L'enfant qui voulut être roi

The phrase "The Once And Future King" is taken from the title of T.H. White's four book series of Arthurian tales, the first of which was used as the basis for Disney's Merlin l'enchanteur (1963). White derived his title from the inscription that, according to Thomas Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur, was written upon King Arthur's tomb: "Here lies Arthur, king once, and king to be." It was White who first described Merlin as living through time backwards; an idea revisited by Joe Cornish in this movie.

Throughout the movie they are counting down to an upcoming solar eclipse. Yet the Moon each night gets more and more full with it being completely full the night before the eclipse. A solar eclipse can only happen on a new Moon approximately two weeks away from a full moon.

Featured in The Month in Movies: February 2019 (2019)