Merlin: Secrets and Magic

Welcome to Secrets and Magic - taking you behind the scenes

to see how Merlin's made.

Today, we trot over to France to see some incredible four-legged filming.

When you're there, watching it, the speed of it is unbelievable.

Whoa! Ooh!

There's also some horsing around from assassin, Adrian Lesser.

Plus we look at what happened when Gwen got saddled with the ungrateful prince.

It's always funny doing kisses with your mates.

All on Merlin - Secrets and Magic.

751, take one, A Camera.

Today, it's a case of lights, camera, action

as the cast and crew of Merlin are making another belting episode.

It looked like so much fun.

Incredible horses and great horsemen.

They weren't pulling any punches!

They're incredible, like they're made of lead and don't get injured.

These guys are absolute nutters

but amazing at what they do. It's 100% real,

cos you're genuinely blown away by what's happening.

And when you see a guy fall off and get dragged by the stirrup,

they get up and they do it again.

It's unbelievable. They are fantastic.

It was just incredible to watch these French guys

who were absolutely crazy!

At the beginning of Merlin, the ambition was to make mini movies -

so each episode feels like an action adventure movie.

We wanted it to have some of the production values

and excitement of Hollywood movies.

I know that's very ambitious, but that's where we began.

In Series 1, we didn't think we'd pull it off,

but we thought, "Let's go," cos if we fail, we'll fail spectacularly.

And we did pull it off.

You told me I would not see you again!

Second series are the best to do.

I think you get a chance to do everything a little bit better

and a little bit bigger than you did before. So, in the first series,

when we did the tournament, we were originally going to do jousting

but we thought it was impossible to do - it's too expensive,

we don't have enough time, so let's just forget it.

This year we thought, "Let's do jousting."

And that bold decision brought them back to France

to film an episode that would see the jousting tournament

as the turning point for an otherwise arrogant Prince Arthur.

Arthur is quite misunderstood,

due to the fact that he seems to put on a front quite a lot of the time,

which makes him come across as an arrogant prat.

What is that smell? Whose clothes are these? Mine. I washed them specially.

'The part of Arthur just really appealed to me,'

cos he had so many flaws but you could see that there was a reason for those flaws.

And he's been through a lot, certainly since Merlin arrived.

Roll, please.

Why did you pull out? I was wide open, you could have unhorsed me.

I thought I might injure you, Sire. You had the advantage. You can't hesitate.

I wouldn't have, if I were facing a different opponent.

You are the future king, my lord.

You can almost describe Series 2 as a transitional stage for him,

cos clearly, he's changing, and he's not what he was.

It doesn't matter who I am.

I do not expect any special treatment from you or any of you!

This story is how Arthur learns a little more about life.

Is that understood?

He learns about how to be the sort of king who'll have a Round Table

rather than a rectangular one, who understands equality is important.

My lord. Guinevere.

It's good of you to let me stay in your home.

The episode's really about Arthur and Gwen.

Arthur goes on this quest

to try and prove himself on his own merits, not cos he's a prince.

I can't believe you talked me into this!

'She's kind of grown up seeing Arthur behaving'

in this really arrogant way

and how he seems to just love himself and have no consideration for anyone else.

Perhaps you could prepare me a bowl of hot water. I take it you have a bowl.

'This is her chance to say all that

'about how she's always felt about him.'

I'll just walk all the way down to the well and fetch some water, then. HE GROANS

Even though it's totally inappropriate cos she's a servant and he's a prince,

'all of a sudden, they're on her turf.'

Would it kill you to say please and thank you once in a while?!

My lord.

More than making him angry, where she kind of goes, "Oh, sorry,"

it actually kind of softens him and he has actually listened to her

and that's when you see that he does care about her a little bit.

It's quite interesting to see how that relationship develops

and how we get to know each other and what happens...

You're right.

I have behaved appallingly.

Arthur's becoming older and wiser

and less arrogant. You know, he was painted as a sort of arrogant prince

and slowly in Series 2, some of that goes.

One more match, tournament will be over.

You can go back to being Prince Arthur.

We begin the romance between Arthur and Gwen

early on in the series.

The first kiss had to be this spectacular moment.

'It's always funny doing kisses with your mates, cos we've known each other for ages now'

so it's very comfortable.

It's so fairytale.

It's exactly what you thought it should be - it's this beautiful,

slow, romantic, backlit fairytale kiss.