Board Thread:Series 5 Discussion/@comment-209.196.232.2-20121230195253/@comment-6338919-20180926162005

MerlinUSA wrote:  This exchange started with a poster named Hunith's Spirit shilling for her anti- Merlin blog on a Merlin site. It has now become about homosexuality and I cannot even attempt a response.

MerlinUSA, I wasn't "shilling" for my blog – which, btw, was neither "my" blog nor an "anti-Merlin" blog. It was an article I wrote which was published both on a very much pro-Merlin blog, one who was campaigning for the series to return, and on Den of Geek. Clearly you haven't read that article, or you would know that  I am one of the most devoted Merlin fans ever and was only expressing my disappointment at the less than ideal way that the writers/producers – who hadn't always made the wisest decision for their show anyway – handled the finale. I loved the series for its many good points – the excellent cast both young and old, the great choice of locations, the great atmosphere that the show had, the fact that it was great family TV, and their fresh and unawed approach of making something new out of the legends - which is almost a tradition when it comes to Arthurian literature, and they honoured it AND created a story and characters that were very relatable, a story about a class-defying friendship between two young men in a time when class was everything, and about identity also: being different, being a misfit, and being prosecuted because of that. It struck a chord with me and I loved the show for it, and for the chemistry between Colin and Bradley. But, as I pointed out in my article, Merlin had another side to it: some pretty one-dimensional, sloppy writing, total disregard of story arcs, less than straightforward character development, some downright awful and superfluous plots (Uther's troll queen anyone?) and, finally, the simultaneously great AND terrible final season: great because of its visual scope and some really thrilling episodes, terrible because so much screen time was wasted on the ridiculous evil Gwen subplot and the Merlin-loses-his-magic subplot instead of focusing on what was always at the heart of the show: the Merlin/Arthur relationship and the great secret that stood between its fulfilment. They missed some great emotional and deep storytelling there, and only the flawless performance of the protagonists saved the finale from being a total, plotholed disaster. That's not being anti-Merlin. That's just calling out the writers for not doing their show justice.