No series set at a medieval castle would be complete without a tournament, and Merlin (the series, not the man) is barely two weeks old before we have a full-blown contest to enjoy, with Uther strutting around demanding the best of sportsmanship from his knights of the realm. Most of them look a sorry bunch but one of them stands out. Or at least, his shield does – when its snake-head device comes to life and the three snakes sit ready to do the bidding of their master Knight Valiant.

Problem with this was, that it was obvious right from the start that the tournament final would be between Valiant and Prince Arthur. So all the rest of the games were a waste of time really. No tension and not a lot of drama.

They made the best of it though, by letting Valiant deploy his snakes when he was in danger of losing. Naturally that gave the game away for Merlin. But this is the middle ages. Those regal types don’t listen to someone in Merlin’s position. Come to think of it, not much has changed in the intervening 800 years. So he has to box clever. Get his hands on some evidence. The need to prepare an antidote to the snake venom, so that Ewan can be saved to give testimony, drives Merlin to chop off the head of one of the snakes. Saving Ewan from poisoning is, sadly, not enough. The snakes can kill just as easily with their fangs.

For any sensible king the head alone would be proof enough, even without supporting knightly testimony. It looked identical to the ones on Valiant’s shield. Well, apart from being three-dimensional of course. They missed a trick here. If Valiant’s shield device had also lost one of its heads, he might have had some explaining to do. Fortunately for him the graphics were intact, as was his reputation. Unlike poor old Arthur who was branded a coward. He needs a bigger chin to be a proper prince.

For once, the magic of the shield was beyond Merlin without a little study. Overnight practice with a spell that animates everyday objects was enough for him to be able to conjure the snakes in full view of the tournament crowd, whereupon Arthur was able to despatch the remaining two heads, along with their owner, who proved in the end to be totally unvaliant after all.

Plenty of action and magic in this second episode, but the story was awfully predictable and full of set pieces. Merlin’s interludes with the dragon were completely pointless and diversionary. All in all a little pedestrian after the glamour and fun of last week’s introductory story. Uther will fast become a boring two-dimensional character if he carries on being so dense. He’s a king for goodness’ sake – and he learned Merlin’s worth last week. If he’s going to have to learn the same lesson over and over again the whole thing will get very old, very quickly.

Still, next week’s preview looked interesting didn’t you think? Mind you, they always do don’t they. Those darned clever media types know just how to knit together the crucial scenes to make it look compelling. Curse them.