When Merlin's home village is taken over by ruthless raiders he risks the exposure of his magical abilities to Arthur, who along with Gwen and Morgana have tagged along to help the young wizard. The long awaited back-story on this rebooted Merlin character has arrived. I have been waiting with anticipation for this episode, and while it was fun to watch, it did however leave me a bit disappointed as well.

Upon starting this episode I was pleased to see that someone else knows about Merlin's gift besides his mother and Gaius. The addition of Merlin's childhood friend was a nice plot element and I liked the fact that Will (Merlin's childhood friend) was the son of a fallen knight. I began to think their relationship could very well mirror a future friendship that Arthur and Merlin could share. This episode also put Merlin’s resolve to the test, because he had to choose between exposure of his gift to his friends from Camelot or saving his village. I was curious about the young wizard's origin and home village, so seeing him not only go there but fight for it was a real treat.

I do however have a few complaints on this episode. First, there was no real reason offered up as to why Merlin left his village. We learn that his village is not under Uther's realm so the threat of being executed for sorcery use seems doubtful. This raises the question, why go to Camelot and take on the risk of execution? Merlin tells Will he left the village because he did not “fit in” a rather weak point on the writer's back story. I know that Arthur and Merlin must be together, but I think the writers could have come up with something better than “teen angst” being the cause of Merlin’s departure to Camelot. The writing thus far has been great, maybe I had just set my expectations too high for Merlin’s origin, or not all has been revealed just yet. Secondly, the battle scenes during this episode were a bit lame in stark contrast to such episodes as “Merlin: Valiant (1.2)”. I think the final confrontation with the raiders came off as a bit too “B-Movie” like and the dust devil Merlin creates was a bit unimpressive. Since we have seen him set things on fire and wield a magical staff with deadly results, I expected more of a “flash”.

As the episode ends we see a dying Will take the fall for Merlin’s use of sorcery and keep the young warlock’s secret safe. I am glad it went that way because I was almost sure Will was going to expose Merlin out of jealousy because of his new friendship with Arthur. This was a good episode but did not turn out to be a step toward an exciting season finale which is on its way in only one more episode. I am a big fan of this show and I was expecting a build up by now since there are only twelve episodes in the first season. I have my eyes set on the next episode with the hope that things are about to get explosive and the wish that Merlin does not lose its magical appeal.