From
TES issue 18 (November 2002)
Series 5/6.
Level 1/2/3.
ELITA
Stephanie Hesp took the part of this obnoxious and brattish cavern
elf, whose appearances in the
Dungeon saw her being exceedingly rude to
dungeoneers and characters alike. This seems to disprove
Treguard's remarks from series 3 about elves being very keen on courtesy, but never mind. Dungeoneers that met Elita had to put up with her foul mouth whilst convincing the diminutive elf to part with whatever useful information she had about the level, which could include
passwords,
causeway combinations and sometimes
spells. Elita was the keeper of
Smirkenorff the
dragon in series 5 and 6, and could be found collecting his fare in series 5, as he was unable to negotiate his own wages until he got a voice in
series 6. Elita's first appearance was with Smirkenorff, as dungeoneer Sarah was about to ride him to level two. It became clear straight away that she was a rude and difficult character, as it took some careful but forceful persuasion to get her to accept a bag of
silver as payment.
Pickle - also an elf, of course - expressed his strong negative views about Elita for the first time here, which he repeated at almost all of her subsequent appearances. ("She's a rude little monster; no kin of mine that I'll ever own to" - Pickle.) Like all elves, Elita hated people knowing her name. For all her rudeness, however, Elita usually played the game fairly, keeping her side of the bargains she made. There is one exception to this: Elitas second appearance, again with Sarah, but in level three this time. Sarah and team tried Elita's patience to excess deciding whether or not to give her their red
gem for her ritual. When they eventually did hand it over, Elita took it and ran. After that, however, she kept her word, even in the case of releasing
Motley from the [
pillory] in exchange for a green stone from the next dungeoneer, winner Ben I.
Only one dungeoneer ever answered back to Elita's rudeness: Sofia in series 6, at the end of level one. ("Well done Sofia, it's no less than Elita deserves!" - Pickle.) It was Elita who had the last laugh, however, as she and Sofia met again in level three, where Sofia was forced to apologise for being rude to Elita so that the elf would save her from
Skarkill and his
goblins. So Elita never got her comeuppance, but at least she was often fun to watch.
Fear Factor: 6 Small but intimidating.
Killer Instinct: 2 Doomed Sarah with her trickery.
Humour Rating: 5 Always laughed at others, but never with them.
Oscar Standard: 9 Delightfully brusque and rude.