Spot the difference: Vartox vs Zardoz

Don’t be fooled reader! This blog ain’t all kangas and nipples! I’m doing film reviews now – lucky you!

I watched the Zardoz DVD last night and once seen never forgotten – Sean Connery’s outfit sure is a retina-frying brain-boggler. No wonder it played on Curt Swan’s mind when he came to design DC’s knock-off version Vartox a few months after the film’s 1974 debut. Take this extravaganza in while you can reader – because you’ll never see another costume like this in the current DCU.

I’m not surprised the film is a pretentious disappointment. Sure, director / writer John Boorman made Deliverance (over rated buggery epic) and Excalibur (outstanding re-working of the Arthurian legend, the centerpiece of which is Merlin’s dazzling helmet) but look at what else he’s done – The Emerald Forest in which he cast his own son, Charley Boorman, as the lead. Yes! If it wasn’t for that we wouldn’t be force-fed ‘documentaries’ of Charley gooning around the world on his motorbike with bezzie millionaire mate Ewan McGregor! So really, John’s done more harm than good in my book.

But thank Hera DC didn’t bring all of Zardoz’s foibles to their comic book interpretation. Because – younger readers look away now – I was SHOCKED to see that in one scene Sean Connery puts his hand down his pants and licks some sticky fluid off his hand. YES!!! Like!! SPEW!!!! WTF?! How the hell Connery salvaged his career is a mystery…

Highlights from the John Boorman’s commentary (yes, I have a lot of time on my hands) include:

“Sean resisted being dressed up as a bride at the time…” and

“I’m astonished by this extraordinary farrago now…there were maybe too many ideas in this picture”

Too right John! Next!