From cliffsides to Bodmin
Poldark 2.1
A quick-cut reminder of the last season, sort of (no scything) and then a helicopter shot suggesting they’ve got a bigger budget. This episode featured lots of familiar Poldarks-staring-out-to-sea moments and Francis being an idiot many times over (and oddly much more curly haired than I remembered him) although he was right about everyone adoring Ross (Judd, Demelza’s father and Francis and Elizabeth’s son excepted?)
My George is in love with Ross but doesn’t know it and Elizabeth is totally displacement activity theory powered the whole episode. He doesn’t understand Ross, like, at all (and neither does Elizabeth, although she is entirely constrained by background and upbringing and Francis having treated her like chattel for too long. I thought her regret and remorse at not saying goodbye nicely to him was a bit overdone for TEH DRAMAH, tbh, but I did call Elizabeth Horseface to myself for most of last season. There, I admitted it. I am not very fair towards her. But in an attempt to be, I will say that whatever she really feels for Ross at this point, she's repressing it as much as she can, because of what he said about Demelza at the end of the first series, and she owes Demelza big time, so Elizabeth is trying to act for them.)
Evil banker!George, with his simmering motivations then, was doing his very best to twist things against Ross as, after a terrible showing at his pre-hearing, he was up for a trial. Yes, Ross, all you said about the poor people on the beach is true but not relevant and not helpful, and there’s a sensible spot somewhere short of what your lawyer was suggesting and what you were doing.
What was engaging was the fact that Ross was doing a brilliant bit of stubbornly plonking his head in the sand, at first, but it gradually became apparent that he was grieving for Julia and a bit of a mess mentally at the unfairness of life. As the episode went on, he woke up to what literally everyone else had sussed, i.e. the seriousness of his position. And Demelza’s by extension. This was helped by the grim prison and the music and all.
Before then we had shirtless mining (apart from the obvious, I got to make a Hobbit joke, which pleased me), a last night of sex with the wife and splitting firewood for her. Aww. Apart from the obvious, my favourite shippy bit may have been the echo of her helping him get ready to ride and the bit where he suspected her of planning to go to Bodmin despite her protestations, because she was planning to do it, after all.
Demelza is still my favourite. SHE’S TAUGHT HERSELF TO READ MUSIC. (Francis’s line about what if Ross had never left? Demelza would have remained a flea-ridden illiterate. One of the many times Francis was stupid.) Her grief over Julia was so sad - this episode was still mainly a downer, apart from a few amusing bits and Ross/Demelza's last night and morning together. I mean, I got very excited that the plotting pals (Demelza and Verity) were reunited, even if it became clear that Verity didn’t have a clue what Demelza was up to, and Demelza played a powerful man better than Elizabeth did George (because she’s got more wherewithal as a miner’s daughter) - I’m talking about Bergerac, but she also met her father’s wrath with grace too, but then George outmanoeuvred her with gross slander. Because rich, powerful men get to call women harlots and bar them entry to where the voting happens. Poldark does feminism for a second.
Still, the political candidate was right, she’s a dangerous woman (although I think he was slamming her for being a hot redhead.)
We had three big new characters (and George’s lackey and Ross’s QC) - the political candidate, Bergerac and his accent, and Paris Hilton and her pooch. I mean, Caroline, whom I found both annoying and fun - the latter when she was being blunt with the men in her life. The former when she was using Ennis and her dog. The actress’s face reminds me of Lena Lamont.
Speaking of blunt, we had Aunt Agatha’s Portent of the Week (I hope there is one every episode, frankly) right before the end.
As for the end, yo, Francis, I know that you have realised that you wreck everything and then wreck it some more, (he was a bit slow to realise that he was emotionally being double-cuckolded, and I couldn’t feel very sorry for him because if he’d tried treating his wife as a person, by which I definitely include not forcing her to have sex and talked to her instead of most of what he did last season, Elizabeth might have grown to love him properly) but even though Ennis is a doctor, I don’t think the invitation to stay in his room extended to committing suicide there. Hello! He's probably never going to be able to stay there again. What a thing to walk in on...and I don’t think it was a tease.
This ridiculous, captivating, gorgeous show/trail for Visit Cornwall! I am so going to be watching it live and not Victoria from here on out.
This entry was originally posted at http://shallowness.dreamwidth.org/251259.html.
A quick-cut reminder of the last season, sort of (no scything) and then a helicopter shot suggesting they’ve got a bigger budget. This episode featured lots of familiar Poldarks-staring-out-to-sea moments and Francis being an idiot many times over (and oddly much more curly haired than I remembered him) although he was right about everyone adoring Ross (Judd, Demelza’s father and Francis and Elizabeth’s son excepted?)
My George is in love with Ross but doesn’t know it and Elizabeth is totally displacement activity theory powered the whole episode. He doesn’t understand Ross, like, at all (and neither does Elizabeth, although she is entirely constrained by background and upbringing and Francis having treated her like chattel for too long. I thought her regret and remorse at not saying goodbye nicely to him was a bit overdone for TEH DRAMAH, tbh, but I did call Elizabeth Horseface to myself for most of last season. There, I admitted it. I am not very fair towards her. But in an attempt to be, I will say that whatever she really feels for Ross at this point, she's repressing it as much as she can, because of what he said about Demelza at the end of the first series, and she owes Demelza big time, so Elizabeth is trying to act for them.)
Evil banker!George, with his simmering motivations then, was doing his very best to twist things against Ross as, after a terrible showing at his pre-hearing, he was up for a trial. Yes, Ross, all you said about the poor people on the beach is true but not relevant and not helpful, and there’s a sensible spot somewhere short of what your lawyer was suggesting and what you were doing.
What was engaging was the fact that Ross was doing a brilliant bit of stubbornly plonking his head in the sand, at first, but it gradually became apparent that he was grieving for Julia and a bit of a mess mentally at the unfairness of life. As the episode went on, he woke up to what literally everyone else had sussed, i.e. the seriousness of his position. And Demelza’s by extension. This was helped by the grim prison and the music and all.
Before then we had shirtless mining (apart from the obvious, I got to make a Hobbit joke, which pleased me), a last night of sex with the wife and splitting firewood for her. Aww. Apart from the obvious, my favourite shippy bit may have been the echo of her helping him get ready to ride and the bit where he suspected her of planning to go to Bodmin despite her protestations, because she was planning to do it, after all.
Demelza is still my favourite. SHE’S TAUGHT HERSELF TO READ MUSIC. (Francis’s line about what if Ross had never left? Demelza would have remained a flea-ridden illiterate. One of the many times Francis was stupid.) Her grief over Julia was so sad - this episode was still mainly a downer, apart from a few amusing bits and Ross/Demelza's last night and morning together. I mean, I got very excited that the plotting pals (Demelza and Verity) were reunited, even if it became clear that Verity didn’t have a clue what Demelza was up to, and Demelza played a powerful man better than Elizabeth did George (because she’s got more wherewithal as a miner’s daughter) - I’m talking about Bergerac, but she also met her father’s wrath with grace too, but then George outmanoeuvred her with gross slander. Because rich, powerful men get to call women harlots and bar them entry to where the voting happens. Poldark does feminism for a second.
Still, the political candidate was right, she’s a dangerous woman (although I think he was slamming her for being a hot redhead.)
We had three big new characters (and George’s lackey and Ross’s QC) - the political candidate, Bergerac and his accent, and Paris Hilton and her pooch. I mean, Caroline, whom I found both annoying and fun - the latter when she was being blunt with the men in her life. The former when she was using Ennis and her dog. The actress’s face reminds me of Lena Lamont.
Speaking of blunt, we had Aunt Agatha’s Portent of the Week (I hope there is one every episode, frankly) right before the end.
As for the end, yo, Francis, I know that you have realised that you wreck everything and then wreck it some more, (he was a bit slow to realise that he was emotionally being double-cuckolded, and I couldn’t feel very sorry for him because if he’d tried treating his wife as a person, by which I definitely include not forcing her to have sex and talked to her instead of most of what he did last season, Elizabeth might have grown to love him properly) but even though Ennis is a doctor, I don’t think the invitation to stay in his room extended to committing suicide there. Hello! He's probably never going to be able to stay there again. What a thing to walk in on...and I don’t think it was a tease.
This ridiculous, captivating, gorgeous show/trail for Visit Cornwall! I am so going to be watching it live and not Victoria from here on out.
This entry was originally posted at http://shallowness.dreamwidth.org/251259.html.