Fun
Frisky
Nostalgic
Intense
Adventurous
Choked Up
Curious
Romantic
Weird
Poldark Season 3, Episode 2 opens with what looks to be a wistfully romantic scene: Demelza (Eleanor Tomlinson) and her son Jeremy stand on a cliff, looking out across the raging seas, wondering wherever darling Ross (Aidan Turner) could be. Spoiler alert: He’s in French Revolution hell.
It’s finally here, guys! The episode that takes us face-to-face with the fallout of the French Revolution! Vive la drama! Ross and his friend Hook Hand (No, I shan’t learn his real name! You can’t make me! Okay. It’s Tholly Tregirls. But I like Hook Hand more!) have traveled to a “quaint market town” in the hopes of getting intel about Dr. Dwight Enys (Luke Norris). The town is basically a murder village. People are literally just killed in the street or tricked by horny spy ladies into getting killed at the guillotine. Ross is just burning through gold coins here, as he gives out bribes left and right in an attempt to stay alive and get word about Dwight. I mean, at one point, he gets arrested and is flat out told that you have to leave now or die. He decides to jump off the ship like some kind of platform trick diver and then proceeds to punch his way through this murder town just to find out if Dwight is alive or dead. I’m serious. Ross just punches the shit of the French. Their laws and guns and guillotines are meaningless, for he is Ross and they are French.
Can I be honest? As much as I like Dwight, I’m not sure he’s worth all the risk Ross puts himself through. Hello, Ross, you have a pregnant wife and family at home! Someone has to take care of them!
Someone is taking care of Ross’s family while he’s away and her name is Demelza.
I think in many ways, Demelza might be the true hero of Poldark. Sure, Ross gets a tricorn hat and lots of thrilling scenes of daring-do, but Demelza has consistently met hardship and transformed herself from within to be better for it. Finally, she’s had enough of being treated like a pet by Ross. She makes a number of decisions that go against Ross’s best wishes in his absence. What are these decisions? Well, they all have to do with her hot, brooding brothers Sam (Tom York) and Drake (Harry Richardson).
I want to take a moment to talk about Elizabeth and what happened between her and Ross. If you’ll recall, the two former lovebirds had a night of passion last season that looks more than a bit like date rape depending on what edit of the episode you’ve seen. However you see it, Ross overstays his welcome in Elizabeth’s room, conceives a child with her, and then devastates her when he says that he’s not leaving his wife and child to marry her. Elizabeth weds George Warleggan (Jack Farthing) post haste as a means to save herself from poverty and scandal, but also to stick it to Ross.
It was a strange moment for the show, and last week’s episode suggested to me that they were going to try to brush the darker implications of it all under the rug. But what looked like just a mix stress and heartache and post-partum depression last week is indeed beginning to take on the form of trauma. Elizabeth is so addled by Ross (and Demelza) that she happily agrees to George’s plan to move them and baby Valentine into their Truro townhouse – away from all the pesky Poldarks. More than that, we see her turn to self-medication in the form of a “tincture” and, yes, we see her shudder in empathy for an abuse survivor.
Which brings us to another really tetchy part of last night’s episode. George Warleggan has now become a Justice of the Peace, and what he’s doing with that power is sticking it to the huddled masses. That includes victims of sexual assault. George is so power-hungry that he rather gleefully accuses a victim of assault of perjury…all to make nice with the rich wastrel would-be rapist’s powerful papa. George has done a lot of terrible things on Poldark, but this was truly evil. It’s not just that he’s making a mockery of justice – he’s literally making it easier for men to commit sexual assault. Reader, can I get a bit of Elizabeth’s tincture?
Of course, last night’s episode wasn’t all creepers being creepy, and perpetuating a cycle of creeps. There was young love! Drake and Morwenna (Ellise Chappell) have it bad for it each other and came close to actually kissing! Well, they talked about it, but decided it wouldn’t be appropriate…in front of Geoffrey Charles. Drake is learning how to read so he can receive secret love letters from Morwenna and literacy suits him. He’s already inventing new expressions like, “Is all love not tricksicle some times?” Tricksicle! Call the OED! This needs to be added!
Demelza’s big moment last night came when she decided to gift her Methodist brothers a storehouse that I guess Ross uses but we never hear about. That will be their church. When Ross finally returns, he’s pissed about it at first, but after Demelza argues her case — that as his wife, she is his equal – he acquiesces. Could it be? Could Ross be maturing? Maybe, maybe not. After all, he did punch his way through a small town in this same episode.
And what of Dr. Dwight Enys? He is alive! And he’s grown an Obi-Wan Kenobi beard. He is also in jail and who knows if he’ll survive. (I guess so? I don’t know!)
Anything else? I did make a note that these were some spectacular geese:
