Do yourself a favour and watch Reign
In which Mary, Queen of Scots, battles for her country or something, but no one cares about that.
When I first heard about Reign, I knew immediately that it would be dreadful. Everything about it screamed The Tudors, but with less regard for historical accuracy. (And if you watched The Tudors, you know that's a bit like saying someone is Henry VIII but without the humility.) Watching the CW turn its hand to 16th century history was going to be like watching a slow-motion trainwreck, and I eagerly signed up.
And sure enough, Reign was bad ... sort of. I thought its first episode was truly awful, and it indeed featured some outright offensive garbage concerning rape and victim blaming. But that's kind of been it for the rage-inducement, except on an abstract "how-historically-implausible" sort of way. Because don't get me wrong, Reign couldn't care less about history. It's following the broadest of broad strokes (although there was a moment there where I wondered if they weren't going to veer right into alternative history), but by and large it's telling its own story.
And this story is totally, utterly bonkers. Major plot points include pagan sorcerers in the woods, a deformed royal bastard living in the walls, sexy!Nostradamus and his increasingly arbitrary prophecies, a king attempting to disinherit his perfectly satisfactory, legitimate heir in favour of a (different) bastard, and Diane de frigging Poitiers being a secret pagan. It's completely nuts. It's also completely entertaining.
Take the most recent episode. In this episode - a real thing, that really aired - the A-plot involved ... well, King Henry of France was engaged in vigorous intercourse with a visiting duke's sister, and during the course of that intercourse she, er, well, fell out a window to her death. Yes, he sexed a girl out the window. Naturally, he turned to his wife for help; she, of course, decided to get a nice chateau out of this, and the two of them moved the body, scrubbed the floor, threw her out of a different window, composed a suicide note, improvised wildly when it turned out she couldn't write, and then implicated a priest (who had been impaled by his own crucifix in one of the episode's subplots - long story) as her devious lover. It was one of the most delightful things I've seen on my screen all year.
And speaking of Henry's wife, Catherine de Medici is enough reason to watch this show all by herself. She is magnificent; every second she is on screen is a joy. Initially introduced as a primary antagonist, she is so utterly wonderful that the show appears to have given in on anyone ever hating her and even spent a whole episode treating her as a twisted sort of protagonist. She's kind of snuck up and stole the mantle of show lead from Mary, and frankly who cares about Mary. She and her ladies all have a bunch of subplots going on, but it's Catherine the audience - and, refreshingly, the show - actually care about.
To continue the Tudors comparison, I stuck with that show for a couple of amazing women (one of whom, not-all-that-coincidentally, was also named Catherine). I'd stick with this Catherine through almost anything, even if the show was far less entertaining than it actually is.
So yes, it's daft. It's ahistorical. It's got irritating teenagers wearing 2000s prom dresses prancing about having romantic subplots, but it's also the most entertaining new drama this year after Sleepy Hollow (which had a similar, if slightly denser, nutty charm). If you need a guilty pleasure, this is it.
When I first heard about Reign, I knew immediately that it would be dreadful. Everything about it screamed The Tudors, but with less regard for historical accuracy. (And if you watched The Tudors, you know that's a bit like saying someone is Henry VIII but without the humility.) Watching the CW turn its hand to 16th century history was going to be like watching a slow-motion trainwreck, and I eagerly signed up.
And sure enough, Reign was bad ... sort of. I thought its first episode was truly awful, and it indeed featured some outright offensive garbage concerning rape and victim blaming. But that's kind of been it for the rage-inducement, except on an abstract "how-historically-implausible" sort of way. Because don't get me wrong, Reign couldn't care less about history. It's following the broadest of broad strokes (although there was a moment there where I wondered if they weren't going to veer right into alternative history), but by and large it's telling its own story.
And this story is totally, utterly bonkers. Major plot points include pagan sorcerers in the woods, a deformed royal bastard living in the walls, sexy!Nostradamus and his increasingly arbitrary prophecies, a king attempting to disinherit his perfectly satisfactory, legitimate heir in favour of a (different) bastard, and Diane de frigging Poitiers being a secret pagan. It's completely nuts. It's also completely entertaining.
Take the most recent episode. In this episode - a real thing, that really aired - the A-plot involved ... well, King Henry of France was engaged in vigorous intercourse with a visiting duke's sister, and during the course of that intercourse she, er, well, fell out a window to her death. Yes, he sexed a girl out the window. Naturally, he turned to his wife for help; she, of course, decided to get a nice chateau out of this, and the two of them moved the body, scrubbed the floor, threw her out of a different window, composed a suicide note, improvised wildly when it turned out she couldn't write, and then implicated a priest (who had been impaled by his own crucifix in one of the episode's subplots - long story) as her devious lover. It was one of the most delightful things I've seen on my screen all year.
And speaking of Henry's wife, Catherine de Medici is enough reason to watch this show all by herself. She is magnificent; every second she is on screen is a joy. Initially introduced as a primary antagonist, she is so utterly wonderful that the show appears to have given in on anyone ever hating her and even spent a whole episode treating her as a twisted sort of protagonist. She's kind of snuck up and stole the mantle of show lead from Mary, and frankly who cares about Mary. She and her ladies all have a bunch of subplots going on, but it's Catherine the audience - and, refreshingly, the show - actually care about.
To continue the Tudors comparison, I stuck with that show for a couple of amazing women (one of whom, not-all-that-coincidentally, was also named Catherine). I'd stick with this Catherine through almost anything, even if the show was far less entertaining than it actually is.
So yes, it's daft. It's ahistorical. It's got irritating teenagers wearing 2000s prom dresses prancing about having romantic subplots, but it's also the most entertaining new drama this year after Sleepy Hollow (which had a similar, if slightly denser, nutty charm). If you need a guilty pleasure, this is it.