User blog comment:Adelina Le Morte March/Lance-uh-not/@comment-4650675-20130103122740

Congratulations, Adelina, this is a very interesting blog post! In fact, Lancelot's my second favorite character of all time, both in the show and in the legends(sometimes first there). He is usually portrayed as a tormented man who has to choose between keeping his honour and not betraying his king, or giving in to his love for Guinevere. Now, to Guinevere. In all the depictions, she goes with Lancelot on her own free will. Sometimes she is...how can I say it...a woman who just likes sleeping with men, sometimes she just marries Arthur out of a political agreement and loves Lancelot, and also leaves Camelot with him, and in some others she loves Arthur, but also loves Lancelot. Either way, Guinevere and Lancelot are some of the people that indirectly lead to Arthur's death.

What I don't understand is the reason you hate Lancelot from the legends. Is it that he came later? The legends change as time goes on, so new characters sometimes arrive and old ones leave. It's only natural. Or because you are an Arwen fan? Anyway, I don't think he is so perfect. As you said, in some depictions, he initially hates Guinevere because she steals Arthur from him(LOL). Jealousy and hatred are not characteristics of a perfect character. Also, he betrays Arthur for Guinevere and kills many good and bad guys alike. Just because his actions are justified it does not mean that he is to blame-if I find a way to justify Morgana and Uther's mistakes, does that make them perfect and not to blame?

Now, to the recent Lancelot. I have to say that I liked him in the Mists of Avalon(it may even be my favorite version)! Yes, he did ignore Morgana, because she was not as beautiful as Guinevere and because he had no feelings for her, but also they were cousins! Yes, back then maybe relationships between cousins were allowed, but it still creeps me out. Maybe it did to him too. Also, in that movie/books, Arthur is also depicted way too perfect (in order for Lancelot and Gwen to have their fun together, he had them have a threesome??? what the hell?) but I had no problem with his personality either.

I did not like Lancelot in 1981 "Excalibur", and kinda liked him in the Merlin movie. One of, if not my, favorite versions of him is in the show though. As Fimber said, he has the personality of a true knight! He, too, has done mistakes and is not flawless (like in the first episode when he illegally became a knight and fooled Arthur and the rest).

Finally, for the way the love triangle happened between him and Gwen...he was at times portrayed perfect, not wanting to ruin the relationship between Arthur and Gwen, but Gwen was also depicted perfect, not even thinking about betraying Arthur with a man she used to love. Between two perfect beings, the only way for something that happened in the legends to happen here as well, is magic!

Those are my thoughts on Lancelot in the legends and the show. Pretty long comment, but hey, he's one of my favorites ;) Ive never been a big fan of the Arthurian legends, even though Lancelot used to be my favourite character when I was a kid. Mostly because I grew up with the fluffy romatical stories about Arthur and the knights, but I got bored by it very quickly.

Anyway, in this re-teling, things didn't have to go the way they did with the well-known legends. That's what made it special until it was all ruined in the last two seasons. Here, on "Merlin", Lancelot was the only real good person, the only real noble character in the entire story. He was even better than Merlin and Gwen, but he was also a mature character and a believable knight, a good contrast to the immature knights who teased and even bullied Merlin. I wasn't really bothered by the fact that he returned as a shade, because it wasn't his fault. What bothered me was the fact that he died, that he suffered when returning as a shade (his soul), that he died again and that in the epsiode of his return suicide was considered to be a redeemable feature and a noble thing. Additionally, I found it very annoying that he wasn't even mentioned just once after his second death. The show runners got rid of him as fast as possible, in a very callous way (just like they did with Morgause, Uther, Morgana, Gwaine and Mordred). Just like "they're dead, let's move on and forget about them."

In this re-telling, he deserved a better ending and most of all he deserved to survive. His nobility and sense of honour would have contributed great deal to the so-called great kingdom under Arthur's reign. Arthur could have learnt from him, Merlin would have had a close friend and some terrible things might have been prevented with him being around. You know that Uther was my favourite character, but actually, the only real good and sensible person on this show was Lancelot. I think it was shame that he was killed off.

1 hour ago by Fimber Reply I agree with everything you've said, Fimber! I've got to say that I don't like how this show handles the character deaths. The only one I think was well executed was Mordred's. Even though I hate how Merlin was looking at him like "you deserve it", I like how Morgana cared for him, buried him and swore revenge for him (even turning to a real sociopath because of his death). Even in front of Arthur, during her (and his) last moments, all she talked about was how Mordred succeeded in killing him, so that she would believe his death was not in vain.

Anyway, the scene at Mordred's grave reflected something from the reality: during the war, there are no victors or losers. Both sides are left with sorrow over the ones lost. I believe that this was not the writers' intention at all, and they just wanted to justify Morgana turning mad, but annyway, at least I did see this as a hidden message!

Now back to the subject, gotta leave a comment about Lancelot ;)

11 seconds ago by Morganaforever nice post!!!!!!!

1 hour ago by Merlin artist Reply As much as I like Lancelot, this was a pretty good post. And LOL you only mentioned Freya once in this post, that must be a record. ;) Jokes, jokes. ;)

1 hour ago by Ḡwẵine Ḹٍٍkƨ Ĺiĸe Ͼềлȑềd Reply To be honest, I could give or take Lancelot. Yes, he was a good friend to Merlin and died protecting Merlin's secret. The heart-wrenching episode of Lancelot Du Lac certainly saw the former shell of Lancelot at its least. I honestly missed the old caring Lancelot from before his first death and what ticked me off was Morgana's control over the Shade. Lancelot didn't even remember that Merlin had magic and that really pissed me off. As much as I loved all the knights of the round table, I think Lancelot deserved to go the way he did.

2 hours ago by Chawk1993 Reply

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