Mention The Dungeon Master to anyone of a certain age and it instantly conjures up a cartoon image of a sweet, little guy who assists a group of kids who have found themselves trapped in the realm of Dungeons and Dragons, by giving them cryptic clues to help them find the portal back home.
See, look, pretty innocent looking.
I, on the other hand, spent most of my adult life thinking he was evil...
And it's all because of this guy:
Mention Mysterious Cities of Gold to the same age group, and everyone instantly remembers the Golden Condor (a hugh flying machine shaped as a condor). Mysterious Cities of Gold is still to this day one of my favourite cartoon series. A group of kids, with a couple of mentors, run around South America looking for cities made of gold, for which they have the key - genius right?
Yes, however these things always have baddies, and one of the baddies just happen to be an alien race called the Olmecs. (Confused yet?). This picture is of King Menator, the leader of the Olmecs, and yes he was pretty evil.
At some point in my childhood The Dungeon Master and King Menator got muddled up, (we can all see why right?), and whilst I had nightmares about one I actually thought I was having nightmares about the other.
Today's lesson: Be careful about what you think you know, things are not always what they seem.