Excellent adaptation.

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

I thought this was a fine and entertaining movie and I enjoyed it a lot. So what, if the story (about Merlin oversleeping 50 years and finding Arthur dead and Camelot deteriorated, while the protecting grail has vanished) is far-fetched? Merlin and Arthur belong to the world of legends, so why fret about the script twisting the supposed historical facts? In my opinion every writer has a right to make a go for creating new legends. Sure, I agree the script was like a cauldron over-filled with Arthurian, medieval and fairy-tale cliché's, but the resulting soup tasted fairly good and was served out in a very appealing way. To begin with, the series was shot in beautiful surroundings (Canada, in fact!), the costumes were fine and the movie had a good pace with seldom a dull moment. The CGI-effects were not too bad, and other than some critics on this site, I found the battle scenes (modest as the were) surprisingly convincing. Unfortunately the acting was a bit uneven. Sam Neill seems to be forever Merlin, and he does his professional job as always, but I couldn't help feeling that he more or less just went through the motions, inwardly sighing: "here we go again", probably gratefully accepting his untimely surmise at the end of part I. John Reardon on the other hand radiates with enthusiasm, he's the vibrant center of the movie and especially after the death of his mentor Reardon succeeds in carrying the whole projects on his shoulders. Reardon has charm and buoyancy and he's truly an attractive and talented actor. The supporting roles were less convincing, I especially was disappointed in Miranda Richardson as the Lady of the Lake, who turned out as a rather bloodless creature; on the other hand she wasn't helped by the script that hardly gave her anything worthwhile to do or say. Other supporting roles (the young Lady Yvonne, her guardians, sir Thomas, the young blacksmith, to name a few of the rather crowded list of characters) were played a bit wooden. The Rauskaug character, the leader of a pack of ominous Norman-like warriors, acted almost preposterously over the top, he looked as if he was up for a gig in Wrestle-mania or in some heavy-metal band, continuously distorting his face and grunting and shouting as a wild bore in heat. And then there was Meghan Ory, the love-interest for the young sorcerer's apprentice, she had the misfortune to be confined by the script to a boy's disguise (why do writers keep coming up with that lame concept?! It never ever works, here we could see through it from the very first second he/she appeared on the screen, but in spite of that we are meant to believe that every-one around him/her is apparently blind as a bat!), and they gave her an unattractively short-cutted hair-do to boot, so her natural good looks are totally wasted here and the whole premise makes her character look and sound rather silly, to put it mildly.In conclusion, I liked the series especially because of Reardon and because of the whole Arthurian fantasy-world, that never fails to enchant me, all the more when it's helped by such a fine and convincing setting as here. The bad script and the (apart from Neill and Reardon) mediocre acting are in comparison minor flaws on the whole of the project, and couldn't prevent me from thoroughly enjoying this movie. I rank it 7 out of 10.

Being a viewer with a short attention span who bores very easily watching TV I was amazed that Merlin's Apprentice captured me so much that it caused me to sit watching avidly for the full three hour epic on the British Christmas TV schedule. I wanted to break away, but I couldn't; for me this testifies to its excellence. Negative criticism of the Director David Wu is unjustified; he's been nominated for Outstanding Direction for another of his works, and in this there was nothing to barrack him about. The production values for a TV drama were engaging. The cast were not "wasted" as David Mayer claims, though it would have been more satisfying if Miranda Richardson had more screen time. I admit I did find some of the editing cuts rather odd, and some of the flashback sequences didn't quite work, but overall it was a very enjoyable fantasy drama. I very much disagree with David Mayer's comment that the script was "flaccid and slow" - personally I thought the vocabulary used was charming and thoroughly in the time/mood of the piece. What is David Mayer's problem about using many different accents? It makes a drama so much more interesting and gives it way more flavour than a piece which only contains a bland monotone of generic American accents - personally I love to hear more than 'one voice' for distinctive characters; especially in fantasy. Drama isn't ALL about SFX - this fantasy didn't really need them, because the story, the cast, the acting, the direction were good enough to hold the attention and keep the viewer watching - and that's ALL a production aims for. How cruel and unjustified for David Mayer to say this should be dubbed for comedy and that it didn't work - this smacks of bitterness to me, as though this reviewer has an axe to grind regarding this production. The truth is that it DOES definitely WORK and it's certainly not a comedy. Merlin's Apprentice is an enchanting, exciting, and captivating tale well acted, well produced, and well directed that all ages can enjoy viewing, with many "Oh my goodness" moments in it that keep you glued to the set until the end. Watch it if you can, and find out!

This three hour film is presented in two distinct parts - and I mean very distinct.The first part is actually rather charming in a dumb TV fantasy sort of way; Sam Niell is very winning as Merlin, and the story has some neat twists and turns, some predictable, but one or two unexpected; certainly we are left hanging over what might possibly have destroyed Camelot and erased its connection with the Holy Grail.But the second part - my God!, this is bad! Slow, completely predictable, a mind-numbingly ridiculous happy-ending, wretchedly hammy acting, a script that no longer remembers it's set in the Middle Ages, fight-scenes that are meaningless even when not confusingly disjointed - no one could imagine a worse second-half of any movie or TV series.So how the heck did it get imagined? My guess is, they started with half a script, got paid up front for the second half and decided, 'screw it, we got the money, let's take a vacation'. Either that or they just went suddenly psycho half-way through production.Don't share that fate (or mine, who wastefully kept watching, expecting - hoping - that something interesting might happen). Avoid this tripe at all costs.

After the first Merlin mini-series (which got showered with nominations and what not) I thought that Merlin II was going to be great as well.I was wrong.Not only are we left with a lot of questions, things could also have been explained more (the Forest scene with Brianna, Jack, Graham and Yvonne for example and the Lady of the Lake... she puzzled me, compared to the first Merlin mini-series), and some should have been completely left out (the kissing scene between Graham and Yvonne and Jack and Brianna... it was... odd and it really didn't fit in the time period.) The special effects were so/so.The acting was terrible, even by veteran actor Sam Neill, who didn't seem to have fun with this movie, like he had with the first Merlin one.And even though John Reardon (Jack) is a pretty boy, he had some strong points in this movie, but he was a total let down otherwise.