History ComicBook / Excalibur

* HeroicSacrifice: There have been many, over the years. Meggan's heroic sacrifice was especially sad, because it was in a tie-in book for the ComicBook/HouseOfM crossover where she saved the whole universe and nobody read it. [[spoiler: At least she's finally back now, after [[LikeABadassOutOfHell bringing some hope to Hell for good measure]].]]

** When he's (temporarily) killed during SecretInvasion, it's said that everyone in Britain felt it.

* EvilCostumeSwitch: Subverted. Rachel Summers eventually ditches her original spiked red bodysuit (which was based on her [[MadeASlave Hound]] costume) and settles for the blood-red ensemble of [[TheDarkPhoenixSaga Dark Phoenix]]. But she's not pulling a FaceHeelTurn; she just prefers these colors over "Light" Phoenix's costume. "[Dark Phoenix] might have been a threat to the universe... but she had '''great''' taste in clothes!"

* WeddingDay: Captain Britain and Meggan

* AlternateCompanyEquivalent: ''Excalibur'' was pretty much Marvel's answer to ''JusticeLeagueInternational'', another LighterAndSofter book that also placed a greater emphasis on humor.

* YouAlreadyChangedThePast: When the team has to travel back in time to save Camelot. Bonus points for the affair between Lancelot and Guinevere coming about because [[NoodleIncident Pete Wisdom tried seducing Guinevere himself]].

After the ''Mutant Massacre'' storyline left the X-Men broken, members Shadowcat and Nightcrawler were sent to Muir Island in Scotland to recuperate. As a result, they weren't with the X-Men when the team sacrificed their lives to defeat [[EldritchAbomination The Adversary]] on national tv during ''The Fall of the Mutants'', and like the rest of the world, didn't know the X-Men [[ComicBookDeath got better]] afterwards. Creator/ChrisClaremont and artist Alan Davis decided to use this opportunity to put the characters into a new team that incorporated the British characters CaptainBritain and his MagicalGirlfriend Meggan, who had little U.S. exposure at that point but ties to the X-Men through Cap's sister Psylocke.

** To be fair, the school to which she gets the acceptance letter is St. "Cyrils". The one she actually attends is St. "Searles", so this was intentional.

So Phoenix (Rachel Summers), who had previously been lured to a parallel dimension by X-Villain (and LargeHam) Mojo, escaped to Muir Island shortly after the X-Men's deaths with Mojo's [[QuirkyMinibossSquad Warwolves]] hot on her trail. It is also decided by ObstructiveBureaucrat Saturnyne that Phoenix is a threat to all reality and a group of interdimensional bounty hunters known as the Technet are sent to capture her. Kitty and Nightcrawler as well as Cap and Meggan are soon brought into the fray, banding together for protection while reminiscing about the X-Men and deciding to keep Xavier's dream alive. Then the quirky metal creature and living portal known as Widget found them, and the team was thrown into a series of interdimensional Wacky Hijinks across TheMultiverse for a while. But no team with {{Mutants}} can ever stay light-hearted for long in the Franchise/MarvelUniverse, so after a while, they returned to their angsty X-Roots and eventually became just another mutant book.

** Meggan had her moments too (frankly, most women drawn by Alan Davis do; though Davis actually drew Kitty to look like a young girl ... [[FetishFuel not that that stopped many people]]).

* HeroicSacrifice: There have been many, over the years. Meggan's heroic sacrifice was especially sad, because it was in a tie-in book for the HouseOfM crossover where she saved the whole universe and nobody read it. [[spoiler: At least she's finally back now, after [[LikeABadassOutOfHell bringing some hope to Hell for good measure]].]]

* LighterAndSofter: This series was originally conceived as being more lighthearted than the [[ComicBook/{{X-Men}} various]] [[COmicBook/XForce X-books]] [[ComicBook/{{X-Factor}} that were being published]] [[{{Wolverine}} at the time]], [[NewMutants which were pretty dark]] and to prove it they took [[EnsembleDarkhorse the most "fun" members of the X-Men]] (Nightcrawler and Kitty Pryde) and basically wrote the team around them.

* MsFanservice: When she disappeared in ''[[ComicBook/{{X-Men}} Uncanny X-Men]]'', Rachel was a stick-thin tomboy who usually wore gym clothes. When she reappeared in ''Excalibur'', she was built like a porn star (perhaps literally - she got her new body in the Mojoverse after all) and wore a skintight, stiletto-heeled, spike-studded, red leather catsuit when on duty, and as little as possible off duty.

Since then, the team has broken up and reformed a couple of times, with different membership each time. Currently defunct, and the SpiritualSuccessor ''ComicBook/CaptainBritainAndMI13'' (even featuring Excalibur the sword) was also cancelled after 15 issues. Has no relation to the short-lived ''Excalibur'' title that followed Professor Xavier's adventures on Genosha (aside from Marvel and/or Creator/ChrisClaremont wanting to keep the name in print). Captain Britain and the Black Knight also show up as playable characters in ''VideoGame/MarvelAvengersAlliance'' along with some of the mutants in Excalibur, and [=MI13=] and Faiza also get mentioned.

Since then, the team has broken up and reformed a couple of times, with different membership each time. Currently defunct, and the SpiritualSuccessor ''Captain Britain and MI: 13'' (even featuring Excalibur the sword) was also cancelled after 15 issues. Has no relation to the short-lived ''Excalibur'' title that followed Professor Xavier's adventures on Genosha (aside from Marvel and/or Creator/ChrisClaremont wanting to keep the name in print). Captain Britain and the Black Knight also show up as playable characters in ''VideoGame/MarvelAvengersAlliance'' along with some of the mutants in Excalibur, and [=MI13=] and Faiza also get mentioned.

[[folder:Captain Britain and MI: 13]]
* AccidentalProposal[=/=]DiggingYourselfDeeper: Sort of. The Black Knight is trying to explain to Faiza's parents why she's now a superhero. Flustered after getting off to the wrong start with her father and trying to find a way out of his predicament, he comments that he's "made a big decision" about him and Faiza after they "became very close during the battle", to which her mother concludes (not entirely unjustifiably) "You're getting married?!" Cue ''massive'' {{Verbal Backspac|e}}ing...
* ArtisticLicenseBiology: So ... Black Knight's heart is made of stone now? How does he...? Uh, never mind. AWizardDidIt.
* BackFromTheDead: [[spoiler: Captain Britain.]]
* {{Badass}}: {{Blade}}, duh.
* BadassPacifist: One of Faiza's favorite go-to tactics as an ActualPacifist is using her body manipulation powers to shut down a fight without bloodshed, though it causes her to butt heads with the Black Knight's BloodKnight tendencies sometimes.
* BlackComedy
* CListFodder: The unfortunate fate of the original team members created for the previous ''Wisdom'' mini-series. Maureen Raven died in the final issue of ''Wisdom'', John the Skrull was killed off in the first arc of ''Captain Britain and MI-13'', and Captain Midlands became a traitor and then died in the second arc. Tink was lucky and only got PutOnABus.
* ContinuityNod: Creator/PaulCornell is ''really'' good at these.
* ContinuityLockout: Averted- while it's fun to know what the {{Shout Out}}s and {{Continuity Nod}}s mean, you don't need to understand them in order to understand what's going on.
* CoversAlwaysLie
* CowboyBebopAtHisComputer: the British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, makes an appearance in the first issue. Inevitably, when the newspapers commented on this they got everything wrong, calling him [[http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1023597/Have-fear-Brown-help-save-world--new-comic-book-Captain-Britain.html SuperGordon]] and/or saying he "[[http://www.financialexpress.com/news/SuperGordon-to-help-save-world-in-Captain-Britain-fantasy/318214/ leads a counterattack]]" against the invading Skrulls. In the comic, although he proves himself to be a competent leader, Gordon Brown does not develop superpowers and start wading into the fight ([[RuleOfCool although that would be cool]]).
* DealWithTheDevil: Played with: [[spoiler: Pete Wisdom willingly releases a whole bunch of demons in order to get Merlin back so he can resurrect Captain Britain... which becomes a subversion of this trope when some of the demons decide that the rules of magic mandate that they ''offer him a reward'']].
** The irony, of course, is that Wisdom could easily have just said "No, I Don't Want Anything". The imbalance of input/output would then have exploded the demons, and all that Britain would have to do would be to mop up the remaining Skrulls.
** Also, the demonic Doctor Plokta is willing to give you what you want... anything you want... in return for your soul. What the characters do about this is up to them. Doctor Plokta dangles Captain Britain's (sorta) dead wife in front of him, offering to bring her back to life in return for his soul. He decides to TakeAThirdOption.
* DeathByOriginStory: Faiza Hussain gets zapped by a Skrull machine, which gives her superpowers instead of killing her off for real.
* DefectorFromDecadence: John the Skrull (Sorta. He was originally sent to infiltrate human society, and liked it much better than the warmongering Skrull society, so he decided to stay.)
* DepletedPhlebotinumShells: Blade's papier mache sword, made from the pages of magical books. "Good against demons. Not so good in the rain."
* DisproportionateRetribution: At one point the Black Knight half-jokes that he's tempted to slice through a group of mind-controlled civilians "because track suits as day wear..." Faiza chews him out over it.
* {{Expy}}: Captain Midlands is a joke version of Captain America.
* FaceHeelTurn: [[spoiler:Captain Midlands will do anything to get his wife Nancy back again, even if it means turning his colleagues over to Plokta.]]
* FiveManBand (?)
** TheHero: Captain Britain
** TheLancer: Pete Wisdom
** TheBigGuy: Spitfire (er... well, she's one of the most powerful members of the team)
** TheSmartGuy: Black Knight (er... well, he's the one who can build [[MechanicalHorse robot horsies]])
** TheChick: Faiza Hussain
** SixthRanger: {{Blade}}
* FoeRomanceSubtext: [[spoiler:Blade and Spitfire]] start out this way, though it eventually turns into just plain old romance.
* GovernmentAgencyOfFiction: MI: 13, of course.
* HeroesRUs: MI:13 is a British Government agency.
* HumanityEnsues: John the Skrull
* IShallTauntYou: Horribly subverted: [[spoiler: John the Skrull is a cheeky, chirpy character who keeps up a constant stream of WittyBanter and taunts even when the situation seems hopeless. He'd be a DeadpanSnarker if he was, y'know, ''deadpan''. The Skrull invaders eventually get fed up and decide to [[WhyDontYouJustShootHim just shoot him]].]]
* LetsYouAndHimFight: [[spoiler:Turns out the reason Blade joined up is because he wanted to stake Spitfire. They eventually reach an understanding after beating each other up enough times.]]
* LotusEaterMachine: Doctor Plokta's dream corridors.
* LittleNo: Faiza gives one when the Skrulls offer to spare her if she surrenders and lets them take the Westminster Bridge.
* {{Magitek}}: The pentagram tesseract.
* MalignedMixedMarriage: Subverted twice. Dracula centers some of his plotting around the romances between Blade and Spitfire and the Black Knight and Faiza, but is stymied on that front when nobody but him sees either as a big deal. Meanwhile, Faiza's father is initially unhappy at the Black Knight having fought in the Crusades, but is eventually won over by the Knight's bumbling charm.
* MorallyAmbiguousDoctorate: The evil Doctor Plokta.
* MoveAlongNothingToSeeHere: When a large crowd ends up seeing the Black Knight trying to land his flying horse while holding Faiza dangling by one arm after she almost fell, his response is a casual "Afternoon, all. It's just us, pay no attention."
* MyGreatestFailure: Pete Wisdom is pretty cut up over the deaths of TemporaryLoveInterest Maureen Raven and [[spoiler: fellow team mate John the Skrull.]]
* OffModel: There was an annoying one in the ''Wisdom'' miniseries where Alistaire Stuart suddenly appeared to have aged several decades. This one stuck around for quite a while -- apparently the artist made an error, thinking that he was supposed to be an old man -- it was [[LampshadeHanging lampshaded]] a couple of times but ended up being explained and resolved in ''Captain Britain & MI:13'' as [[spoiler: Alistaire having been cursed with a variable appearance after an unfortunate dinner incident with Morgan le Fey]]. He was intentionally drawn slightly different every so often throughout the series because of that.
** There's also a single panel early in the "Hell Comes To Birmingham" story where Spitfire's burnt hand switches from right to left.
* OmnidisciplinaryScientist: Dane Whitman AKA the ''Black Knight''.
* OurVampiresAreDifferent: Spitfire has it under control. Apparently. [[spoiler:At least until Dracula and his vampire army shows up...]]
** [[spoiler:And even then it's probably all a ploy by Wisdom to infiltrate Dracula's ranks. After all, why NOT use one of your vampires to get into the enemy camp?]]
* {{Prequel}}: Creator/PaulCornell laid out the groundwork for this series in his ''Wisdom'' miniseries.
* OutGambitted: The last bit of the book is an epic chess battle between [[spoiler:Pete Wisdom and Dracula]], which [[spoiler:Wisdom]] wins via making fine use of ChekhovsArmoury.
* PoliticallyIncorrectVillain: Dracula is depicted as a virulent anti-Muslim bigot, both generally and in his treatment of Faiza.
* PublicDomainCharacter: Dracula
* RealAfterAll: [[spoiler: Captain Britain thinks Meggan is just an illusion created by Doctor Plokta's Dream Corridors when he realizes he's been trapped in one, and abandons her to escape. The audience eventually sees that no, it really was her, and the Dream Corridor really did form a link to where she ended up. Oops. Although she did finally find him towards the end of the series.]]
* RewardedAsATraitorDeserves: From the Skrull's perspective, at least: [[spoiler: John the Skrull]].
* RunningGag: "The Ebony Blade says hello!"
* SheIsNotMyGirlfriend: Faiza is Dane's ''steward''. Really. Even when Gambit is trying to hit on her. Amusingly Faiza seems to find that more romantic anyway.
* ShipTease: [[http://marvel.wikia.com/File:Captain_Britain_and_MI-13_Vol_1_7.jpg The cover of issue 7]]. WordOfGod is that [[spoiler:it's a hint to what Faiza's heart's desire in Plokta's corridor was]].
* ShoutOut: Creator/PaulCornell does this a lot, too. Two of the biggest [[ShoutOut Shout Outs]] are John the Skrull (a Skrull pretending to be John Lennon) and [[PeterPan Tink]], the fairy princess, but there are loads more.
** [[HouseOfM "No more Skrulls."]]
** Faiza Hussain's surname is a ShoutOut to the former Captain of the England Cricket Team, Nasser Hussain.
** Plokta is named after a well-known British SF fanzine.
* ShownTheirWork: Creator/PaulCornell asked a group of Muslim women for help with characterizing Faiza. They're listed in the credits.
* TheSquire: The Black Knight originally asks Faiza to be his [[ItMakesSenseInContext just to talk his way out of her mother thinking he's proposing to her]], but Faiza rather likes the idea and gets him to let her take it seriously. [[ContinuityNod He also mentions]] [[ComicBook/TheAvengers his original squire Sean Dolan]] [[ContinuityNod at one point.]]
* TechnoBabble: "This is a pentagram tesseract, an intrusion of magical fields into another dimension."
* TwoScenesOneDialogue: Happens in issue 5, which has the same overall explanation about the current superheroes & demons situation being given by Pete Wisdom to Blade at [=MI13=] HQ and the Black Knight to Faiza Hussain's parents at said parents' house.
* VillainsNeverLie: Deliberately invoked by one of said villains. [[spoiler:Plotka]] counts on [[spoiler:the Captain]] to assume he's telling the truth about [[spoiler:Meggan being trapped in another dimension]], then [[DangerouslyGenreSavvy gloats afterwards about how superheroes always assume villains tell the truth]].
* WeHardlyKnewYe: [[spoiler: John the Skrull]]
[[/folder]]

* RealAfterAll: [[spoiler: Captain Britain thinks Meggan is just an illusion created by Doctor Plokta's Dream Corridors when he realizes he's been trapped in one, and abandons her to escape. The audience eventually sees that no, it really was her, and the Dream Corridor really did form a link to where she ended up. Oops.]]

After the ''Mutant Massacre'' storyline left the X-Men broken, members Shadowcat and Nightcrawler were sent to Muir Island in Scotland to recuperate. As a result, they weren't with the X-Men when the team sacrificed their lives to defeat [[EldritchAbomination The Adversary]] on national tv during ''The Fall of the Mutants'', and like the rest of the world, didn't know the X-Men [[ComicBookDeath got better]] afterwards. ChrisClaremont and artist Alan Davis decided to use this opportunity to put the characters into a new team that incorporated the British characters CaptainBritain and his MagicalGirlfriend Meggan, who had little U.S. exposure at that point but ties to the X-Men through Cap's sister Psylocke.

Since then, the team has broken up and reformed a couple of times, with different membership each time. Currently defunct, and the SpiritualSuccessor ''Captain Britain and MI: 13'' (even featuring Excalibur the sword) was also cancelled after 15 issues. Has no relation to the short-lived ''Excalibur'' title that followed Professor Xavier's adventures on Genosha (aside from Marvel and/or ChrisClaremont wanting to keep the name in print). Captain Britain and the Black Knight also show up as playable characters in ''VideoGame/MarvelAvengersAlliance'' along with some of the mutants in Excalibur, and [=MI13=] and Faiza also get mentioned.

* AnotherDimension: It almost seemed like the original Excalibur team were hopping into another dimension every other week. More cynical readers might speculate that this was because the book was usually written by Americans who didn't know the first thing about the UK, and this was the easiest way to hide that fact. (That said, TheMultiverse was already a well-established feature of Captain Britain stories; it was shown early on that Brian was only one of a dimension-crossing corps of near-infinite Captain Britains. Even with a long storyline explicitly involving parallel realities--"The Cross-Time Caper"--Excalibur really spent no more or less time in the primary Marvel Universe than Cap himself did in his previous solo adventures.)

* AnotherDimension: It almost seemed like the original Excalibur team were hopping into another dimension every other week. More cynical readers might speculate that this was because the book was usually written by Americans who didn't know the first thing about the UK, and this was the easiest way to hide that fact. (That said, TheMultiverse was already a well-established feature of Captain Britain stories; it was shown early on that Brian was only one of a dimension-crossing corps of near-infinite Captain Britains.)

After the ''Mutant Massacre'' storyline left the X-Men broken, members Shadowcat and Nightcrawler were sent to Muir Island in Scotland to recuperate. As a result, they weren't with the X-Men when the team sacrificed their lives to defeat the adversary on national tv during ''The Fall of the Mutants'', and like the rest of the world, didn't know the X-Men [[ComicBookDeath got better]] afterwards. ChrisClaremont and artist Alan Davis decided to use this opportunity to put the characters into a new team that incorporated the British characters CaptainBritain and his MagicalGirlfriend Meggan, who had little U.S. exposure at that point but ties to the X-Men through Cap's sister Psylocke.

** For all intents and purposes, they were also the British ''Avengers'', partly because there were no other super-teams who could play that part, and partly because mutants were less controversial in Britain than in the U.S. at the time (just like [[AlphaFlight Canada]], one suspects that the British took whatever superheroes they could get)

* ShipTease: [[http://marvel.wikia.com/File:Captain_Britain_and_MI-13_Vol_1_7.jpg The cover of issue 7]].

Since then, the team has broken up and reformed a couple of times, with different membership each time. Currently defunct, and the SpiritualSuccessor ''Captain Britain and MI: 13'' (even featuring Excalibur the sword) was also cancelled after 15 issues. Has no relation to the short-lived ''Excalibur'' title that followed Professor Xavier's adventures on Genosha (aside from Marvel and/or ChrisClaremont wanting to keep the name in print). Captain Britain and the Black Knight also show up as playable characters in ''VideoGame/MarvelAvengersAlliance'' along with some of the mutants in Excalibur, and MI13 and Faiza also get mentioned.

Since then, the team has broken up and reformed a couple of times, with different membership each time. Currently defunct, and the SpiritualSuccessor ''Captain Britain and MI: 13'' (even featuring Excalibur the sword) was also cancelled after 15 issues. Has no relation to the short-lived ''Excalibur'' title that followed Professor Xavier's adventures on Genosha (aside from Marvel and/or ChrisClaremont wanting to keep the name in print). Captain Britain and the Black Knight also show up as playable characters in ''VideoGame/MarvelAvengersAlliance'' along with some of the mutants.

So Phoenix (Rachel Summers), who had previously been lured to a parallel dimension by X-Villain (and LargeHam) Mojo, escaped to Muir Island shortly after the X-Men's deaths with Mojo's [[QuirkyMinibossSquad Warwolves]] hot on her trail. It is also decided by ObstructiveBureaucrat Saturnine that Phoenix is a threat to all reality and a group of interdimensional bounty hunters known as the Technet are sent to capture her. Kitty and Nightcrawler as well as Cap and Meggan are soon brought into the fray, banding together for protection while reminiscing about the X-Men and deciding to keep Xavier's dream alive. Then the quirky metal creature and living portal known as Widget found them, and the team was thrown into a series of interdimensional Wacky Hijinks across TheMultiverse for a while. But no team with {{Mutants}} can ever stay light-hearted for long in the Franchise/MarvelUniverse, so after a while, they returned to their angsty X-Roots and eventually became just another mutant book.

* TheChessmaster: Pete Wisdom successfully plays [[spoiler:Dracula]] like a fiddle, via making fine use of ChekhovsArmoury.