Known more fully as Fatilla the Hun. As the wordplay (a reference to Attila the Hun) suggests, he was a portly barbarian. Fatilla appeared in Series 4 as a guard (usually on Level 1 at the Castle of Doom or Dungarth, occasionally on Level 2), and a hindrance to dungeoneers. He wielded a club and was keen to "blip" and "blop" dungeoneers with it, but his menace was undermined by his illiterate lack of intelligence, relatively easy corruptibility and overall entertainment value.
Every team that encountered Fatilla negotiated their way past, and did so in a variety of ways that encompassed bribery, magic, assistance and pure guile. Team 1 of Series 4 used gold, which appealed to Fatilla as a foodstuff; Team 3 of Series 4 used gold too; though by Team 7 of Series 4, gold didn't appease him, and a JOKE spell was needed. Team 2 of Series 4 used flattery to mollify the guard.* In Team 4 of Series 4's quest, Fatilla was deterred from harming dungeoneer Simon by intervention from Pickle (who entered the Dungeon and claimed that Simon was a "military forager") and Oakley (who scared Fatilla off just as he realised Pickle's ruse. Oakley repeated this action on Team 6 of Series 4's behalf). Team 5 told him they were on his list of people permitted to use the wellway and bribed him with a "magic" key. Team 8 of Series 4 took the most aggressive approach, incapacitating the barbarian with a bottle of Sniff (in what became Fatilla's final appearance).
Fatilla once locked Mellisandre in the stocks on Level 2 (clearly following the zeitgest of the season). On another occasion, he fell victim to two self-activating spells, and ended up wooing Gundrada in slow motion! He named his superior as "skull face" and "old bony face", taken by some Knightmare fans as a reference to Mogdred, and by others less plausibly as referring to Lord Fear.

A promo for Series 4 featured Fatilla breaking the fourth wall with the giant reptile behind him. It was shown at least once on Children’s ITV, on Wednesday 5th December 1990 after Mike & Angelo.

The spelling of Fatilla's name is conjectural, since he was not individually named in Series 4's end credits, but generally accepted by Knightmare fans. Fatilla was played by Michael Cule (who also played Brother Mace and Doorkis in Series 4), and provided the inspiration for the Knightmare RPG character Funkus. Fatilla is the subject of a filk of Michael Jackson's song Thriller, and later a filk of Chesney Hawkes' single The One And Only, which became The Hun And Lonely.

*Michael Cule recalled this encounter when interviewed by James Aukett in 2012: 'I remember one occasion where I was playing Fatilla and the dungeoneer was being really flattering and saying how wonderful I was, and Tim Child through the earpiece was just encouraging me to go with it! I ended up just being as complimentary and let them go past, not worrying about what was originally planned.'

[Earlier version: 2005-12-15 11:01:05]

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From TES issue 54 (November 2008)

Series 4. Level 1/2.
FATILLA THE HUN

Fatilla was a Dungeon guard, following in the footsteps of such characters as Gumboil, Cedric and Olaf. As his title suggests, he was a Barbarian, which meant that he slurped a lot as he spoke, which he did in a rather rough, primitive manner. The actor responsible for Fatilla was Michael Cule, almost unrecognisable in his Hun getup, which was a far cry from his Brother Mace costume. Fatilla’s main job was to guard the wellway to level two, which is why he was usually found hanging around Dungarth and the Castle of Doom.

The most common method of getting past Fatilla (despite his claim that “nobody gets by when Fatilla the Hun is on guard”) was to bribe him, usually with a bar of gold. Fatilla met all eight of the dungeoneers in series 4 during the closing stages of level one, and each appearance followed this basic structure. However, there were slight variations in some of the appearances, such as Jeremy’s use of a JOKE spell, and Vicky’s bogus claim that her name was on Fatilla’s list of people who were authorised to go down the well. Fatilla also had longer appearances in both Simon’s and Dickon’s quests, being scared off by Oakley on both occasions. Simon’s quest includes Fatilla’s famous battle of wits with Pickle (which the Barbarian lost, of course, somewhat spectacularly), marking the one and only occasion that one of Treguard’s assistants makes a personal appearance in the quest.

During Alistair’s quest, Fatilla had to be flattered into letting Alistair pass by at the Castle of Doom, which was quite a nice scene, before popping up again in level two, where he became involved in a “comical” scene with Gundrada, which involved the appearance of a self-activating ADORE spell, leading to Fatilla declaring his undying love for the sword mistress. As funny as this exchange was trying to be, it just wasn’t happening, if you ask me, and this scene is certainly guilty of slowing down the gameplay for no particular reason, which is one of the quibbles many fans have with series 4. This is one reason, I think, why I don’t remember Fatilla with any fondness.

Even ignoring the rather crude pun in the name, I’ve never really liked Fatilla as a character, as I think he was a bit too comical, what with his ridiculous speech and all too obvious total lack of mental agility. Under the right circumstances, he could easily have bagged himself a victim, as could any guard who was lucky enough to meet a dungeoneer that had not taken the correct object with which to bribe them. However, Fatilla didn’t really seem to be a major threat, because he was too ridiculous for words! Despite the presence of his large club, and his constant threats to “blip and blop” dungeoneers, Fatilla’s appearances are all very comical, even though he is presenting an obvious threat whenever he appears on the scene.

So, in very broad terms, Fatilla was a Dungeon guard, who could be bribed to let the dungeoneer pass. However, I don’t think he was a good addition to the Knightmare cast, as he was far too comical to be frightening, and he sometimes did little more than hold up the quest.

Fear Factor: 5 Obviously a threat, but too comical to be really scary.
Killer Instinct: 2 Could well have bagged a victim, but didn’t.
Humour Rating: 8 Certainly played for comedy, at least.
Oscar Standard: 7 Michael Cule is always great to watch, but this is definitely by far his least glorious character.

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Fatilla is one of the many Knightmare characters who is commemorated by a Knightmare Discussion Forum username. Fatilla_The_Hun was a member from June of 2003 until six years later, when a post count of zero saw the account deleted by Mystara.

In addition, forum member Moocowthingy based his screen name upon something he thought Fatilla had said. This turned out to be inaccurate: Fatilla referred to the Helmet of Justice as a "moo-cow helmet", and to dungeoneers as "dunger-thingies", but never mentioned a moocowthingy. However, no other members seemed troubled by what Moocowthingy referred to as his 'falsehood'.

[Previous version: 2009-11-20 19:53:50]

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