Hypable caught up with Once Upon a Time‘s Merlin, Elliot Knight, to discuss season 5, fairytales, and how long he’s been preparing for the role.

It was clear within one minute of speaking with Elliot Knight that there is no better man to step into Merlin’s robes this season on Once Upon a Time. In fact, you could argue that Knight has been preparing for this role since he was a child. If you missed his appearance in the season premiere, do not fear, Knight is just getting started.

Hypable’s interview with Elliot Knight

Photo Credit: Isaac Sterling Photography

Hypable: Once Upon a Time fans are pretty passionate about what is going on, what has your experience been like encountering the fans for the first time in season 5?

Elliot Knight: Oh, the Oncers. I am obviously one of the freshest people coming into the show, so I am only just starting to experience it now. But it’s the most committed, devoted, passionate fandom I am aware of. Maybe only on par with 1D [One Direction]. They’re awesome, they’ve been so great. Since I was announced to be in the show people started getting in touch and saying how excited they were to see the character and go to Camelot and see what was going to happen.

So many people got on touch on Twitter yesterday. It’s pretty amazing and I think the rest of the cast as well mentioned that you just feel very supported. Which is so nice because you’re able to enjoy doing your work so much more. You know that there are people out there who [the show] means a lot to and they are really going to enjoy it.

‘It’s the most committed, devoted, passionate fandom I am aware of. Maybe only on par with 1D.’

The character, Merlin, was a huge reveal at the end of season 4. What did you do to prepare for the role of Merlin?

[Once Upon a Time‘s] Merlin is definitely not the classical imagining of this character. And too be honest what a better place to do that than on Once Upon a Time? They love mixing things up. I met Eddie and Adam a few months ago and at that point I hadn’t watched the show. They were talking about what they wanted to do this season and with this character. At first I just said thank you so much for considering me for this.

It’s a role that I grew up with. Merlin [the 1998 TV miniseries] was one of my favorite shows, the TV series with Sam Neill and Miranda Richardson. I absolutely loved it. I used to watch it over and over and over again. So to have the opportunity to get to play a version of him I was great. I feel like a lot of my education started then, when I was watching it as a kid.

I was an only child until I was nine, so during play time it would just be me trying to do magic, trying to make things move, working on my magic hands, trying to be more epic and mysterious. [Merlin’s] definitely going to be different in more ways than appearance from what we’ve classically seen from the original movie.

I’ve also watched The Sword and the Stone again, cause I had not seen it in so long. One of the things I noticed is that Merlin is so funny. He is so funny. And I think it is one of the only Disney movies that I’m aware of that doesn’t have a typical romance in it. There isn’t “a man falls in love with a woman.” It’s more about the journey for Arthur. I just wanted to try and capture the essence of Merlin from the movie and then go back and make sure that he is likeable, but also wise.

We learned that Merlin had a hand in nearly every piece of Once Upon a Time’s mythology. That was a huge information dump. Did you have to go through a Once Upon a Time crash course?

No one told me anything! I have a little sister who actually already watched the show before I even came in to talk about being in it and she loved it. Once I had the chat I was like you know what, “I’m already a huge Disney fan, I love Disney movies, this sounds like the kind of show I need to watch.”

‘So I sat down and I watched every single episode from season 1 to season 4. It took up quite a bit of my life. But I loved it so much.’

And I’m glad I did that because I think I’m aware that this guy is going to be a pretty big deal when he comes in. [Merlin’s] tied to a lot of the events and the characters. I wanted to really understand for myself the world I was in. So I sat down and I watched it all. And of course by the time I got to the season 4 finale, the Apprentice is like [in his best ailing Apprentice voice] “You must find Merlin.” I was like “OHHHH, OH!”

That’s me!

Yeah! That’s when it really hit me for the first time. And I was like, “This is so exciting I can’t wait.” And as soon as I said that I finally got nervous. “Oh, I have to be him now.” Okay, alright, time to do it.

What your favorite fairytale that you’ve seen Once Upon a Time put a spin on?

I have to say in terms of Once Upon a Time, I was watching the show and they did an episode where they looked at Red and they did Red’s story. At this point I was still getting into the show and I really liked Red/Ruby. I wanted to see more of her character, [Ruby’s] fairytale character. I was watching it and I was like, “Oh, okay I see. I see what’s going to happen here. They think that they’ve fooled me, but I can really see what is going on.” And then I was completely wrong. [Once Upon a Time] turned it around totally and I was like. “what are you talking about?” From that point I was hooked.

In terms of my favorite fairytale, if we are talking Disney, my favorite villain has always been Maleficent. Maleficent has been the absolute, the archetype, the main bad guy, in terms of Disney villains. I was really excited at the end of season 4 when the Queens of Darkness came in. I thought that was brilliant.

Sorry, I know you said one, but Victoria Smurfit as Cruella De Vil is one of the best things I’ve ever seen.

We were sad to see her go over that cliff.

That’s the other great thing about this show — you just don’t know. It’s so exciting to be able to have license with something like the Disney archives. You can have fun and play around with it. It’s definitely a good thing that they are onto.

‘Victoria Smurfit as Cruella De Vil is one of the best things I’ve ever seen.’

We only saw you for a brief flash in the premiere as a movie usher, which some people didn’t pick up on…

Most people said that! [The creators] said that people forgot they know you’re playing Merlin, so we can put you in there and people wouldn’t realize. So many people did, but so many people didn’t.

It was a really nice touch I think that they added to the first episode and they really wanted to set the basis to remind everyone, this is what’s happening right now, these are the stakes of the season. I think it was a nice touch that whether you wanted to see him as Merlin or maybe you don’t, is an interesting thing. I don’t think it has to be one way or another. But it was definitely me, Elliot, on screen.

If you could pick one character for Merlin to have as an ally who would it be?

Are we going to rule out Emma because that would be an obvious choice? I do want to make this choice…Okay you know what, I think Regina. Woah. I’m just going to say it — Regina. Not only would she be a powerful ally, I think she would keep me very entertained. Which would be great.

Which character would you not want to cross?

I don’t think I would enjoy going up against Zelena. She’d be my second choice [for an ally] because she’d also keep me very entertained. Can I just say in the premiere as well, she is so funny. She has the best lines. So brilliant.

And you know in terms of Rebecca [Mader] she is so funny anyway and so much of her adds so brilliantly to that character. It made me laugh watching it. If [Zelena] was on the other side opposing me, I’d find her very irritating and annoying because she is so funny and nothing seems to phase her. That would start to get on my nerves a bit.

But I would also have to say Emma for both [sides]. Because she is Emma. She is the Savior, so why would you pick anyone else? Even though I did.

Regina’s lined up to be the new Savior this season so you could still wind up with a Savior on your side.

Yeah, hey! Yeah, you never know. I really love what they did with Regina’s character that they just made her more than one dimensional. All of the characters in fact, but using her as an example, I think it is so great that they are showing a journey of redemption and how that is possible but still not easy. It’s still a struggle. The re-occurrences of the characters when they’re a little evil adds a really interesting dimension to the whole show.

Can you tease what’s to come for Merlin in one sentence?

I would say: A lot more than you might expect.

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And that is exactly how this interview turned out! We loved chatting with Elliot Knight and we cannot wait to see what Merlin does this season on Once Upon a Time.

Once Upon a Time season 5, episode 2, “The Prince,” airs Sunday, October 4 at 8:00 p.m. ET on ABC.