those of you who’ve been following my column for awhile are aware by now, during the summer I spend my afternoons and evenings trying to get caught up on the streaming series I often have little time to watch during the fall season. I am, more often than not, guided by the nominations of the Emmys and similar awards show when I decide which ones to prioritize. Sometimes, I get genuine joys that I kick myself for waiting this long to see – Dead to Me, Ramy and Fleabag are among the series I really wish I’d gotten to see earlier and I’m always behind on Ted Lasso. And sometimes it can be homework – Ozark and The Mandalorian are series that I had to will myself to look at.
And then there are series that you look forward to with all the desire of root canal. One such series is Bridgerton, which I was really hoping the Emmys would basically ignore so I could focus on finishing The Flight Attendant and Wandavision. But the Emmys went and gave it eleven nominations, so I here I am.
As anyone who has been following by blog is well aware, I pretty loathe everything Shonda Rhimes and everyone connected with her have been doing for the past fifteen years. This isn’t a universally held truth of course: I was captivated by For the People and devastated when it was cancelled, and I am hoping against hope that imdb.com takes the ball and gives Rebel a second life. But the most successful of Rhimes’ shows I not only dislike, I find utterly pretentious.
If Rhimes’ were just to admit that all of her work was basically glorified soap operas - which make no mistake, is all they really are – I’d actually have more respect for her and the people who work with were here. The world needs The Good Wife and Parenthood to be sure, but it needs shows like Empire, too. But she won’t do that. She insists that there are bigger and broader themes to her work on ABC besides being basically trashy, utter cliff-hanger building dreck. So Scandal can’t just be a series where the people behind the corridors of power are just behaving badly; it has to be a series about those where those who have been disregarded by most of America control everything. (The fact that they can’t really solve anything, as was perfectly demonstrating in ‘The Lawn Chair’, is regarded as irrelevant.) Similarly, How to Get Away with Murder can’t just be a series about an ethically bankrupt criminal attorney wrecks the lives of her students; it has to be a series about how the system is set up to destroy African-Americans. (The fact that Annalyse Keating was, at her core, a criminal was basically considered irrelevant as well.) I love Viola Davis and Kerry Washington but Annalyse and Olivia Pope are not the kinds of roles that African-American actresses should be trying for.
When Rhimes went to Netflix, I thought I would finally be rid of her. Then the first production came out in Christmas of 2020, and audiences everywhere went wild over Bridgerton. My first reaction was: Why not? From what little I know, the Bridgeton book series is little more than a highly done early 1800s bodice-rippers. That essentially has been the trademark of every Rhimes series from Grey’s Anatomy onward. At the very least, she isn’t being pretentious. Then the various awards groups began swooning over Season 1 and Rege-Jean Page in particular. I put it all the way at the back of the pile of things to watch, knowing I’d have to get around to it eventually. Well, eventually is now.
To start with the biggest shock, I’m kind of astonished this is a Netflix series at all. I’ve watched the first three episodes and the writers really aren’t taking advantage of it in the way you’d think Rhimes’ crew would want to. I’ve heard two or three obscenities, no real violence and no sex scene that would’ve set the pulse racing more than one on Private Practice would a decade ago. Given the opportunity to use the word that basically all her characters do and think about – and hell, maybe shatter some concepts from this stuffy English era – Rhimes and her crew have basically shown a surprising amount of restraint. Unfortunately, if you think this restraint is being directed too brilliant writing and creative thinking, then you clearly haven’t taken a journey to Shondaland.
For those of you who have been blessed to never have even heard of the Bridgerton series, you’re lucky. Set in the nineteenth century, it focuses on the Bridgerton family, and in the first season it focuses on Daphne (Phoebe Dyvenor), the eldest daughter and the one picked by the queen as the most eligible debutante. Unfortunately soon after this announcement, a new visitor comes from across the sea Marina – and the parish is focused on her. Soon it becomes clear to Daphne that the odds for her wedding are remote.
Not long afterwards, the Duke of Hastings (Rege-Jean Page) arrives from abroad to take up the family title. His guardian begins the process of manipulating him so that he may wed, something he is enormously resistant too. Eventually a scenario emerges where the Duke and Daphne learn of their problems and in order to try and solve them, they hatch a scheme to – surprise – fake an engagement. If you can’t see the machinations of the plot of twenty minutes in, you’re clearly not a fan of these type of novels which does beg the question why you’re watching this series in the first place.
Now, I grant you there are some interesting ideas capped with the fact that the Duke and Marina are both African-American and no one makes a big deal about it in this entire series. But that is not the reason why millions of people love Bridgeton. It’s a formula show, pure and simple. And I imagine everyone can pick up. Everyone’s attention from the opening minutes of the pilot is off a gossiping matriarch who seems to know everybody in Bridgeton’s business and almost every major romantic attachment. Indeed, Hastings and Daphne begin their manipulations not so much to fool the world as they do ‘Lady Whistledown’. Voila! Bridgeton is nothing more than a nineteenth century version of Gossip Girl, with Julie Andrews doing the voice instead of Kirsten Bell. And since I had no use for Gossip Girl in its first incarnation (much less the ‘revival’ on HBO Max) why should you have any use for this version with corsets?
I’m well aware that successive seasons of Bridgeton will take on different members of the family and other members of this society, as the sequence of novels has done so. But having met the lion’s share of these characters, I fail to see when anybody would want to hang around for another year to see more of them? The only character in the entire series who interests me is Eloise, the only Bridgerton who has interest beyond marrying can’t understand why Daphne is so caught up in it? But I know how these novels work, and frankly even if there is a plot change, why would I want to stick around another season to see if she escapes?
Now I have to admit Bridgerton is a lot better than I would’ve given in credit for being upon description. It is exquisitely shot and scored, and Page’s performance is very different from the lion’s share of Rhimes’ work. (It’s rare for any male character to being given any dimension beyond being a love interest and the backstory we’ve gotten for Simon is by far the most intense and devastating of any character in Rhimes’ work. And the wit is a lot better now there doesn’t need to be the double entendres hanging everywhere. But if you’re going to do a Netflix series, then do something to make it worthy of Netflix. I wasn’t expecting a lot of character depth, but if you’re going to adapt a bodice-ripper, then have the characters rip some bodices! There’s nothing here that wouldn’t be out of place in a PBS period series which at least have some culture to them. If you’re just going to do one of those series, you might as well have kept it on ABC. At least, then there could’ve been some scandal and culture to it. At its score, what I’ve seen of Bridgerton is frankly something I didn’t think I’d ever see from a Shondaland series: something that’s basically bland.
My score: 2 stars.
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