Whew! The previouslies alone were exhausting. Can you believe they’ve crammed this much into one season? I cannot imagine the further amount of crazy this show has up its sleeve.
The Intrigue
- Bash gives Kenna a wedding ring that was his mother’s. She’s surprised, but appreciative. He reminds her they’re trying to make this work.
- Lola gets a flashy sapphire necklace from Julian before the wedding. Kenna and Greer are only a little bit catty with jealousy. Then Henry comes and mauls Kenna in broad daylight in the ballroom in front of anyone who happens to be around. Henry has done the impossible and made me feel sorry for Kenna.
- At the wedding reception, Lola and Julian dance to an instrumental version of Lorde’s “Royals”. HA, show, HA.
- The cardinal is visiting for negotiations with Henry. Catherine enlists Francis and Mary for stalling purposes.
I just have one question. WHAT ARE YOU ALL WEARING?
- A servant tells Catherine that Henry is tied up. We find that he meant literally, of course. Catherine is appalled at how he’s allowing Penelope to walk all over him. Again, probably literally.
- Mary’s half-brother, James, arrives at the castle and tells Mary that her mother’s French-led regency is causing turmoil and that Scotland needs Mary to come home.
- Mary tells Francis that she needs to go and help strengthen her mother’s rule or to replace her with another regent. Francis wants her to wait, because he needs her to help him cover for King Henry’s madness. Mary isn’t happy that France comes first, yet again.
- Julian and Lola are enjoying their post-consummation afterglow when Lola tells him she wants to meet his parents and leave on their honeymoon ASAP. Julian let’s it slip that he’s waiting on her dowry, but she chooses to be oblivious about what that may mean about the state of his finances.
- Nostradamus and Olivia are also enjoying some afterglow when he has one of his ominous visions. This time, of a possibly dead Olivia. The dude sure knows how to spoil the moment.
- Henry is coming on to Kenna again, so she flashes her new wedding ring at him in hopes of reminding him why she’s off limits. Penelope comes up and demands the ring for herself, just to be a bitch. When Bash protests, Henry demands that Catherine forfeit a ring for Kenna. Bash is angry that they have to live like this. Kenna would like for him to live, period.
- Kenna tries to return the ring to Catherine who tells her to keep it as a token of her sympathy. And then she enlists Kenna’s help in getting rid of Penelope. Sadly, she doesn’t mean murder this time. She dangles an estate away from court as bribery.
- While Francis and Bash are practicing fencing (the bromance is back on!), they discuss their love lives, and Francis realizes that the reason Mary wanted to marry Bash is that because unlike the future king of France, Bash would have been able to put Mary’s needs first. Then, they presumably shared a pint of ice cream and talked more about their feelings.
Francis’s favorite is vanilla. You can just tell.
- Lola discovers the sapphire necklace appears to have fake gems. She and Greer speculate about what may be going on with Julian’s fortune – or lack thereof. She has the solicitor hold off on transferring her dowry to Julian’s account.
- Nostradamus wishes to leave court with Olivia, but Catherine won’t hear of it, because she needs his gift too much. He basically tells her “I’m not asking.” Which, he of all people, should know that does not go over well with Catherine de’ Medici.
- Francis tells Mary that he wants to take her to Scotland, though they have to deal with the cardinal first, and the trip has to be brief. James doesn’t want a French prince to accompany Mary, since her mother’s French advisors are part of the problem already. This dude has a really cute accent, but he’s all kinds of shady, isn’t he?
- Francis catches James’s footman with English gold, which makes him suspicious and thinks they can’t trust James, since he has the strongest claim to the throne after Mary.
- Catherine and the bishop burst in on Henry in a compromising position with Penelope. The bishop gives him an earful, which seems to appeal to some religious guilt that Henry was already starting to experience. Catherine uses the chance to insist that the evil witch be sent away, which the bishop takes care of. Henry tells Catherine that he’s lost and begs for her support.
- After a scare with a poisonous snake in his chambers, Nostradamus sends Olivia off on a ship to the New World without him, since as he says, he’s a slave to a wicked queen, and there is no escape for him.
- James tells Mary that there’s a rebellion looming in Scotland and that they must leave now, with or without Francis. At the same moment, Francis is torturing and bribing the truth out of James’s footman. The man was paid to murder Mary on the voyage by Englishmen who want James to be king of Scotland.
- Bash and Kenna bask in the victory over Penelope (including the fact that the bishop was a fake!) that netted them an estate and Kenna got her ring back. They share a kiss, and I start shipping a married couple, which is just weird.
- Henry is hallucinating the teenage tennis player ghost that he saw last week. Yikes.
- Francis refuses to let Mary go to Scotland, to the point that he has her confined to the tower, for her own protection. She’s justifiably pissed, and tells him that if she loses Scotland because of this, he loses her.
History According to Reign
- James is referred to as Lord Moray at one point, which actually wasn’t his title until 1562. The show seems to still be set in 1559.
- It is possible that the English wanted James to be king of Scotland, since he was protestant, with no ties to France. However, per wikipedia, Francis is totally justified in being suspicious of James.
- There’s no record of King Henry actually having been mad as a hatter, which I am saddened to learn. He’s SO much more interesting that way. Don’t you think?
Number of Times I Forgot I Wasn’t Watching Gossip Girl: 2
1. Kenna: “I’m too high-spirited to be a widow. People will talk.” If only Lily van der Woodsen had been so self-aware.
2. Blair would have had words to say about Kenna’s seriously gaudy Forever 21-looking gold pendant.
Next: Mary’s uncle, the Duke of Guise visits. He may or may not be trustworthy. Henry wants to fight a battle. Francis is adamant that they would lose.
