Rewatching Merlin and something that mad me REAL sad for Arthur

The writers not allowing Arthur to pull Excalibur out of the stone himself without Merlin's help. It took away so much from the legend and from Arthur's own character.

I think it would have made more sense if Merlin put the sword in the stone with magic with a set of conditions - that only a warrior pure of heart, strong enough to lead, ready to bring respect the old religion and bring about prosperity for all etc. would be able to pull the sword out again. Almost as a way to test Arthur to make sure that by the time Arthur needs to wield the sword again, he'll be ready. And so when Arthur goes to the stone in Season 4, not even Merlin will be able to help because he placed such powerful conditional magic upon the stone/sword that only if Arthur passes those conditions himself and is truly worthy can he pull the sword out. And then Arthur does and it's like wooooooo King Arthur baby!

Of course in my head canon, by that scene, Arthur would have already known Merlin has magic and Merlin has put the sword in the stone with these conditions. And Merlin can't help him at this point, so it's Arthur that has to believe in himself and pull it out. And there won't be anyone else around. Just Arthur and Merlin in the woods in this quiet, powerful scene.

Anyways, I often get frustrated with this show because it's great enough to rewatch but there's so much wasted potential all because the writers struck gold with Season 1's formula and were too afraid to stray from it for the rest of the series by actually allowing characters to permanently grow and change.