Episode II.XI – The Witch’s Quickening
In which we are a bit punch drunk, and not too happy about what’s happening to all of our best beloved characters. Sorry about that.
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18th May 2020 @ 5:18 pm
Came to the podcast late, so this is my first time writing in an episode comment <3 We'll see how long I can resist going back and writing comments for earlier episodes way too late to be part of the discussion
I think it would be interesting to keep a list, a la the Merlin Kill count, of how many of our rare positive examples of the old religion are female. We've had Aglain, who was wonderful, and Anhora the Unicorn keeper, who was more of a neutral figure but not portrayed as villainous, and I can remember a few spoiler characters going forward who range from good to complicated-but-at-least-not-villians, but I genuinely can't remember if ANY of them are women. I think that however unintentionally, the creators did make a divide between how they treat their female magic users and their male ones. I think just casting one or two of those positive/neutral druid characters who have speaking lines as women would have at least helped a bit.
I feel like that kind of thoughtlessness towards the deeper implications of their choices extends a lot to how this show talks about oppression and contributes to the Major Issues ™ I have with their views on the right and wrong ways to handle oppression, but that's something to expand on more as we go forward. Still, I think you guys hit the nail on the head with the major issue being that the writers room consists of mainly white men, who may or may not have experienced actual oppression and inevitably view it through the lens of someone in a position of privilege. The rest of my comment will have to wait for when I actually can do a proper Merlin rewatch, which will hopefully be soon.
11th May 2020 @ 11:11 pm
I never really liked this episode. None of the characterizations made any sense. Morgana was acting irrationally and Alvar came out of nowhere. If they had put even hints of a rebellious band of magic users in some of the previous episodes, I might have accepted it but nope, didn’t make sense at all.
29th April 2020 @ 12:07 pm
I was almost done writing my comment and then I lost connection and the page refreshed 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 🙁 I have rewatched the episode to take notes on it which overall with the writing took around 3 hours, then reworded it all into a comment and that took an hour and now its al gone ugh, anyways I am going to do my best at writing it again.
Because I am fed up now I am going to jump right into my first point which is about when Mordred is speaking to Alvarr from inside the barrel. 1 how can he see where they are going to be able to direct them correctly and 2 how come merlin can hear them talking in their heads? we have previously learned that both Morgana and Gaius also have magic and I doubt they are the only magic people in Camelot, surely they would have considered that when they made the plan or is it just merlin that can hear? if so is it because his magic is more powerful than everyone else’s or is it just that the writers needed to find a reason for merlin to find out about them. personally I think it would have made more sense if merlin had been walking down the hall after doing something for Arthur and saw them just as he was returning to his and Gaius’s chambers to sleep.
my next point is about when Morgana takes the crystal to the druids. in this scene, she mentions that it is early in the morning however she has fully dressed with her hair done in a more complex style, as far as we know the rest of the castle is still asleep so Gwen would have no reason to be with Morgana that early and she makes it clear that no one else knows about her visit this means she would have had to get ready all by herself. It just confused me a bit because the last time she saw Gwen was presumably the night before when she was in different clothes and had her hair done differently so Gwen did not help her with it in the morning. also, how is her hair so perfect even though she is in the middle of a forest and has had a hood on the whole journey, is this the fairytale element of the show coming out? because it definitely seems like something that happens a lot in fairytales.
if you are not already bored of my rambling, the next point is about when Gaius says to merlin that they can ‘bend the truth a little’, I just think that this line was a bit odd as it made it sound like its something they rarely do, and considering merlin lies to pretty much everyone every day the phrasing and delivery of the statement could have been changed slightly to make it sound like Gaius actually knew about all the lying that they do all the time. I like where they were trying to go with this but it didn’t quite make the total sense that it could of if Gaius maybe instead said something like ‘it doesn’t have to be the whole story’ with maybe a side glance with a small smile at merlin to show that he understands.
Anyways onto the next point which is the scene directly afterward when they are in the courtroom and Gaius is explaining to Uther the story of what happened with Alvarr. in this scene, Morgana just gets up and leaves and with merlin paying close attention to her actions, he obviously sees her. the part that bothers me is the fact that there is a whole room of people facing in the direction of Morgana and apart from merlin, not one seems to notice her acting very strangely and then just leaving, it’s not even like she does it subtly. Did no one else see her looking increasingly worried as Uther got angrier at Alvarr was merlin seriously the only one that paid attention to any of it?
The next point is about when Morgana leaves to warn the druids about the knights coming to find them. So Morgana’s horse would have been in the same stables as the knight’s horses, so why did she arrive so much earlier than all of the knights considering no one knew she was going. how did she manage to get her horse completely ready by herself and then ride all the way to the druids arriving 2 hours prior to the knights? it just doesn’t make that much sense that Morgana would be quicker to do all that than the knights that had servants that have been trained to get horses ready quickly. even if she had left immediately after the scene in the courtroom, it is unlikely she could have gained so much time on them.
now I’m done with all the negative points of the episode I wanted to talk about a scene that I think really shows just how much the relationship between Arthur and Merlin has developed. this is the scene when Arthur tells Merlin to guard the crystal with his life, although this scene can be seen as Arthur prioritizing the crystals safety over merlins life, it actually shows the amount of trust that Arthur has in merlin now. if this had happened previously, Arthur would have stayed awake and guarded the crystal himself because of the value of it however him giving merlin this huge responsibility really shows just how far they have come since the start of season 1.
LESSONS:
my first lesson from this episode is for merlin. it is to not give in to temptations no matter what you think the result might be because often it doesn’t do any good for anyone. however, he obviously doesn’t learn this lesson because I have lost count of the time he has got himself in trouble for giving in to temptations in future episodes and he would almost certainly not be the character that causes most the problems if he actually did learn the lesson (goblin episode come to mind). But as a result of his lack of self-discipline, he is now going to be focused on what may be rather than what is, if he spent half the time he spends getting involved in other peoples business simply enjoying the time that he has in Camelot with Arthur, Gwen, Morgana, Gaius, etc… he might feel like he has done a lot more with his life than just worry about what some crystal that he hadn’t even known about until a few days ago showed him.
the second lesson this episode is for Morgana, she learns (or rather doesn’t learn) that she needs to be more subtle with her deception, she can’t show her true feeling about a situation openly and she certainly cannot just get up and leave in the middle of a trial. I also think that if at least one person in the room had noticed Morgana’s strange behavior and pointed it out, she might actually have leaned the lesson she needed to but anyway.
As usual, Uther doesn’t learn anything in this episode, maybe because yet again the main ‘bad’ character is magical so he has a reason to believe that magic is bad or maybe just because he is too proud to admit or even consider that he may sometimes be wrong.
I hope you like my answer, as I said it took me ages and even longer because the connection lost. but thank you, I am really enjoying Shadowhunters, I am currently on episode 8 of season 1 but only because I also have work to be doing. cant wait for the next episode of D+C
Bye
29th April 2020 @ 1:50 pm
Oh no! That’s such a shame and so frustrating. It’s happened to me before as well. Since then, I always type on an offline doc first so I don’t lose my work…:( You’re so dedicated to go and do the work a second time!
In terms of the council scene, I agree with you. Merlin is a little slow and dim-witted in this episode anyway. He is clearly already suspicious of Morgana when he sees her in Arthur’s chambers when she takes the keys. Yes, he confronts her, she thinks of a stupid excuse which he challenges and she leaves. But why didn’t he check the drawers straight away? Then he would have noticed the missing keys straight away, would have been able to alert Arthur and the whole fiasco could have been avoided by Arthur posting some more guards down there – or any, since when Morgana enters the vault, there seem to be none at all!
Equally, in the council scene, both Gaius and Merlin know that Morgana stole the keys and is in league with the rebels. Why did Gaius not talk to Uther privately? Surely, that could have been arranged, especially since he knows Morgana will be present and he needs to protect the identity of his ‘witness’. And yes, even if that wasn’t possible, why doesn’t Merlin stop Morgana leaving (an accidental bucket of water over her head?). Also, Morgana is shown riding through the forest at night to warn the druids. Then we see the knights leaving in broad daylight…what is up with that timing? When Gaius told the council of the location of the Crystal, it was broad daylight. Are we to believe that Arthur would have waited until the next day to ride out with his men? Or is that just so Morgana could get a completely unreasonable headstart?
In terms of Morgana appearing the druid camp the first time to deliver the crystal and appearing all hair-styled and make-upped – I think that’s unfortunately just often the nature of film and TV. Especially the girls in Merlin are very often beautified in scenes when they should be pale-faced, sweaty and sticky. There is a little too much catering to the male gaze for my taste – but then, the show was basically run by men and we do have occasional topless Arthur scenes as well. Oh, and just wait till all the knights arrive…I don’t really appreciate the ‘objectification’ of either men or women in Merlin – I don’t need it to care about the characters and the story – but I think it is just a mark of the TV/ film industry. Maybe one day that’ll change and girls, when riding through the forest all night, will arrive dirty and sweaty and unkempt as would be realistic.
I think Morgana didn’t get ready by herself, by the way. She just didn’t take out her hairstyle from the night before. We see her sending Gwen away rather sharply and we know that Morgana can get ready for bed by herself because she willingly offered to do so in S1 Ep4 so that Gwen could look after a very poisoned Merlin. In this instance, she just didn’t get ready for bed but rode through the night. However, the line about it being morning and the castle about to wake up doesn’t make sense because the scene is filmed in definitive late-morning/ noon light and even if it were morning, Morgana’s absence would certainly be noted since, if she took an entire night to ride to the druid camp, it would also take her a few hours to ride back to Camelot. Logically, she can’t get back to the castle in time for no one to notice her absence.
28th April 2020 @ 2:56 am
Completely agree with you, Mary, that Morgana’s motivation is extremely underbaked. When I finished this ep, I actually starting scrolling back through the previous episodes to see if there was one I’d forgotten about that appropriately set this up. To be honest, the last really strong Morgana/Uther moment I remember was her deciding not to kill him and that she did in fact love him on some level in “To Kill the King”. Yes, Uther has done plenty of awful stuff since then, but nothing in Morgana’s reactions has felt significant enough to set up this turn of events.
I also remain excessively frustrated about the Dragon continuing to forget about Merlin’s promise for multiple episodes in a row – he was literally giggling about the love curse in the previous ep – to suddenly calling in this great debt as though he is going to destroy the entire world tomorrow.
LESSONS
Merlin does seem to have learned that he is rather alone in his role of defending Arthur against a slew of powerful magical foes. This episode seemed to mark major turning points in his perception of Mordred, the Dragon, and Morgana, who are all the magic users he currently encounters on a regular basis. I agree he was shown to be freaking out quite a bit, but I interpret that reaction to be largely a factor of his suddenly feeling very small. As kind as it sounded at the time, seen from this angle, Gaius’ speech about shaping the future probably didn’t help.
Anyway, haven’t finished the podcast yet so hopefully I’m not retreading territory Ruth and Michelle already covered! I’ve been struggling to keep up this season, which I blame on COVID and continuity errors. (Because it couldn’t possibly be MY fault 🙂 )
28th April 2020 @ 5:59 am
Thanks. Yeah, I don’t remember a one-on-one Uther/ Morgana scene since ep 12 last season either… There was her insistence on rescuing Gwen in Lancelot and Guinevere but Arthur was there and the king was rather indulgent of her then. I don’t know that I’ve seen much evidence of her having to hate or fear Uther since then. It was said quite a few times (obviously especial in ep 3) but apart from maybe the Witchfinder, they didn’t show any real hazard to Morgana herself.
Which is why I think it would have been great if the break with Uther would have occurred when defending someone in actual peril and not to fight for a freedom she hasn’t really been lacking or indulge a boy she’s barely spoken to.
27th April 2020 @ 11:21 pm
Sorry, there is a lot of rambling because I am confused by this episode and how it presents the characters. Also, this is the episode when I start grieving and that isn’t the most conducive to lucidity.
Lessons:
We learn that, like Merlin (S2 Ep3), Mordred possesses those infamous and incredible powers of navigation. During his only other sojourn at Camelot, he was mostly passed out or deadly sick, hidden away in Morgana’s rooms or taken through hidden passages and the city at night. It must be his magic – how else would he know exactly how to get to Morgana’s rooms from the courtyard and be able to guide Alvarr while stuck, unseeing, in a barrel?
Merlin may have told the dragon that he has no choice but to help him and tell him about the Crystal of Neahtid; however, by the end of the episode, Merlin learns that the dragon has a choice after all: he can and does choose to not only be stinky and selfish but also a nagging and agonisingly persistent lizard. I can see him moan and call and torment Merlin relentlessly, day and night, until Merlin finally releases his lizardy arse because he is sleep-deprived and driven to madness!
Once again, we learn that Gaius is wilfully withholding information to make Merlin’s life a pain and any task much harder. He sends him to the dragon to ask about the Crystal because apparently there is nothing in his books. Really?? I mean, his library has stuff on Bastets, Griffins, information about Morteus flowers that are so rare and access to them so dangerous that hardly anyone comes back alive! Over 636 love spells!!! Gaius’s books have everything on everything. But we are to believe they hold no information about a well-known magical artefact that even Uther knew enough about to lock up? And then after Merlin has looked into the Crystal, Gaius suddenly reveals that ‘there is nothing on this earth that can reveal all possible futures, even the Crystal.’ So, how did Gaius suddenly know so much about this then, huh? Gave yourself away, Gaius!
Merlin understands some very important aspects of Mordred’s personality. I think whereas Merlin has previously seen himself (or his younger self) reflected in Mordred, in this episode, he understands their fundamental differences. Both Mordred and Merlin have lost loved ones, often at Arthur’s hand. But their reaction is entirely different: Merlin has grieved for Freya or Will and has then humbly assumed his servant role again, without placing blame on Arthur and in good faith that the prince is a good man and will one day be the king foretold. Of course, the promise of Merlin’s destiny and purpose plays into that. He meets Mordred again at a crossroads in time when the druid boy has also recently acquired a purpose: to destroy Uther and all who serve him, including Arthur who has saved his life in S1 Ep8. In this way, Merlin sees Mordred reacting to Arthur slaying his druid camp in Ep 3 with violence and hate, even though he has been raised in the relative safety of a druid community who encouraged and accepted his magic. Merlin, on the other hand, has been afraid all his life, having to hide who he is. Actually, it wouldn’t have been surprising to see their roles reversed: Merlin displaying such volatile behaviour and Mordred continuing on the druidic path of peace he has been taught. I think what Merlin observes about Mordred in this episode may or may not influence his attitude to and trust in Mordred should he ever happen to meet him again in the future. (cough)
And this is where is transition from lessons to general thoughts…
This begs the question of how Mordred was turned from a peaceful druid boy to a rebel so quickly? Clearly, their way of fighting Uther is the extreme opposite of all he has been taught until then, yet Mordred trusts them so quickly and willingly participates in their vengeful acts. Perhaps this is why the druids looked after him in the first place – they saw his magical potential but also his potential to be volatile, emotionally unstable and vengeful?
Also, Mordred has clearly been taught about Emrys and the prophecies of what Merlin and Arthur will achieve. In fact, he was the first to recognise Merlin as Emrys. Where is that all gone? The fabled Emrys was actually the one who saved his life when he was chased by guards, first time he went to Camelot; Emrys warned the druid camp about Arthur’s approach when they had taken in Morgana and conjured the mist so that he could escape. He owes Emrys his life many times over, knows about his destiny and yet turns against all that with some stranger rebels first chance he gets? Why isn’t his bond with Merlin at least as strong, if not stronger, than his bond with Morgana? Why didn’t they go to the mighty Emrys to get the Crystal? Was this kid brainwashed?!
This brings my comment to what bothers me most: I think Morgana’s motivation in this episode is so under-baked because it relies so heavily on the special connection with Mordred the showrunners THINK they set up in S1. In this episode, to get Morgana to do what he wants, all Mordred has to say is , “Please, Morgana, we need you” and she is ready to do whatever, channelling maybe a mother hen or older, protective sister? However, in my opinion, this falls flat because ‘The Beginning of the End’ never managed to textualise the nature or reason of that special bond. We had a lot of people (Gaius, Merlin, Gwen) being confused at how protective she felt of the boy and how far she was willing to go for him. It didn’t bother me so much then, putting it down to Morgana’s sense of justice and willingness to help innocent victims of Uther’s rage. However, she has done the same for Merlin and his village and she was locked up and almost killed the king for Gwen. Yet, she did not develop a special bond with either of them, that meant her extreme loyalty, trust and affection! Yet now, to betray Uther and potentially all the friends and family she has ever known and who have been caring and good to her, all she needs is Mordred saying please? I don’t get it. Maybe that’s why they made Alvarr so flirtatious and (apparently) charismatic so that Morgana had another (maybe) slightly more feasible reason to do their bidding?
Of course, I get that Morgana is preyed on by Alvarr because she feels helpless and friendless in Uther’s castle. People keep her ignorant and she is scared of being discovered which helps me to sympathise somewhat with her and why she is so easily falling for the manipulations of Alvarr, Mordred or Morgause. These people seem to be kin and to offer her some sort of agency to fight for her/their cause. However, I think the showrunner’s attempts to villainise Alvarr in order for us to sympathise with poor, silly Morgana somehow stand in contrast to the Morgana we have seen in Season 1: she used to have gumption and agency in and of herself; she was intelligent, fierce, independent and deeply caring and she stood up to Uther. She didn’t need anyone on the outside to give her a chance to act: she would do it because it was right and she was gutsy. Yes, she now knows she has magic and her dreams have been troubling her more and more, but she has been easily hiding behind the nightmares lie and so far, all we have seen have been two magic mishaps and nothing after she visited the druids and found out the truth.
This is what I would have liked for Morgana’s ‘turn to the dark side’: no outside figurehead to follow and cling to, no one suddenly appearing to manipulate Morgana or ‘grant’ her agency. I would have loved it if Morgana had turned against Uther of her own accord and from her own conviction. There were so many great points where this could have happened: Perhaps when Arthur was disinherited in Ep 6 or when Gaius was almost burned to death in Ep 7. Then Morgana, because she knew Uther was doing wrong, could have turned away from Uther and started down her own path, but as her own boss. On that path, she could then make terrible choices, form fateful alliances and develop into the Morgana of later seasons. But at least, at the start, I would have been able to follow along with her, especially since turning away from Uther for someone she deeply cared for would have made so much more sense than for some random stranger and a kid she’s seen twice that appear in her bedroom at night.
24th April 2020 @ 4:27 pm
Having forgotten the ep entirely, through Merlin’s scenes of being yelled at by Arthur I was expecting something to come of it: for Merlin to find out a crucial bit of info and try to tell Arthur and got Arthur to go “why the hell should I trust you when you made me look like an idiot before?” and for that to be relevant to the plot… but no. Arthur’s just mean. It’s not quite out of character, I mean he’s taken out his frustation and humiliation on Merlin before, but this felt undermotivated, like you said, especially since in the scene with Morgana it didn’t feel like Arthur actually had been THAT humiliated. With his father I understand a little better, but Morgana telling him off wasn’t that bad. I’d be more inclined to accept a slightly out of character Arthur if it felt necessary to the plot, but since Gauis’ sudden physician-ex-machina moment solves the issue of how to get Arthur to the druid camp, there’s no info left that Merlin needs to convince Arthur of, so there’s on reason to set up a conflict that stops Arthur trusting him, if that makes sense. They don’t even really return to normal, as they have done in previous episodes where there’s conflict between them, and I just ended the episode kind of upset about the two of them.
I did enjoy Merlin saying to the dragon “do you have a choice?” because a) it’s nice to see Merlin talk back to the stinky lizard, and b) it’s an interesting bit of character growth for Merlin and a nice reversal of their usual dynamic (given that the dragon is so often the one who makes Merlin feel trapped in his destiny) where Merlin is coming to realise that he has the power in this situation at least while the dragon is in chains. There are interesting things happening with power throughout the episode: Mordred’s power is evident, we’ve seen him kill people before but this was more deliberately violent and murderous than the time he screamed to throw people away from him – that was desperate, this is less so, I feel. Merlin emphasises his power over the dragon in a way that is almost cruel – he’s right not to let an angry winged beast loose on Camelot but it’s still letting a large beast remain confined in a cave – and then when he sees the future in the crystal it’s evidence of his magical power, both the dragon and Alvarr mention the power one would need to use it, but it’s also disempowering because of what he sees. It didn’t appear that Merlin had to use any spell or anything to make it show him the future, and since it compelled him to look it seemed less like Merlin had the power necessary to wield it and more like the crystal had power over Merlin. Like his magic is something that can be used against his will.
I also think it’s fascinating that the images Merlin saw were the dragon and his own face. The dragon makes sense, but for Merlin to see himself crying instead of someone he cares about is an interesting choice. I don’t really know how to put into words why, but there’s something different about Merlin knowing that he personally will suffer rather than seeing something bad happening to someone else. The latter would compel him to action, I think, whereas the former gives a sense of futility and hopelessness. It makes me wonder whether the crystal has its own purpose (or an old-religion-y purpose, or something) in what aspects of (or versions of?) the future it shows you.
27th April 2020 @ 11:29 pm
Oh, I completely agree with you: I do not like shouty Arthur whatsoever and it feels so mean and pointless. It seems such a disappointment after Sweet Dreams, where we got such a multi-layered, many-register Arthur, to go (back?) to such a one
register Arthur and not even for good reason. If I didn’t know Bradley was a good, imaginative actor, I’d say he reminded me of a typical student in a school play: enthusiastic but not very versatile. However, since I do know, I am going to put this down to a bad script…
Also, just to have this on record, Merlin is far too twitchy for me in this episode. It makes me twitchy watching him! 🙂
I love your idea that maybe the Crystal has its own agenda and consciousness and chose exactly what it wanted Merlin to see and act on. (Kind of reminds me of the One Ring now!) The question is, if that is true, whether the Crystal showed Merlin this particular future to make him react against it and fail (possibly suggested by the vision of himself crying) or react against it and hopefully succeed.
24th April 2020 @ 2:33 pm
Loved your guys’ discussion about this episode! It made me think a lot about Morgana’s character and actions (like a LOT) so hopefully I can make you feel a bit better about it Ruth!
I think the biggest issue with Morgana’s character from here onwards is that there is a huge amount of change and development that takes place, which does not seem to always be particularly consistent or linear. This is mostly down to us not having many Morgana-centric episodes, and when they do appear, she features more as a plot point than as a character we are trying to understand the motivations and emotions of.
Despite this, I think we can do some headcannoning that makes this episode way more understandable, and hopefully gives a better lense going forward! It was a whole season ago that Morgana’s nightmares got super intense, and she became aware of her magic. Prior to this, Uther literally clapped her in iron for helping a child – yes he was a Druid and magic is evil and blah blah, but surely Uther would have been reminded of taking in a young Morgana at a similar age who was also all alone? And then Morgana discovers her magic.
Now we don’t have an exact timeline, but several months, if not a year have gone by over the course of this, and Morgana has watched Urther execute people relentlessly this whole time. She must surely be thinking he would do the same to her, if he were to imprison her for aiding a child. She is all alone, absolutely terrified, and is shut down any time she has sought out help. Imagine living in that constant state of fear and feeling entirely alone with it for a year, and believing your primary caregiver would execute you without a second thought for something that was completely beyond your control.
Now I think this background makes it easier to approach this episode: where someone comes into her life, who has magic, who wants to see a world where people with magic are free and safe, who has a plausible plan for bringing this about, and who is straight up just really kind and understanding to her (at least to her face). Who finds out she has magic, and does not dismiss it, but comforts her, actually says the word out loud. You guys comment a lot about all magic characters being evil and that is problematic and I completely agree with you. But Morgana has also seen magic cast only in an evil light, and to her this is finally ‘proof’ that someone can have magic and be kind and compassionate and comforting, which is what Morgana has needed for so long.
I think were Merlin to find someone with magic who seemed good, he would want to believe in them too (as we see a hint of in A Remedy to Cure All Ills – sorry for bringing that horror back to mind).
Overall, although this does not excuse everything Morgana does, I think it puts some context in place where we can at least understand where she is coming from. And her knowing that there are others who are feeling the same of her gives her the courage to distance herself from Uther at the end which such a final manner, which I don’t think she would have had the confidence to do otherwise (even if it goes a bit far considering she will continue to live in the castle and therefore being provided for by the man she disowned by let’s just ignore that).
Even if you don’t feel better I hope I’ve at least given you something to think about Ruth!
LESSONS
Uther learnt that there are people ‘rising up against’ him, and I think we all know the takeaway from that is him deciding to crack down on magic users even harder because he’s clearly been complacent. Uther why.
Morgana has learnt that she is not alone when it comes to fearing Uther’s laws, and wanting them abolished. I think this is super important in getting her from point A to point B, as being scared and isolated it would have been difficult to have her distance herself from Uther at all, but being backed by the knowledge she is not alone helps her to take that step away. I think it will be interesting to track the progress of Morgana and how she aligns with Uther over the next few episodes. She will clearly need more than this knowledge to act on her wanting the governance of Camelot to change, and I think it will be good to see what it is that pushes her further away from his side. I think, at least to begin with, Morgana will need to feel there is another person by her side to help her discover her magic and solidify her growing disdain of Uther…..
I think this is a real turning point for Morgana in terms of her central relationships. There is a significant shift of fear that she feels of Uther, to resentment and maybe even hate. It will be interesting to see if this hatred affects other central characters, too, and to what extent. Overall, I think Morgana realising that she shares the same sentiments as people who are part of a cause, rather than just being by herself, is what really kicks her into gear as someone who could bring about that change, and that it is worth standing up against Uther despite what he could do – because it is no longer just herself that she is standing up for (which is likely also why Mordred is featured – so that she is siding with people she cares for and wants safe from persecution, not just cause some cute guy told her he believed in her, which is what we come pretty close to doing but I’m trying to give Morgana some props here).
Sorry if this is a bit messy, it’s 1:30am and by brain has properly shut off for the day
27th April 2020 @ 11:41 pm
I think all you say about Morgana and her want to cling to a positive magical figure with an actual plan and, on the face of it, acceptance, compassion and kindness for her, makes sense. However, I think Morgana also very much chooses to be blind against the true Alvarr, even before he ‘works his charm’ on her. I mean, the guy appeared like a creep in her bedroom at night, having clearly infiltrated the castle by illegal means. He knowingly endangered her favourite little kid by bringing Mordred back to Camelot. Also, as much as she hates Uther, she is definitely aware that Alvarr means to finish off everyone else that will stand in his way and support the king and that means she is willing to sanction the slaughter of possibly her friends and only family as well as a lot of innocent people. I don’t think Morgana can be excused for choosing to be blind to Alvarr’s brutal and ruthless methods, even if he shows compassion and kindness to her. Of course, if we had set up Morgana as an utterly spoilt, selflish brat who is inconsiderate of anyone but her own plight, that might be an explanation. But we’ve seen her be the opposite from literally her very first line in the first episode when she selflessly defends the mother of the man who was beheaded.
28th April 2020 @ 4:20 am
I think you make a great point about her choosing To be blind to it! She definitely seems to want him to truly be the front he puts on, and convinces herself he is! It’s definitely not an excuse for an episode full of frankly appalling decisions but I think it helps to frame the episode going forward
28th April 2020 @ 5:49 am
Of course, it does. I like that we’re all trying to make sense of Morgana and it’s really difficult. She’s very hard to pin down as a character and whereas that often stems from inconsistencies in her portrayal, it also makes for a great discussion.
In general, I’m not a fan of bad Morgana at all, so I just want to shout at her all episode (and the next and many to come) to stop what she is doing and think. But it’s never helped….Morgana never listens. 🙂 And I think that’s actually true to character: she’s never been shown to be someone who listens very well (although she advises Arthur quite frequently early on) and she’s stubborn once she’s made her mind up about something.