Pictured: Katie McGrath stars as Morgana

CTV specialty net Space has captured some magic with the season 3 premiere of Merlin. The Saturday 8 p.m. airing summoned a record 410,000 viewers (BBM, 2+) to the channel, which represents a 50% increase over the season 2 audience average for the show. In total, the kick-off attracted 719,000 unique viewers.

Comparatively, that debut was higher than MTV Canada’s Jersey Shore season premiere, which pulled 377,000 viewers.

Merlin began this volume with a two-part story arc, the second half of which airs this coming Saturday.