Terry Gilliam’s first, best destiny was always to be the greatest production designer/art director of his day.

He’s directed a handful of great films — “Time Bandits,” “Brazil,” “The Fisher King,” “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” and “Twelve Monkeys.” But even misses like “The Adventures of Baron Munchausen” and salvage jobs (“The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus”) can be stunning to behold.

Even the Gilliam disasters (“Zero Theorem,” “Tidelands”) can stick in the memory because of their stunning look. Whoever is credited with art direction or production design on his films — and sometimes it’s him — they’re to a one visually striking and vividly textured.

Even 1977’s “Jabberwocky,” his first and not remotely his biggest flop, stands as a testament to cinematic eye candy, great art direction on celluloid, with frame after frame a textbook on cinematic chiaroscuro.

After co-directing and production designing the cult hit “Monty Python and the Holy Grail,” Gilliam set out to solo direct something even more medieval, if considerably less nonsensical. “Jabberwocky” was sold as “Monty Python’s Jabberwocky” in much of the world, and it just isn’t.

Michael Palin may star, with Terry Jones the first familiar face we see and Python-supporting player Neil Innes as well as Gilliam himself in bit roles. But no Cleese, no Idle, no collaborative joked-up script, no Python.

There are flashes of wit in the script, which Gilliam and Charles Alverson wrote, stealing the title and loose inspiration from a Lewis Carroll poem.

The befuddled, aged King (Max Wall) is “Bruno the Questionable.”

Closed captioning subtitles help the less-punchy-than-you’d-like punchlines. Somewhat.

“Look! It’s a nun in the guise of the DEVIL!”

“No! It’s the Devil in the guise of a NUN!”

“Get her!” “GET HIM!” “Get THEM BOTH!”

The themes, as expressed by Palin’s character, Dennis the Apprentice Cooper (barrel maker), are about the birth of capitalism, contrived “crisis” shortages created by monopolist guilds at the expense of “craftsmanship” and the wellbeing of The People.

All of that still plays, set against a backdrop of mud, grime, earth tones and bad dentistry. This was bottom line survival where it was The People against Predators, aka bandits, royalty, armed suppression of the masses and those greedy guildfolk.

There is a gigantic beast roaming the land (dingy ancient Welsh castles and a stark quarry in Wales), the Jabberwock. It eats people and livestock, and the king’s chamberlain (John Le Mesurier) helpfully insists that the government do something about it.

But a cabal of merchants (Peter Cellier plays their spokesman) profiteering from the shortages created by fear of travel and city folk cowering indoors aren’t keen on that.

“If you destroy the monster, you destroy the city!”

The king’s half-assed solution is “a TOURNAMENT” to select “a CHAMPION” knight to ride out and vanquish this creature and cleanse the land. The chamberlain can complain all he wants about “the numbers,” how a to-the-death tourney is rendering the kingdom defenseless, one losing jouster at a time. The king and his princess daughter (Deborah Fallender) are too blinded by the bloodbath to fret over details.

It is into this city at this particularly “dark” Dark Ages moment that Dennis the Cooper’s Apprentice arrives, having undergone shunning by his dying father and the “fair” — OK, kind of grotesque — Griselda Fishfinger (Annette Badland).

Dennis will struggle to feed himself and try to fit in, even as his many suggestions of barmen and armorers and others about the lack of “efficiency” in their work regimen are discounted. His misadventures, only a few of them remotely funny, are destined to throw him into the company of a knight sent to vanquish their monstrous tormenter.

Roy Smith is the credited production designer and Millie Burns art director in this sometimes stomach turning feast for the eyes. But Gilliam’s “Holy Grail” and later “Life of Brian” and “Brazil” and “Time Bandits” and “Twelve Monkeys” touches are in every visual flourish, every weathered and unwashed detail.

It’s easy to pick out the “Holy Grail” gimmicks repeated or at least paid homage to (future Darth Vader David Prowse silently plays a couple of Black Knights). Selling this as a “Holy Grail” sequel, of sorts, was both a marketing no-brainer and serious cinematic bait and switch.

But even though Gilliam protested that approach, it suits the subject matter, in a “Well, that’s capitalism for you” way.

Pretty much everybody here has been funnier in other films and TV programs of the day. Jones alone hits just the right notes and makes his exit in the film’s opening scene, just in time to escape blame when things don’t go as well the rest of the way.

Gilliam at least learned from this experience. Don’t start production without a better script. Pythons on camera aren’t as important as Pythons behind it, when it comes to gag writing (most of Monty Python had a hand in “Time Bandits” on and off screen).

And for all its shortcomings, “Jabberwocky” is still a visual feast and something of a time capsule, with men-inside-a-gigantic costume monsters, stunts and in-camera effects that go well or don’t (check out the most useless grappling hook toss ever in a blown take that Gilliam had to use), all of it preserved on celluloid images so vivid it’s as if spherical lens 35mm cameras and production designers got their start in “the Dark Ages…ages darker than anyone had ever expected.”

Rating: PG, despite the nudity and bloody gore

Cast: Michael Palin, Harry H. Corbett, Deborah Fallender, Max Wall, John Le Mesurier, Peter Cellier, Neil Innes, Terry Gilliam and Terry Jones.

Credits: Directed by Terry Gilliam, scripted by Charles Alverson and Terry Gilliam, inspired by the poem by Lewis Carroll. A Columbia-Warner Bros. and Cinema 5 release on Tubi, other free streamers.

Running time: 1:46