Here we are again. It’s Bridgerton time! If you haven’t watched seasons 1 and 2, you must do that before watching season 3. All episodes are streaming on Netflix. If you haven’t read my blog posts about those seasons, you can still do that. I blogged about each episode of season 1 separately:
- Season 1, Ep. 1
- Season 1, Ep. 2
- Season 1, Ep.3
- Season 1, Ep.4
- Season 1, Ep.5
- Season 1, Ep.6
- Season 1, Ep.7
- Season 1, Ep.8
I blogged about season 2 in one post. Now I will blog about season 3 in a few posts, primarily because season 3 is released in two parts. In part 1 we get to watch the first 4 episodes, which were released in mid-May 2024. In part 2 we will finish the season with the last 4 episodes. They are released in mid-June.
Here’s part 1 of my season 3 part 1 blog posts.
I enjoyed watching season 3, even though I feel like this season departs from what we got in seasons 1 and 2 in terms of its pacing and its casting.
Seasons 1 and 2 really didn’t get exciting until the last 4 episodes in my opinion, and some of the groundbreaking elements in season 1–the hyperbolic sex scenes–were comical, almost farcical. But seasons 1 and 2 really helped viewers rethink the potential for diversity, equity, and inclusion regarding race and period dramas. Accordingly the storylines and coupling called our attention to this added element by the Shondaland team, and these changes to Julia Quinn’s assumedly white characters brought something exciting and forward thinking to period dramas. And then we got the spinoff Queen Charlotte (also on Netflix).
So far season 3 hasn’t really engaged with race and ethnicity in the same way as seasons 1 and 2. It’s like the color-consciousness in seasons 1 and 2 turned into color-blindness in season 3. There seems to be more racial diversity in the side characters, but the main characters that have been introduced this season don’t seem to be distinguished by their skin color or ethnic background.
This is not to say there aren’t any interracial couples this season. There’s potential with the Lady Bridgerton and Lord Anderson pairing, as well as Francesca Bridgerton and the Earl of Kilmartin.
Unlike the first two seasons there aren’t plot points addressing why a Black or Brown person in this fictional world might feel they have more to prove to themselves and the white families around them, or in spite of those white families. Recall why the duke in season 1 refused to impregnate his wife, as well as the way Kate Sharma reacts to some of the English things that she finds inferior to Indian ones.
Season 3 feels whitewashed. I don’t know of a better way to say it. It’s like this season suggests that there are no differences in skin color or ethnicity. Everyone’s just a part of the ton–or trying to get back in it after being away.
I’m not sure what I expected from this season in terms of racial awareness, but perhaps the second part of the season will call more attention to race? or maybe it doesn’t need to do that. What do you think?
What’s worth our notice, then, in the first part of the current season? We all know we’re supposed to want Penelope to find her true love match–to marry Colin Bridgerton. That’s been in the works for two seasons now. But, as a professor of literature, I have found something that interests me in the way this season is working literarily.
Like it or not, the first part of this season really leans into the idea of a fairy tale. I mean look at the poster image I included at the start of this blog post. We have a pretty girl looking into a hand-held mirror, and she is described as a wallflower who is ready to bloom. Hmm. Can you think of any other fairy tale characters–especially wallflowers–that look into a mirror?
Let us not forget that so many of the fairy tales we enjoy to this day were written before or a little later than the time period in which Bridgerton is supposedly set (season 3 seems to suggest it’s 1815). After all, the Brothers Grimm published their fairy tales, including their own version of Cinderella, in 1812.
Hans Christian Andersen published “The Ugly Duckling” in 1843, and is that not what our beloved Penelope Featherington is supposed to be? Seriously, her last name is Featherington. Last season we figured out why her first name is Penelope, nickname Pen. She is a writer. She uses her pen to become a different person: Lady Whistledown–who ironically punches up, not down. But “Penelope” also means “weaver” (think of The Odyssey), and Bridgerton‘s Penelope is weaving a tale about the ton that ruffles a lot of feathers. <–See what I did there! 🙂
If we compare Penelope Featherington to the Greek matriarch, we should also recall that she has great patience and courage. As Odysseus is off doing what Odysseus does for years, his Penelope waits at home and has to prevent would-be suitors from making her their wife. Pen, in a way, does something similar: she waits and waits and waits throughout seasons 1 and 2 for Colin to grow a brain (yeah, I said it. He’s the Wizard of Oz Scarecrow in my opinion.) and notice her–even as he falls head over heals in season 1 for a pregnant girl whose baby is not Colin’s. In season 3 Pen continues to wait, but not for long as she quickly realizes and says to Colin that she has to get married soon. She’s been “out” for three seasons (aha that matches up with the Netflix seasons. I see what you did there, writers.) and is about to become a spinster if she doesn’t marry soon. Cue Jane Austen, spinster writer?
Pen has the courage to ask Colin for help in finding her a husband, and she has the courage to eventually ask him to kiss her because she doesn’t want to die without having been kissed. Cue Drew Barrymore in the 1999 flick Never Been Kissed. Of course, this trope is familiar to us, especially the Gen Xers and millennials out there. The genre of hot-guy-coaching-ugly-girl-how-to-become-swan was a staple of 1990s and early 2000s films and TV shows. I mean, do I have to remind you of a show called “Ugly Betty”?
And the cliche of the girl asking the guy for just one kiss and then his suddenly seeing her differently as someone desirable is something we’ve seen before. Like I said earlier in this post, the season is not innovative but quite a pastiche. There are so many elements of the Pen/Colin story that feel familiar and traditional–even Colin’s own libertine/rake smacks of 17th- and 18th-century literature. Yes, yes, I can hear you saying, but what about the carriage scene where Colin fingers Pen!? That’s progressive for popular television and for period dramas. Ah, but it’s something I’ve seen on film in the Restoration era movie Stage Beauty. I kid you not, there’s a seen in a carriage with actor Ned Kynaston fingering a gentlewoman.
I also see Pen as a Cinderella type, for it’s her makeover that makes her desirable. Without the new hair and new dresses Colin likely would not have had a change of heart, or at least a rise of passion in the pants. Pen doesn’t have a Fairy Godmother or a pumpkin carriage, but she has a mother like Cindy’s evil stepmother who constantly puts her down and rarely shows her any kindness. Pen’s sisters are spitting images of Anastasia and Drizella–it’s so obvious. The twist is that Colin kind of steps in as Fairy Godfriend for Pen and in a perversion of that relationship they have an interesting encounter in a carriage. I know it is supposed to be a sexy, oh-my-god scene, but for me it was more weird than wonderful. Did anyone else feel this way?
Maybe it’s because I just don’t find this couple convincing. I love the actress Nicola Coughlan, and Luke Newton is okay, but he’s at the bottom of my Bridgerton brothers list (and I’m not counting the kid brother).
To be honest, throughout the first part of this season I was finding myself drawn to Sam Phillips as Lord Debling. I kept saying, Pen, choose Lord Debling. He’s the perfect husband–he’ll never be around and you can do whatever you want! 😀
But no, we have to have a true love match. OK. Fine.
In my next blog post I’m going to talk about season 3’s fashion–cuz it is a lot of fun. I think that has been the best part of this season. The clothes and sets are to die for, dontcha think?
Until next time…..
Misty Krueger 
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