daibhidc | Merlin - The Hunter's Heart

The Radio Times billing for this episode complains of Merlin's "hermatically-sealed" episodes in an age when viewers expect continuing storylines. This is, of course, nonsense. This week's episode, like last week's, follows on from Gwen's exile two weeks ago and, moreover, Morgana's latest alliance leads directly to the two-part finale, just like in Doctor Who.

The main storyline is that Arthur, while he still misses Gwen, feels he needs to make a dynastic marriage for the good of the city. The secondary storyline is that Agrivaine has provided Morgana and Helios with a copy of the ~~Death Star~~ Camelot Siege Tunnel plans, and Gwen has learnt about this. But Morgana turns her into a deer, just as Arthur, his knights, and his new fiancee are going hunting.

It would have been very easy to make Princess Mithian vain, spoilt, or otherwise unlikeable, so kudos for presenting a perfectly nice character who's main flaw is Not Being Gwen. She even chides Arthur for his treatment of Merlin!

Shame Merlin completely failed to convince Arthur of his uncle's duplicity, since the concept of copying the documents never occured to anyone. But presumably, when Helios's men start blocking up the siege tunnels next week, Arthur'll think "Wait a minute..." (Funniest moment, apart from the Arthur/Merlin banter: Morgana suggests that Agrivaine might actually have to take a risk in her service, and the man practically collapses on the spot.)

Mythwatch: Helios and Mithian are OCs. Helios is named after the Greek sun god, and Mithian is a village in Cornwall. Personally, I'd probably have called Helios Meleagant.

The woman who gets turned into a doe, and is then hunted unknowingly by her lover, has its roots, not in Arthuriana, but in the 1901 poem The White Doe, which fictionalises Virginia Dare of the Roanoke colony. But white does, harts and stags all appear in Arthurian legend with some regularity, usually as harbingers of a quest.