#there were hints of arthur being accepting of magic in s1

[justaz]

like i’ve said time and time again, i haven’t watched bbc merlin in years but i was just wondering when the first time merlin called arthur by his name to his face and im scrolling thru the transcripts on the fandom wiki (supposedly it was s1ep4 btw) and im skimming the script for all these episodes and getting angrier and angrier. gaius was wrong for all that. morgana deserved so much better. edwin muirden was valid as hell (for targeting uther AND gaius. yeah. i said it.). also kilgharrah ate with that one lil line “then turn a blind eye. that is, after all, your talent” okay lizard brain pop offff.

[coinofstone]

2x11 The Witch's Quickening

Hey Arthur, remember last time you were on a manhunt in Camelot and it led you to Morgana's chambers, and she talked you out of searching them and later admitted that she'd been hiding a fugitive in there? Have you learned NOTHING

And Merlin too, he doesn't like, double back and confront Morgana or suggest Arthur do that?

Why is Arthur yelling at Merlin so much in this? Who wrote this episode.

::Coin watch the show instead of playing on her phone challenge::

Morgana being manipulated by a nine year old

Why is Arthur insulting the food as if Merlin cooked it himself? Every other meal he brings up is from the palace kitchens but on this occasion Merlin cooked himself? Ok.

Even the fkin dragon is OOC in this ep

Morgana is so much more intelligent than this.

Gaius needs to bring this to Uther in the throne room like a member of the public? He couldn't get a private audience with the king? Ok.

I really don't remember this episode being so terrible, maybe I'm in a bad mood.

You know, not for nothing, but from Mordred's perspective Merlin is being an absolute dick, not only siding with the oppressor but actively working to sabotage their plans and hurt their people. As we, the audience, are privy to the reasons behind this, WE don't necessarily questions Merlin's actions, WE know he's after the crystal because he's trying to prevent Mordred and Morgana from teaming up and bringing harm to Arthur - that's all good and well but like... Merlin could never bring himself to kill Mordred because he's just a boy, but yet he's allowed the boy to go off and become somewhat radicalized (I say 'somewhat' because honestly, it's not all that radical to plot to overthrow the king that has been waging a genocidal war against your people for twenty fucking years) without ever trying to bring him into the fold. If Merlin had explained his and Arthur's destinies to the boy, made an argument for waiting out Uther's reign in the hope that Arthur's reign will bring peace and magic back to Camelot, but which may not happen if he sees his father killed by sorcerers, and explained his reasons for hiding who he is from Morgana, regardless of Mordred's ultimate destiny to be Arthur's doom, Merlin would've at least had a shot at cultivating an alliance or at very least an understanding between them. Instead, all Mordred sees is this supremely powerful sorcerer who isn't even a druid, serving the very people that would bring an end to their entire race if they could. Although, it seems as tho Mordred has forgotten who exactly snuck him out of the castle and back to the druid camp in three first place. Makes you wonder if Morgana never explained to him that she was believed to have been kidnapped when they found her with the druids last time, and that she went along with that lie for her own safety.

Tl;dr: communication is important kids!

Do I even need to point out how much sense Morgana's little tiff with Uther did not make? Or her sudden distrust of Gwen? If anything she should think Gwen would be an ally considering a) her father was killed by Uther, as an innocent victim of Uther's war on magic, b) Gwen was party to Morgana's previous involvement in aiding and abetting a druid fugitive, c) Gwen L-I-T-E-R-A-L-L-Y sacrificed herself to save Morgana from Hengist's men, the is zero reason to question Guinevere's loyalty to Morgana, and d) Gwen has never said a WORD against sorcery or hinted at any kind of prejudice against druids or anyone with magic.

I looked up the writing credit for this, it's Jake Michie who is also credited with some fantastic episodes like Lancelot, Beauty and the beast, and the Lamia to name a few. It was directed by Alice Troughton who has also done some good eps, including other eps written by Jake Michie, so like I really don't understand what went wrong here.

Oh God there's a commentary track on this episode. I don't wannnnnaaaaaa but maybe I'll learn something, like why it turned out the way it did.

Commentary by Julian Murphy, Alice Troughton, and Katie. I do not have high hopes.

Katie right off the bat explaining shit that's important to note, God I love her on these tracks. Apparently, this was one of the last things to be shot (Merlin films everything out of order and films several episodes concurrently, depending on filming location.) and it was being shot while three other episodes were being wrapped up - so they had FOUR episodes filming concurrently and a lot of THIS episode was directed by Julian Murphy, and Jeremy shot some of it as well. This COULD explain a lot of the inconsistency, but I question how much since Julian seems to be involved in filming lots of scenes in lots of episodes. But I guess it's possible that just that on top of the rush to finish and the pressure of so many spinning plates in the air right at the end. They've just said that for this episode they had the least amount of days to shoot it out of all the episodes they've done, which is partly why they had so much going at once. It's as good a reason as any to explain it being so off, but I don't really see that explaining the wildly off characterization.

Katie going on the whole thing about Alvarr-as-revolutionary and Alice picks up on Morgana's sort of desire to be in that position and they're having a quite meaningful discussion then Julian:I think she just thinks he's hot 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

Katie says the script changed a lot even as it was filming, and that things were being changed as it was filmed so I'm kind of thinking for whatever reason this entire thing was a mess and that's why it came across looking so disjointed to me.

At least Julian realize the soup scene was terrible.

Idk why they're ganging up on Katie over the chemistry between her and Alvarr. She says she wasn't playing it that way and that she wasn't feeling it and they're just like "yea uh huh sure."

They're talking about having two units filming like a few feet away from each other in the forest, while there is another two units going in France.

Julian says they had added Alvarr's girlfriend in because they wanted to dramatize his charisma and calculation... but it's not manipulation - ?????????? Someone get the man a dictionary. 'We added a random blonde in four him to kiss so that the audience knows he's got a girl already, who sees him working his charm on Morgana and comments on it 'you played her well', but Alvarr isn't actually manipulative' ??????????

They've just pointed out two entire significant beats within a sequence that was constructed on set and off script. Arthur's confrontation with Alvarr in the forest and Merlin's slow motion tracking the crystal to show its got a powerful draw. The more they describe the specifics of filming the more it sounds like an utter disaster which kind of makes me feel bad for being so harsh on the episode.

I keep having to rewind to focus on what they're saying and I feel like I've been watching this episode for about 4 hours.

Awkward bit of prop-exposure there. Trying to work out what LK could even stand for.

Idk everyone's really happy with this scene between Morgana and Uther and I'm still sitting here thinking the dialogue was utterly ridiculous.

They talked about changing that final scene, where Uther clearly knows/suspects it was Morgana who helped Alvarr escape, so that it doesn't prematurely push the story too far ahead. They cut a look Morgana gives Merlin which, rightfully so, because it would've been too much too soon. The ending to this episode still feels wholly unsatisfying to me. I understand the little tag with the dragon yelling for Merlin to release him, I don't mean that, but the ending to the main story where Alvarr just escapes and Uther not only accepts that but also accepts that Morgana must've helped him. Overall Uther's been entirely sort of neutered throughout this episode, which I understand that partially has to do with it being Morgana, but like, in previous episodes when she's been so defiant against him, he's had her by the throat and locked her in a dungeon overnight. So I just doubt understand him being so subdued here, especially since he directly threatened her when he found pr Mordred escaped, and now another druid's escaped and he essentially knows she was involved given how she spoke to him, yet he doesn't do anything? Just wildly inconsistent behavior.

Anyway apologies for overanalyzing this episode, I realize I tore it apart pretty thoroughly during the commentary and the post became quite long. I wish there was a way to add a cut on mobile but there isn't. I'll have the S2 finale post up in a few hours - I might hold off on posting until I've watched the extras, I didn't do that for S1 but then I felt the extras didn't quite warrant a whole post on their own, so I might just tack on any thoughts I have to the 2x12 post. We'll see.

[thegeminisage]

okay i’ve had a good cry and a couple of hours to Process so here’s how i feel about the ending of merlin. spoiler cut i guess for the three people who still don’t know what happens

i still think that destiny shit is stupid. i think it’s a bad and lazy plot device contrived simply to explain away all plot problems

i still also think the tone shift went way too far. this show had a farting troll in it and then suddenly it does THIS? believe me i did love a BIT more seriousness but i did not expect an unhappy ending, i don’t think anyone who began watching during s1 could have expected that to happen. it feels cheap, like they tricked me

i’m also anti character death, especially pointless character deaths. every so often i do agree with one but they’re few and far between. la noire, fullmetal alchemist, mirror’s edge all had character deaths i was OK with - if it’s for a purpose and it MEANS something then i’m not entirely unreasonable about it

gwaine’s death, for example,was entirely pointless, and held no meaning or satisfaction. same for morgana’s. same for elyan’s if we want to rewind a little

...............i have very mixed feelings about arthur’s.

it was like, technically really well done. he spent the ENTIRE episode dying, which i was not expecting. he and merlin got that WHOLE TIME to hash it out. it wasn’t enough time by far, there should have been an entire season, but it was so much more than i was expecting. the struggle to get him some help, the FEELINGS they both had, everything was very organic and real (too real...) and they kind of knocked it out of the park in that respect

technically speaking as far as magic reveals go it was very clever to have arthur injured during it because then he was forced to stop and listen and observe instead of just acting rashly. i’m dead ass writing a fanfic with that premise that i have to take another long look at now because i don’t want to rip off canon. like, i agree with that choice. there are only a few other ways i think that would be just as good

that said, i think arthur died for no good reason really except someone decided that they needed this tone shift or whatever

they just didn’t have time to wrap up this ending. imagine if we had cut the four episodes of mind-controlled gwen, we could have had time to do anything

morgana died without a hint of compassion or catharsis, we never saw magic returning to albion or literally anything that happened to ANYONE after arthur died - there was absolutely no epilogue whatsoever except a brief speech from the dragon

and speaking of, he should have died too, because it’s stupid that merlin didn’t just CALL HIM FOR A RIDE - so much bullshit had to go wrong for arthur to die it was LITERALLY unbelievable

i think of season 5 in teen wolf - they wanted to make the villain look smart because he was able to infiltrate their friend group and turn them against one another, but the writers couldn’t make it believable, so instead the main cast just all wound up looking like they were being extra stupid for no reason

this is the same feeling i have with season 5 of merlin. merlin and arthur repeatedly make terrible choices in order to bring about the events that lead to arthur’s death but i only really BELIEVE in those choices like 50% of the time at best. it’s like the writers have gone out of their way to really make them both look extra stupid in order to punish them (and their audience by extension), and i don’t understand WHY

why is it that when arthur’s destiny is to die he does but when it’s to restore magic he doesn’t? are we supposed to believe old man merlin (and HOW is this dude immortal) is STILL waiting for arthur to come back and show us diagon alley is real??

GEE, IF WE HAD MORE TIME FOR AN EPILOGUE MAYBE SOME OF THOSE QUESTIONS COULD BE ANSWERED

i just...this started out as such a happy little show...sure, a lot of shows change tone over time, but it’s usually MUCH more gradual than this

if arthur had died to bring magic back as he was destined to do, i would have accepted it. if he had died for LITERALLY REASON AT ALL besides to punish his and merlin’s choices i might have accepted it

there just wasn’t enough time to make it make sense. and yeah some of that was bc they got canceled but like they had an entire season to work with. if they had stopped torturing gwen for five minutes arthur and merlin could have spent that whole season getting to truly know each other for the first time and it might have made arthur want to fight for magic and it made have made his death meaningful

but as it stands it was just...meaningless suffering. there was nothing gained in return. it was not a satisfying ending because we didn’t even get to SEE a real ending for anyone but arthur

it was a very good death, which i guess is what he always wanted. it just.......wasn’t good enough :/