Board Thread:Rewatching "Merlin" - Season Five/@comment-5102537-20140405091322/@comment-5772693-20140411155323

I was conflicted about this episode. I too liked the interactions between Gwen and Morgana, but as Issy5209 pointed out, it was disturbing seeing Gwen tortured. I didn't really get what was going on, did Gwen succumb to Stockholm syndrome or was it all magic?

I wanted to know more about Queen Mab. I mean she is in a lot of the legends right? Also, she was in league with Morgana wasn't she. It wasn't clear, but that's the only way Morgana could have gotten through the forest, right? So that's another member of the Old Religion backing Morgana.

It makes me curious about what exactly all these prophecies are saying. Some people think Arthur is the chosen one, some seem to think it's Merlin, and a lot of these people/creatures of the Old Religion consider Morgana their savior. Are there just a bunch of conflicting prophecies or is there this one really vague prophecy that everyone's interpreting the way they want?

I think it was a good episode, but the overall story arc annoyed me. There didn't seem to be any point to it, we only had a few episodes of Merlin left, and it felt like a good chunk of them were wasted on this.

I might feel differently about it if they were trying to stick with part of the legend, where Guinevere is part of the reason for the end of Camelot, but her enchantment here didn't affect Camelot at all. Even if it had, I still wouldn't have been satisfied because I would have felt bad for her, I mean it wasn't her fault she was brainwashed.

I'm glad that they took a moment to remember that Elyan and Gwen were related, but I feel bad that Gwen didn't really get a chance to grieve over his death.

The way Morgana and Gwen acted after this point confused me. Were the creators trying to say that Morgana had been enchanted this way by Morgause? Or were they implying that you could read it that way if you wanted to? It would really bother me if Morgana had been enchanted and nobody knew and none of this is her fault, but she dies because of it anyway. That would just be awful, I would rather go with she just went bad.

Why don't Wyverns ever seem to attack Morgana? I mean it's not important or anything, but I'm curious. Is it a High Priestess thing or is she just that good with animals?

I actually liked Merlin stepping up and being the leader in this episode. It's better than watching all the knights bully him anyway.

Where was Mordred?

The scene with Gwen and Morgana having dinner together was interesting. I don't know what to make of it. Was it all part of the Stockholm syndrome angle Morgana was working on or is she lonely? Both? Morgana choosing Gwen makes things complicated, couldn't she have used one of the knights just as well? As the plan didn't really seem to call for Arthurs death, it wouldn't have been that big of a deal if she took a knight and Arthur didn't show up. She could just send the knight back after the brainwashing with a story about how he escaped.

Morgana has always been a wild card, you never know what is going on in her head. Everyone else (minus Uther) seemed pretty straightforward throughout the show. I don't know if the two of them were just supposed to be crazy or if they are incredibly complex. I think the writers should have talked to each other more.