So, to those of you who haven't seen my excited comments and don't already know, I was quite delightfully pleased with the Merlin series finale.
My mum, who usually has to listen to me laughing my head off every time Colin makes a joke or Bradley does a funny facial expression every time I'm in the back room watching new episodes of BBC Merlin on my laptop, was concerned because she didn't near any laughter whatsoever from me when I watched the finale; I was silent as a mouse and only made a bunch of grunting and "Hmm" noises when I had to pause it not five minutes before the end because somebody was calling me from the other room to ask if I was the one who had gotten into the jar of grape jelly (guilty, LOL). I think she thought it meant I didn't like it; when she asked if it was that horrible and if that was why I seemed kinda glum and dumpy, I explained, that, no, indeed, I liked the finale, it merely had no funny parts (nothing of a laughing matter) and also I have been fighting a headache (I'm prone to migraines, it's a curse, and every time I get a headache I panic, thinking it's going to get worse and I'm going to wind up spending hours upon hours in bed crying till it passes, and the fact that I had to get a headache of ANY KIND on the day the MERLIN FINALE hits the world wide web? So not cool!) all day.
That was, in fact, one of the few problems I had with it. No funny bits. I wasn't expecting laughter galore, anyway, knowing the ending would probably be sad, but maybe just ONE funny part, towards the beginning, so it wouldn't all be somber (especially as children apparently watch the show as well, and this is much more Disney's Sword in the Stone than Mists of Avalon as far as age-range of the viewers goes), but I guess that's the reason they had the funny tavern bit in part one. So that's cool.
I was also glad Kilgharrah didn't die on screen. I liked that it left it to the viewer to decide the Great Dragon's fate. Does he live longer? Does he die? We know he's getting weaker, so much so that Merlin didn't even want to summon him until Arthur was DEAD, after all. But, seeing as we had to watch Arthur die after saying Thank you to Merlin, my poor little heart I don't believe could have handled Kilgharrah dying on screen. I've loved that dragon so much since episode one...
As for the Freya cameo, it may be pathetic of me to be so dang excited over an ARM, but I was thinking there could plenty of reasons why we didn't get to see her fully come out of the lake. Maybe they couldn't get Laura back and didn't want to recast for just one cameo (I respect that, and am impressed that over five seasons the only character ever recasted was Mordred, so that was okay). Or perhaps, as they were trying to tell the whole ending of a story in under forty minutes or whatever (give or take commerials), there just wasn't time enough. Which is why I feel very strongly that, as much as I love the series as it IS, and hate to complain, they should have A) made The Lady of the Lake the two part episode instead of Beauty and the Beast, and B) cut back in a short scene to Merlin and Freya briefly talking after she gives him the sword in The Coming of Arthur (nothing long, just a short little reunion; even if she just leaned on the boat and reached up and touched his face or something, and they looked at each other for like half a second, I would have been pleased). But what's done is done. And what makes me very happy is that her character was not entirely IGNORED. That's what I was most afraid of, really. That the writers would act like she never was a part of the story, have the sword just fall back into the water with a plop or something. If they could have gotten Laura back for a proper cameo however, I think it would have been kinda nice if Freya could have breifly comfored Merlin and then guided Arthur's funeral boat to Avalon, simply because Morgana (who did so in the legends) was dead by this point and unredemed. But the whole Merlin as Bedivere (which I guessed SEASONS AGO!) was awesome.
Now to the actual topic of this post (sorry it took me so long to get to the point, I just had so much to say about the finale in general and I couldn't help myself, not to mention this is me not even GOING INTO my thoughts on the big magic reveal for the sake of moving this post along faster!): Guinevere.
I feel her ending was the most sad, in a way. And the most ironic.
In Guinevere's POV, she never WANTED to be queen. In season 1, she wanted Morgana to marry Arthur one day and become queen! She hinted at as much in the first episode. But she realized how wonderful Arthur was and fell in love with him as a person. Frequently she would say things like, "I cannot be your queen," etc... She really loved Arthur as a PERSON, and the only times she ever betrayed him were when Morgana had her under spells, the sole exception being that, while obviously believing she and Arthur could never be together, in season 2 she was all lovey-dovey with Lancelot when she was impersonating Morgana back in season 2.
So after Morgana pulls all that crap on her, constantly trying to off her husband so she -Morgana- can be queen all on her own (in her mind, her perfect world, all of her former friends -Gwen, Arthur, and Merlin- would be dead and gone). Now, in the end, it is not Morgana who has to suffer a hollow victory, queen with no love left in her life (not even Morgause, because she killed her, too, to tear the veil between the worlds), but GUINEVERE, her serving-girl! We don't know if Merlin EVER came back to Camelot after Arthur died. I think it would have been too painful for him. Also, because he was so close to Arthur, I could see -with the passing of years- Gwen, who back in series 1 had a crush on him, considering marriage to him (two servants on the throne, the irony parade marchth on...), but I think that would have been TOO hard on both of them. It would feel like betraying Arthur (and Freya, maybe?), for one, secondly Merlin never wanted to be a ruler/leader anyway, just to help Arthur (so there would have been TWO people on Camelot's throne who never even WANTED it to begin with). And even assuming that's not an opition and they just remained friends, I think it would have never worked out with Merlin as her adviser. Gaius, if he lived much longer, YES. Merlin, nope. Why? Because he would have been too tempted to compare EVERYTHING Gwen did to Arthur's choices. Not to mention, if she ever decided to remarry, he probably would have been even more hostile to her possible husband (loyalty to Arthur) than he was to Mithian when Arthur almost married her instead of Gwen. So, we assume, for the moment, that Merlin just wanders for years on end until modern times. And Gwen, no husband, many of her knights dead, her old friend from her serving-girl days (Merlin) out of action, is left alone as queen. It's better than the legends where she becomes a nun, sure, but not MUCH. It's sad because she -a much more stable minded and warm person- is stuck with MORGANA'S cold, madness-driven dream of queenship. Yes, by this point Gwen is strong in her role as queen, and she isn't going to do what Morgana did and let everyone get shot or starved, heck she may even legalize magic, in light of Merlin's reaveal, but it's kinda hard luck on HER. She loved her friends, and never wanted to jump over their heads and be alone like that. That's just soooooo sad!
I really felt bad for Guinevere in this version. There was nothing about her, like in other versions, that made her seem like she was getting her just-deserts. Even in Mercedes Lackey's Arthurian novel, Guinevere's split from Arthur was not that sad because he was kinda a loser anyway and he loved her sister (and his late wife also named Guinevere) way more than he loved her. But in this version, they really loved each other, the Lancelot affair thing was a misunderstanding during their ENGAGMENT, and they had only, what, FOUR YEARS of being happily married? Not even that because for part of the last year she was enchanted into hating him? And then she loses him and is on a throne all by herself? Heartbreaking!
I also felt, and this is unrelated to my opinon on Gwen's ending, that Merlin in modern day would have been SOOO much better if only they had done it with young Merlin instead (leaving it to the viewer to decide if he stayed young forever or was reicarnated or whatever) and after the truck pulls by, you see Arthur -also in modern clothes- coming from the lake towards him. The return of the once and future king and all that jazz. Even just young Merlin walking away, looking at the lake , and then Kilgharrah's "No young man can know his destiny" bit to sort of circle back to the beginning would have felt a little more complete. Still, I loved it the way it was, even so, and I think Julian Jones did a very good job with the short time frame he had to work with. If this could have been like a four hour finale or something, I'm sure they WOULD have tied up more loose ends, instead of just the big ones. They did very well, and still managed to show us Eira's end, too, in a very short amount of time. AND gave us a lengthy reveal, Arthur's opinon and realization well spread-out through the episode. It's better than as some fans thought might happen, the series ending with Merlin doing a "Gilli" type reveal and opening his hand (why didn't they ever bring Gilli back anyway?) and Arthur staring and then the show fading to black.
Well that's my thoughts. Good end to a good story, but rough luck for poor Gwen.