Merlin 2.07 "Witchfinder"

[emeraldstag]

I was interested in seeing this episode from the moment I saw the little preview at the end of last week's and while it's still a fairly new show I'm intrigued by the accusations thrown against Merlin whenever the villain seems to find out there is something peculiar about the boy - like the last two week's troll trying to get Merlin out of the way by accusing him of something to get him out of the way.

• Gaius. He's been the one character of the main cast outside of Uther that I've had trouble wanting to root/care for. The only times I've felt for the guy have been moments with Merlin where his gruff exterior is cracked and you see how much they care for each other (reminds me we haven't seen Merlin's mom so far this season and we're already halfway through right?). This episode gave more of the self sacrifice Gaius that we saw in the season finale last year and it really had me feeling for the guy everything that he went through to try to save Merlin & Morgana from the same fate. But perhaps the most powerful scene was when he stood up to Uther at the end and didn't let things return to how they used to be between them.
• Aredian. This guy is made to be the villain. The plotline I thought was pretty obvious right from the beginning, I thought it would make sense that he would accuse anyone he wanted and then plant evidence and that it would be funny if he targeted Merlin not knowing the truth about him. Also I don't know if anyone noticed but the actor also played the villain in "Last Action Hero" 16 years ago. Maybe it's not a good thing to remember so much about a movie that wasn't that great but it was useful here.
• Arthur. Even though there wasn't a lot of focus on him, I thought there was plenty of character moments in Witchfinder. Not feeling comfortable about Aredian (much like he didn't like the new taxes in the previous episodes when Uther was enchanted), holding Merlin back from attacking Aredian and then letting him visit Gaius when he hadn't been allowed to, and finally listening to Gwen and stopping the burning before another innocent man lost his life.

This episode didn't have a lot of Morgana, Gwen or Arthur but for the first time in this series the episode didn't really suffer because of it. I had predicted last week that Arthur would save the day and he did in a way but not as big of a presence as I would have thought. Next week's preview definitely heats things up and promises to have tons of Arthur as we're teased with him finding out the circumstances of his birth. It will be interesting to see what that woman has to say and who she is.