From TES issue 44 (March 2007)

Series 8. Level 1/3.
HONESTY BARTRAM

This character really was one of the less glorious aspects of the rushed, disjointed mess that was the blink-and-you-miss-it series 8. With his tradesman's cart, sackcloth robes and two-coloured hat, Bartram was clearly designed to be a kind of successor to Julius Scaramonger, in that he could sell useful objects and spells to dungeoneers if he chose to do so, but his quick-talking sales patter, combined with his allegiance to Lord Fear, meant that any dungeoneer who found that they needed something from his cart would not have an easy job in acquiring it.

As it turned out, only two dungeoneers met Honesty Bartram in the end, and due to the shortness of series 8, Bartram never got a chance to develop as a character, particularly as most of actor Bill Cashmore's time was taken up with playing Snapper-Jack. Honesty Bartram was given several 'amusing' lines (Don't tell your dad; You're not Dishonesty Daniel/Naughty Nathan, are you?) and a slight stutter in a very obvious attempt to make him comical, but it just wasn't happening.

My main objection to series 8 is that the production team tried to fit too much new stuff into too short a series. What with the introduction of a whole new antechamber for Treguard and Majida, the much-hated Reach wand, the Mire World, Lord Fear's new costume and castle, excessive numbers of new creatures (skeletrons, miremen, snapdragons, miretrogs) and the redesigning of the entire Dungeon (except a few chambers from Goth) there was far too much happening in series 8, and not enough time to accommodate it all effectively.

Honesty Bartram is just one of the characters (along with the likes of Bhal-Shebah, Motley, Hordriss, Smirky, Hands, Sidriss and even Treguard, in my opinion) that got ingloriously absorbed into this disappointing mess of a series, which (combined with the fact that only Daniel and Nathan met him in the entire series) makes him a very forgettable part of Knightmare.

Fear Factor: 3 With the knowledge that he was in Lord Fear's pocket...
Killer Instinct: 4 Certainly part of Daniel's losing slump in level three.
Humour Rating: 7 Made several jocular remarks, none of them amusing.
Oscar Standard: 5 Sadly, there wasn't much to do with the character.

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Honesty Bartram was a character added to the cast in Series 8 and, as such, had rather few appearances. For whatever reason, he had less appearances than other Series 8 additions such as Stiletta and Maldame. He was played by Bill Cashmore.

Bartram was a trader character in the vein of Julius Scaramonger, his name itself being a portmanteau of "Barter 'em". As a trader he was officially neutral, but as the Powers That Be had a 'positively'-aligned trader in the form of Rothberry, Bartram was sometimes shown to be something of a dodgy dealer.
Stiletta made a casual reference to Team 3 of Series 8, commenting that dungeoneer Nathan was the sort of person "Honesty Bartram would sell a goblin caller to"! The same team then used a spyglass to view Bartram consorting with Lord Fear himself. All this suggests that 'Honesty' was a misleading assumed title, and that he was prepared to sell you anything for money, regardless of its usefulness.
Yet for all these shortcomings, Bartram was a character who it is clearly intended for you to like. Although often viewed as an Opposition character, he had a cheerful demeanour, and would often sell teams things that would help them in their quest. He exchanged a sight potion for a SHADE spell, which helped Daniel escape from Miremen. The following team managed to persuade him to sell them a Risky potion, despite Fear's warnings not to. He encountered the team again, later on, and was persuaded - wth the aid of a little extra gold - to sell the team a rather intriguing book.

Bartram's sales pitch was actually quite persuasive, and coupled with his willingness to engage in banter with dungeoneers á la Scaramonger, and his catchphrase of "Don't tell your dad!", the general performance by Cashmore made him a more tolerable character than the brief of 'slightly dodgy trader' initially offers up.

It is, however, difficult to envision what else the producers would have done with him, had there been an extra series.

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