Merlin 303 - ABANDON ALL DIGNITY ALL YE WHO ENTER HERE.

[paxpinnae]

Oh, Merlin.  When I quit watching Supernatural, that wasn't an invitation for you to become my new "Why Am I Still Watching This?" show, and yet I had to open up Notepad and start snarking to make it through this episode.  Please re-up your slash quotient before I quit you and just read fic.

EPISODE 3x03 - The Goblin's Gold


-Geoffery!  I missed you so.  Also, congratulations on acquiring several libraries since you last got screentime.  I mean seriously, where do you get your funding?

- Awww, Merlin is almost as good at directions as I am.

- Run, Merlin!  You'll be sucked into an episode of Scooby-o!

-HMMMM I WONDER IF THAT INCANTATION WILL BE IMPORTANT LATER.  Also, I thought it looked vaguely Latinate on first pass, but pausing reveals it to be gibberish.  My faith in the laziness of the Merlin writers: restored!

-AHHH Sealed House Elf in a Can! Oh, wait, I think that's supposed to be the goblin.  Seriously, though, it looks kinda like the illegitimate love child of Dobby, Gollum, and an owl (the owl was the egg donor).  Though I do have to congratulate the CGI team on advancing past the mid-nineties in terms of Quality Animation.

- Dear Merlin: Magic.  You has it.  PLEASE AT LEAST ATTEMPT TO USE IT TO CATCH THE GOBLIN. 

-The old offscreen mayhem trick! Oh, BUDGET.

 - Listen to your faghag, Merlin.  You do not have the bone structure for statement jewelry.

- Oh, ASH.  How much is your dignity going for these days anyway?

-Merlin, it's a good thing you're pretty, 'cause you ain't going nowhere on brains.

-Arthur.  It took you at least a minute to wake up and spring into action, after Merlin did everything short of marching the Rose Bowl Parade through your room. Your keen warrior instincts need some work. 

-Dammit, why are all my favorite characters felled by drapery?
 
- GAIUS'S FACES.  I hate "wacky hijinks" eps, but this one is almost worth it for that one face with the tongue.

- OH GOD I TAKE IT BACK.  I'm sorry, Richard Wilson, but you are far too old for me to enjoy your sexyface.  PUT THE TONGUE AWAY, GAIUS.  PUT IT AWAY.

-Oh great body humor.  gdiaf, writers.

-I am so using the "badger's armpit" line the next time I have a hangover.

- Gaius, you are giving me flashbacks to middle school.  Please stop going "woooOOOOOoooo."

-Mean Gaius, I like you.  You can stay - OH GOD THE TONGUE AGAIN.

-Gaius. seriously, STOP with the tongue after talking about your big boils.  You are making my vagina pull in the welcome mat.

-The headslapping - I have never understood why this sort of thing is funny.  I think I lack the physical comedy gene.

- OH THANK GOD MERLIN YOU DO HAVE A BRAIN SOMEWHERE IN BETWEEN THOSE EARS.

 - Arthur.  Be honest with your daddy.  You lost a fight with your bed canopy. 

- MORE GODDAMN BODY HUMOR.  REALLY, SHOW?  I knew you weren't especially good, but this is a new low.

-No, Goblin, it was not funny.  Even a little bit.  IF YOU ARE GOING TO DO FART JOKES, AT LEAST MAKE THEM FUNNY.

- OH YES, THANK YOU MERLIN YOU REMEMBERED YOU HAD MAGIC - Wait, that's it?  You're tipping your hand without a plan? 

- Oh, y hallo again thar significant book of significance.

- Hey look Merlin's being accused of saucery again.  It's the third episode, show, why'd you wait so long?

- Awwww, Arthur looks so sad about his boyfriend's execution.  Honey, this is what happens when you arrest your toys.

- Annnnnnnnd we've arrived at the spittake portion of the evening. Oh well, at least Leon gets screentime - wait, is that poison?

- Show, when I can see Merlin take the keys off the fishing line, you need a new special effects guy.

- Gwen, you're the blacksmith's daughter.  Don't you have a sword or something?

- Gwen, everybody poops.  There's even a book about it!

- Yay! The bromance is back!  Defend your lady-love, Arthur! - oh wait.  First curtains, now crockery?  Seriously, Arthur, go train in a Pottery Barn or something.

- Okay, Arthur really is an ass.  *snerk*

- So, lil bit of a furry moment there.  Awkward.

- Yay temporary-death-to-fulfill-magical-obligations trope!  I haven't seen you on shitty genre tv in six whole months.

- Merlin. When I said you would get sucked into a Scooby-Do episode, that wasn't encouragement.

- Hmmmm.  All this talk about itching is making me think of the Atul Gawande article.  *scratches*

- AHHHHH FUCKING TONGUE AGAIN.

-VOMIT OF GREAT JUSTICE.  And the Goblin didn't just go down his throat.... why?  Whatever, the show doesn't care, why should I.

-Oh, Colin Morgan.  I know your lines are terrible, but that's no reason to look so sad!

- Arthur and Gwen are going to have the most awkward and repressed babies EVAR.

- Merlin.  When are you going to learn that it is always your fault? 

- You know, I'm in favor of operant conditioning if it lets Arthur have some damn character development.

- ...Annnnd I guess that inscription wasn't important after all.  Shitty foreshadowing, or even shittier filler?  You be the jury!   (On the off chance that it's the former, there was also in the book a weird little dragon-thing that looked like it had a squirrel treed and was trying to figure out how to get up to catch it.)

NEXT TIME: People try to kill Arthur.  What else is new?.

Seriously,  I really need to abandon ship at this point.  Unfortunately, prior experience with Heroes, Supernatural, and Bones has shown that it will take at least a season more before I actually quit watching.  Damn loyalty.