Merlin club is a weekly feature in which Jessica Jarman, Bronwyn Green, and myself gather at 8pm EST to watch an episode of the amazing BBC series Merlin, starring Colin Morgan and literally nobody else I care about except Colin Morgan.
Okay, I lie. A lot of other really cool people are in it, too.
Anyway, we watch the show, we tweet to the hashtag #MerlinClub, and on Fridays we share our thoughts about the episode we watched earlier in the week.
So, here’s a quick rundown of episode eleven: Arthur kills a unicorn and everything in Camelot goes all to hell.
I’m leaving it at that, because that is really the entire plot of the episode.
If I had written this episode, I would have changed: From the moment Athur kills the unicorn, people are saying, “Historically, there are consequences to killing a mythological creature like a unicorn.” Then when weird shit starts happening (grain being spoiled, water turning to sand), Arthur and Uther are still like, “No, I think we’re being too hasty jumping on this unicorn thing. Let’s explore some other options. Like sorcery.” But dude, wouldn’t unicorns fall under the sorcery umbrella? I would have had them realize the link way earlier. Way, way earlier. Then I would have shown Arthur’s successes and failures at the tests affecting Camelot in positive and negative ways. Basically, I would have spread the tests out more and made them the center of the episode, rather than bringing them in during the second half.
The thing I loved most about this episode: There’s a fucking unicorn in it.
The thing I hated most about this episode: Besides the unicorn blindness that made Uther and Arthur lose their common sense? I hated the amount of comedic relief that was taken over hunger and lack of clean water. From a storytelling standpoint, it removes some of the urgency and forward momentum if you’re downplaying your main conflict for funny shots of characters eating bugs.
Something I never noticed before: The unicorn is alive again at the end of the episode. I don’t remember that happening at all before. Or maybe I thought I was confusing Merlin with Legend and mentally corrected something that wasn’t wrong in the first place.
Favorite Costume: The Unicorn dude’s bitchin’ druid robes:
Here is proof of some random headcanon I created: None this time around. I would say it’s a welcome change, but it’s just laying low until next week.
What object would Bronwyn steal from this episode? The unicorn’s horn. And she would give it to me, because I could put it in my unicorn collection. UNICORN!
What Merthur moment did Jess have the naughtiest thoughts about? I assume that in Jess’s mind, the scene where Arthur makes Merlin try the rat dinner ended much differently. Probably with a spanking.
Check out Jessica Jarman’s take on the episode here
Check out Bronwyn Green’s take on the episode here
That’s it for this week. Join us on Monday as we watch S01E12, “To Kill The King” at 8pm EST on the hashtag #MerlinClub.
