31 thoughts on “SNARK WEEK RECAP: The Empress (2022), Ep. 3

  1. Hahahahahhaha that dance scene wtf I can’t even

    I watched 28 seconds before I had to stop. This is the most idiotic, pompous pseudo-historical nonsense I’ve watched recently. Too bad Falco isn’t alive to turn this into a fun, bearable dance video.

    Also, that interview. With the designer not even bothering to hide her disdain of historical styles, no wonder these costumes are such an absolute clusterfrock!

    1. Is Reumer an actual professional-designer-type person? If so, of what? I hope she intended the non-Elisabeth dresses to be ugly, because they are undoubtedly the nastiest-looking wedding-party gear I’ve ever seen, and I survived the era of polyester double-knit. (It’s not even witty/stylized, just…yuck.)

    1. Oh, my lord, I’m STILL laughing. It looks like it was a parody created by Contemporary Eric and his assistant Bich.

      1. It looked like it. The only logic I can see in that dance and her reaction to it is ‘see the courtiers setting out to get the bride into the mood for her wedding night’. Which is bat-sh*t crazy for pretty much any European court at any time.

    2. This is the mid 19th century when the waltz was still slightly risque! The Austrian Court was nothing if nor stiff. Probably nothing but quadrillion at Sisi’s wedding ball.
      Her wedding night may have been somewhat traumatic, being forced to breakfast with her mother in law the morning after definitely was!

  2. The dance actually reminded me of Wednesday’s dance, which was fine for a young goth girl, not Austrian courtiers. Weird.

  3. How are those eyesores at all minimalistic or symbols of throwing off oppression and power plays? These costumes are as bad as “denim is relatable.”

  4. So it would seem that the wedding dress originally had the clunky appliqué all around the neck? They shot one scene, after which the actress or director or whoever found it irritating or ugly and they ripped a piece off the front?

    The neck decoration kinda makes sense to me now, after seeing the picture taken in the sewing studio. I hadn’t noticed the one outside scene with the lace and beading intact. Without the front piece the placement of the appliqué seemed like a very weird and very modern design choice. But even with it the dress is totally whackadoodle for the period. As are all the others.

  5. That dance…words fail me. I can say, however, that Franz is looking pretty tasty in his wedding finery. :)

  6. Crap. More crap. Still more crap. The production team is still flunking history. And the costume designer needs to read Austrian Court Dress for Dummies: Volume I: 1840-1870.

  7. Maybe “The Favourite” and “Marie Antoinette” are the only historical films the makers of this episode have ever seen, so they thought an anachronistic dance sequence was necessary.

  8. I genuinely didn’t realize that bizarre dark tiara was her HAIR. I mean, cool to be able to do that with hair, but also, can you really do that with hair? And if you want to keep it that long, you won’t be gluing jewels into it.

    That dance, wow. None of this makes sense.

    1. IKR? Surely if it was real bling, you wouldn’t be Gluing. It. Into. Your. Hair! And if it was paste, that would be pretty tacky for a Kaiserin at her wedding, trying to impress with power and wealth.

  9. This makes me feel like I forgot to take my meds this morning. And hot glue is not good on hair.

  10. I’m hate-watching this while reading the recaps, and I think each episode had me yelling at the screen about something. I swear they were vogueing during that hideous dance number, and the hair: dear gods, the hair. It’s so annoying that so many of the background crowd are much more appropriately dressed for the period. Thanks for the recap Kendra, now every time I see the Dowager Empress, I’m thinking “Oh boy, Sophie’s on her postmodern bullshit again?” 🤣

    1. I am mad at the designer for that interview in general… I can’t imagine trying to design for a period you have nothing but contempt for…. but specifically regarding the wedding dress, like you have a golden opportunity to design a period-appropriate wedding dress (since there aren’t records of the original) for one of the most stylish women of the era (can’t remember exactly when Charles Worth first set up shop, but it was around this time and he made a number of things for Sisi, including her 1867 coronation gown) …. And you go with the bullshit “oh we have to MODERNIZE historical figures and fashion so they’re “RELATABLE” “ and arrghhh, no, I hate it so much!

      1. And Sisi and Franz married in the early 1850s and Worth earliest is I believe a 1858 Fancy Dress Costume. But yeah, dressing a young and beautiful empress would have been a big deal. And her wedding gown train is gorgeous

  11. An acquaintance of mine, who is very interested in the Habsburgs of the 19th century and hence trashed this series, called the nightgown of Franz Joseph, we see on the last screenshot, “pontifical robe” :-D. I think that hits the nail on the head! But on a more serious note, how could this shitty series, where neither the costumes nor the customs and not even the chronology are presented correctly, get such good reviews from professional critics????? They must have been bribed by the producers, I just can’t explain it otherwise.

  12. Awful dress, awfully hsur, nice lace veil. One out of three is pretty bad. The actor playing Franz Joseph is adorable.

    1. The interview… When she hated the original pieces so much WHY DID SHE TAKE THE JOB? Why??

  13. I watched this over Christmas and noticed the costume weirdness. I had wondered if the difference between more historically accurate costumes worn outside the Palace circle and ‘designer’ costumes worn inside the world of the Palace was meant to suggest a message: the artificialty of Palace life, perhaps? But the interview with the costume designer shows that there is no such complexity. It’s very sad that she has such contempt for the reality of women’s lives. Women lived and worked in such clothes. They adapted these fashions in various ways to suit their bodies and lifestyles, and sometimes decorations that may seem strange to us were part of these adaptations. Just because she does not like the fashions is no reason to assume that the women who wore them were mere dolls. I have to ask with Vogue: why did she take a job for which her disposition and opinions make her so unsuited?

  14. So what I’m gathering from this interview is that the designer heard you call the 1850s the death of fashion and said, “Hold my beer…”

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