Review: Merlin 4.5: His Father's Son

Lindsey Duncan? What are you doing here?

In a show like Merlin, where the endpoint is a foregone conclusion, the trick is not to make us wonder whether Good will win, but how it will win. The show has prophecised itself enough times, and we all know that at the end of the day, Arthur will be the old benvolent ruler, Merlin will be his happily-accepted head wizard, and Guinevere will be his queen. There's no point in tempting us otherwise, and every twist that appears to take us away from that feels more like timewasting. His Father's Son didn't do anything in particular to change matters, and instead gave us another mix of the "Camelot goes to war" and "magically influenced competition" templates.
     Upon the invasion of his realm by a rival king, Arthur makes the decision to execute said king as a show of strength, to prove himself as the true King of Camelot. Inspector Lynley (who's fast becoming tiring for more reasons than one) used this to his advantage, manipulating the King into his decisions. Soon the king's widow, Queen Annis (goddamn Lindsey Duncan, everyone!) arrives with an army to avenge her husband. Meeting her on the field of battle, Arthur admits his cock-up and suggests a compromise; he will fight her champion for half of Camelot's lands.
     Annis is joined by Morgana, who with Inspector Lynley rigs the match using magic (It's a fighting competition. In Merlin. Did you expect anything different?) When Arthur fights her champion (played by that one guy from Sherlock Holmes, you know the one), Merlin of course helps when she of course tries to rig the match and he of course wins. A truce is made and everyone goes home happy. Yawn. Oh, and there's a subplot with Arthur and Guinevere, but that goes nowhere, as you'd expect.

Protagonist? What protagonist?

    Notable, I think, was the lack of our eponymous protagonist - not that that was a problem, but if the series doesn't have the faith to use its titlular character there's obviously something wrong. It certainly doesn't help that Arthur and Merlin are not used together well - Merlin is still the bumbling comedy protagonist that I despise, and Arthur is still acting as if Merlin has never done a good thing for him, despite the fact that HE SAVES YOU EVERY EPISODE, YOU BLOODY CLOT. 
    Nothing more to report, Captain. Yet another boring week, one that had me turning off at times. I don't really know why I pay so much attention to Merlin any more, as it just isn't going anywhere, and when it does it cocks it up. The series has the potential to be brilliant, and this week was just another example of it wasting that potential and going absolutely nowhere.

Thanks.

NEXT WEEK: Old Merlin. Again. Bloody again. Kill me now.