Board Thread:Rewatching "Merlin" - Season One/@comment-5102537-20130406100756/@comment-5102537-20130408114900

MerlinDragonLord, why do you hate being the start of a discussion? Someone has to start, otherwise we wouldn't have a discussion :-D So, thanks.

@J8in, I agree with you.

What you wrote, Rubelle:

"BTW, As it is shown Morgana had powers of seer but her magic starts to develop only after Merlin comes to camelot. So is it because, she is the darkness to his light et al and his presence actually acts as her catalyst without them knowing anything? "

Exactly my thoughts. I've been wondering about this too because actually, all problems started with Merlin's arrival. I don't know if it had anything to do with Merlin, but it's obvious that the numeours attacks of sorcerers/magic-users increased or started when Merlin came to Camelot. If it's not just coincidence, which I believe, Merlin probably started the prophecies/fates/destinies to come true. If so, it's again a paradox, because Merlin's destiny was to protect Arthur, yet protecting him was necessary due to the fact that the prophecy had begun to come true.

On the other hand, the execution of Thomas Collins had nothing to do with Merlin and had been decided already before he arrived in town. If it hadn't been for Merlin, Arthur would have died at the hands of Thomas' mother. But I do wonder how things would have worked out if Merlin had left again (if this wasn't just a fictional story anyway... ).

I believe that Merlin was "sent" to Camelot by his destiny because the predetermined fates of everyone were about to reach their climax by all the sorcerers attacking Camelot, by Morgana developing her powers, by Uther dying and Morgana uniting with Mordred and so on...

Shame that it was all invane in the end. Merin saved Arthur only to see him die a little later anyway.

As for this episode, it's hard to figure what was the right thing to do. Killing a child can never be right, so from that point of view and according to all ethics, it was totally right to save Mordred. On the other hand, Mordred was destined to kill Arthur, whether he wanted to or not (and as we know, Arthur didn't kill his girlfriend later because of her magic, so Arthur bowing to the Triple Goddess wouldn't have changed anything since Kara seeked revenge and would have tried to killed Arthur anyway).

If Uther had succeeded in executing Mordred, fate would have been changed and Mordred wouldn't have killed Arthur in the end. Maybe someone else would have taken Mordred's place, but basically, Uther tried to prevent the death of his son without being aware of how right he was about Mordred. At first one might have thought that the fact that Arthur, Morgana and Merlin saving Mordred would do the trick and change Mordred's destiny, but as evident, it didn't. Mordred was Arthur's killer, no matter what happened in the meantime between saving him and making him a knight of Camelot - and it actually was a joke that Arthur didn't know about Mordred's magic since he knew about it in "The Beginning of the End", whether he knew that Mordred was born with it or that he practiced it as a druid. Plotholes again.

Once again, Uther was right about the bad intentions of magic(-users), and Kara couldn't simply blame Uther and Arthur for everything and for her desire to take revenge since her actions and motives weren't any different from Uther's. Not to mention that magic had started it all in the first place.

Same goes for Mordred who was willing to help evil Morgana slaughtering thousands of people out of pure revenge over the loss of a loved one.

This all seems to prove that, no matter what people did or wanted, their fate and destiny was predetermined by a higher power and they couldn't escape it but were used like toys and puppets, including Merlin.

So by saving Mordred, Merlin and Arthur helped him to kill Arthur later and sealed Arthur's fate. It seems that the only one who tried to break this cycle of fate was Uther, even though he didn't know that especially Mordred would be the one who would kill Arthur in the future.

And still, even though Mordred's part in the Arthurian legends has always been well-known and even though I've always understood Uther's motives, I've always sided with Merlin, Arthur and Morgana saving Mordred. That's the thing with trying to do the right thing that is currently happening and seems to be priority, even though we all know now that saving Mordred killed Arthur/will kill Arthur in the end. However, Mordred had a life until he was killed by Arthur which he wouldn't have had if Uther had succeeded in executing him. So personally, I think it was right to help Mordred, but it was also understandable that Uther wanted to kill him. To Uther and Arthur's friends, Arthur's life was more important than Mordred's. From an objective point of view, Mordred had as much a right to live as Arthur had. Too bad and how cynical that both died in the end - at the same time. Crazy.