Young Merlin (Colin Morgan) spots a pretty girl who has been captured by a brutal bounty hunter and decides to free her after Gaius (Richard Wilson) tells him she is a druid rounded-up as part of Uther's continuing anti-magic purge.
Totally smitten, Merlin hides Freya (Laura Donnelly) in the catacombs of Camelot and plans their escape from the fortified city, dreaming of an idyllic life together, despite her protestations that she is "cursed" and "is not like him".
Meanwhile a magical creature is killing random people within Camelot and it doesn't take a genius to realise that this is the manifestation of Freya's curse - at midnight she transforms into a giant, winged panther; a creature Gaius calls a "bastet" (after the Egyptian goddess, I presume).
It was inevitable from the start that Merlin's first love was not going to end well - primarily because the nature of Merlin is usually to dispose of new characters in a single story to allow the next story to begin again from square one.
Luckily for Merlin, his master, Arthur (Bradley James), had reverted to his oblivious and trusting self from the first season because the lovesick sorcerer was incredibly cavalier and careless with his magic - using it at every opportunity in his mission to help Freya.
A surprisingly straight-forward and uncomplicated story after recent weeks, The Lady Of The Lake was a touching, small-scale drama about a teenager blinded by emotion, and made an interesting change of pace for the series.
It's just a shame, as usual, that Merlin's format required both Freya and Halig the bounty hunter (Richard Ridings) to be written out in a single story - although, I guess, there is the possibility that Freya will somehow return as the titular "lady of the lake", echoing TH White's Once And Future King take on Arthurian myth, which had The Lady Of The Lake as Merlin's lover.
The actual "lake" connection in this particular story was tenuous at best - Freya's fondest memory of her childhood was growing up near a beautiful lake - but it didn't really matter in the context of this intimate teen romance.
Next week:
Saturday, 21 November 2009
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About Me
- The Acrobatic Flea
- I was a regular salaryman, earning a crust with my meager writing skills, until an aneurysm tore open my aorta unexpectedly in early 2005. I suffered a stroke during surgery and a collapsed lung afterwards. I have since realised that I now have a new chance at life, which (body willing) I shall indulge in with positiveness, happiness and the good companionship of my wonderful wife. The Acrobatic Flea handle comes from the name of my favourite - and most successful - Villains & Vigilantes RPG character in the '80s.
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2 persons have something to say about this!:
This was a one-idea epsisode - to give Merlin a love interest. It was thin and, probably because I am not a teenage girl, I thought it the worst episode of any in series one or two so far. Morgan gave a good performance with weak dialogue material, especially upon Freya's death at the lake.
The end scene with Arthur was the first this series (it is the ninth!) to suggest the friendship that existed throughout most of series one. I think series 2 so far would have been better as the side story on a minority channel to support series 1, rather than a series in its own right. The writers appear to lack core story-telling values, at least sufficiently to occupy an easily-entertained fan of series 1.
Thanks for your well reasoned comments, Anonymous (I do wish people would sign their names!) I have to agree it was a very thin story - then most are on Merlin - but it felt like the first to actually give the character of Merlin some depth.
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