literally no one asked me this but i think about it a lot. one of the big reasons i love merlin so much is it is one of the only shows i watched growing up where it was seemingly both normal and okay for men to cry. where men are usually disparaged for showing Emotion or their Tears, or called weak when they showcase them, merlin was crying basically every other episode. and he's said to be the most powerful man to walk to earth.

— MERLIN 4.01 (The Darkest Hour Pt.1)

Get attacked!! ✨🌈SEND THIS TO OTHER BLOGGERS YOU THINK ARE WONDERFUL. KEEP THE GAME GOING🌈✨

(merlin slaying the house down) (and slaying our hearts)

thank you, lovely!!❤️

They’re judging you

I'm suddenly very, very sad about them again, so you all have to suffer with meeee muhahahaaa

have a reeeeally quick sketch of the cause of all of our pain and tears :]

can someone please analyze this dream i had about colin morgan in 2021

we should do this more often

looking at merlin cast photos to feel some semblance of whimsy and joy

ok...i was going to just leave a reply but it turned out longer.... i'm so sorry this is so long. we can have a lil fandom "history" lesson. (which like all history, is biased and based solely on my experience.)

it's definitely not as bad as i imagine it could be lol. imo discourse has always centered around The Characters and The Narrative more than the ships. but there have always been people who are pretty anti gwen/anti arwen, which is just poorly disguised racism/misogyny/misogynoir. ("she's getting in the way of merthur" "she's a beard" "arthur doesn't love her" "arthur doesn't look at her the way she looks at merlin." anything about the infamous "you're not merlin" bit in 4x06 has personally never sat right with me.) i do think it's better than it was, say in 2011-2013, but i've still definitely seen it around. and may i say i don't think the goal here should be to "be better." we should literally just not be racist at all!

but then interestingly it can swing to the other end of the spectrum with people who are vehemently anti merthur (and often anti arthur, tho not always) in favour of other merlin-centric ships. this imo is way more prevalent than it was in ca. 2012, since i think it's more "popular"(for lack of a better word) to ship anything but merthur lately. the things i've seen about this are is that "arthur is abusive to merlin," "merthur is problematic," "arthur is just as bad as uther," "arthur's the true villain," etc. i'm biased here because i don't agree with any of that, but it exists and i've seen it. this also tends to somehow turn into an anti-monarchy argument? in a tv show about a myth about a medieval king? (girl what are YOU doing at the devils sacrament?)

the only other discourse i can think of off the top of my head is people who get mad when morgana is shipped with a man. not people who prefer she is shipped with women, and only read that in fic (which is fine!) i'm talking about people who claim that you are somehow homophobic and it's "wrong" to ship morgana with a man (which is a weird take!)

i also feel compelled to say there's always the people up in arms about incest in fiction. which i can really only respond with: have you ever read any arthurian myth? do you know who mordred's parents are in some versions of the legends?

but yes. TLDR, of course there is always discourse! the weirdos are out there. but to end with some positives: merlin fandom has always had a very good relationship with multi-shipping. it was fairly popular to have rare pairs "back in the day," but even more so now! yay!

just realized i haven't really seen much ship discourse for merlin. does it not happen or is it just because i am only following like 10 people

As easy as breathing…

there's an obvious answer

just so we're all aware: this is merlin's facial journey during the scene where arthur outright lies to uther to protect merlin

bbc merlin - 02x11 The Witch's Quickening

of course arthur has protected him before, lied for him - take arthur telling him to run when he was accused for sealing the seal for example. it's happened before. but i think this is the first time merlin so explicitly realises just how much arthur is willing to do, considering that he just hammered the guilt into him only a few moments ago. arthur has pretty much taken the responsibility without merlin asking. i wonder if, for him, it's comparable to everything he does with his magic. all these things arthur has not asked of him, that he does happily anyway. i wonder just how much it really means, how much and how different of a weight it puts on their dynamic.

i swear i break out in hives whenever that queerbaiting ask i answered almost four years goes around. like i stand by it. But Beware: The Discourse.

dante and virgil • arthur and merlin