Barely watched
Bridgerton part 2 review
Disclaimer: This post contains spoilers and is intentionally longform, featuring detailed scene analysis and interpretation.
Having watched in one go during its initial release, I felt like I had been waiting for months to see the aftermath of what had happened just last night and the next day being the continuation to what would be the tumultuous pestering question of the entire episode. “Yes or No”
We see Benedict in the wake of confusion as to why Sophie has now distanced herself send his footman a couple of times to the distressed Sophie as he awaits her answer but the confusion reflects more on her as she relies on her old friend Alfie for advice.
Again I would love to add that their friendship has been really heartwarming to witness as he helps her navigate the pros and cons of being Benedict’s mistress. Benedict on the other hand finds a friend in Will as he being the experienced married one makes Benedict understand that while his intentions for Sophie are good, it may have been interpreted differently for both of them as while Benedict sees that as some sort of loophole to which they could end up together, Sophie on the other hand as someone in a lower rank merely had nothing to rely on other than more scrutiny and in essence stripped off her virtue. This conversation between them serves as an eyeopener for Benedict and a wake up call to his emotional intelligence. It is during that self reflection that he meanders his way in the girls’ outing by distracting Eloise with some feather she could use to appease Hyacinth. All of this are in attempts to talk to Sophie who again has avoided him since that night.
Sophie after mild frustration that she could be seen in an uncompromising position with Benedict gives him her answer further pushing Benedict away. This answer dawns on them both in different ways, to Benedict as someone who is unworthy of love, more so of the woman he loves and for Sophie bearing in mind that a nobleman and an illegitimate could never be together. And it isn’t just our leads that are faced with some sort of confusion, Penelope also has a lot on her plate as she is faced with some kind of emotional tusssle between following her heart and doing what she loves. During her season, she is revealed to be lady whistle down and again i would like to express my anger with everyone finding out. I didn’t want it to be like that because it killed the thrill that I felt Bridgerton had, the thrill of everyone guessing who the mysterious writer could be and I for one I’m glad it was revisited this season. Penelope as we can see now is in some sort of frenzy battling with the attention/backlash she faces as a person now that her whistle down persona is now prominent.
“But it is your quill that has ruined me” to quote the mistress whom was revealed in her column. This causes her not on occasion but several to come to the queen, lady Danbury as witness, requesting that she retires her column as it is something that she no longer enjoys, to which the queen refuses.
Going further, I’m also glad Florence Hunt has more lines this season as Hyacinth is such an interesting character, aka the only one Eloise could bend backwards for. Hyacinth in the midst of all the chaos going on with the adults has her recital or as I’d like to call it a ball for younger people, giving way for Gregory to take a liking to one of the girls there and for Marcus and Violet to explore their relationships further. We also see Eloise try to get in Hyacinth’s good graces by showing up at somewhere she wouldn’t necessarily be especially when she wasn’t forced to go by their mama. I loved the dance between Hyacinth and Benedict to Birds of a feather, as we can see Benedict lace up his big boy pants to fill in as chaperone for Anthony even though he would much rather be in Sophie’s arms.
Stretching further to the kilmartin’s home where Francesca groans at missing Hyacinth’s recital coupled with the fact that Michaela has come into their home and sort of injected herself into the relationship that she and John intimately share. The frustration, from her making him miss their routines to making him keep late nights causes Francesca to try to set Michaela up with suitors which further wanes on their relationship. This further sums up to the much needed confrontation between Francessca and Michaela with both women expressing how they feel with the entire arrangement, to Fran admitting that she is at times jealous of Michaela’s “chaos” and how Michaela confirms that her best friend/cousin smiles the most with Francessca.
I guess I was saving the best scene for last because I am smiling to myself even as I wrote this. We go back to the ball which sees Sophie head upstairs as she hears the unsettling news of Araminta’s next door move and like expected, Benedict moves to follow her with Violet who has nursed the suspicions of them both confronts him. He does end up following Sophie and all the while they stand opposite each other in the closed room, I kept saying yes finally our first love confession of the season!!!
Every scene during this confession was immaculately done and I’m not just saying this because I’m bias but because from how he spoke you could really feel the emotion, a tortured poet as I call him and how much he had wrestled with himself before he realizes there was no fighting that.
“But the thought of spending a single day without you torments my soul”
Overall score: 10
Episode 6
In the wake of the confession, the episode starts with the confrontation of how much the weight of their emotions can really go and the evidence of facing a society that doesn’t condone that. Our female lead coupled with the emotional battle she’s fighting for a place in society with the feelings she has for Benedict is faced with a pregnancy scare making her fear a cycle may be repeated. This battle causes her to send a letter to Penwood house, anything to rid her from seeing the only man she lives. The fear and frustration comes to play each time she comes across Benedict whom she hasn’t told yet and the ticking off the calendar emphasizing that desire the fictional paradise she and Benedict seem to have created, they cannot be together in a harsh world.
Benedict on the other hand can simply not get his grip on reality and things get worse for him when the people around him all seem to tell him one thing. “ Society cannot condone it” from his mother to his brother, Anthony, the pressure from them for him to stick to Society all mess with his psyche. The scene between him and Anthony seem to have done it for Benedict as he feels like truly he may seem to have no purpose at all. It lands him in a juxtaposition as he feels “they wanted me to find love and now that I finally have they refuse because for some reason society says i cannot end up with her.”
All this seemingly grows worse for him with the arrival of Baby Edmund his nephew as it dawns on him that even the no 2 position he once occupied could no longer stand.
Benedict isn’t the only tortured poet in this episode as Penelope’s conflicts continue. There’s a particular scene where she stares at herself in the mirror, her past self staring back at her and you can see how so much has changed, from her being timid to her now confident self. Speaking of confident, an escape or resolvement comes from the surprise return of the season in Cressida as Lady Penwood. She pleads with Penelope that despite their rocky past she should find it in her to forgive her and spare her the attention her quill could give her, further emphasizing the power her alter ego now holds. She hands her a truce in form of an outlandish invitation which she also gives to the queen. The queen talks about it with contempt with Alice as witness who has made her debut as the queen’s lady in waiting. Alice gains the nod of the queen’s by presenting an idea on how the queen would preserve her ego by upstaging Cressida at the ball. The decision Penelope seems to make as expected is shared in conversation with her friend Eloise who has somehow had a massive character development in terms of softening up to society and marriage.
Additionally, Eloise’s attempt to squash things up with her little sister stems from her unconventional idea to sneak Hyacinth into a ball stating that someone like Cressida merely cares about social status and is quite oblivious. A lot of things seem to happen at Cressida’s ball which seems like a likely place for things to happen as first of Penelope retires her alter go Lady Whistledown, Hyacinth debuts as a maid and has the most “remarkable” time and John and Francessca tease their ending with a scene at the conservatory. Now for people that haven’t read the books, John Dies. He does in the books and just like it’s written, it is the most heart wrenching thing because I loved John’s character so much. Likewise in the series as well, and in as much as it is expected, it’s sad it’s teased like this.
He dies in the next scene though, after a puzzle day shared by the two women he loved the most, Michaela and Francesca , with Hannah Dodd delivering the most gut wrenching scream as Francesca. You could see Micheala’s reaction during the scream telling that she’s suspected what had happened.
Overs score: 7
Episode 7
The next scenes continue just as so with Bridgerton being enveloped with this dark cloud that has sat on everyone and has refused to be erased.
Benedict and Sophie are both caught in the aftermath of Sophie’s decision to leave the Bridgerton home coupled with the grief that Francesca still hasn’t come to terms with. How Hannah Dodd portrays the way Fran grieved was truly heartbreaking to see, with the way she busied here self so as not to come to terms with the reality of it was such good acting. Plus I loved how Michaela’s character also showed how she wanted to grief and how different she and Francessca’s opinions still differed emphasizing how little they still knew of each other. Another scene I loved was where Benedict defended Fran in front of the Kilmartin lawyer with his monologue on how he’s tired of what society views things as.
Plus the scene of them both playing the piano together. Him truly being there for her was really beautiful to see showcasing how much of a bond they share.
Despite how much comfort the Bridgerton’s try to get from one another, Edmund Bridgerton is missed a little more from Hyacinth whom vows to recoup into spinsterhood due to the fact that her idealization of love comes to adhes when she realizes that it could end in death. Or sudden death. This new turn for Hyacinth stirs some kind of awakening in Eloise who realizes that she does not want her younger sister to be shrouded in spinsterhood like her. The talk of loss overshadows the happiness that amatcus and violet share(their engagement) that both of them agree to lay low and remember their late partners( it sounds weird but that’s not what I meant)
All in all this episode was just downright gloomy for all parties as it shows how each character navigates grief and what death means. Fran as expected seemed to have been dealt the heaviest blow as even though she navigates her grief by being calm, all that unravels when she finds out through the examination that she is not pregnant forcing her to come apart in her mother’s arms. She finally grieves the way she wanted and the episode comes to an end with the funeral ceremony Micheala wanted from the start. The stag dance, not in mourning of John she says, but in celebration of his life. During the course of the mourning, a pivot scene is hated between Violet and Benedict that emphasizes how good of a mother she is to her children that despite what she may tell them or how society upholds things, they must always put their happiness first. The dialogue between them sees Violet explain the consequences of Benedict’s action if he chooses to make that choice and stating that she would always love him even if he takes that path.
“ I would always love you even if you love Sophie”
This conversation takes that direction where Benedict is about to leave the Kilmartin home with his mother stopping to tell him she left something on his desk for him giving a nod to whatever decision he was about to make. He goes back home and realizes it’s a ring she left him. And he also finds a necklace ( the necklace Sophie had been looking for) and he pieces all of this together with the drawings he had of the lady in silver. Plus finding her glove was the icing to the cake in this cliffhanger episode.
Overall score: 10
Episode 8
After being hauled away by the constable in the final moments of episode 7, this episode begins where Sophie is thrown in jail. Meanwhile Posy is shocked that her mother has twisted the situation of her vulnerability and used it against Sophie. She tells Varley the real truth about the shoe clips and with the information Varley goes to see Alfie as the one known friend to Sophie to ask if she had any family. Then they proceed to the Bridgerton house to see Hazel. It all boils down to Benedict and Violet getting Sophie out of jail on bail and now the truth of her being the illegitimate daughter of the Earl of Penwood and The lady in Silver has been revealed. Violet takes it upon herself to figure out how Sophie and Benedict can be together. She tells him;
“ we’ll find a way. We always do”
The rest of the Bridgerton family in the next scenes air their grievances and make some resolutions with Micheala resolving to stay in London either Fran potentially hinting at a live match between them in the upcoming Bridgerton seasons( preferably 6 cos I want Eloise’s season next)
And now it’s time for one more ball which seeks to close out the season, the queen’s ball. Sophie has learned that contrary to what notion Araminta projected in her head, the narrative that she was nothing but illegitimate was false as Araminta stole the portion reserved for her in her father’s will. The evening culminated in some sort of showdown between Violet and the leads and Araminta and her daughters as Sophie confronts Araminta on how she was never supposed to be a maid and how she was meant to be treated equal just like her stepsisters.
Posy on the other hand who has proven to be the Anastasia of the family is being charmed by a gentleman and to everyone’s surprise, that character development i mentioned from Eloise comes to light when she is the one that encourages posy to explore a relationship with him. Alice the queen’s lady in waiting confronts Queen charlotte about how she’s treated Sophie and the people of lower class and really proves herself as a lady in waiting. The queen having found out Sophie is a legitimate daughter of Penwood house tells Sophie she would have made a wonderful diamond of the season( She didn’t become a diamond of the season so she bagged one😜)
What took the cake for me was the dance between the leads to the instrumental cover of “The night we met” before he proposes( again I’m not being bias but that singular scene toppled season 1 and season 3 no shade)
In as much as it’s all rainbows and roses, my heart broke at the end of Violet and Marcus’s relationship where she tells him she isn’t ready to be a wife. Plus apparently We have a new copycat posing as the new whistledown which means the gossip is far from over( plus I would appreciate if they are kept anonymous just like old times)
Overall score: ♾️
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