The Poisoned Chalice

Guest(s): None.

Unfortunately, Seb doesn't join me for the fourth instalment of Watching Merlin. 

So, I am alone.

Me: Yippee!

The episode begins with Nimueh splashing some water with her red fingernails. She does that a lot, doesn't she?

Meanwhile, in Camelot, two kingdoms unite. Camelot, headed by Uther, and Mercia, headed by Bayard. The-

Me: Camelotians? Camelotese? Camelottos? Cameloti?

-are wearing red, and the-

Me: Mercians? Mercianese?

-are wearing blue. 

Standing behind Uther, Arthur and a few soldiers is-

Me: Merlin! Why's he even there? He's a servant.

But there are other servants standing next to him.

Me: But they're all wearing red. Merlin isn't.

After the opening titles, I'm told the name of the episode.

Me: 'The Poisoned Chalice'? Hm...

And Nimueh 'accidentally' bumps in to Merlin and Gaius. She's pretending to be one of Bayard's servants or something.

Me: Merlin has big ears. I didn't notice that before.

And Nimueh seems to have successfully convinced Gaius and Merlin that she's just an ordinary servant. She's almost convinced me.

Me: She's the villain, right? I'm confused.

But when she uses magic to open a door...

Me: She's the villain.

And when she tampers with a special chalice...

Me: I have no idea what she's doing, but she's definitely the villain. I'm not confused anymore.

The official ceremonial robes of the servants of Camelot is what Merlin will be wearing at the banquet tonight.

Me: Ha! He looks like a Scot!

He looks ridiculous. 

Merlin and Gwen have a conversation that isn't awkward! But Merlin's in love, and not with Gwen...

Me: Jealous, Gwen? Jelly?

Gwen goes to stand next to Gaius.

The blood of Mercia's men stains the ground, from the walls of Camelot to the gates of Mercia, according to Bayard.

Me: The walls here are cream.

He said 'ground'.

Me: So what? The ground doesn't look blood-stained either.

Bayard presents some ceremonial goblets to Uther and Arthur.

Me: No! They're dodgy!

Nimueh drags Merlin out of the room to warn him. She convinces him that Bayard has poisoned one of the goblets. Merlin rushes in just in time to stop Arthur drinking from it, and drinks from it himself to prove it's poisoned. He falls to the ground. Nimueh smiles.

Me: The ratings must've been really bad if they're thinking of killing him off mid-series.

The only cure for Merlin is a potion that includes a very rare flower only found in a faraway cave.

Me: Oh look, a quest.

Arthur walks over.

Me: He's going to do it, isn't he.

And a beast guards the cave! According to Gaius' book, no one has ever got the flower and come back alive. 

Me: He's definitely going to do it. This is strange, Arthur hardly liked Merlin before, but suddenly he wants to risk his life to save him.

His father doesn't approve, of course. He goes anyway, after some persuasion from the manipulative Morgana.

The guards try to stop him, but Arthur bulldozes them with his horse.

Me: Yeah, stuff everyone!

Nimueh looks into her barrel of water and sees Arthur leaving Camelot to begin his quest!

Me: Yeah, look out Nimueh, Arthur's coming!

Back in Gaius' room, Gwen observes that Merlin is getting hotter.

Me: Yeah, you'd notice.

But Merlin has a rash on his arm! According to Gaius, this doesn't appear until the final stage. Gwen asks what that means for Merlin.

Me: It means this is the final stage, dummy! He's going to die even sooner!

Sorcery! Gaius suspects Nimueh is behind all this. He tells Gwen to look for her.

Me: If Gaius knew who Nimueh was, why didn't he recognise her? Is she using a different body or something?

Gwen can't find Nimueh and-

Me: Morgana as a weird name. It sounds like some sort of weed that people smoke.

Arthur seems a bit lost.

Me: He still hasn't got his armour right!

You can read my commentary for 'Valiant' by clicking here.

The forest is very misty.

Me: Puzzlewood? Probably. It doesn't look like France.

Arthur meets a poor, innocent slave girl with a scratch on her arm. It's Nimueh.

But before Arthur can be all noble and knightly, a big-

Me: Dinosaur?

-appears from behind a hill.

Arthur slays it and we get a closer look at it...

Me: Oh, that looks terrible! Didn't they give The Mill enough time to do it?

Nimueh tells Arthur she knows where the flower grows, so Arthur follows her inside the cave. Nimueh puts on a cowl.

Me: How could you look at her now and say she's not evil? She's wearing a cowl, Arthur! Where'd she get it from? She didn't have it before, did she?

Nimueh points at some fake-looking flowers.

Me: Are they meant to look like real flowers? Apart from being plastic, they look like the ones Dad gets from Bunnings.

Arthur tells Nimueh not to worry.

Me: I think you should be worried.

Nimueh starts whispering a spell. 

Me: Can't he hear her? They're only a metre apart!

Eventually, Arthur does hear her, but it's too late! The ground beneath him falls away, and he's left clinging on to the edge of a cliff. Nimueh tells him that her face will be the last one he sees.

Me: But he can't see your face! Unless he has very good peripheral vision.

I know he's already seen her face, and he won't see another face after hers, so technically she's right. But you can read my commentary for 'Valiant' by clicking here.

Nimueh sends some spiders to kill Arthur, because apparently it's not his destiny to die at her hands.

Me: All this stuff about destiny is getting annoying.

Merlin sends a light to help Arthur get up on to the cliff.

Me: How did that help?

Arthur grabs a flower and escapes the spiders.

Me: Merlin's light looks so dodgy. Hold on, couldn't Merlin just kill all the spiders? Wouldn't that make things easier? This story is dumb.

But it's about to get a lot dumber, as Arthur arrives in-

Me: Camelot!

-he is arrested, by order of the king.

Me: WHAT? You can't arrest a prince! And what sort of parent would arrest his son? And... Put him in a cell? This is stupid. Uther would never have done this in the last three episodes.

Arthur gives Uther the flower and tells him to give it to Gaius.

Uther crushes the flower in his fist and drops it outside the cell.

Me: Wow. He should be on World's Strictest Parents.

Arthur tries to reach the flower, but it's just out of his reach.

Gaius tells Gwen to go and get the flower.

Me: So all you have to do is pick up the flower from outside the cell and run back to Gaius? Easy.

But the flower isn't there when Gwen comes with Arthur's food. Arthur puts the flower in the food and tells Gwen to send it back.

Me: Clever Arthur. Wait, when has Arthur ever been clever? And how did he have the flower? He couldn't reach it. Maybe the guards gave it to him.

But when Arthur's real food arrives, the guards run after Gwen, who drops the plate.

Me: The flower was on the plate! She didn't drop the flower, did she?

When Gwen arrives back at Gaius' room, it seems the guards have given up the chase. But Gaius says he might not be able to make the cure without magic. He sends Gwen to get water so he can secretly do some magic to get the cure to work.

Me: You can't send her back out there! The guards are looking for her, aren't they?

When Gwen gets back, she finds Gaius has been successful.

Me: She's not dumb! Surely she can tell he used magic. 

Merlin wakes up and Gwen kisses him, which starts a very awkward conversation.

Me: That conversation was awkward before it started.

Gaius tells Uther that Nimueh is responsible for poisoning the goblet, but Uther refuses to believe him.

Me: But didn't you suspect Nimueh last episode? Did Uther lose his memory just before this episode started?

But he does believe that Bayard is innocent. He tells his soldiers or knights or whatever not to go and meet the Mercian soldiers or knights or whatever that are on their way to attack Camelot. Gaius tells Uther that he's made the right decision.

Me: That's a change.

But then Gaius asks if Arthur should be told the truth about Nimueh.

Me: Oh! Nimueh's Arthur's mother! Am I right?

Arthur and Morgana are standing on top of the castle, as 'Bayard and his men' leave Camelot to go and give their friends from Mercia some chill pills.

Me: So he let Arthur and Bayard out? That's nice.

Uther tells Arthur that Nimueh is evil. Arthur says it sounds as if he knows her.

Me: He knows her very well if my theory's right.

Uther tells Arthur that he did the right thing.

Me: What? You locked him up because you thought he did the wrong thing! Have you changed your mind because he met Nimueh? Why?

Gaius reveals to Merlin that he was Nimueh's intended target. Merlin, that is. It seems that Nimueh is aware of Merlin's destiny too.

Me: You mean John Hurt's been calling her as well?

And then we have the 'Next Time' trailer.

Me: What? That's it? That can't be it! That was nowhere near 45 minutes! Nothing happened!

But it was 45 minutes, and to be fair, something did happen. But not much.

Me: It didn't feel like 45 minutes.

I know this is part of a long series of stories, but every episode needs to work on its own. Sure, there was a plot, but it was a very weak one, and it didn't feel like a full episode. Even worse, the character development that's been going so well so far went BACKWARDS in this episode. Uther was completely different to how he has been so far, Gwen was unusually dumb, and Arthur was too clever and too caring. Colin Morgan's lack of involvement as Merlin was frustrating, but even more so is how little character development Nimueh is getting. It's not mysterious, if bloody annoying! This was by far the worst of the four episodes I've seen. 3/10. It was an abomination.

Join me next time for 'Lancelot'