In an article about Russell Davis, the Telegraph mentions that the BBC are working on a new series, called Merlin, for the 7pm Saturday evening time slot (it will apparently be broadcast next year).

There's not much more than that to go on at present, but you can read the full interview here: Russell Davis Interview (the Merlin comments are on page 3 of the interview).

Let's hope they do a better job of it than they did with Robin Hood!

Depends who they get to play Merlin, to be honest. Track record on this hasn't been great with Sam Neill and Rik Mayall being two very odd choices. Neither were great, really.

Dr. Who, Robin Hood, Torchwood, Primeval...

It will be shit.

Will Merlin be metrosexual?

I agree. Shitness will inevitably ensue.

He bums Sir Galahad. I always wondered about him.

Sefi x

I hope everyone in Camelot is at least bi-curious.

Merlin will be a cocky northerner with a McFly haircut and no arse. The direction will be slovenly, the production values as low as Merlin's jeans, the writing unrealistic and clunky, and the effects even less so. The forum will love it.

I didn't think the original series with Sam Neill was that bad (the Return of Merlin that followed it was pretty dire though . . .).

I hope he wears cons!

*crosses fingers*

I fear this will be the case exactly.

You also forgot that Guinevere will be some fresh out of LAMBDA girly who speaks in a Sloaney-slumming way and the 'modern' soundtrack full of beeps and twiddles and geeee-tar.

Sefi x

Is Billie available?

I miss her.

It already sounds great to me. I look forward to that gimp off About a Boy and Skins being cast in the title role.

The series looked great, I'll give you that. Neill has all the charisma of a wet flannel though, and let's face it, Merlin needs to be charismatic.

No chance of a complete retelling of Malory's Morte d'Arthur entirely in Middle English then?

Shame, because reading that at university was a hoot and a half.

Don't forget the animated screen-titles of a magic wand making words appear, informing the audience which location they are looking at, in case their eyes had been burned out by Archangel Gabriel in the past 5 minutes since it was last on screen; *SWOOOSH* "Meanwhile at Winalot"

The main villians will include an incredibly hammy, well-regarded thespian biting chunks out of the scenery while commenting wryly on his or her sidekick's slapstick shenanigans.

I'm gonna go out on a limb and say it will be ultra realistic as insane alchemist leads messianic Arthur on a bloody crusade against foreign types to prove Briton's god given sovereignty over the rest of the world. That's the kind of thing the beeb are likely to put out, right.

You wouldn't need Merlin, with Billie's extraordinary magical ability to actually NOT turn into a horse, mouth-first.

And there will be an extended opening sequence every bleeding episode.



Yes - but i wonder who now Allen's been used. Nigel Planer? The gotta have at least comedy actor cast against type in a villain's role.

Sefi x

Tom Baker.

I look forward to whole thing being an analogy for US Imperialism and religious tolerance

Good call, I saw him the other day looking miserable.

My first thought was Joanna Lumley, in another completely-out-of-character character as an evil witch like Evilynn from He-Man but with smaller tits.

I said comedy actor cast against type. Baker will be guesting as strange old magician of the Saruman school who turns evil. I'd say around episode 7.

Still - renowned actress of some unspecified Celtic descent such as Dervla Kirwan or Susan Lynch as Morgana will probably be good.

Sefi x

more likely to be toyah...

I'd watch

or bonnie langford...

Gina McKee has smallprint in her contract which binds her to any fantasy project made in the UK.

I really did LOL when i read this.



It is a mysterwy (haw haw) but she ain't sexy enough. Morgana has to be fanciable for the dads - the nearest thing to Miranda Richardson they can get.

EDIT - Gina McKee - exactement!!

Sefi x

As does Jean Marsh.

Well Helen Mirren is too "big" for the role again, Lindsay Duncan slightly too old so it has to be Gillian Anderson!

They said "fanciable for the dads".

I'm not even a dad and I fancy all three!

Mirren, yes, I'll give you that one. Haven't seen Duncan for a while, so couldn't comment, but Gillian Anderson? Seriously?

Helen Mirren over Gillian Anderson?! Anyway, as already mentioned, I predict this will be an excellent opportunity to make some quality television, touted as such with much fanfare until it's realeased and everyone realises it's absolute wank, but still watches in the hope that it will come good in the end - despite everyone knowing it won't. Or, just maybe, the beeb will have realised that there really isn't any point wasting a bit of money on something rubbish, and will actually spend some money on it, rather than employing cheap actors who've never done anything before and filming it all in the cheapest country they can find, to stem the spiralling marketing costs required to cover up the crapness.

It will be called Merlin: The College Years

It will be set in Cardiff

"Good" people will be pretty, "Evil" will be less pretty, those wavering between the two will be dark haired.

It will have a contemporary setting

Josh Merlin will have dreams of being a indie rock star until one day he finds a rune or something and the spirit of the original Merlin will tell him of his true destiny, which includes protecting and aiding the future king.

With adolescence come magic.

He will spend a lot of his time trying to keep his social and magic life seperate. His relationship with his girlfriend will suffer.

It will have huge viewing figures the first week which will be halved by the end of the run.

At some point he will bump into The Doctor or Captain Jack.

Or Willow off Buffy. (She needs the work, people. Crap US sitcoms and teen comedies don't last forever.)

Merlin will be from space and travel through time in a post box with dad bait companion trying to keep the space/time continuum in order. Along his travels he'll meet Arthur, Robin Hood, dinosaurs...

or Giles/Ripper...he moved back home!

exactly what i was thinking!!!...is she still around??

i'm not sure if i agree with this new Merlin thingy....whatever happens you just know he'll have a hoodie.

sniggers...

See, I'm thinking that what with the popularity of Harry Potter and the new book / film / toy line etc, they'll be going along the lines of it being all about how Merlin in fact was an orphan and was raised by his aunt and uncle on Tatooine in suburbia somewhere in the arse end of, oh I don't know, Cornwall let's say, before someone comes along to tell him he is in fact a Jedi Knight wizard and that he has to go to join the rebellion wizarding school so he can defeat Darth Vader Lord Voldemort Mordred who had previously murdered his parents.

Well why mess with a winning formula eh?

I've just worked it out. Merlin will be Harry Potter's dad, who has to beat the Daleks and the Cybermen by use of a suspicious plot device that's never properly explained.

He also has to help Justin Hawkins win Eurovision.

Written by RTD. It's ok, he'll never see it.

I think Arthurian texts actually slightly pre-date Harry Potter and, yes even Star Wars in terms of popularising the heroes quest.

It's the Beeb. Remember, they turned Robin of Loxley into a hoodie.

I don't think we're talking about the same point.

There are likely to be shades of Harry Potter and Star Wars in any adaptations of Arthurian romances, but it's the former that are derivative. It's the latter's popularity that really brought the heroes quest to the masses.

Anyhoo, I do hope they keep the incest in.

I doubt it somehow. Although I bet it'd still be better viewing than Primevil.

Its what the viewer wants.

To be fair the parallels between Star Wars / Harry Potter and Arthurian legend are probably more firmly rooted in the actual legend of Arthur himself (orphan with destiny finds aforementioned destiny, saves world from evil with group of good, but not as good as he is, friends). Unless you're willing to go right back to 12th and 13th century prose there's actually very little in the Merlin folklore about his early life, which is why I assume that most people won't be aware of anything surrounding it and also why film-makers seem more inclined to dick about with that period of his life when "re-inventing" "re-imagining" or just plain "re-fuckingup" stories involving him.
The sad state of affairs is that you say "wizard" to the majority of kids these days and they'll automatically think "Harry Potter" rather than "Merlin", this combined with the frankly piss-poor lazy writing of Robin Hood made me come up with the assumption that they'd judt rip off the standard orphan with mystery past saves world dynamic, rather than any real belief that Arthurian legend is in any way derivative.

I went to school with that guy..hehe.....he was slightly less annoying on tv, believe it or not!

(and, no, i don't mean the actual Robin Hood)