Sunday, August 15, 2021

Emmy Catch-Up: Bridgerton

Every year, I watch the six submitted episodes of every series I don’t regularly watch that’s up for one of the Emmy series prizes. Last year, I started watching the entire season of each show to get a better idea of the quality I missed, and I’ve decided to continue that this year. 

Bridgerton: Season 1, Episode 4 “An Affair of Honor” (B+)

One of the assets of having such a large cast is that there’s always so much going on, and all of it is quite salacious on this show. The Bridgerton siblings alone have plenty of drama, and I’m glad to see Eloise and Benedict getting more substantial subplots of their own in this installment. Eloise was entertainingly chastised for thinking that a servant would have time to be Lady Whistledown and that they would still choose to work for the family if they had her fortune (which I’m not sure she actually has, but that’s another matter), and Benedict put his foot in his mouth with the artist who then opened his eyes up to a whole new and inviting world. Colin also got to act on his crush on Marina, a development that devastated Penelope since she was obviously interested in him and thought she might have his attention for a moment before he was distracted by her. Cressida was expectedly furious at Daphne for stealing the prince’s affection, and it now appears that she may have witnessed Daphne’s indiscretion with the duke in the garden. Daphne was clever to spin herself away from the prince as he was trying to propose mid-dance, and for a man sensible enough not to offer up his sister for marriage without her consent, Anthony was quite foolish to so eagerly challenge the duke to a duel. That may have more to do with his own desire to be rid of his high-society lifestyle so that he can be with the woman he really loves, something that his mother might endorse if he was open and honest with her about it. It’s great to see Polly Walker get such a juicy role as Lady Featherington, and I also enjoyed seeing Ben Miller as her husband after watching his buttoned-up performance as the title character in “Professor T.”

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