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I like the look he’s going for, but I don’t know how Vortigern as the baddie that’s murdered Uther Pendragon works for the story. I guess we’ll see in 2017!

What? Vortigern will be Arthur’s villain? I right he was there only in a pre /flashback sort of situation.

Yep…in the article it says:

That edge serves him well when dealing with his tyrannical uncle, Jude Law’s Vortigern, who’s got more than a bad boy appeal to defend himself.

As the murderer of his brother and Arthur’s dad Uther Pendragon (Eric Bana) and the usurper of the throne, Vortigern has done more than enough to earn his nephew’s wrath, but backing him is a set of deadly magical powers that give him the upper hand.

I didn’t expect guy ritchie to give a faithful adaptation, but I’m not sure how magical Vortigern works for the story…or me!

But there’s no such thing as a faithful adaptation of “the” Arthurian story, because there’s no actual story to be faithful to, rather hundreds of stories that get added to, changed, and lovingly jumbled together or horribly mangled by medieval authors (and modern ones too).

Vortigern figures most prominently in Geoffrey of Monmouth’s book from the 1130s, and he’s a great villain there. And while he himself doesn’t have magical powers, he employs prophets and magicians, the most famous of whom is Merlin. Geoffrey’s Vortigern is not related to Arthur, and is dead before Arthur appears in the story.

It’ll be great to see an Arthurian movie with a different main villain, and I like the nod back to some of the older sources like Geoffrey at the same time that that material is getting adapted for narrative purposes. Vortigern as the evil usurping kinsman whom Arthur has to overthrow to take his rightful place has the potential to work really nicely. It’s an old trope, but a good one. Ritchie’s changes look promising.

That’s the one original, “faithful,” maybe, characteristic of Arthurian stories: that they always change and adapt themselves from previous multiple iterations. The versions of the Arthur legend that flop most badly in my eyes are the ones that attempt to rigidly adhere to some idea of an authentic original story, because there really isn’t one.

‘King Arthur’: Get your first look at Jude Law as a medieval villain