User blog comment:MerlinUSA/Merlin -- The Big Picture/@comment-5102537-20130120143649/@comment-5995315-20130122171402

Hi Lurker --

The Freya episode might show Merlin as bisexual, but a male in Merlin's position and with his destiny bound so intimately to another man cannot be altogether straight. In response to Freya, I could give the Daegal episode (The Hollow Queen). In it, Merlin is in Arthur's bedchamber helping get ready for a sexual encounter with Gwen, and the two make out as Merlin watches. Neither would have done that in front of a straight man.

Merlin is clearly agitated watching them. He speaks sharply to Arthur and deliberately brushes Gwen's dress on the way out. In the very next scene, Daegal seduces Merlin while he's still sexually agitated, and for the rest of the show those two off alone in the woods.

The important thing is that both Freya and Daegal get killed. It is fate's punishment of Merlin for straying from Arthur's side.

Merlin's "magic" in this show is, to me, an allegory for his sexuality. The Reveal was like a coming out. However, the second Reveal ("I was born to serve you, Arthur") is then most breath-taking declaration I've ever heard on television. No 100% straight male could have said it.

Again, one of Merlin's biggest  fan bases is the men-over-forty segment. It is hugely popular among gay men all over the world. It's true most shows depict male realtionships as completely straight. Merlin doesn't do that at all, and that's why the gay fan base is so fanatical about it.

However flexible the interpretation of the characters can be, Merlin is not straight by our standards. The whole point of setting this show in the Dark Ages is to get the characters away from modern labels and stigmas, and allow them to decide for themselves who they are. That's why the show works as fantasy.

The Merlin episodes, for me, are more often than not erotic, even if it's hard to say at the end exactly what makes them that way. The idea that Merlin himself is bisexual is plausible enough. But to say he's straight and nothing else reflects a high discomfort level about same-sex eroticism. This discomfort, left to itself, can and does become hatred toward homosexuals. I hope this doesn't describe you. Merlin is a litmus test of sorts. Again, so what if Merlin and Arthur had erotic feelings and even possibly acted on them?