If you were around for the 2016 queer-character decimation, then you will understand my pain caused by this episode. In 2016, if you were queer, fictional, and on TV — especially if you were a woman — your time was likely limited. So imagine my surprise when the show where everyone seems to be queer by default kills a queer woman character. It’s not like we’re drowning in women over here in Jamesian England, either.
Our count of women characters stands as follows: We have Mary, but she’s Julianne Moore, so she’s not going anywhere; Queen Anne, who also is now dead; Sandie, George’s wife whose name I forget because she’s barely been in it; Frances, who has disappeared; Frances’s mother Lady Hatton, who has disappeared; and George’s sister, who has also disappeared. Oh, and Countess Somerset, who we’re led to believe died at the hands of the state but historically survived. So if you’re saying we now have two women among our hordes of men, yes. I would like to be a Lady Catherine de Bourgh saying, “I am quite put out,” except I’m more a Marianne climbing a hill in the rain, gazing forlornly at what might have been.
Don’t kill queer characters! They’ve suffered enough!
Okay, moving on to the other events of the episode. Everyone in England is also mad about the killing of fictional queer women. Just kidding! They’re super mad about Sir Walter Raleigh’s execution and the part Spain played in it. It being 17th-century England, they express this by dressing up a pig as King James and throwing it on the fire while chanting, “King James, Spain fucker.” Hmmm. James is meanwhile in his palace, being like, “Well. Here we are.” To be fair, I don’t know how I’d react to that either. It seems like a waste of a pig.
James is experimenting with avoidant behaviors such as staying in his room, not governing, not burying his wife, and acting out Grecian tableaux with various court dandies. They’re not even sexy tableaux; they’re just silly. Get it together, James (he will not). Meanwhile, Charles is losing it because his mother hasn’t been buried yet because James is out of money and won’t open Parliament because he hates it. To be fair, Parliament does seem very annoying, especially with the rise of the Puritans. But the king needs Parliament to levy taxes, and it hasn’t been called for six years. James is in a pickle about burying the queen, not that he’s really thinking about that. He hasn’t even gone to pay his respects to Queen Anne (again, see “avoidant behavior”).
James is also avoiding George, it seems, who now has long hair. I don’t know how I feel about the long hair! It’s Nicholas Galitzine, so he can pull it off, but it’s not my favorite. George has been icing Mary out as much as he can, but that doesn’t stop her from telling him that he’s being called the Marquis of Fuckingham in taverns. That’s pretty good. Everyone spends this episode telling Mary how little power she has, which is goading, and I would not goad someone as devoid of morals and good at scheming as Mary is. Have none of you noticed what she is capable of? Or how quickly reversals of fortune happen at court? And now you’ve removed the thing she cares about the most, so what does she have to lose? I imagine someone saying, “Susan,” and Mary saying, “Who?” Poor Susan. I had to look up her name because she’s almost never mentioned. I hope she got to marry that guy.
George and Charles have a talk about James, and George tells Charles that James needs constant reminding that he loves you or he’ll forget you. In accordance with this very unfortunate fact, George, Charles, and some other gentlemen carry the queen’s coffin into James’s room and lay it on his bed, forcing James to deal with it. And he does — he reopens Parliament, tells them they’re eagles pecking out Prometheus’ liver, but in a way they find funny, and everyone except Sir Edward Coke chants, “God save the King.”
There’s a lot of political shenaniganery going on with Francis Bacon, George, and Diego Gondomar, the Spanish ambassador. Essentially, Diego has been paying both of them to keep James on Spain’s side, but now Sir Edward is leading an anti-corruption committee, so everyone is screwed, and by “everyone,” I mean mainly those two guys.
Before Francis comes under threat from the committee, he imprisons Sandie for murder, which is fair because she’s guilty, but also, no one wants that. Mary asks Sir Edward to release Sandie, and he basically tells her to fuck off. So Sandie might hang and Mary is feeling desperate, but also she currently has very little leverage. Until! Sir Edward comes for George and Kit (I love Kit). They escape out the back while George’s very pregnant wife, Katherine (I looked it up!), tries to seduce Sir Edward into letting George off the hook. It almost works, but then he gets all Puritan “I will not succumb to the temptations of the flesh” about it. Katherine really is a team player.
Sir Edward is searching for evidence of corruption, and since there is a lot of it, George and Kit don’t know what to do other than go see Mary. Mary makes both of them apologize, but especially George. As she should; he has been terrible. She says she’ll fix it if George can get a pardon for Miss Brooks (Sandie). The plan is to sacrifice Bacon by getting evidence from Diego that Diego paid him. This plan works, and Bacon confesses in front of Parliament and is stripped of his titles, land, and place in court.
But then Bacon, now with pox, visits George and asks for one small act of personal vengeance, which George agrees to because MEN. This act, of course, is to murder Sandie. He pays the woman from the beginning who threw the king pig on the fire, and she stabs Sandie in the throat right when Sandie thinks she is on her way to being freed. JUST NOT COOL, SHOW.
We have one episode left and not much time remaining in James’s reign. We’ll find out Mary’s reaction to Sandie’s death, and for the sake of drama, I kind of hope she kills George. Can you imagine? But I’ll settle for her tearing everything else down in the wake of her icy fury. That sounds pretty good, too.
