User blog comment:Fimber/Things that went wrong in "The Death Song of Uther Pendragon"/@comment-7285162-20130415005522/@comment-7285162-20130602100712

Hello again!

Alright, my mistake about Morgause --- her backstory isn't that clear indeed. Still, it doesn't matter much in general.

On Nimueh

[i]She obviously lied to Uther when she claimed that she didn't know that Igraine would die. Maybe she did it to make Uther feel even more guilty. Why she killed Igraine is a miracle but maybe it had to do with all the prophecy-stuff. Maybe she was jealous, maybe just in a bad mood or maybe the writers didn't know why either... I have no idea[/i]

Oh now, you're certaily biased here. Why whould she do that? There was no one else there, whom would she deceive with that?

[i]Fact is that even if Nimueh didn't kill Igraine, which she obviously did according to Gaius and Merlin, she definitely knew that someone close to Uther would die. She could have said that Igraine might be the price, yet she didn't.[/i]

Yes, she did now that *someone* close to Uther must die. Why did she still do it?

Well, I have a little theory on this subject, although it's just a guess. It seems almost everyone and everything of the Old Religion were aware of Arthur's destiny, and Nimueh with her gifts of prediction and knowledge of the lore and profecies certainly must have known. My guess is she was willing to make the sacrifice for The Once And Future King to be born. In the end, that was not a completely evil thing for Albion: while Uther with his Machiavelli-style reign could have been a suitable ruler for the moment, in the long term Camelot would crumble apart as soon as Uther showed weakness; it was up to Arthur to build something completely different.

Later we see Nimueh quite disenchanted with what she has done, and for a good reason: young Arthur was quite zealous looking up to his father. She even tried to lead him to an untimely demise, although she didn't quite kill him directly; after all, it was she who gave him life, and the series state quite clealry that what is magically *done* cannot just be undone.

[i]Asking for magic when Morgana was about to die wasn't an evil act. It was hypocritical but nevertheless born of good intentions since it saved someone else's life. [/i]

Yeah, that's exactly what he had other people (e. g. Gwen) sentenced to death for --- trying to save someone's life with magic. ;)

I still wonder why he hasn't executed Sir Leon for being healed by the Cup of Life: lying unconcious and dying, he had consorted with sorcerers! :D Pursuant to the laws of Camelot, Leon should have run his guts through with a sword after being healed, I guess, to undo the evil magical healing. :D

[i]I wonder what happened to the life-for-a-life policy when he had Morgana healed. According to season one, he should have paid another price for Morgana's life, yet the whole thing was suddenly forgotten. [/i]

I've never had a problem with that before, it always seemed quite consistent.

While Merlin was naturally a rather powerful warlock, he didn't have much skill for healing even trivial wounds (of course, that doesn't mean they can't be lethal, but still trivial), on many an occasion he used someone else's spell in order to succeed.

Morgana suffered from a grave cranial injury, so Gaius's or Merlin's skill was not sufficient, but the dragon had a very special and ancient spell that was powerful enough (wasn't the first time either). As a side note, I believe Morgana used a similar incantation on Merlin later, at least according to the wording you can find on this Wiki's page.

In "Merlin" it never took a life in order to heal a scratch or an ingrown toenail, did it? ;)

The bite of the Questing Beast is a rather different matter: it's not just a blow to the head, it is that particular power of life and death that kills unless someone else takes the victim's place (the Old Religion cares not *who* exactly must die, it just fancies taking a life one way or another).

[i]As for all the sorcerers attacking Camelot out of revenge. This is definitely not true. As a matter of fact, the majority of magical attacks had nothing to do with revenge on Uther. For example:

Valiant, the Griffin (conjured by whomever), the Questing Beast, the Shide, the Pixies, the Anhora, Cornelius Sigan, the troll/Katrina, The Witchfinder (he at least place a magical object in Gaius' chambers), (poor) Freya/the beast, King Align who used Trickster who then used magic, the Goblin, the bandits who disguised as knights in order to kill Arthur and to win the tournament, Cenred, the Manticore, the Lamia, the ghost of the druid boy... [/i]

I thought I explicitely mentioned that the magical creatures do not count for my thesis. After all, they are monsters, not humans.

Valiant was never a sorceror, the Trickler was coerced by an evil King, and Cornelius Sigan was freaking executed becasue he had become "too powerful" --- seems like a reason for revenge to me.

---

As for Uther being complicated and all: I never denied that. The thing is, whatever his intentions and stuff, he probably has the highest innocents bodycount in the series, rivaled perhaps only by that darling daughter of his. Who is the real villain then? Whatever he feels or talks doesn't make the others feel better, especially those who lost their loved ones because of him. And Uther never stopped...

You ladies mentioned Nimueh and Morgana kill innocents? Well, that wasn't out of the blue for the sake of greater evil, it's Uther who taught them this: he regulary killed their loved ones/kin/subjects and made them stand aside and watch. They both wanted him to feel the same.

[i]Uther surely wasn't the oldest inhabitant of Camelot (not to mention Gaius) but there were naturally people the same age or older than Uther who witnessed the times before or during the Great Purge. If Uther had lied about the chaos that magic brought to the land back then, neither Gaius nor anyone else would have confirmed that. Someone would have mentioned a different story and Arthur would have heard of it.[/i]

You gotta be kidding me! Do you really, really expect someone to speak against the tyrant, especially in a society ruled by fear and oppression?

[i]As for Gaius, his "friend":  I see their relationship as complex as both characters were themselves. In season one their friendship seemed to be mutual but later, especially in season four it seemed to have been one-sided and that Uther thought of him as a friend but not vice versa.[/i]

He had a good reason, didn't he? Especially after being deliberately subjected to some visiting with-hunter's particulat "methods" by his "friend" Uther.

And one final question. Who do *you* think Uther should have done having returned as a ghost?