5.11: Merlin - The Drawing of the Dark

[Perpetual Man]

Mordred finds himself torn between loyalty and love, but little does he realise that the path he chooses will shape Camelot's destiny... As the drums of war beat ever louder, a desperate Merlin feels trapped by the cruel circle of fate - is he powerless to stop his dreams of Albion from crumbling to dust?

 

[Perpetual Man]

And we run into the final straight. We can clearly see the writers know where they going now, and like an arrow loosed they are heading straight for the target.

I felt it was another excellent episode, that worked well. I think we all knew that Mordred was going to change sides at some point, the main worry was that it would seem forced.

And although to some degree anything like this is going to gave a degree of the artificial about it, I personally felt the method of turning him worked well.

I particularly liked the feeling that there was an air of tragedy in proceedings, that events went the wrong way no matter what the characters said or did.

The end though, surely that stole the show. As almost inevitably Mordred went to join her of the deliberately tatty hair, the pronouncement of Emrys identity was tge final thing that needed to be moved into place to set up the grand finale

 

[ctg]

Thank you and apologies. We'd Finnish guest for whole week and I thought I should had had time to put it up but I'm so pleased Perpetual Man managed the board in the meantime.

Thank you Perpetual Man.

PS. I'll comment later on after I've seen the episode.

PPS. Perpetual Man, if you have time, could you change the title a bit and add 5.11: Merlin - at front of the episodic title.

 

[Dave]

So, in a land of myth, and a time of magic, the destiny of a great kingdom does indeed all depend upon a silly girl?

Except, it wasn't half as bad as I expected; in fact it was one of the best episodes yet IMHO. She wasn't a silly girl at all, she was a deep and well thought out character. She believed that what she was doing was right and just, just as all freedom fighters would. One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter and all that jazz. Pity we had never seen her before today.

I agree about the idea of fate - and that whatever Merlin did he could not change the events unfold exactly as he predicted they would. He was watching a car crash in slow motion from the other side of the road.

The ending was another step up, but I was waiting for Morgana of the tatty hair to just laugh and say "Who? Merlin?" I still can't believe that Arthur will die in two weeks time - he hasn't achieved anything yet, has ruled for less time than his father, and still only Morgana is aware that Merlin is some great wizard. Surely, Arthur must rule, and Merlin must practise magic for a fair few years yet otherwise why would they be remembered?

And in my TV guide letters page, someone has complained that this Season is too dark! Apparently, they liked the humour in it before. I'd make them watch re-runs of The Chuckle Brothers back to back as a punishment for that.

 

[Perpetual Man]

Thank you and apologies. We'd Finnish guest for whole week and I thought I should had had time to put it up but I'm so pleased Perpetual Man managed the board in the meantime.

Thank you Perpetual Man.

PS. I'll comment later on after I've seen the episode.

PPS. Perpetual Man, if you have time, could you change the title a bit and add 5.11: Merlin - at front of the episodic title.

When I suddenly realised there was not a thread up I began to panic, I know how reliable you have been and began to think we'd done something to upset you

Sorry, too late to change the title, I'll PM a moderator and ask one of them to change it a bit later - unless one sees this first.


Dave - I agree with everything you have said about the length of reign and everything. What exactly has happened to make Arthur the king of legend. This might end up being a little quibble at the end though...

I have an itch at the back of my head about the girl, have we seen the character before, if not the same actress? Anyone know?

 

[Mouse]

Perp: http://merlin.wikia.com/wiki/Alexandra_Dowling

All I have to say is, how awesome is Percival? Just put him up against Morgana and Modred and he'd take them out.

I'm not totally ok with Mordred running back to Morgana, but whatever.

Do we know Arthur's definitely gonna die? Can't see that happening somehow.

 

[ctg]

Wow.

This episode must have been so easy and yet so hard to write. And they tried to give every bit of reason, every opportunity to turn this thing around and head in another direction. But no, and we know that this series could had been as well as called Arthur as this follows very closely the legends to the bitter ending. But the funny thing is that in Merlin vision, Mordred was wearing the red cloak - the banner of Camelot.

So giving strong emotions, strong acting and a very clear reason for his betrayal delivered, as Dave said it, the best episode in the season. They are really going out with a bang and I for one believe that the series final isn't going to let us down.

Not in any way or shape. And for the note, I look forward their mysterious next production they mentioned of doing couple weeks ago. And I'd like to say,

Hail Merlin, Hail Arthur and Hail the Knights of Round Table. You have done good.



PS. I try to include the series title one way of another when I put up the thread as it'll show the people what we're talking about when they see it flagging up in the forum display. So if Dave could add Merlin after the 5.11: bit, I'd be grateful.

 

[Dave]

I've done it to match the rest of the season but it isn't really necessary as it has it's own forum so you can see the forum name at the side on any search. The "X.XX: name of episode" format is something we began from the earliest days of the forums and have used in all TV series.

"Mordred was wearing the red cloak - the banner of Camelot." Are you saying that means the vision does not come true? Or was that a continuity error? Or are you saying something else? I would never have put any importance on it, even if I had noticed it.

I only vaguely remember the vision now from the first episode of this Season but it looked like Mordred and Arthur were fighting on the same side and he turned around to kill him. If anyone has access to it could they describe what happens again?

 

[ctg]

I've done it to match the rest of the season but it isn't really necessary as it has it's own forum so you can see the forum name at the side on any search. The "X.XX: name of episode" format is something we began from the earliest days of the forums and have used in all TV series.

Thank you. I noticed that if you put the series name and the people are in the forum, the thread becomes more visible to the readers, when in times if it's under the forum as in xx.x: - title format, people get confused about what we're talking at the moment.

"Mordred was wearing the red cloak - the banner of Camelot." Are you saying that means the vision does not come true? Or was that a continuity error? Or are you saying something else? I would never have put any importance on it, even if I had noticed it.

The vision was quite explicit, and I thought they filmed the vision scene with Mordred wearing the Camelot cloak at the same time, when they filmed the final episodes. So as Mordred has now done the betrayal thing and he's obviously wearing brownish cloak, the whole "Mordred kills Arthur" thing might have changed - even though the feeling is that the series is going to follow Arthurian legends with Arthur dying at the battlefield by Mordred hand.

Maybe that is wishful thinking. Don't know. We see.

I only vaguely remember the vision now from the first episode of this Season but it looked like Mordred and Arthur were fighting on the same side and he turned around to kill him. If anyone has access to it could they describe what happens again?

I'll see if I can find the thing from the web.

 

[reiver33]

Two minor quibbles - Mordred escapes and goes to Morgana, who apparently lives within walking distance of Camelot? Plus if he knew how to find her (when a good guy) why didn't he mention this?

 

[DarkYami]

The most unsuprising episode i've ever seen, after saw the trailer for this episode i pretty much worked out what was going to happen. I still watched it of course but knew from the start that Mordred would cross over to Morgana and then tell her who Merlin really was once his "girlfriend" was killed. Still we all knew Mordred would turn or was playing the long game.