In a land of myth and a time of magic...
This year, Amazon Prime put up the Guy Ritchie King Arthur in my part of the world. Which is so awful that I didn’t manage more than twenty or thirty minutes before giving up. But it did inspire me to a Merlin rewatch for the first time since s5 ended. These last weeks, I managed to squeeze in the entire show, from the pilot to the finale, only skipping two or three episodes which I dimly recalled as too awful and/or boring. But I still found myself ridiculously charmed all over again.
By and large, my Merlin opinions haven’t changed much. By which I mean, I still like what I liked the last time around and still have problems with what I disliked the last time around, though I found myself a bit softer on s5 (perhaps because I knew what would happen and thus there was no problem with expectations) and a bit harder on s2. (S4 is still my overall favourite.) (By which you can conclude I still don’t hold with the „only s1 is good and everything else downhill from there“ credo.) Also, my dormant Merlin muses seem to have woken up again. I was reminded I still want to write a later season „Gwen confronts Morgana“ story, and the urge is now more strong than ever, because a preliminary look at existing fanfiction tells me that stories focused on the Gwen & Morgana (or Gwen/Morgana) relationship either go AU after s1 (after s2 at the latest), meaning in them, Morgana did nothing bad to Gwen ever, or they have Gwen all sweet and forgiving, which, no. I mean, Gwen is a sweet and kind person, yes, but Morgana arranged to have her burned on the stake in late s3 (in Queen of Hearts), ordered a massacre on Camelot’s civilian population while Gwen was around to witness it in the s3 finale, in s4 put her under a love spell or, if you want to leave it at what Gwen canonically knows about, changed her into a deer so she should be killed by Arthur, and in s5 put her through an extended period of torture and brainwashing, complete with engineering the death of Gwen’s brother and making Gwen responsible for additional murder. No matter how much Gwen adored Morgana in s1, this is not the kind of behavior that can be forgiven without much effort. And as opposed to, say, Arthur, who has blood on his own hands and can be plausibly written in a way that he feels guilty re: Morgana, let alone Merlin, who canonically does and should feel guilty for at least some of Morgana’s development, I don’t see Gwen blaming herself for how Morgana developed. At all. (Nor should she.) She’s also quite capable of condemming people if she deems it warranted. (See s5 opener.)
This touches on my general problem with the Morgana redemption stories I’ve found - they never confront her with her victims. (If, that is, they don’t go AU post s2 to begin with, in which case no real redemption is necessary.) Now I’m actually in the market for what I’d call „Morgana reconciliation stories“ , meaning those where she makes peace with Arthur (either in an AU or in reincarnation tales), with or without also making peace with Merlin, not least because I have a soft spot for dysfunctional siblings who used to be close. (And later Morgana and Merlin talking to each other beyond „you poisoned me“/“You’re an axe crazy murderer“ should be fascinating, if someone manages it ic.) But it seems to me that by confronting Morgana solely with characters who also wronged her and not with characters she victimized without any excuse whatsover, people are chickening out if redemption is where they want to go.
(A bit like if someone were to write an Uther redemption story in which the fact he had people burned by the dozens (hundreds?) is untouched, and instead the focus is solely on him failing Gaius by not protecting him from Aredian, and for the climax, Gaius‘ own moral failings of course also come up.)
Otoh, the Gwen story I have in mind would mainly be about Gwen coming to terms with what happened and how she feels about it, probably set immediately post With all my heart, possibly also post finale, not least because the last season is seriously lacking in her perspective when putting her through a lot of trauma. Whereas the other story I got the idea for during my rewatch would not have Gwen but would have Morgana as one of the three main characters, and it would deal with reconciliaton and redemption (of a sort), so I’m guilty as charged as well. It is this: post-finale, Arthur, Morgana and Mordred, all three of whom died through a blade forged by a dragon, find themselves not on Avalon in the Otherworld. (Note to self: do research on Celtic underworld.) And forced to work together, because ever since Morgana and Morgause mucked about with the veil separating the dead from the living in s4, with the closure Lancelot’s sacrifice achieved partially nixed by Morgana bringing Lancelot back as a Shade, supernatural underworld menace X has been collecting all the souls of everyone who died since then, non-magic users and magic users alike, and consumes them/torments them. Mordred found this out when Kara was executed, and that’s the true reason he went to Morgana. Being a druid, he knew the likely outcome of Camlann would be the three of them dead, but for mystical plot reason Y only the three of them would be able to liberate the dead from menace X and allow them peace. The Triple Goddess went along with this because she wants the dead returned to normal and because all three of them are oathbreakers - Arthur because while as King he did his best for his non-magical subjects, he failed the magic users (who were his subjects as well) on a massice scale, Morgana because when she had herself crowned as Queen in the s3 finale, she took the same protect-the-realm-oath Arthur did (and she failed both the non-magic users and the magic users - ask the poor slob who gets sacrificed so she can test her anti-Merlin device at the start of the show finale), and Mordred because he swore fealty to Arthur and Camelot, and, well, obviously. (That would be the title: The Oathbreakers. ) Cue everyone in varying degrees having massive issues and feeling themselves betrayed by the others but through underworld questing achieving recognition of their own responsibilities, doing something about it and eventually reconciling. (I wouldn’t exclude this was Mordred’s cunning plan all along, in addition to saving Kara from becoming soul food, because he did love both Morgana and Arthur yet felt massively let down by them not living up to the original impression he had of them.) (It’s ironic that this particular version of Mordred is not their son, yet emotionally, that’s how he relates to them at different points in his life.)
And lastly: Merlin as a show, cheesy GCI (and general cheesiness) included, still is drop dead gorgeous, and I don’t just mean the actors. (Though them, too.) It really had some of the most beautiful imagery around, and that, too, was one reason I skipped relatively little on my rewatch marathon. And damn, Colin Morgan was good. I mean, all the other plusses the show had going for it not withstanding, including the occasional legendary guest star (Charles Dance, Lindsay Duncan), it would have collapsed with a lesser actor in the title role, able to sell the cheerful soul arriving at Camelot in the pilot as well as the guy very nearly letting a child die before s1 is over, the compassionate guy helping out (most) of the people-in-need throughout the show and the most efficient killer of the lot (if a in-his-right-mind Merlin wants you dead and you're not Mordred, you do die on this show) with quite an inventively vengeful streak if he's angry enough (ask Aredian), the easily distracted youngster from the pilot to the single minded obsessive at the end. And it all feels organic and connected. Well done, casting people. Really well done.
This entry was originally posted at https://selenak.dreamwidth.org/1347563.html. Comment there or here, as you wish.
By and large, my Merlin opinions haven’t changed much. By which I mean, I still like what I liked the last time around and still have problems with what I disliked the last time around, though I found myself a bit softer on s5 (perhaps because I knew what would happen and thus there was no problem with expectations) and a bit harder on s2. (S4 is still my overall favourite.) (By which you can conclude I still don’t hold with the „only s1 is good and everything else downhill from there“ credo.) Also, my dormant Merlin muses seem to have woken up again. I was reminded I still want to write a later season „Gwen confronts Morgana“ story, and the urge is now more strong than ever, because a preliminary look at existing fanfiction tells me that stories focused on the Gwen & Morgana (or Gwen/Morgana) relationship either go AU after s1 (after s2 at the latest), meaning in them, Morgana did nothing bad to Gwen ever, or they have Gwen all sweet and forgiving, which, no. I mean, Gwen is a sweet and kind person, yes, but Morgana arranged to have her burned on the stake in late s3 (in Queen of Hearts), ordered a massacre on Camelot’s civilian population while Gwen was around to witness it in the s3 finale, in s4 put her under a love spell or, if you want to leave it at what Gwen canonically knows about, changed her into a deer so she should be killed by Arthur, and in s5 put her through an extended period of torture and brainwashing, complete with engineering the death of Gwen’s brother and making Gwen responsible for additional murder. No matter how much Gwen adored Morgana in s1, this is not the kind of behavior that can be forgiven without much effort. And as opposed to, say, Arthur, who has blood on his own hands and can be plausibly written in a way that he feels guilty re: Morgana, let alone Merlin, who canonically does and should feel guilty for at least some of Morgana’s development, I don’t see Gwen blaming herself for how Morgana developed. At all. (Nor should she.) She’s also quite capable of condemming people if she deems it warranted. (See s5 opener.)
This touches on my general problem with the Morgana redemption stories I’ve found - they never confront her with her victims. (If, that is, they don’t go AU post s2 to begin with, in which case no real redemption is necessary.) Now I’m actually in the market for what I’d call „Morgana reconciliation stories“ , meaning those where she makes peace with Arthur (either in an AU or in reincarnation tales), with or without also making peace with Merlin, not least because I have a soft spot for dysfunctional siblings who used to be close. (And later Morgana and Merlin talking to each other beyond „you poisoned me“/“You’re an axe crazy murderer“ should be fascinating, if someone manages it ic.) But it seems to me that by confronting Morgana solely with characters who also wronged her and not with characters she victimized without any excuse whatsover, people are chickening out if redemption is where they want to go.
(A bit like if someone were to write an Uther redemption story in which the fact he had people burned by the dozens (hundreds?) is untouched, and instead the focus is solely on him failing Gaius by not protecting him from Aredian, and for the climax, Gaius‘ own moral failings of course also come up.)
Otoh, the Gwen story I have in mind would mainly be about Gwen coming to terms with what happened and how she feels about it, probably set immediately post With all my heart, possibly also post finale, not least because the last season is seriously lacking in her perspective when putting her through a lot of trauma. Whereas the other story I got the idea for during my rewatch would not have Gwen but would have Morgana as one of the three main characters, and it would deal with reconciliaton and redemption (of a sort), so I’m guilty as charged as well. It is this: post-finale, Arthur, Morgana and Mordred, all three of whom died through a blade forged by a dragon, find themselves not on Avalon in the Otherworld. (Note to self: do research on Celtic underworld.) And forced to work together, because ever since Morgana and Morgause mucked about with the veil separating the dead from the living in s4, with the closure Lancelot’s sacrifice achieved partially nixed by Morgana bringing Lancelot back as a Shade, supernatural underworld menace X has been collecting all the souls of everyone who died since then, non-magic users and magic users alike, and consumes them/torments them. Mordred found this out when Kara was executed, and that’s the true reason he went to Morgana. Being a druid, he knew the likely outcome of Camlann would be the three of them dead, but for mystical plot reason Y only the three of them would be able to liberate the dead from menace X and allow them peace. The Triple Goddess went along with this because she wants the dead returned to normal and because all three of them are oathbreakers - Arthur because while as King he did his best for his non-magical subjects, he failed the magic users (who were his subjects as well) on a massice scale, Morgana because when she had herself crowned as Queen in the s3 finale, she took the same protect-the-realm-oath Arthur did (and she failed both the non-magic users and the magic users - ask the poor slob who gets sacrificed so she can test her anti-Merlin device at the start of the show finale), and Mordred because he swore fealty to Arthur and Camelot, and, well, obviously. (That would be the title: The Oathbreakers. ) Cue everyone in varying degrees having massive issues and feeling themselves betrayed by the others but through underworld questing achieving recognition of their own responsibilities, doing something about it and eventually reconciling. (I wouldn’t exclude this was Mordred’s cunning plan all along, in addition to saving Kara from becoming soul food, because he did love both Morgana and Arthur yet felt massively let down by them not living up to the original impression he had of them.) (It’s ironic that this particular version of Mordred is not their son, yet emotionally, that’s how he relates to them at different points in his life.)
And lastly: Merlin as a show, cheesy GCI (and general cheesiness) included, still is drop dead gorgeous, and I don’t just mean the actors. (Though them, too.) It really had some of the most beautiful imagery around, and that, too, was one reason I skipped relatively little on my rewatch marathon. And damn, Colin Morgan was good. I mean, all the other plusses the show had going for it not withstanding, including the occasional legendary guest star (Charles Dance, Lindsay Duncan), it would have collapsed with a lesser actor in the title role, able to sell the cheerful soul arriving at Camelot in the pilot as well as the guy very nearly letting a child die before s1 is over, the compassionate guy helping out (most) of the people-in-need throughout the show and the most efficient killer of the lot (if a in-his-right-mind Merlin wants you dead and you're not Mordred, you do die on this show) with quite an inventively vengeful streak if he's angry enough (ask Aredian), the easily distracted youngster from the pilot to the single minded obsessive at the end. And it all feels organic and connected. Well done, casting people. Really well done.
This entry was originally posted at https://selenak.dreamwidth.org/1347563.html. Comment there or here, as you wish.