As a compainion piece to my "Best under-rated Characters" blog post, I wanted to share my thoughts on the characters who were polar opossite and got a little too much credit by fans.
Morgana[]
Now, to be fair, I like Morgana's character (even when she was evil, with the expection of her actions in The Hollow Queen which I feel have no excuse) myself, but some fans of hers seemed to go a bit overboard in their attachment to her. I've seen comments saying that she's not to blame for any of her mistakes, the Great Dragon and Merlin and Uther are the ones that "ruined" her, and all she ever wanted was love.
To some extent, this may be true! The bit about her wanting love, I mean. She probably only did want love early-on, afraid of her magic, and her creepy dreams that came true, etc... But later on, she was a perfect example of one who got corrupted by her own power. It seemed that, the more powerful she realized she was, the more ruthless she became. While intially Morgana may have wanted someone to tell her she wasn't a monster so she could feel safe and better about herself, like everything was going to be all right after all, it would appear that, from series 3 onward, she used the 'you're not a monster thing' as a "I'm right and everybody else is wrong" get out jail free card.
It's like she decided that her not being a monster, being in her own mind a "real person", everyone else (that is those without magic) was the monster. Even people she grew up with and once loved. She never gave Arthur a real chance. Uther, well, she sort of did, in that she seemed in The Crystal Cave, to be urging him to admit she was his daughter and reconcile with her, but naught came of this. Arthur, though, she wanted to kill pretty much the very moment she realized they were rivals for the throne. Never-mind that they were friends.
Don't even get me started on how she treated Merlin. I know this is controverial and there are many different opinons on what would have happened if he told her he had magic early on, sort of like he did with Gilli in The Sorcerer's Shadow, but mine is that, either way, Morgana's reaction was cold and selfish. Because what if Merlin HADN'T had magic? What if he had just been an average guy who wanted to help her in season 2 but eventually just had to stick by his master (would she not have expected Gwen to do the same for her? I mean, look how MAD she got when Gwen "betrayed" her by helping Leon escape in The Coming of Arthur; she was ready to KILL her over that before Morgause stopped her)? Where's the fairness in that? As far as Morgana knew, Merlin DID try to help her and kept her secret loyally. The only wrong he truly did her was poisoning her, and that was under extreme duress. She starved little children and had guards shoot innocent people as a political move. How is that not worse than anything Merlin personally did or did not do to or for her? What really was the kicker for me was how in The Hollow Queen she used a false Druid to lure Merlin into the woods so she could kill him. How is this logical? She wants to wipe out people in Camelot because they "have no love for people with magic" and she's going to kill someone who wants to help a dying Druid girl when no one else will?
What I did like about Morgana was her undying love for Mordred and Aithusa. Those were the only hints we had that she was still even remotely human.
But is love for two characters alone (three if you count Morgause) enough to justify that she wanted the death of practically everybody else in the storyline?
I think what bothers me most is that girls are watching Morgana thinking they're seeing a character making a "strong female point". No, little ladies, what you are watching is a woman who starts off kind and loving but becomes so bitter and drunk with her own power that it leads her into maddness. I like this potrayal of Morgan Le Fay, very, very much; especially in the moments when they show her truly alone and sad after she gets something she wants (Uther's death, for example), but I don't think she's a good role model for girls. If you want to see her as a great, well-acted character, that's fine, but I certainly hope impressional young women aren't thinking Morgana's actions (however multi-layered) are always okay. And I really hope they aren't thinking, "I want to grow up to be like Morgana!"
You want to grow up to be bitter, alone, and run through with a sword? Oh-righty, then. Good luck with that, my dears...
But, on a lighter note, does anyone else think season 1 Morgana was a lot like Kristen Cashore's Katsa from Graceling? If they make that book into a movie, I personally really want Katie to play Katsa!
Kara[]
Just shoot me. Kara is another character I can't understand why fangirls are watching and rooting for.
And why? Because she's feisty? Because she and Mordred look "cute together"? Yes, that's great and all, but think for half a moment here! Do you really think, even if Kara had lived, she and Mordred would have been happy together? Look how she bossed him around, telling him to kill with his magic, and how little she was willing to consider his opinon (going straight for the kill with Arthur, knowing Mordred was friends with him)? I'm think ye old middle-ages divorse papers would have been drawn sooner or later...
And even supposing things WOULD have worked out between them, that Mordred could have brought out her better side (not altogether impossible to imagine, seeing as she was loyal to him in not revealing that he was the one who helped her with her leg, if nothing else), that doesn't change the fact that Kara is a willing, cold-blooded killer. She'll stab anyone who works for Camelot.
In earlier series, Merlin once scoffed that Uther was willing to kill anyone who passed a sorcerer on the street. How is Kara killing anyone with "Camelot" attached to their job any different? Because she's pretty? Because she is a friend of Mordred's?
Also, she really is not comparable with Freya. That's like comparing Ygraine with Morgause!
Aside from the fact that she was the childhood friend of Mordred, there is nothing that seperates Kara from any other Druid character. She could just as easily be a spunkier verison of Sefa. Most Druids lost something at Uther's hands, at one point or another. What makes it okay for her, out of a whole group of people who are supposed to be peaceful and acceptant of others (even taking in those in need; remember how shocked Gaius was when he learned they turned Freya away, knowing her curse must be something massive?), to be vindictive and commit mass killings?
Not to mention, to anyone who has ever watched a show that centers around fanatics who commit crimes and the cops that catch them, realized how creepily similar Kara's mannerisms are to the villians in those kinds of shows?
Mordred[]
Sigh, Mordred. Aka, the boy whose fanbase -when in doubt- blames Merlin for his problems.
It's not that I hate Mordred or anything, I just don't find him as sympathetic as many of the fans seem to have found him to be.
As a child, he was rescued by Merlin, Arthur, and Morgana (The Beginning of the End).
However, he seemed to know, even at an early age, that Merlin hesistated to save him. Interestingly, in spite of the fact that Mordred appeared to understand Merlin's importance to Druid-folk (the first person in the series, if I'm not mistaken, to address him as 'Emrys'), he seemed to have no knowledge of his own destiny, that he would one day kill Arthur.
Although we are never shown this in earlier seasons (her name is not even mentioned until her sole episode appears and untimely demise/hanging), we know he was childhood sweethearts with a girl called Kara. He held Morgana in high regards, possibly the highest out of the three persons who saved him, as he chose to lead Alvarr to her rather than Arthur or even Merlin.
Because Alvarr runs away when Morgana helps him escape and is not seen nor mentioned again, and Kara dies, Mordred's fans dub him a man who loses his friends without reason. I see it more as Mordred has terrible taste in friends!
First Alvarr, then Kara.
Also, for all his loyalty to Kara, even when she is cruel and fanatical, we can't even say Mordred is strictly loyal to those he loved as a child and that alone is what motivates his actions. If that were really the case, would he not have found some other way of sparing Arthur from Morgana's killing aside from a cowardly stab in the back to the woman who -in spite of her flaws- was welcoming of him and overjoyed to see he was alive? I disliked him for stabbing Morgana. A smart boy like him could have found another way of saving Arthur if he felt the need to, without hurting Morgana.
And then, he flip flops. Throughout the series, there were plenty of moments when Merlin could have turned on those who treated him badly and he didn't. He's proof that a magic-user doesn't have to turn on Camelot to be loyal to those he loves, and that letting things go can be strength sometimes. Mordred, on the other hand, the second he loses Kara, runs to Morgana and vindictively rats out Merlin's secret to her. Merlin lost his FATHER, HIS GIRLFRIEND, HIS BEST CHILDHOOD FRIEND, THE ONLY KNIGHT WHO KNEW AND ACCEPTED HE HAD MAGIC, AND almost lost Gaius and his mother on a couple of occastions. Yet, if he had done something like that, turned to Morgana and offered to help her kill Arthur, all of the fans would have been all, "How can he be so cruel and betray poor Arthur?" But Mordred does it and it's okay? That's nuts!
Oh, and Merlin giving Mordred so-called "evil looks" throughout series 5 does not justify Mordred's actions either. For mercy's sake, I've gotten dirtier looks from random strangers in shopping malls! Also, Merlin was cold towards Mithian as well (back in series 4) and she didn't hold it against him.
Alvarr[]
Ah, Alvarr. The guest star who just wouldn't die. After surviving in his sole episode for no apparent reason and never returning, his fans did naught but beg endless for his return (I have no qualms against this, as I did the same for Freya). Personally, I too would have liked, if not a return, then for Mordred to mention him or for a Druid to confirm by word of mouth at some point that he had died or was living in another kingdom (Nemeth, maybe? Or that kingdom that supposedly premits magic, perhaps?)
My problem with Alvarr is that Gaius is 100% right. The man's a fanatic. He has no multi-sides. He has a girlfriend, yet flirts with Morgana. So we don't even have a loyalty in love thing going for this guy. He kills, steals, and apparently misguides impressionable young persons (Morgana and Mordred) without a second thought. He's Kara the first, only a dude! She could be his daughter! Huh... you know what? I wonder if she IS. That could be how Mordred would have met her, if she was like a bastard daughter of Alvarr or something... Is that possible? How old was Alvarr in series 2? Old enough to have a kid Mordred's age? Does anyone know? I'm curious now...
I have no problem with Alvarr HAVING a fanbase, to each their own, but that those fans present him as a "hero" or one of the "good guys" is enough to make me role my eyes. Like him if you want, but don't make him something he isn't. He's no hero.
Uther[]
I, too, disliked his season 5 return as a ghost and thought it was a poor reflection on his character overall.
Because, yes, we saw a much deeper side to Uther in earlier seasons. We saw a man who loved both his children more than his own life, who wanted to protect his people, and who bascially did die saving his son's life (Morgana, Agravaine, and -unwittingly- Merlin just made his death come a little faster, he would have died from his wounds from defending Arthur anyway).
Yet it seems to me, that, because he was unfairly shown as a vindictive ghost that hated every choice his son had ever made, who wanted to kill Gwen (he really don't like her!), and destroy the knights, and reveal Merlin's secret ("Merlin has m-" LOL, wasn't that scene so unbearably bad it was almost good? Hee hee), his fans have now started speaking of the 'old Uther' like he was the saint of the show to some extent.
Let us not forget, that yes, Uther was a good man in some respects, BUT he also killed hundreds of people, drowned children, tried to have his daughter's serving girl killed on two seperate occastions, attempted to force his son to marry a girl he did not love, threw his court sorceress out on her bum for doing something he asked her to do, let his kingdom fall to splinters and his son's instruction be taken over by a till-then absent uncle while he sat brokenly by a window wondering why his daughter hated him so much, ran a dragonlord who did him no wrong into hiding, treated servants like second-rate humans (he had flings with serving girls, evidently, when he was young but found the thought of marrying one replusive enough to be angry with Arthur for wanting to do so, and he treated Merlin like he was retarded) and chained up a dragon for years on end instead of just killing the poor thing and ending its misery.
Yes, Uther had his good points, but he is not "better than Arthur, because he tried to unite the kingdoms first" or "the real victim of the show, because he lost his wife a long time before Mordred lost Kara", etc...
Edwin []
Not so much anymore, since he was a series 1 character and seems to be mostly forgotten, but it appeared that some fans were justifying a lot of his actions too. I just didn't see it. Aside from a few face-scars nothing seperated him from any other character who wants to kill or ruin the life of the Pendragons and hates Camelot. I couldn't understand for the life of me where the Edwin/Morgana fanbase came from, either. I still don't see it, and that's why I've included him here.
Thoughts anyone?