Adding period drama to the roster
May. 31st, 2025 09:31 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shallownessMiss Scarlet and the Duke - 2.1 Pandora’s Box
Back in 2019, I was able to watch the first series of this show, and now the second and third are on U (formerly UKTV/Drama.) I know about the casting and title change that are coming, and that’s definitely changed how I’m watching the show. But hey, our heroine is solving crimes anachronistically in the Victorian era. Also, our heroine is played by Kate Phillips, who was Jane Seymour in Wolf Hall: The Mirror and the Light, latterly. There’s no trace of her in her Eliza Scarlet.
There’s a bit of setting things up because it’s a new season in this ep: Eliza has to fight the mutton-chopped patriarchy to get paid for what jobs she gets. Inspector William ‘Duke’ Wellington has to rescue his old friend who he is a bit more touchy-feely with in private, and meet his new boss, a Glaswegian who rose through the ranks despite starting life in a tenement. So far, so good. One of the new men he’d brought along was completely incompetent, though, but every time William interrupted him from explaining himself, you knew what was coming (he was in the job because of his powerful father, and the new boss thought William had to suck it up, because the man was his boss.) Actually, what with Eliza’s antics – taking on the very case a woman had been haranguing William at the station for closing behind his back, despite housekeeper Ivy’s warning – William was in a choler (I believed that an apt Victorian phrase) all episode. I think he should start worrying about his blood pressure.
The police’s investigation of the missing person case sounded as if it hadn't even achieved the level of 'cursory'. Eliza was hearing different things from her client and the missing woman’s colleagues. Basically, the case involved a prostitution ring at a department store, blackmail, a murder, and when the truth came out, it was that Wentworth, the store's owner, had got the missing woman pregnant, when she found out, his wife had decided to fake a pregnancy (she really wanted a child) and would raise the baby as her own. The missing young woman was sequestered out of London to have the baby. It turned out the wife had shot the would-be blackmailer, although I think she probably wanted to shoot her husband. I got huffy that everyone was calling it an affair when IT WAS A PROSTITUTION RACKET. The bosses were pimping out the shopgirls. ALSO, WENTWORTH WAS HER BOSS. (I also wonder whether – ew! – what happened at Harrod’s was in the writer’s mind.)
Speaking of language, I crinkled up my nose almost time they used ‘lady’. Okay, Eliza has a servant, but she isn’t one. I don’t think anyone we saw on screen in the episode would count as a proper lady in properly Victorian London.
Moses returned, half-scaring Eliza with his various entrances to her office. He seemed more plot device – able to get Eliza’s fee or information as required – than character. I get the feeling that they aren’t going to bother making him a love interest, despite William’s jealousy in the previous season.
We were introduced to Harriet, who talks too much, has a dull life, and fangirls Eliza and her freedom. This inspired Eliza to admit to William that she would probably continue to take cases that intrigued her, regardless of how it made him look, because she loves what she does. He said they couldn’t have dinners any more and would revert to being old friends (which will no doubt mean he will still spring her out of her problems with law enforcement, and she will call on him when she is shot at/finds dead bodies.) They both had pointed second thoughts about this decision (and the near-photographic effect of him pacing and turning in the hallway was gorgeous.) But knowing that he’s going to leave the show eventually, and it’ll be renamed Miss Scarlet (it’s halfway there, Miss Scarlet is in an enormous font, while ‘& The Duke’ is much smaller) took a chunk out of the whole ‘will they, won’t they’ angle for me. And really, as he remembered to be a Victorian male, while she was being an anachronistic woman detective, there were always credible doubts as to their compatibility. Oh well, even if it’s a cleaned-up, very teal Victoriana look, her suit-referencing gowns were very smart.
Back in 2019, I was able to watch the first series of this show, and now the second and third are on U (formerly UKTV/Drama.) I know about the casting and title change that are coming, and that’s definitely changed how I’m watching the show. But hey, our heroine is solving crimes anachronistically in the Victorian era. Also, our heroine is played by Kate Phillips, who was Jane Seymour in Wolf Hall: The Mirror and the Light, latterly. There’s no trace of her in her Eliza Scarlet.
There’s a bit of setting things up because it’s a new season in this ep: Eliza has to fight the mutton-chopped patriarchy to get paid for what jobs she gets. Inspector William ‘Duke’ Wellington has to rescue his old friend who he is a bit more touchy-feely with in private, and meet his new boss, a Glaswegian who rose through the ranks despite starting life in a tenement. So far, so good. One of the new men he’d brought along was completely incompetent, though, but every time William interrupted him from explaining himself, you knew what was coming (he was in the job because of his powerful father, and the new boss thought William had to suck it up, because the man was his boss.) Actually, what with Eliza’s antics – taking on the very case a woman had been haranguing William at the station for closing behind his back, despite housekeeper Ivy’s warning – William was in a choler (I believed that an apt Victorian phrase) all episode. I think he should start worrying about his blood pressure.
The police’s investigation of the missing person case sounded as if it hadn't even achieved the level of 'cursory'. Eliza was hearing different things from her client and the missing woman’s colleagues. Basically, the case involved a prostitution ring at a department store, blackmail, a murder, and when the truth came out, it was that Wentworth, the store's owner, had got the missing woman pregnant, when she found out, his wife had decided to fake a pregnancy (she really wanted a child) and would raise the baby as her own. The missing young woman was sequestered out of London to have the baby. It turned out the wife had shot the would-be blackmailer, although I think she probably wanted to shoot her husband. I got huffy that everyone was calling it an affair when IT WAS A PROSTITUTION RACKET. The bosses were pimping out the shopgirls. ALSO, WENTWORTH WAS HER BOSS. (I also wonder whether – ew! – what happened at Harrod’s was in the writer’s mind.)
Speaking of language, I crinkled up my nose almost time they used ‘lady’. Okay, Eliza has a servant, but she isn’t one. I don’t think anyone we saw on screen in the episode would count as a proper lady in properly Victorian London.
Moses returned, half-scaring Eliza with his various entrances to her office. He seemed more plot device – able to get Eliza’s fee or information as required – than character. I get the feeling that they aren’t going to bother making him a love interest, despite William’s jealousy in the previous season.
We were introduced to Harriet, who talks too much, has a dull life, and fangirls Eliza and her freedom. This inspired Eliza to admit to William that she would probably continue to take cases that intrigued her, regardless of how it made him look, because she loves what she does. He said they couldn’t have dinners any more and would revert to being old friends (which will no doubt mean he will still spring her out of her problems with law enforcement, and she will call on him when she is shot at/finds dead bodies.) They both had pointed second thoughts about this decision (and the near-photographic effect of him pacing and turning in the hallway was gorgeous.) But knowing that he’s going to leave the show eventually, and it’ll be renamed Miss Scarlet (it’s halfway there, Miss Scarlet is in an enormous font, while ‘& The Duke’ is much smaller) took a chunk out of the whole ‘will they, won’t they’ angle for me. And really, as he remembered to be a Victorian male, while she was being an anachronistic woman detective, there were always credible doubts as to their compatibility. Oh well, even if it’s a cleaned-up, very teal Victoriana look, her suit-referencing gowns were very smart.
