Grade: A
In the series' first two-parter, we are introduced to the sorceress Nimueh, who is destined to have a major, long-term effect on the remainder of the story. Arthur and Merlin grow closer, Gwen and Morgana develop as characters, and Uther arrests people indiscriminately. Just another week in Camelot.
We open with Nimueh, a young, electric-eyed woman standing over a magical basin in an abandoned cave. She sculpts a small, half-formed creature out of mud and seals it in an egg, using magic to send it through the underground water sources to Camelot's main supply. There, it begins hatching.
Cut to Camelot, where chalky, blank-eyed corpses are being discovered in the streets. When Gaius in unable to pinpoint any non-magical source of the illness, Uther orders a thorough search of the entire town. Arthur himself searches Merlin's chambers, narrowly missing the secret book of magic. Soon afterward, Gwen finds her own father, a blacksmith, gravely ill, but Gaius is still unable to guarantee the availability of any cure. The physician expressly forbids Merlin to use magic of any kind to cure the townspeople, telling him that it would be far too obvious in the atmosphere of suspicion pervading the city. Merlin, however, unable to watch Gwen's father die, creates a small magical poultice and hides it in the sick man's bed, resulting in his recovery. The blacksmith is almost immediately barraged with questions regarding his sudden health, leading to a search of his house, on which the poultice is discovered and Gwen arrested.
Brought before Uther, Gwen is unable to give any satisfactory answer to her accusations and, suspected to have caused the plague in the first place, is immediately sentenced to death. Uther refuses to change his mind despite pleas from both Morgana and Arthur. Merlin, recognizing that the entire situation is his own fault, goes before Uther's council and confesses; however, his claims are disregarded when Arthur and Gaius manage to convince the king that Merlin is both mentally unstable and in love with Gwen. Determined to save Gwen by finding out what is truly causing the plague, Merlin and Gaius travel to the city's underground water provision. Gaius discovers that the source of the disease is, indeed, in the town's water supply, and is the result of a creature dwelling there. Made from mud, animated by magic, and extremely strong, the creature is called an Afanc. Despairing, Merlin goes to speak to the Dragon, who gives him cryptic advice regarding the elements and his relationship with Arthur. Grasping at straws, Merlin goes to look up a book on the elements, guessing with Gaius that since the Afanc thrives on mud and water, perhaps fire should be used against it. Adding the Dragon's comments about Arthur, Merlin deduces that Arthur should be the one to fight the beast. Upon learning that Gwen's execution is being brought forward to that night, he chooses to confide in Morgana, resulting in her coming with Merlin and Arthur to the tunnels which house the water supply.
Entering the tunnels, the three of them eventually encounter the Afanc. Arthur is unable to fend it off with his torch, prompting Merlin to surreptitiously summon the fourth element, wind, to ignite the flame and destroy the beast. The plague stopped, Gwen is released, and Morgana obliquely let Merlin know that she witnessed his use of magic. Immensely relieved that someone else knows his secret, Merlin almost gives himself away, before realizing that Morgana was actually talking about his supposed feelings for Gwen. Chagrined, Merlin returns to Gaius's workshop, unaware that he has incurred the wrath of Nimueh. Meanwhile, Gaius shows Uther fragments of the old eggshell from the water supply and points out the mark of Nimueh, revealing that both Gaius and Uther are familiar with her.
Part two begins with Nimueh poisoning the inside of a silver goblet. Meanwhile, Uther has negotiated a peace treaty with the ruler of a neighboring kingdom, long at war with Camelot. The King and his knights have arrived in Camelot to finalize the agreement, and Nimueh, disguised as a servant girl, arrives with the foreign party. She ingratiates herself with Merlin before sabotaging the visiting king's intended gifts to Uther and Arthur by replacing a harmless goblet with her poisoned one. That night, during the festivities, when the goblets are being presented to the king and his son, Nimueh pulls Merlin out of the banqueting hall and claims to have seen Arthur's goblet being poisoned. Merlin rushes back into the hall and accuses the visiting kingdom of treachery.
The celebrations disturbed, Uther tells Merlin to prove his claims. Unable to, Merlin is ordered to drink from the goblet himself. He does so despite Arthur's protests, and collapses within seconds. The hall is thrown into chaos and the visitors to Camelot put under arrest, while Arthur, Gaius, and Gwen retreat to Gaius's workshop to attend to Merlin. Examining the goblet, Gaius is able to find a transparent petal stuck to the inside, and identifies it as a rare, extremely poisonous flower. After researching it, he discovers that the antidote must be extrapolated from the same plant, which is nearly impossible to find. With Merlin given a diagnosis of five days to live, Arthur determines to ride out and attempt to gather the plant in a cave where it is reported to grow. When he asks for Uther's permission to do so, however, the king is appalled at his son's wish to undertake a dangerous mission for Merlin's sake, and forbids him to go. Despite Arthur's pleading, Uther refuses to change his mind, telling him that if it is too difficult for Arthur to watch Merlin die, he should simply ignore it and find another servant.
Torn between obeying his father and saving Merlin's life, Arthur sits about his chambers until Morgana comes to see him, telling him that a true king should be willing to take risks for the sake of a servant, which galvanizes him into action. Riding for the rest of the night and part of the next day, he arrives at the caves, only to encounter Nimeuh posing as a runaway slave. He is forced to fight a giant lizardlike creature which guards the entrance to the caves, and defeats it, much to Nimueh's secret disappointment; falling back on another plan, she offers to show him the way to the flowers.
Meanwhile, back at Camelot, Uther is infuriated to find that Arthur is absent and Morgana aware of his son's disobedience. Gaius puts the magical nature of Merlin's ailment together with the disappearance of the supposed servant girl Merlin was seen conversing with, and deduces that Nimueh must back in action. At the caves, Nimueh leads Arthur deep underground and, when he approaches the flowers, magically causes a portion of the rock on which he is standing to give way. Leaving Arthur dangling over a deep chasm, Nimueh tells Arthur that she is refraining from killing him herself because it is not his fate to die at her hands. Trapped in the dark, Arthur is attacked by a species of large spiders which inhabit the caves. In the throes of a high fever, Merlin senses Arthur's desperation and, even over great distance, is able to conjure a light to lead him to safety.
As Merlin's fever worsens, Arthur returns to Camelot with the flowers, only to find himself immediately arrested on Uther's orders. Put in a prison cell, Arthur begs Uther to make sure that the flowers get to Merlin, claiming that he doesn't care what's done to him as long as Gaius is able to make the remedy in time. Uther refuses to indulge his son, crushing the flowers and throwing them to the ground before leaving. With Merlin at death's door, Gwen pretends to bring Arthur food in order to infiltrate his cell and discover whether he acquired the flowers; ordering her to take the food back to the kitchens, he slips the plant onto the plate, battered but still usable, and she barely makes it back to Gaius before her ruse is discovered. Briefly getting Gwen out of the way, Gaius performs a surreptitious spell in order to make the antidote as powerful as Numueh's poison was, and administers the remedy. Merlin's heart stops for a few seconds, leading Gaius and Gwen to believe that he has died, but he revives quickly, causing Gwen to kiss him joyously.
Later, with Uther distracted by the threat of attack from the armies of the imprisoned king, Gaius confides to Uther that he believes the visiting royalty to be innocent of the attempt on Arthur's life, and that the blame should rather be laid on Nimueh. Uther trusts Gaius on the matter and the prisoners are released. Arthur tells Morgana about the light in the caves, and credits whoever conjured it with having saved his life. Uther asks his son about he woman he met, very nearly telling Arthur about his own mysterious history with Nimueh, but choosing simply to let Arthur know that he approves of what Arthur did for Merlin despite the fact that he disobeyed Uther's orders. Arthur goes to visit a recovering Merlin, and neither of them are entirely sure that to say; however, as Arthur leaves, Merlin thanks him for everything that he did, a sentiment which Arthur returns.
Wow; can I just say that I think that the second half of this two-parter may be the Merlin/Arthur episode of Season One? In a season also featuring The Moment of Truth and The Labyrinth of Gedref that's saying quite a bit, but I really think it may be the case. However, more on that later
The first episode is a solid, unremarkable threat-of-the-week installment which doesn't give any indication that it's going to become a two-parter until the very end. It shows us a first glimpse of Gwen's home life (a Merlin character who doesn't have an angst-ridden relationship with her father!) and expands on her friendship with Merlin. Morgana, previously a fairly minor character, gets to play an active role in the episode's climactic scene, and we see for the first time, in both episodes, the true extent of the manipulative power that she wields over Arthur. For the moment she's choosing to use it for good, but her capacity to goad him into action with a mixture of insinuation and delicate mockery is remarkable, and her field of influence grows as the series continues.
This is also the first instance in which we see Camelot as a whole targeted by a ill-intentioned sorcerer, rather than Arthur alone being threatened. The antagonistic plot which plays out in the second episode, individually targeting Merlin, Arthur, Uther, and the welfare of Camelot, is quite intricate and ingenious, and displays a good judge of human and individual character. As a villain, Nimueh's powers, history, and capacity for evil put her above and beyond either of the previous threats featured in the series, and her convoluted past with Uther, expanded on far later in the story, makes her a long-term game-changer in the mythology of the show.
The second episode, as I mentioned above, is extremely Merlin/Arthur-centric. The story opens with Merlin accepting the prospect of a painful death without a moment's hesitation in order to save Arthur's life (and it's worth noticing that as soon as Arthur understands the severity of Merlin's situation, he wants nothing more than to drink from the cup himself). Upon discovering that the only way to save Merlin from the poison is through a potentially deadly quest, Arthur is halfway out the door. Stopping to seek permission from his father, he initiates the first serious argument we've seen between father and son, with Uther unable to countenance the idea of his son wishing to put his life in danger "for the sake of a serving-boy". Torn between his constant desire for his father's approval and his need to save Merlin, it only takes a nudge from Morgana for him to leave without looking back; which, taking Arthur and Uther's relationship into account, speaks volumes about how much Arthur is already prepared to risk for his servant. Merlin was willing to die for Arthur; Arthur is willing to lose his life and jeopardize his father's regard in order to save Merlin. Considering that Arthur isn't the one with a dragon filling him in on the details of his and Merlin's relationship, the feelings he already has for Merlin are incredibly (and probably, from his perspective, unaccountably) strong.
Arriving at the caves, Arthur lets absolutely nothing deter him from getting what he needs for Merlin; not giant lizards, not falling rocks, not poisonous spiders or the dark, not an apparently helpless girl who allegedly needs getting to safely. When he appears doomed, something in Merlin, whether triggered by the fever or not, is able to see Arthur's peril and get him to safety. When Arthur returns to Camelot, what would normally be an even worse obstacle, his father's anger, doesn't stop him from doing everything possible to save Merlin. He offers to spend a month in the stocks if that will satisfy the king; this is Arthur, four episodes ago taking pleasure in bullying and endangering a servant, virtually pleading for public humiliation if it will help Merlin recover. At one point in the episode, he regretfully admits that in the rush to care for a poisoned Merlin, he didn't even think of Morgana's safety after a fight broke out in the hall. At that moment, he was more concerned for his servant than the woman he thinks of as a beloved sister and friend. Merlin has changed him, and I doubt he would admit it to himself or even be capable of understanding why, but it's happened. The entirety of this episode plays out almost like a Gedref-style series of tests to see how far Merlin and Arthur will go for each other, and they both pass with flying colors.
The scene between them at the end of the episode is characteristically awkward and terse; it is only as they part that they both manage to express a genuine, affectionate gratitude for everything the other did. They are two sides of the same coin, and are only just beginning to realize it.
Complaints:
- The Afanc looks pretty fake, but I'm giving it a pass because, for a creature made out of clay, the effect (bulky, slow, cumbersome) is actually fairly convincing.
- After the true source of the plague is revealed, why is Gwen released so quickly? She'd still have the poultice to account for. Was Uther just... feeling magnanimous? (Answer: no.)
- Likewise, in the second installment, Arthur most definitely did not spend a week in prison as Uther ordered. Two days, at the most. However, based on Uther's words to Arthur at the end of the episode, perhaps his resolve softened enough to let his son out early.
- Okay, I just have to get this out there... why does the Great Dragon ship Arthur/Merlin so hard? The sort of dialogue he's given, I can see him using his spare time to make sappy fan videos and post them on YouTube.
- These two episodes in particular highlight the fundamental differences between Arthur and his father. Uther would cordon off the lower town and let the people there die of plague if it would save the rest of the city, while such a proposal horrifies Arthur. When Arthur wants to risk his life for Merlin, Uther tells him that one of the burdens of being a king is to be forced to watch people die for you and be unable to stop it. Uther displays a jaded, emotionless, for-the-greater-good perspective, whereas Arthur is reckless and compassionate. Somehow I feel that the two of them would never have quite an easy relationship even under the best of circumstances.
- When a fight breaks out in the banquet hall after the revelation of the poisoned goblet, probably thirty knights draw their swords; Morgana draws a butter knife. Hee. I'm sure she could use it, too.
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