Ah, back to the old burp and fart humour.
The first two-part story of season 3 of Merlin ("Tears of Uther Pendragon")
was a cracker. Generally dark, dramatic, entertaining, engaging and action
packed. The ending was perhaps wrapped up a bit too neatly - by which I mean
they pretty much hit the reset button - but otherwise enjoyable.
But this weeks episode took me back to season 1.
It was humorous and amusing in parts - like when Arthur (or should that be
Eeyore?) became a half-donkey - and it was good to see a little more of
Gaius (played by the lovely Richard "I don't believe it!" Wilson). The
goblin was reasonably well-animated - although they didn't quite manage to
pull off the integration of the CGI into the real world. And at least they
didn't overuse the crude humour.
Still, in the end, it felt like a filler episode and one that had no impact
in the overall story - if there actually is one in Merlin. This episode
could've taken place in any of the previous seasons and the only thing that
would have had to be changed was Gaius-Goblin's mention of Morgana's
darkness. Although even that could've been some handy foreshadowing.
So, although not bad, it wasn't great either. The preview of next week's
episode looks better, although the whole
"Arthur-targeted-at-tournament-but-is-saved-by-knight-of-round-table" seems
somewhat familiar. We'll see.
2 comments:
It's hard to say how much of an overarching story there is in Merlin and how much is the show simply paying lip-service to the established mythology.
I guess that's one way they hook us to watch more episodes and 'overlook' the burp-and-fart humour of this style of episode.
It certainly didn't help that it came after two rather excellent episodes, although - to be fair - it wasn't nearly as bad as I think we feared ;)
Well, it's been said that the writers have an overarching story sketched out to the end of season 5. Now, they might not have started with one but supposedly they are now - even if it's just to cover the established mythology.
And yes, it wasn't actually as bad as I made out. I just hope there aren't many other episodes like this this season.
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