User blog comment:Ksrouse94/Power isn't even a question/@comment-5772693-20140225023043

I agree that Merlin was the more powerful of the two, that much was apparent, even if it didn't always completely feel like it. Mostly in season 5. However, I don't think power counts for everything.

I felt that Morgana made an interesting antagonist, partly, because she simply knew more than Merlin did, by season 4 anyway. He may have been aware of his magic a lot longer than she was of hers, but by the end Morgana was a magical expert. Merlin still seemed to rely entirely on Gauis to tell him everything, and his sheer power to get him out of tough jams. He was pretty clever too, I will admit.

I don't know, maybe he was on to something, he won didn't he? You know, kind of. Killed her anyway, so he won on that front. None of the other stuff happened, or at least I don't think they did.

You do have a point about the friends thing, but I disagree about all' of Morganas' followers acting out of fear. I think Kara would too. I think that one of the many things Morgana and Merlin have in common, is their magnetic personalities. Merlin through niceness, and Morgana...well I don't know what it is about her, but it can't really be as easy as she makes it look to get that many armies. It's like allies just can't stay away, unless they completely, adamantly, oppose whichever one of them they are interacting with.

Also I'm not so sure about what you said about Morgana working with thugs who would turn on her the first chance they got. I mean her allies were Morgause, Cendred, Agravaine, Helios, and the Saxons. None of them ever showed any inclination to turn on her.

Morgause was 'condemned to a long and painful death' in the attempt to overthrow Uther and give Morgana the throne. Didn't seem to hold a grudge when she was leading Morgana to the Isle of the Blessed so that she could be sacrificed. Cenred died after sharing his army. It was more with Morgause, but I think it counts. Agravaine died while following orders, and far from turning on Morgana (which Morgana might have deserved after the way she treated him. Even if he was creepy.) he tried to convert Merlin to their side. Helios pushed her behind him, apparently intending to fight five opponents on his own, and giving her a chance to escape.

And Finally she still had Saxons following her orders even after the battle at Camlann(is that spelled right? Probably not, but you know what I mean.) went horribly wrong, and Morgana had clearly lost, what was left, of her mind.

The only allies I can think of who betrayed her were Merlin, Mordred, and Queen Annis. I mean they all had a pretty good reasons, but still.

Your right about Merlin being more consistent. However that kind of bothered me about Merlin. He started out as the greatest sorcerer of all time, so we didn't see much progression (or at least I didn't) on that point. I just always expected him to be more powerful than his opponents, and he usually was. It made the fights a bit boring to me. With Morgana, she felt more powerful, nearly, everytime I saw her use magic. I thought that was pretty awesome.

I disagree that the amount of time it took for Morgana's powers to activate automatically proved her inferior. Honestly, I was always impressed that she got pretty darn close to the level Merlin was at in, what, 7/8 years when he'd had about 25/28 years experience.

Morgana didn't say that no mortal blade could kill her until like the second to last episode. I think something definitely changed right before that. Maybe there's like different levels of High Priestess, and she is now at the highest point, or close to it? Merlin was not just as mortal as everyone else, I mean the dude ended up living over a thousand years, right? He probably just didn't go around saying that, because, 1. his magic was a secret, and 2. I'm pretty sure he was ignorant of that little fact.

He was a slightly better person than she was though. Had more friends and Mentors, too. I will say, I don't think he would have been a particularly great King either. Probably better than any version of Morgana past season 1, but I generally disregard that point. Just cause I can.

Cool blog post. It really gave me some things to think about, and I appreciate that you wrote it. I also apologize for this response getting longer than intended. You had some great points that I'm probably going to be thinking about for the next few days.

Of course that goes for your response as well, Fimber. As always, I found your insight to be interesting, intelligent, and fair, even if we do not agree on all points.