16 thoughts on “The Serpent Queen (2022) – Recap Episodes 3 & 4

  1. they have GOT to be using those incorrect flared caps on Catherine to give her a cobra’s profile.
    so now I have to go thru and identify which animal they have each of the character’s costumed as…. Henry is a zebra, but only it’s ass.

  2. I have found the show so refreshing! They are telling a part of history that I find really interesting and the acting is good. Sure the fabrics veer into strange sometimes, but they are making a real effort most of the time. For a show that has an electric guitar theme song, I am suitably impressed. My favorite is the actress playing Catherine. She was one of the best parts of Harlots. I will watch both shows multiple times just for her performances. So good.

  3. I really don’t know what the production was thinking with the massive time skip on Episode 4, or with the costumes.

  4. I’m enjoying this more than any of the Philippa Gregory adaptations or Becoming Elizabeth. I did notice that the timeline is off which is probably why they don’t tell us what year it is. Both the future Francois II and Mary, Queen of Scots are way too old for 1547. Especially since Henri II reigned for 12 years. So I’m guessing that the King is going to die pretty soon. Interesting that the Guise brothers seize Chenonceau which is actually the chateau that Henri II gifted to Diane de Poitiers, which was taken back by Catherine after Henri’s death. I wonder if they’ll mention that Henri also had an affair with Mary’s governess Janet Stewart.

  5. The interaction between Diane and Angelica confused me. Diane has the money to hire anyone she wants to fill that position, so why would she pick Angelica, who has failed to de-frump Catherine despite twenty years of trying? If it’s just to antagonize Catherine, she still shouldn’t trust anything Angelica gives her. On Angelica’s end, she knows Catherine is willing to sacrifice her servants’ lives. Plus, if the audience is meant to believe the liquid gold treatment works, why was Angelica sitting on it for all this time when Catherine was trying to gain Henri’s favor?
    Anyway, since Catherine no longer has her servants in the 1560 timeline, I assume it won’t be too long before we pass a sign reading “Here lies Angelica.”

  6. I’m not sure I want to see this; inaccurate timelines upset me. Also, Mary Stuart’s mourning headgear looks like an old-school hair dryer. Good casting for Catherine young and middle-aged, though.

  7. Diane de Poitiers and Anne d’Heilly’s rivalry should’ve been EPIC! They hated each other so much in real life! They supported different religions, they supported different candidates to the throne (Anne d’Heilly tried to convince Francis to name his younger son Charles d’Angouleme King, above Henry), they tried to undermine each other so many times, it’s just ridiculous Anne kisses Henry during her farewell; Henry, always “guided” by Diane, hated Anne so much!!! Probably Anne had a good relationship with Catherine (the young Dauphine, neglected by her husband, was a member of King Francis’ “Petite Bande”) but not with Henry!
    By the way, it would’ve been cool to show Anne’s friendship with Marguerite d’Angouleme, Francis’s sister, to present her as more than a pretty face with “post-coital” hair, she was the visible head of the Protestant faction during Francis’ last years. And it would’ve been great to see Marguerite, btw.

    Another thing that annoys me (a little) is the use of a ficticious, unnecesary sexual trauma to explain someone’s “bitchiness”, or to give them “depht”: Diane saying her husband raped her, when all the reports say they had a good relationship, despite the gross age difference; and the Dauphin François saying the Spanish guards “took a fancy” on Henry, like… Do you think the f*cking Emperor, always cautious, would’ve allowed the rape of a young French prince, knowing that some days he would return to his father?

    Mary Stuart is presented as a schemer, a spoiled brat who thinks herself more important/smarter than she really is, someone who thinks has a right to every crown nearby… Which works for me, it is the way I usually see this historical person, I don’t buy the saintly/Snow-White/Girl-Power versions of Mary we’ve been given these last years.

    Oh, and while some dresses are cool (especially Catherine’s light blue one and Diane’s reception dress) most of them, and headgear, could be way better! (We needed French Hoods, we WANTED French Hoods for this show, at least for the 1530s part)

    1. PD: despite all the inaccuracies, the stupid fashion choices, the absence of moments/characters that would’ve made the show better… I like Serpent Queen, I think the acting is good, the way they tell Catherine’s story is entertaining, I really think this show is fun and I do really wish to see what happens in ep. 5… We humans are full of contradictions LOL

    2. Totally agree on MQS’s personality. But to be fair she was genuinely grieved for Francisvas well as losing the crown of France and while she was soon intriguing it was for another rich and powerful husband, anything rather than go back to Scotland. As I recall she had her eye on Don Carlos, the crazy son of Philip II, and there was some talk of marrying her to the ten year old Charles X.

  8. I love Samantha Morton. She is an AMAZING actress.

    I think about her painfully magnificent decolletage in Harlots, and I’m truly impressed that they’ve managed to disappear them here.

  9. Sorry (not sorry), now I’ve got “Is it a 1 or a 2? Better time it right!” stuck in my head. Gut problems, in this one and only case, would make me more thankful for skirts to squat.

  10. I’ll miss young Catherine but Samantha is rocking as Queen. I guess I would classify the head necklace as a sign of Henry’s mistresse en titre. But I hate them. When will Catherine get her revenge on Diane? Can’t wait. And MOS is portrayed as a brat, why can’t we get a good and accurate MOS?

  11. Henry did not bring his Italian mistress home with him, he wasn’t an idiot. Little Diane de France did end up at the French Court, without her mother and was treated very well, given a fine education and married to an Italian nobleman who promptly died sending young Diane right back to France where she remarried and enjoyed the favor of both her father and Queen Catherine as well as her half brothers when they became kings. She seems to have been fond of Catherine, it was Diane who had the late queen’s remains moved to St. Denis to lie beside Henry’s.

  12. Love the article! I thought white was the mourning color for French Queens? Is it not? I read Antonia Fraser’s biography on Mary Queen of Scots and she mentions that white is the mourning color of a French Queen when her husband passes.
    Thank you:)

    1. Sorry Id like to correct that IK Mary does not wear it herself but I thought traditionally it was

  13. What bugs me more than anything with these Starz productions is the cheap acrylic and nylon fabrics. What is with that green drape on the throne? And the armor is all made of painted rubber or something, which is fine for the stage, but not for camera work. I’m watching because of Samantha Morton, who has risen above the limitations of the Starz milieu. Despite the goofy hats.

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