YMMV / Quest for Camelot

• Adaptation Displacement: There are many who aren't aware that this film was based off a book, probably helped by the fact it has very little in common with said book (to the point it doesn't even qualify as an In Name Only adaptation).
• All Animation Is Disney: Not coincidentally for a movie notorious for shamelessly ripping off all of the Disney cliches from this era which also has very Disney-esque animation, it's often mistaken for a Disney movie. One of the film's editors was even quoted as saying that they couldn't find any merch for the movie at the WB Store because even the staff thought it was a Disney movie!
• Alternative Character Interpretation:
  • Try rewatching the movie under the impression that Ruber is a huge Disney Villain fanboy. Suddenly his character will make a lot more sense.
  • After they retrieve Excalibur together, and Kayley has watched Garret being awesome any number of times, and saved his life, and they've sung a duet, Garret still thinks she'll compare him unfavourably to men who can see. You could say he's kind of an asshole for thinking so little of her when she clearly thinks so highly of him. Or he's so self-conscious about his blindness, he doesn't think he'll ever be worth her time.
  • Ruber's goal was the conquest of Camelot, Arthur's home and capital, so he could be king and return Britain to chaos. Either he thought conquering the capital equaled conquering the kingdom or he knew where to draw the line, as according to Arthurian legend, Arthur's domain of Logres included Ireland, Orkney, the Gallic region of Armorica, and more, making simply taking the capital with his band of barbarians nothing short of pragmatic.
• Ass Pull: Explain, Movie! EXPLAIN!!!
  • The Stone magically healing everybody and vaporizing Ruber when Kayley and Garrett trick him into sticking Excalibur back in it, as it was still melded to his hand. Such powerful abilities are not alluded to in any way prior, and even more egregiously it doesn't even do a thing for Garrett's blindness. One might forgive it for the fact that it does kill Ruber, as he was not the legitimate holder of the sword.
  • Kayley tending to Garrett's wounds earlier in the film by placing leaves over it as he rests, which cures him in a couple of seconds. Although Garret mentions briefly beforehand that those leaves had healing properties, he didn't hinted that they were that powerful. The leaves also repair his clothes. The leaves must have really incredible healing possibilities. Too bad they are never used on Garrett's eyes.
  • Devon and Cornwall both wordlessly agreeing to rejoin their bodies together after they're split. Sure, they did just recently discover they can fly and breathe fire together, but given they had plenty of other issues with their joined body, not to mention how much they hated each other with a passion their whole lives, you'd think they'd prefer to be two separate beings. And even if they still want to stay together at all times, why not just stick together in more comfortable single bodies, especially after yearning so long to be separated from each other? Not to mention, the separate Ass Pull of how they can so easily undo Excalibur's magic.
• Awesome Art: Though not everyone likes the film, Ruber's half-weapon, half-human monsters have some impressive designs.
• Base-Breaking Character: Kayley. Plucky and active lead who just happens to be Overshadowed by Awesome? Or obnoxious and irritating Faux Action Girl who should know her place better? This film's Trivia page goes on at length about how not even the producers and animation staff could agree on what direction they wanted to take with Kayley's portrayal, which probably contributed heavily to her divisive status.
• Critical Backlash: Though the film was poorly received by critics, it does have its fans and there is still fan art and fan fiction of it being created. The consensus among most audiences is that while the film has a lot of issues and is shamelessly trying to copy the Disney Renaissance formula, it's far from the worst animated fantasy movie ever and has some redeeming qualities. Some also think it's worth watching for its more campy and ridiculous moments.
• Crossover Ship: Kayley is often seen shipped with Taran from The Black Cauldron, due to the two both being Heroic Wannabes in a High Fantasy setting.
• Don't Shoot the Message: Having Garrett remain blind in the finale does send a good message about living with disability...but the fact that this is a fantasy setting where Excalibur's World-Healing Wave can literally separate conjoined dragons... It would be one thing if, perhaps, Garrett was blind from birth. But he tells Kayley he was blinded in an accident. Making the above with splitting apart conjoined from birth dragons but not curing his blindness even stranger.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • The mechanical soldiers along with Bladebeak have a lot of fans for their comparatively shorter screen time than main characters like Ruber and Gareth.
  • The Round Table knights reacting to Ruber's outburst have gone memetic due to their utterly baffled expressions.
• Evil Is Cool: Ruber, though not for the usual reasons, as he's a somewhat generic villain if it wasn't for Gary Oldman's lively performance and him Chewing the Scenery in every scene he's in. He's by far the most entertaining thing about the film.
• Genius Bonus: As far, far, FAR different as the film is from the original novel that inspired it (pretty much the only things that stayed was the Arthurian setting and the fact it has a female lead who goes on a quest to serve King Arthur), one thing did stick. Garret is inspired by a character from The King's Damosel named Lucius, who is also a blind outcast and falls in love with Lynette (the main character of the novel). However, unlike Garett (who was blinded in an accident), Lucius's blindness is caused by a lifetime of living in a cave and not going out. Unfortunately, when it's revealed that he's dying, Lynette goes on a quest to obtain the Holy Grail. However, instead of wishing for health, Lucius wishes for sight so he can see Lynette before he dies. In the film, something similar does happen. After Garett is wounded, Kayley takes him to a cave to recover. It's then he reveals that he's fallen in love with Kayley. A bit Strangled by the Red String...but it's nice to see a shoutout to the original book.
• Ham and Cheese: Baron Ruber's shallow usurper character is salvaged by Gary Oldman's hamtastic performance.
• Harsher in Hindsight: Near the end of the "If I Didn't Have You" number, Devon and Cornwall briefly impersonate Sonny & Cher, Cornwall even sneaking in a quick few bars of "I've Got You Babe". A fairly harmless, if out-of-place, gag within a Disney Acid Sequence musical number full out Shout Outs but given Sonny Bono died in a skiing accident mere months before Quest for Camelot's theatrical release, it's in a bit of bad taste.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • The voice of Sonic the Hedgehog in a movie whose soundtrack became far more popular than the actual film. Eight years later, the actual Sonic series would receive this when the soundtrack for Sonic 2006 became far more popular than the game, which wrecked the franchise for quite some time.
  • When Kayley extols the virtues of knighthood (grand adventures, fighting evil, rescuing damsels in distress), the fact that she doesn't know what a damsel is is made funnier when you learn that the movie is based on a novel called The King's Damosel.^note "Damosel" being an archaic spelling of the word "damsel".
  • Devon and Cornwall's song "If I Didn't Have You" was about how they'd be better off without the other. Years later, a certain movie would have a song with the same title, only it would be about how much the two characters singing value their friendship.
• Informed Wrongness: Devon and Cornwall's anger at being literally stuck together as conjoined twins is treated like they're ungrateful of being brothers at all. Throughout the film, they learn to work together, and this culminates in the pair rejecting the opportunity to finally have individual forms. Trouble is that their relationship would probably improve if they were separate and able to live out their dreams anyway. Them remaining close even after separating would've been a far better message.
• Launcher of a Thousand Ships: Kayley is rather popular in the Disney Crossover Ship Fan Vid community.
• Love to Hate: Ruber, for being a badass who kills a dragon with one punch, as well as for his campy Large Ham portrayal. In addition, Gary Oldman was clearly having a blast.
• Memetic Loser:
  • Even people who like the movie love to mock Kayley, due to relying on a blind guy and an incest dragon and frequently failing to prove her competence.
  • Ruber. It's hard for people to find you intimidating when you're the literal butt of a fart joke.
  • Both the Knights of the Roundtable and the guards of Camelot, considering how easy they go down when Ruber attacks. Sure, Ruber is strong, but those are adult men trained for fighting probably since childhood. The latter especially, since they fail to notice something's off about Lady Juliana's visit until Kayley spills it out for them.
• Memetic Mutation: Ruber's ridiculously over-the-top appearance and demeanour have become a staple of image boards.
• Moment of Awesome: Ruber kills a dragon by punching it in the face.
• Moral Event Horizon: Ruber crosses this in his first scene when he attacks the knights and kills Kaley's father, Sir Lionel.
• Narm:
  • "The ogre's butt..." *cue dramatic music sting*
  • Big, scary Griffin opens his beak and out comes... Balki's voice.
  • Ruber's Song gets narmy when he says "Now watch me create MY MECHANICAL ARMY with pride," mainly due to the incredibly stupid looking dance he does, which looks kind of like "The Robot."
    • "Prepare for the dawning of a new aaaaggge! The... RRRRRRRUBELLION AGE!"
    • "NOW I'M BACK!!! AND I WILL BE STAYYYIIIING THIS TIIIIIIIIIIIME!!!!"
  • "The Prayer" would've worked better if it was sung in a more somber, moody scene akin to how "God Help The Outcast" was handled, instead it plays out while our heroine is running away from weird, boar-riding human/weapons hybrids. There isn't much Mickey Mousing to the song so it feels like it was just slapped on top of the scene like a lazy Fanvid, and it ends up making an otherwise beautiful song come off as lousy Soundtrack Dissonance for an unfitting action scene that also suffers from the misplaced music.
  • The first line of "Looking Through Your Eyes" as Garret looks like he's in immense pain while singing. Maybe starting a musical number while you're fatally wounded is a bad idea.
• Narm Charm: Ruber's "song" is So Bad, It's Good. Actually, just Ruber in general since he sounds like he's trying way too hard to act like a Disney villain.
• Never Live It Down: Kayley can never live down any time she messes up or gets in trouble - even though the point of her Character Development is that she's a Heroic Wannabe who's never been off her farm. She does several impressive things like hypnotising the ogre to grab the sword, keeping the villains at bay in the forest, breaking free of her bonds to warn Arthur's knights of the trap, knocking Ruber out of the throne room and ultimately defeating him. It doesn't help that Kayley's character was a major point of contention during the film's difficult production, and there was much fussing among the staff about how best to portray her. Given her polarizing reception over the years, it clearly shows in the final product.
• Nightmare Retardant: The henchmen's transformations are accompanied by ridiculous cartoonish sound effects and a goofy chicken getting turned into an axe, which really sucks a lot of the terror out of the scene.
• Older Than They Think:
  • The concept of a woman wanting to become a Knight of the Round Table originates with the character of Rowanne from The Legend of Prince Valiant.
  • Arthur being a minor character in his own legend? It has been done, in one of the major Arthurian texts no less: Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. Likewise, the comic strip Prince Valiant has Arthur in perhaps half of the strip's story arcs or less.
• One-Scene Wonder: Well, three scenes actually, but Merlin proves to be quite memorable. It helps he was voiced by John Gielgud, who alongside Gary Oldman gives one of the best performances in the film.
• Periphery Demographic: "The Prayer", in the context of the film, was initially seen as a half-hearted attempt at going toe-to-toe with Disney when it comes to musical numbers. It did later find an audience with Christian groups for its message of seeking God's intercession especially with the far better known duet with Andrea Bocelli.
• The Problem with Licensed Games: The Game Boy Color adaptation is utter dreck from beginning to end. Whereas the movie tried way too hard to copy Disney, this game tried way too hard to copy The Legend of Zelda (specifically, Link's Awakening), but with none of the charm. The hit detection is clunky, level design is very linear compared to Zelda, the save system is poorly handled, the combination of poor enemy placement and lack of invincibility frames often leads to cheap deaths, and the music is absolutely horrible. Somehow, this game got a re-release for Nintendo Switch Online’s Game Boy service in 2023 over licensed games with more potential that are on the opposite side of the spectrum.
• Questionable Casting:
  • Balki from Perfect Strangers as a gryphon. Jaleel White as the comedic axe-chicken, Bladebeak. (Well, OK, that sort of makes sense.) But most especially, as the two-headed dragon Devon and Cornwall: Don Rickles and Eric Idle. While Devon and Cornwall's casting could be partially defended, since both actors were comedians and the characters are supposed to be humorously mismatched, it also causes two characters that have spent literally their entire lives together to have completely different accents.
  • The original choice for King Arthur was Christopher Reeve, who would have been a good one had this been live action. But they didn't realise until he was in the recording booth that hiring someone who was on a breather to do a voiceover wouldn't have the desired effect.
  • Cary Elwes does a great job as Garret, and Bryan White's singing in the part is lovely. Unfortunately, these two men sound absolutely nothing alike, causing Garret to not only blatantly change voices whenever he sings, but even changing his accent.
• Retroactive Recognition: Jessalyn Gilsig would eventually become more famous for Vikings. This makes the Nostalgia Critic's review hilarious - where he refers to her as "that chick from Heroes", several years before Vikings.
• The Scrappy: Few people seem to care much about Devon and Cornwall, for being pointless comic relief, as the main villain is already Laughably Evil, and many find their jokes and song more obnoxious than funny. Notably, a lot of fanfics will either write them out completely or rewrite their characters to be more serious and helpful.
• Serial Numbers Filed Off: The Nostalgia Critic accused Kayley's image and opening song of being a ripoff of Belle from Beauty and the Beast (which wasn't even a decade old by this point), and also accused Warner of not even trying for originality. Years after the film's release, one of the animators also pointed out the similarities between Kayley and Belle, and also noted that Garret was apparently copied from the human form of the Beast. It's comparable to what The Emoji Movie would eventually do nearly 19 years later, this time with CGI movies from the 2010s.
• So Bad, It's Good:
  • Ruber's "Song". Despite the fact that it barely even qualifies as a song, Gary Oldman's scene-chomping performance and extremely over the top gestures make it gut bustingly funny to watch. Plus, it fits Ruber's loony personality.
  • The entire movie could count as this, owing to its clumsy attempts to copycat Disney and for the bizarre liberties taken with the source material to the point where it almost adopts an In Name Only quality. The inconsistent animation certainly lends itself to this, making for some unintentionally hilarious moments in a film that clearly attempts to tell a more serious story against all the aforementioned corniness.
• Special Effect Failure: The CGI on the giant rock ogre and even several of the Camelot sequences haven't aged well since 1998.
• They Copied It, So It Sucks!: The film is not subtle in its attempt to emulate Disney, the exact opposite of what the original script had aimed to do before the executives stepped in. Audiences and critics were not fooled, and the animators have spoken critically of this decision since.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • King Arthur is mostly reduced to a background character in the story of his own legend; the fact that the griffin put him out of action early in the film doesn't help and is an especially serious shame as Pierce Brosnan had lent his voice to the part.
  • An even more egregious case with Merlin, who gets barely three minutes of screentime. It is a shame as well, considering acting legend John Gielgud voiced him.
  • Lady Juliana could've served a purpose beyond being Ruber's Living Macguffin. As Kayley's mother, she could've been her Foil, advising her not to become a knight since her husband died working as a knight. The movie even seems to set this up in the first act, before Ruber attacks, but doesn't bother exploring it at all.
  • Bladebeak's wife, and to a lesser extent Bladebeak himself. Appearantly, Bladebeak's Heel–Face Turn was because Ruber had crossed the Moral Event Horizon for him by imprisoning his wife in a cage. Why do we know that? Because it was shown in the movie... for about two seconds. The lack of focus on this character led to many viewers believing that him betraying Ruber came out of nowhere, the pieces were there, they just didn't use them.
  • Comedic legends Eric Idle and Don Rickles apparently spent did a lot of ad-libbing, and none of it was used. One had to wonder if Devon and Cornwall would've been better received if their famously witty actors got to have their lines used instead of the script's.
• Took the Bad Film Seriously:
  • As Garret, Cary Elwes gives the best performance in the film.
  • Gary Oldman as Ruber, who manages to rise above the material he's given and makes an otherwise cliched villain entertaining to watch.
  • The singers hired to dub the voices. Andrea Corr absolutely nails "On My Father's Wings", elevating it far above the generic 90s "I Want" Song it was written as. Celine Dion likewise managed to make "The Prayer" into a Breakaway Pop Hit.
• Trapped by Mountain Lions: "I Stand Alone" is a pretty good Establishing Character Moment for Garrett. But it puts the plot on hold for three minutes to explain that he's a loner by nature - and then once the song is over he lets Kayley come with him anyway with little fuss.
• Values Dissonance: Devon snarking "You know, there's nothing more pathetic than a flame-retarded dragon" is the type of joke that wouldn't fly nowadays since the use of "retarded" would be seen as ableist.
• Values Resonance: Despite all the writing issues with the movie, Garett is a surprisingly positive and well-rounded depiction of a disabled protagonist. Although his blindness does have obvious disadvantages, he's not portrayed as a completely helpless and pitiable figure; he's learned to work around his blindess, and he's proactive and largely independent. His being blind also doesn't diminish his appeal as a love interest for Kayley in the slightest. At the same time, the film avoids going down a glurgey Inspirationally Disadvantaged route; Garett's blindness does still occasionally cause problems for him and he feels understandably insecure about it in certain situations (which he initially covers up with stoicism and snark). There's also nothing to suggest he magically gets his eyesight restored in the ending, but he still becomes a knight and gets the girl.
• Visual Effects of Awesome: Aside from the songs, a good deal of the animation is one thing most agreed was one of the few redeeming values of an otherwise underwhelming movie.

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