Morgana (Tales of Arcadia)

**Morgana** is the former secondary antagonist in the *Tales of Arcadia* franchise. She appears as the main antagonist of *Trollhunters*, is mentioned in *3Below*, and the central antagonist in *Wizards*, serving as the central antagonist of the first half and a supporting anti-heroine in the second half.

She was an ancient, paranormal witch whose main goal is to cause the Eternal Night so that the troll warlord Gunmar could vanquish all of humanity and she could rule the world to free trollkind from mankind. However, he is nothing more than a pawn to her, as she is willing to kill him once she no longer needed him.

She is voiced by Lena Headey.

## Biography

### Background

Morgana was a human witch who was born in planet Earth and was King Arthur's sister. At first, she was Merlin's apprentice, as they both worked on magical spells and the like. However, one day, King Arthur's wife, Guinevere, was killed by a Stalking while Morgana tried to save her life. As a result, Arthur developed his own ambitions and became odious by his own will, eventually coming up with genocidal intent on all magical beings to avenge Guinevere, regardless of whether or not they're good or evil, even though those he pursued had nothing to do with her. Disgusted by this, Morgana plotted to free trollkind from his wrath, and slowly began to hate Arthur. She felt betrayed by her master when he protected Arthur because she tried to kill the king, becoming Merlin's sworn nemesis. During a battle outside of Camelot, Arthur used Excalibur to cut off Morgana's left hand, which Merlin and Douxie used to create the Amulet of Daylight.

Following this, she swore revenge on Merlin and participated in the war between humans and trolls to free the latter. Because of her new hatred of Merlin, she went to a troll named Angor Rot who was trying to protect his village from Gunmar, and went to Morgana so he could get the power he needed to protect them. However, she chose to enslave him instead by transforming his soul into a ring called the Inferna Copula, so he would be forced to do as she says. Eventually, when Gunmar was banished to the Darklands by Deya the Deliverer, Merlin banished Morgana into the Heartstone beneath what would eventually be known as Arcadia, but he lost most of his magic in the process.

### *Trollhunters*

Despite this, Morgana still had her dark influence on the world, as she became a deceptive spirit guide to Gunmar and the Janus Order, as she would give them orders through her phonograph. However, when Gunmar kills off the Janus Order despite their conspiracy to release him from the Darklands, Morgana puts an illness in Claire to slowly take control of her body by separating it from her soul, and shows Gunmar the key to the Eternal Night. In one of Jim and Claire's dates, Morgana possesses the latter to use her as a host to kill Jim in horrifying ways, but Jim is able to restrain her. Following this, Jim and his friend, Toby, go into the Shadow Realm to return Claire's spirit to her body. While Blinky and Stricklander try to open the portal long enough for Jim and Toby to escape, Morgana tries to seduce Stricklander into give up and close the portal, but Jim and Toby escape and return Claire's spirit to her body, thus permanently separating Morgana from Claire's body.

However, Morgana is definitely not done with her goals. Once she is freed from her prison by Gunmar, she starts by killing several of his own followers, the Gumm-Gumms, and succeeds in seducing the now-resurrected Angor Rot into following her evil ways like he did before. Using the ashes of the dead Gumm-Gumms, Morgana starts the Eternal Night so that trolls could destroy all of mankind just because she feels like it, first by having the Gumm-Gumms crush and devour everyone in Arcadia, then trying to murder Merlin before the spirits of past Trollhunters protect him by using the ashes of fallen Gumm-Gumms to fight her.

After Jim, who became a half-troll, kills off Gunmar, Morgana continues her genocidal ambitions, and tries to make several attempts to kill the heroes one last time. When she holds Jim captive, she offers for Angor Rot to kill him in front of his friends, but having been reminded of the hero he once was, Angor instead redeems himself by battling Morgana and coming up with the idea to trap her in the Shadow Realm, but she kills him in the process even though the heroes overpower her. In her final moments, she tries to drag down Claire with her, but the latter throws the Skathe-Hrün to Toby who destroys it, thus rendering Morgana completely powerless and sealing her in the Shadow Realm, presumably for good. Following this, Merlin gets all his magic back and stops the Eternal Night before it could be completed. Although her final fate is unclear, it's possible that she died since Merlin claimed that she would die if he gets his magic back.

### *3Below*

Morgana is mentioned by Toby when he compares her to General Morando after the latter is imbued with Gaylen's Core.

### *Wizards*

Back at the 12th century, Morgana at first is an ally for the wizards, up until the moment in which she rescues the magical creatures from her brother King Arthur. King Arthur then fights her as an act of vengeance towards the magical creatures. Arthur then remorselessly cuts off her arm, and out of a shock she falls into the sea. Morgana eventually resurfaces as she was revived by Bellroc and Skrael, and she is used as a pawn for their plans. She eventually sends a changeling to cause an explosion in an attempt to kill Arthur, though it is foiled by the heroes, and enchants Gunmar's Decimaar Blade to use him as a pawn. During the Battle of Killahead Bridge, Morgana tortures Arthur until he explains that he's trying to redeem himself for his crimes. Just as they are about to reconcile with each other, however, Bellroc sneaks from behind and kills Arthur, but Morgana blames Merlin for Arthur's death. Although she knocks out Merlin, Douxie and Claire beat her, with Claire sending Morgana to the Shadow Realm. After this, Bellroc and Skrael revive Arthur as the Green Knight, who shall command the Arcane Order.

During the 21st century, Morgana is released from the Shadow Realm by Bellroc and Skrael, who berate Morgana for failing to fix the balance between magic and man, and the Green Knight reveals himself to be Arthur. While they eventually raid GDT Arcane Books, Morgana goes to the Shadow Realm to save Arthur's soul, who she believes is mind-controlled by the Order. However, the Knight realizes that Morgana is a traitor and reveals that he joined the Arcane Order by his own will in his twisted concept of redemption, as he believes that the only way to redemption is helping the Order destroy and remake the world to their liking. Upon realizing that King Arthur is beyond redemption, Morgana sacrifices herself by fighting him to the death, and he uses one of his Onyx Shards to fatally wound Morgana. However, she strips King Arthur of his right to wield Excalibur and lifts up one of the remains of Camelot before she dies, which then crumbles and its roof falls on the dark knight. It is after this when Morgana finds Merlin after he was previously killed by Arthur, and the two peacefully move on to the afterlife while knowing that their time has come.

## Personality

Morgana was originally motivated by her hatred of King Arthur and the rest of mankind. It was due to this hatred that she became sadistic and cruel, up to the point of tormenting her enemies, and while she did help Gunmar in his goals, this was only out of pragmatism as she only kept him alive because he was useful to her; she even told Angor that Gunmar is nothing more than a pawn and will kill him once her goals are complete.

However, while she did want to rule the world, she did have some good intentions as well when bringing forth the Eternal Night; she truly cared for trollkind and felt that mankind must be destroyed to ensure the trolls' freedom, even though Merlin claimed that she wanted to do it just because she craved chaos. What caused her to hate King Arthur in the first place was his genocidal crusade against trollkind because of Guinevere's death. Morgana genuinely cared about Guinevere and tried to save her life from the Stalkling that soon killed her, and despite her hatred for King Arthur, she did seem to genuinely care about him as well to an extent as she was horrified when Bellroc literally stabbed him in the back to his death as it seemed that she and Arthur were about to reconcile.

Eventually, Morgana realized that the planet didn't belong to her nor King Arthur and tried to save Arthur's soul, but realized that he was beyond saving upon finding out that he chose to join the Arcane Order and wasn't mind-controlled by them. In a last act of redemption, she used the last of her power to strip King Arthur of his right to wield Excalibur and crush him to his death, and it was because of her redemption that she was able to move on with Merlin to the afterlife, rendering her a saved soul.