shallowness (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
shallowness) wrote2019-08-28 09:13 am
shallowness) wrote2019-08-28 09:13 am
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This is how far behind I am on Poldark
Poldark 5.4
It didn’t feel like there was much forward momentum for a while, just restating what I’d assumed had already been set up e.g. Dwight taking care of George, but Valentine had to suffer some more of his father’s mental illness and its ‘treatment’ (I found the scene where they relived Elizabeth’s death very boring, TBH).
Things did start happening – Caroline is clearly bored and Dwight unknowingly stepped in it and now she thinks she should be jealous of Kitty. But we know Kitty is pregnant. Morwenna caught sight of her son and started stalking him (while still running a successful school) and Drake started stalking her. Sam/Rosina is a thing (I thought they were teasing Sam/Tess, but Rosina is blonde, but deserved more than one scene of dialogue, given the whole ‘whoops, nearly married his brother’ backstory.)
Geoffrey Charles finally learned Cecily was being sold off to his odious stepfather (who was out of his mind at the time) and blurted out that he loved her. She tried to be more pragmatic, but it was obvious she wouldn’t have sex or his version of love to manage George as Elizabeth had had, and nobody could bear to tell her quite how odious he was and how grim her future was. Dwight restored George to reason.
But, in the meantime, Valentine had been wandering about, totally making Ross forget to tell his wife about mortgaging their mine and their everything else to buy the other mine in what his lawyer/banker called a crazy plan. Demelza rightly complained (and I complained on behalf of Jeremy, TBH). Demelza was awesome, a mix of forgiving and good in a crisis. Loved the bit where she got an only too pleased Prudie to back her up as she sacked the ‘comrade of the down-trod’ AKA greedy troublemaker Tess.
Pretty good on the shipping front, expect I don’t care that much about this season’s loves – it occurred to me that knowing Kitty was expecting might cool Ned down. I also snickered at GC’s slowness in realising Cecily was admitting to loving him back and suggesting an elopement (on what are you going to live anything like the life you’re used to, kids?) But Drake didn’t talk to Morwenna about her grief – such a cruel position she’s in – and, well, I’ve already mentioned the Ennyses and Sam/Rosina. I know Ross was praising Demelza all episode, and the suggestion of a horse race was delightful, but the test will be whether he discusses things like mortgaging the estate with her the next time it happens. For it’s bound to.
5.5
More eventful. Indeed, if I hadn’t seen nothing new on the previouslies and was automatically guided to my next episode on iPlayer, I might have wondered if I’d skipped an ep.
Overall, I found Cornwall more interesting than London, until the Ennyses got to be magnificent in the capital city. It seemed that Caroline was mostly over her issues with Kitty and was in some of Dwight’s confidence as to why they were in London, which left me a bit confused. But anyway, Dwight was the Voice of Sense over Despard – Ross was, as he’d later admit, blinkered by the Christmas plan to get rid of him he’d cooked up with Demelza and what he felt he owed Ned. And then Caroline was the Voice of Even More Sense, pointing out that Dwight owed Ross some loyalty, not to turn and run. Dwight fortunately set aside his protective streak and took her with him. Contender for my favourite exchange: ‘You were magnificent.’ ‘I know.’ Indeed, I felt that we were denied a big smacker on the lips for Caroline there in hiding the planted oath and bossing everyone.
My other favourite line was Hansen telling GC he was an idiot. Which he was. Cecily is now realising the naivete (and privilege?) of her beloved. But it looked at the masked ball as if she decided she wasn’t going to spend the rest of her life managing things for her idiot beloved. George found out his stepson loved the woman being dangled under his nose and moved up the wedding. Cecily contrived her best, but is clearly not in Caroline or Demelza’s league.
The second George decided to take Valentine along to Parliament (query: has Ross taken his kids there? I doubt it. Granted, he has higher self-esteem), it was obvious Ross was going to show him up, and lo he did. George and his uncle may come to learn about little pitchers, while plotting revenge on Ross in Valentine’s hearing. But then, do they learn? At one point, I thought you could do a WB cartoon of the Warleggans vs. Ross, the Roadrunner to their not so wily coyote.
Of course, they don’t realise that Ross is the hero of this story, which makes Demelza the heroine, but it took her a while to realise that as well as bossing her brothers, she is capable of bossing Cornwall, and certainly taking on Tess, who hadn’t thought so far as forgery being a hanging offence. Demelza’s speech was A Moment (and more compelling than George vs Ross in the Parliament.) But the forgery and its impact on the community and how it tied into most villagers’ ignorance and illiteracy and the planned school was interesting.
Sam actually quoted the Bible (but didn’t push the learning to read means being able to read your Bible) so maybe he’s not the worst Methodist in Cornwall anymore. We also had Rosina looking meltingly at him in the crowd as he spoke.
As for the other brother, well, by kidnapping John Conan, he made his sister think fondly of the days when she was worried about Valentine hanging out with her kids all the time. There’s another one who doesn’t think things through, but he was acting out of love.
Morwenna’s immediate reaction was strong, and not quite what I expected. The performance they got out of the very young kid playing JC worked well, and Morwenna’s goodbye to him was so simple and heart-breaking that it made even the apparently heartless grandmother feel twinges in the region where her heart ought to be. (Though in fairness, Drake’s well-meaning words about mother and child were bound to remind Lady Whitworth of the son she wrongly adored and confirm her in her actions.) I wonder if love might mean that snobbery and rancour will be overcome enough that this isn’t the last Morwenna sees of her son. Joint custody might be pushing it!
Anyway, apparently, it was not grieving for the loss of her son – not being repeatedly raped – that was blocking Morwenna from loving her husband That Way. And then they cut away to boring stuff in London, when surely we could have had a little more initiation of Loving Her Husband That Way from Morwenna – we and Drake have been waiting for that for a long while. Obviously, slavery is bad and slavers setting up Ross and, for Kitty’s sake, Ned is bad – and no, I didn’t see the magistrate being in cahoots with Hansen coming, or the bird of prey being Hansen’s coming for that matter – but I care more about Mr and Mrs Carne.
We ended with Ross realising that his loyalty to Ned was probably going to cost him more than a bloody nose. Duh, Ross.
It didn’t feel like there was much forward momentum for a while, just restating what I’d assumed had already been set up e.g. Dwight taking care of George, but Valentine had to suffer some more of his father’s mental illness and its ‘treatment’ (I found the scene where they relived Elizabeth’s death very boring, TBH).
Things did start happening – Caroline is clearly bored and Dwight unknowingly stepped in it and now she thinks she should be jealous of Kitty. But we know Kitty is pregnant. Morwenna caught sight of her son and started stalking him (while still running a successful school) and Drake started stalking her. Sam/Rosina is a thing (I thought they were teasing Sam/Tess, but Rosina is blonde, but deserved more than one scene of dialogue, given the whole ‘whoops, nearly married his brother’ backstory.)
Geoffrey Charles finally learned Cecily was being sold off to his odious stepfather (who was out of his mind at the time) and blurted out that he loved her. She tried to be more pragmatic, but it was obvious she wouldn’t have sex or his version of love to manage George as Elizabeth had had, and nobody could bear to tell her quite how odious he was and how grim her future was. Dwight restored George to reason.
But, in the meantime, Valentine had been wandering about, totally making Ross forget to tell his wife about mortgaging their mine and their everything else to buy the other mine in what his lawyer/banker called a crazy plan. Demelza rightly complained (and I complained on behalf of Jeremy, TBH). Demelza was awesome, a mix of forgiving and good in a crisis. Loved the bit where she got an only too pleased Prudie to back her up as she sacked the ‘comrade of the down-trod’ AKA greedy troublemaker Tess.
Pretty good on the shipping front, expect I don’t care that much about this season’s loves – it occurred to me that knowing Kitty was expecting might cool Ned down. I also snickered at GC’s slowness in realising Cecily was admitting to loving him back and suggesting an elopement (on what are you going to live anything like the life you’re used to, kids?) But Drake didn’t talk to Morwenna about her grief – such a cruel position she’s in – and, well, I’ve already mentioned the Ennyses and Sam/Rosina. I know Ross was praising Demelza all episode, and the suggestion of a horse race was delightful, but the test will be whether he discusses things like mortgaging the estate with her the next time it happens. For it’s bound to.
5.5
More eventful. Indeed, if I hadn’t seen nothing new on the previouslies and was automatically guided to my next episode on iPlayer, I might have wondered if I’d skipped an ep.
Overall, I found Cornwall more interesting than London, until the Ennyses got to be magnificent in the capital city. It seemed that Caroline was mostly over her issues with Kitty and was in some of Dwight’s confidence as to why they were in London, which left me a bit confused. But anyway, Dwight was the Voice of Sense over Despard – Ross was, as he’d later admit, blinkered by the Christmas plan to get rid of him he’d cooked up with Demelza and what he felt he owed Ned. And then Caroline was the Voice of Even More Sense, pointing out that Dwight owed Ross some loyalty, not to turn and run. Dwight fortunately set aside his protective streak and took her with him. Contender for my favourite exchange: ‘You were magnificent.’ ‘I know.’ Indeed, I felt that we were denied a big smacker on the lips for Caroline there in hiding the planted oath and bossing everyone.
My other favourite line was Hansen telling GC he was an idiot. Which he was. Cecily is now realising the naivete (and privilege?) of her beloved. But it looked at the masked ball as if she decided she wasn’t going to spend the rest of her life managing things for her idiot beloved. George found out his stepson loved the woman being dangled under his nose and moved up the wedding. Cecily contrived her best, but is clearly not in Caroline or Demelza’s league.
The second George decided to take Valentine along to Parliament (query: has Ross taken his kids there? I doubt it. Granted, he has higher self-esteem), it was obvious Ross was going to show him up, and lo he did. George and his uncle may come to learn about little pitchers, while plotting revenge on Ross in Valentine’s hearing. But then, do they learn? At one point, I thought you could do a WB cartoon of the Warleggans vs. Ross, the Roadrunner to their not so wily coyote.
Of course, they don’t realise that Ross is the hero of this story, which makes Demelza the heroine, but it took her a while to realise that as well as bossing her brothers, she is capable of bossing Cornwall, and certainly taking on Tess, who hadn’t thought so far as forgery being a hanging offence. Demelza’s speech was A Moment (and more compelling than George vs Ross in the Parliament.) But the forgery and its impact on the community and how it tied into most villagers’ ignorance and illiteracy and the planned school was interesting.
Sam actually quoted the Bible (but didn’t push the learning to read means being able to read your Bible) so maybe he’s not the worst Methodist in Cornwall anymore. We also had Rosina looking meltingly at him in the crowd as he spoke.
As for the other brother, well, by kidnapping John Conan, he made his sister think fondly of the days when she was worried about Valentine hanging out with her kids all the time. There’s another one who doesn’t think things through, but he was acting out of love.
Morwenna’s immediate reaction was strong, and not quite what I expected. The performance they got out of the very young kid playing JC worked well, and Morwenna’s goodbye to him was so simple and heart-breaking that it made even the apparently heartless grandmother feel twinges in the region where her heart ought to be. (Though in fairness, Drake’s well-meaning words about mother and child were bound to remind Lady Whitworth of the son she wrongly adored and confirm her in her actions.) I wonder if love might mean that snobbery and rancour will be overcome enough that this isn’t the last Morwenna sees of her son. Joint custody might be pushing it!
Anyway, apparently, it was not grieving for the loss of her son – not being repeatedly raped – that was blocking Morwenna from loving her husband That Way. And then they cut away to boring stuff in London, when surely we could have had a little more initiation of Loving Her Husband That Way from Morwenna – we and Drake have been waiting for that for a long while. Obviously, slavery is bad and slavers setting up Ross and, for Kitty’s sake, Ned is bad – and no, I didn’t see the magistrate being in cahoots with Hansen coming, or the bird of prey being Hansen’s coming for that matter – but I care more about Mr and Mrs Carne.
We ended with Ross realising that his loyalty to Ned was probably going to cost him more than a bloody nose. Duh, Ross.