White Queen

It is clear that there was not enough money left in the budget to have more than twelve actors in the Battle of Bosworth. A somewhat anti-climatic final battle (because face it, we all knew what was coming) led to an even more anti-climatic ending. The finale of The White Queen was just a whole lot of nothing. We began with Elizabeth Woodville finally leaving sanctuary and going home. When Margaret Beaufort finds out Elizabeth has made peace with Richard…

It’s Stanley against the world! Plotting against Richard, plotting against the Rivers, his wife, Buckingham and his own beard, his delightful duplicity just about steals the show this week. I wasn’t sure whether or not to root for Stanley or feel sorry for Margaret Beaufort as he grins cheerfully and tells her she is under house arrest and her lands forfeit to him. The look of incredulity on her face when she exclaimed “You betrayed me to get my fortune!”…

I am longing to dance on the grave of Faye Marsay’s Anne Neville. In the writer’s attempt to portray her as Richard III’s Lady Macbeth, she spends most of this episode, whining, smirking, nagging and plotting, all whilst still looking fourteen and clad in her mother’s too-large dresses. This should have been the pivotal episode; Edward IV goes fishing, catches a cold and dies to everyone’s shock. It was sad to see the running joke from the book “Wife, to…

This week’s episode was a strange mix ranging from the visually gorgeous to the slightly absurd to the somewhat creepy.  The show opened with Stanley, George and Richard watching Edward clumsily meddling with a couple of his mistresses. Good Richard, of course, remained impassive if somewhat uncomfortable. But if Stanley’s voyeuristic glee wasn’t creepy enough for you, there was the bizarre image of George methodically stroking his dog while gazing fixedly at his brother’s wanton antics. Perhaps George was channeling…