“Mary, you are the Queen of Scotland”
This is a retro review of a pilot
episode, so there will be no spoilers about the future episodes. However I will
be talking about the events of the pilot, so if you still haven’t seen it, go watch
it first, then please come back to read and comment.
The pilot episode of “Reign”
turned out to be very addictive and highly entertaining. Sometimes pilots can
be over packed with information to the point that it makes it difficult to
watch, this one did a good job of setting up the scene for the season. It
presented a world of interesting, diverse and gorgeous characters. It also gave
us a captivating story that has pretty much everything one can wish for - love,
intrigues, political plots, murders and some supernatural\mystery elements.
It is 1557. The French Court is
about to celebrate a marriage of Princess Elizabeth to Philip II of Spain.
King Henry II thought it was time for Mary, Queen of Scots, who has been hidden
at a convent or as we learn here “sent away for irritating the Queen” since the
age of 9, to return to France as it would be the perfect occasion to showcase
the alliance with Scotland.
King Henry II might be the
only one who wants Mary to return albeit for purely political reasons. Queen
Catherine isn’t thrilled to see a future daughter in law who she doesn’t know
how to control. Francis doesn’t seem too happy about his arranged marriage to
Mary. Even though they knew each other as children he remembers very little
about her.
Thankfully Mary has an unexpected mysterious friend at the castle,
whose intervention saves her from a horrible rape set up with the only purpose
to compromise her so she could never wed future King of France. To stand up to that kind of
enemies Mary needs better friends than her ladies-in-waiting [“three titled, the other ridiculously rich”],
who are so very childish, they reminded me kittens thrown into lion’s cage and
they aren’t even aware of that.
The girl, that
hides her face and lives in the tunnels underneath the caste, is not the only
friend Mary can rely on. She found a true friend in Henry’s first son Sebastian.
His allegiance could be easily attributed to his heart that went ‘boom’, but I
think it was also because he understands perfectly what awaits Mary at court
and wants to help her. At this point I don’t think Mary is interested that
much in Bash, despite some of the exchanged looks. She can’t afford to, she is
to marry his brother.
Even if Mary allows some
dose of innocent flirt with Bash, her heart is quite obviously given to
Francis. Judging by his comments, Francis wasn’t expecting his life to change
much after Mary’s arrival. He doesn’t believe in the alliance with Scotland, so
he’d be pretty comfortable keeping her at court just in case while enjoying the
company of his mistress. But from second one we could see sparks flying and there was an
immediate attraction. If only they were normal boy and girl! Well, then we’d have
no series.
There were also immediate
bumps on the road. Francis is torn by his responsibilities as a future king
where he has to worry about his country that at the moment doesn’t really need this
marriage, and his growing feelings for Mary.
Francis: “And right now, an
alliance with Scotland could
destroy France.”
It is a shocking revelation
for Mary, when she realizes that Francis doesn't want to marry her at all and she is merely a pawn in a game of powerful
people, who will got through with this marriage only if it would be deemed useful for France.
Francis: “All engagements
really do is hold alliances. My father’s betting we might need Scotland, I'm
betting we'll find more support elsewhere.”
But what Francis doesn’t
think about is that Mary is also a Queen and has a country to think about. They are
equals (sort of). We’ll see how this will play out.
King Henry and Queen Catherine can’t stop arguing, not that I want them
to. These two bickering is a delight to watch. He blames her for not having a
country or an army, but happily lives off her family’s money and parades his
mistress all over the place. Even when Mary arrives, Diane joins the King and
the Queen comes solo. That takes so much courage and self restrain, or maybe
she just got used to it over time. Still Catherine may not have the heart of
the King, but she is a much more interesting character than Diane. She is
poised, smart, witty, strong and no doubt powerful. Relying to much on the magic and visions
to my liking, but that was the era. Also at the beginning Catherine didn't
seem like an enemy of a young Queen. All she worried about was her son’s
happiness and being able to control Mary. She’s was not a threat to Mary. That is
until she learned that union with Mary will cost Francis his life.
Another relationship that haы a lot of potential is of Francis and Bash. Two
brothers seem to love each other even though love is tainted by somewhat mutual
jealousy. Francis is jealous of Bash who is free to learn, to travel, who
doesn’t bear the cross of being the king one day, therefore no one is worried much about his life. Bash
on the other hand, first and favorite son of King Henry, is jealous
of Francis because of Mary.
Historical bits
Now, let’s talk about the
elephant in the room – a historical accuracy or the lack of thereof. It’s been
said like thousands of times everywhere how inaccurate the series is. The talk
was so loud that even its Wikipedia page was changed – in the beginning it was
referred to as “period drama”, whereas now [8 episodes later] it says
“historical fiction”.
“It’s like historical fan-fiction. You’ve got these people we’ve all heard of, and we’re watching them experience relationships and events that never happened. I’ve found that it’s very easy to cling to research and get caught up in the accuracy of things. With Reign, it’s about exploring these wild characters in hypothetical situations. We’ve kind of created a new world; it’s fantasy history”
Although it might be a headache for history buffs, it is also a good
thing. There will be some element of surprise. Honestly, if they had to strictly follow history the show would end
pretty quickly. So I will not talk about obvious inaccuracies in my
reviews, but I will point out some interesting [or not] directions they might take as they go
along.
For example, they made
Diane younger than Catherine, whereas in real life Diane was 20 years older, than the Queen. Personally, I think it was a good call.
Mary’s ladies-in-waiting have funny and out of the era names. In reality they would have all been called Mary, but since it is an obvious inconvenience, we'll let it slide. Still they could have thought of better suited names.
Some observations
Mary has an
undeniable chemistry with both men. Good casting! And we’ve got ourselves a
love triangle. At the wedding celebration when Mary and the girls went nuts and
started dancing Mary caught eyes with both brothers. The three of them were
even standing in a triangle.
Mary’s old
rooms are now abandoned and nobody goes there except Francis, who turned them into
his own blacksmith shop, where he is trying to
learn how to make knives and swords. Okey!
How come a
little girl at the convent knows about “a girl whose face is a ruin and she
hides it” and Mary who lived in a castle before doesn’t?
Freedom in
a hair style department is driving me nuts. I can forgive the dresses,
because they are gorgeous, but what’s up with girls’ hair? It is “I just got out of bed and can’t
find a brush” style. It’s not like they don’t
know how to do it. They do. Both Queen Catherine’s and Diane’s hair styles are
somewhat what it is supposed to be.
Bash warns Mary off the
woods. Woods are bad. Got it!
Francis’
mistress is called Natalia. Seriously, how do they come up with those names?!
Kenna has
her first, rather intimate, encounter with the King.
Memorable Quotes:
Francis: “Every man, even a king, should have some
kind of skill. One, that I didn't inherit, wasn't given to me and... and can't
be taken away”
Queen
Catherine: “Too many alliances make a king look weak.”
King Henry:
“Then why did we sell our daughter to Spain?”
Francis: “She had
skinny legs, a missing front tooth and strong opinions.”
King Henry: “I'm sure the
adult tooth has come in. The opinions you can ignore. Isn't that right,
Catherine?”
What a delight! That’s the kind
of dialogue that makes me come back.
Queen
Catherine: “Well, will he love her? Will she love him? How do I control a
daughter-in-law who's a queen in her own right?”
Queen
Catherine: “We're overrun by Scots.”
No rating for the pilot, but I liked it. I liked it
a lot. Not only did I watch it until the end, it left me curious about what
happens next. What did you think? feel free to comment but please
remember, no spoilers about future episodes.
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