils himself at the last moment and attempts to cook Dirk in rising lava as he again makes his escape.
In the final encounter, Mordroc meets his end in two slightly different ways, both as the result of the Death Ring. The stage opens with the moment he succeeds in placing the Death Ring onto Daphne's finger before getting his own arm impaled by Dirk's sword.
- In the standard, longer sequence that was featured in the original arcade release, Dirk picks up Daphne as the ring transforms her into The Banshee, a hideous beast that tries to devour him. Down below, Mordroc throws Dirk’s sword at him yet the knight catches it and proceeds to remove the ring from Daphne's finger and uses his belt to launch it onto Mordroc's finger. Mordroc quickly succumbs to ring's deadly effects, turning into a bloated monster who continues to inflate in size. As Daphne reverts back to normal, Mordroc's rapidly deteriorating body floats near Dirk and begins to leak foul air, and Dirk kills the wizard by striking him with his sword, causing him to explode. His dusty remains are then crushed by the falling rubble of his cavern.
- The alternative, shorter sequence omits Daphne's monstrous transformation, as she simply disappears after Mordroc's arm is pierced by Dirk's sword, leaving the ring behind. Dirk struggles to retrieve the ring, and Mordroc attacks him in various ways as the cavern begins to crumble around them. Dirk tosses the ring onto Mordroc's finger, resulting in the wizard bloating up and self-combusting like popcorn, blowing himself to pieces as he expands.
Dragon's Lair 3D: Return to the Lair[]
Mordroc is once again the main villain in Dragon's lair 3D, with Singe being his pet and minion, making the dragon a secondary antagonist.
Long ago, Mordroc ruled over the lands with six magical items known as the Dragon's Essences after poisoning the king who had guarded them. After a war with the kingdom’s defenders, Mordroc was defeated and imprisoned to another dimension and leaving the magical items behind. Mordroc's minions would collect the dragon's essences and hold them to themselves until their master broke out of the dimension and wreaked havoc on Dirk as well as kidnapping Princess Daphne and holding her hostage in his castle.
With Singe slain and the essences collected, Mordroc continues to impersonate Daphne, imitating her voice to taunt and insult Dirk for delaying his pace and obtaining magical arrows (a weapon to which he is vulnerable). As Dirk reaches Mordroc's dimension through a portal, the wizard reveals his plan to Dirk and transforms himself into The Black Dragon. After a long battle atop the castle, Mordroc is defeated by Dirk. As Dirk reunites with Daphne, the weakened Mordroc summons enough magic to zap the princess's buttocks, causing her to chomp down on Dirk's lip as he laughs to himself.
Other Appearances[]
Mordroc is named in the manuals of Dragon's Lair: The Legend and Dragon's Lair (SNES) as the primary antagonist who has enchanted the Castle in which Daphne is held captive, but he does not appear directly in either game.
In Dragon's Lair III: The Curse of Mordread (the ReadySoft home computer sequel to Time Warp), Mordroc's evil twin sister Mordread seeks revenge on Dirk and Daphne one year after the events of the previous game. For Mordread's voice, the programmers repurposed several of Hal Smith's voice recordings for Mordroc.
Surviving storyboards for a cancelled “Dragon’s Lair IV” (teased by ReadySoft president David Foster for a Fall 1993 home computer release), feature the apparent return of Mordroc to trouble Dirk and Daphne in their family's cottage, eventually resulting in Dirk once again boarding the Time Machine to revive Daphne from the wizard's spell.[2]
In the early draft and presentation pitch for Dragon's Lair: The Legend, the first attempt to adapt the franchise for a theatrical feature film, an evil horned-king sorcerer named "Mordrock" would have featured as the primary antagonist in his plan to raise an army of corpses from a river of the dead. Mordrock would have captured and possessed Dirk's friend Strun, eventually incarnating into his entire body and soul. Desiring Daphne to become his unwilling queen, Mordrock's soul would eventually transform into an immense and hideous dragon for a final battle with Dirk.[3]
Mordroc appears in the presentation pitch for Dragon's Lair: The Movie and employs a lackey named Grum. Seeking to rule the royal kingdom uncontested, Mordroc seeks out the teenage Prince Dirk hiding in exile. Transforming himself into a poisonous serpent, he bites Dirk which makes the prince lose consciousness as the teenaged Daphne pleads for him to wake up.
Trivia[]
- In the video tutorial "Learn to Draw: Draw as You Please", Don Bluth revealed that he was disappointed that Mordroc's finalized design looked generic relative to other established fictional characters such as the Evil Queen's hag disguise from Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. Bluth experimented with an alternative character design that would have emphasized several "alien" features such as ram-like horns with elongated nose and limbs in addition to a more distinctive outfit highlighted by high-heeled boots.[4]
- Despite some official artwork of Mordroc wearing a hood, he always wears a pointed hat in-game.
- In John Cawley's book The Animated Films of Don Bluth, written prior to the official release of Time Warp, the wizard's name is written as "Mordrok," a spelling that was reflected in 1980s press interviews and some production material.[5]
- Don Bluth recollected referring to the transformed designs of the Daphne-Banshee and Mordroc’s inflated state after putting on the Death Ring—as “tud balls,” also described by Gary Goldman as “filled with warts and blisters and swelled up like way too many carbs.”[6]
- Dragon's Lair 3D is the only game in which Mordroc interacts with Singe on-screen.
- In 2002, AnJon Toys released a wave of four action figures as a tie-in with Dragon's Lair 3D: Return to the Lair: Dirk the Daring, Princess Daphne, Mordroc, and Singe. Mordroc's figure included two Ding Bats and a sceptre as accessories.
- Cardmiths' Dragon's Lair Trading Card Series One pictures or references Mordroc on several cards in the series, but he receives particular focus on cards #32 ("THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS"), #43 ("PUT A RING ON IT"), and CS06 (Culture Shokz™ "MORDROC").
Gallery[]
A full image gallery of Mordroc can be found here.
References[]
- ↑ "Wizard character model" SCAD Libraries Digital Collections
- ↑ Worthpoint.com sourced "DON BLUTH DRAGON'S LAIR IV CONCEPTUAL STORYBOARD DRAWINGS"; Worthpoint.com sourced "DON BLUTH DRAGON'S LAIR IV CONCEPTUAL STORYBOARD DRAWINGS"
- ↑ John Cawley, The Animated Films of Don Bluth, (1991), page 80-82
- ↑ Don Bluth Animation Tutorials: "Learn to Draw: Draw as You Please" via DonBluthAnimation.com
- ↑ John Cawley, The Animated Films of Don Bluth, (1991), page 76-79
- ↑ "Video Commentary" (Dragon's Lair II: Time Warp, Digital Leisure BluRay, 2009)