Review: The Pendragon Cycle Episode 3…This is a Hot Mess (Spoilers)

Last week, I started reviewing the Dailywire’s adaptation of The Pendragon Cycle and said that my review of the show was going to be similar to my reviews of Amazon’s Rings of Power. That means that every time a new episode comes out, I will review the episode to see if the show is getting any better or if it’s going downhill.

And boy is The Pendragon Cycle heading downhill.

Overall, Episode 3 had the same pros as Episodes 1 and 2, but it also had the same pitfalls. However, this time, the pitfalls were way more pronounced because instead of learning who Merlin was before he was the famed wizard (or prophet…druid…person…whatever), we immediately jump to what would be the equivalent of the last third or so of the second book of The Pendragon Cycle plus (maybe) the beginning chapters of the third book.

Which means that Episode 4 is going to probably be the only episode that bothers to explain any of Merlin’s background in any depth.

Yay.

Because of this problem, we have no idea who anyone is, why they’re important beyond the vaguest sense, why we need to care about the bad guys, nothing. Thus, when King Vortigern’s village is attacked, we have no idea why we should care. When Uther and Aurelius come into the show, we have no idea who they are or why they’re important. Heck, we have no idea why they’re even attacking Vortigern. Are they Roman, Saxon, Welsh? Whose side are they on? What’s their motivation? Why doesn’t Uther like Merlin? Why does he try to kill him? Literally nothing is answered or explained.

Then there’s this scene.

Which looks a lot like this scene from Lord of the Rings.

It’s almost the exact same picture. When this scene came on, I looked at my dad and said something along the lines of: “If a Nazgul appears right now…”

It was that on-the-nose.

Another complaint I had with Episode 3 is how unlikeable Merlin is. Thankfully, he isn’t Strong-Whaman Galadriel bad, but he’s such a flat, brooding character who we have no understanding of that nothing he does really makes sense. We don’t know his motivations. We don’t know why he acts as he does. We don’t what know what his past looks like. We just know he’s important because the script says so and he’s Charis and Taliesin’s kid. That’s it.

I had had high hopes for this show. Even after the first and second episodes, I had hoped that the show would get better as time went on. After this episode, though, I doubt The Pendragon Cycle is going to get better. If anything, it’s going to continue becoming exponentially worse because of how rushed the pacing is.

Until next time,

M.J.