I truly don’t think Morgana’s downfall was her fault. There were a number of key players in her becoming “evil”, but not one of them was her, and I think that is tragic. She never had a choice in what she became, unlike Merlin who knew the whole time what his destiny was, but also chose it. His destiny to protect Arthur is exactly what he wanted. Do you think Morgana ever wanted to hurt her friends, her family? No, I don’t think she did. Her hand was forced. So, those who are responsible for the fall of Morgana, in my opinion, are:
Uther: Because he’s a misogynistic lying bastard who lied to her at every turn and made her terrified of who she was. If Uther had a) told her the truth from the beginning about her parentage and b) not sentenced everyone who was known to possess magic to death, Morgana would have felt much more secure and not fallen under Morgause’s charm and promises.
Morgause: The real bitch witch in this story. Morgause saw a weakness in Morgana and used it to her advantage. Morgause was obviously aware that Morgana was her sister, and knew that the promise of a family who would understand every aspect of Morgana would draw her in. This gave Morgause the power to bend the trusting Morgana into whoever and whatever she desired. And she did.
Kilgarrah: Screw destiny and prophecies and all that bullshit. The point here is, Morgana was not evil in seasons 1 and 2. Actually, she was the furthest thing from it. I feel that out of all the characters in the early stages of the series, Morgana was the most righteous and implicitly good of all of them. However, Kilgarrah kept going on with his bullshit destiny about Morgana being the hate to Merlin’s love, the darkness to his light, blah blah blah. Merlin went to Kilgarrah to seek advice on how to help one of his closest friends, and Kilgarrah told Merlin to let Morgana die. If Kilgarrah had offered Merlin a different course, a way to actually help Morgana, that would have changed everything.
Gauis: Okay, so probably no one else is going to agree with me on this one, but whatever. When Morgana first started showing signs of magic, Merlin went to Gauis about ways they could help her. Clearly, the best thing they could have done would be to reveal Merlin’s magic to her, to show her that she was not alone, and that it wasn’t something to be so terrified about. However, Gauis wouldn’t allow Merlin to reveal his magic to Morgana and instead just kept making her those sleeping draughts.
Merlin: And last but not least, we have the great Merlin. Because, despite Gauis and Kilgarrah’s words, he could have done whatever the hell he wanted to help Morgana. If he thought revealing his magic to her would have helped her, he could have done it. If he had thought of another way to break the sleeping curse on Camelot, he could have. Or, he could have told Morgana that he believed she was the vessel for the curse and they could have found a solution together. That solution may still very well have been poisoning Morgana, but at least she would have had a choice, an understanding of her fate.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I know that Morgana is “evil” in the legend (I’m a huge Arthurian Legend nerd, in all honesty), and I loved evil Morgana in the show. I just hate how much potential she had to continue being a protagonist instead of the antagonist. I hate how she was so intrinsically good, and had such a pure heart and so much potential to do good for Camelot, and then they go and send her down the road of the evil, power hungry bitch witch. I hate how people always seem to blame her for who she became. Add to that the fact that she didn’t even get the redemption arc she so desperately deserved. After her downfall, that was the one thing I was hoping for. The redemption arc. The chance to make amends with Arthur and be the one to lead him to Avalon as the Morgana / Morgan of the Legend does. But we didn’t even get that. And I also loved her death scene with Merlin, because it was such a bitter sweet ending, and Katie and Colin played it so flipping well, but I wanted the old Morgana to shine through for just a moment.
Also… I would have very much liked for Mergana to become canon…
Broke Bohemian 