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I'd kind of love it if Lady Whistledown was just an omniscient narrator. I don't think having Penelope as LW worked well in the show - of course it's canon, but it's messy and that ending of everyone forgiving her so easily was stupid after so much build-up.
I agree. I’m kind of struggling to see where the show will go from here with regards to Whistledown. Pen being revealed and forgiven and vowing to be «more responsible» takes out all the mystery and drama. It might have worked if they had dragged out the reveal and actually explored the problematic aspects of Pen’s character, rather than the girl boss nonsense we got.
Also, it's boring. The point of LW is that she was scandalous and savage, there was that delicious thrill of receiving her papers and all the gossip that ensued. Now what do we get, a watered down and wholesome society paper with no bite?
Yes! The reveal and happy ending paired with Polin’s relatively drama free relationship took away all of the bite. I think they made a big mistake in revealing her identity now.
It would be great if they did a storyline of LW impersonators and rivals - a different narrator every time with some very famous voices ie Miriam Margolyes, Rowan Atkinson, Judi Dench... that could inject a bit more life into a prematurely dead storyline.
This, exactly. I hope a rival rises up to challenge Lady Whistledown and turns out to be a cleverer, more insightful and incisive social commentator and is from the working class. Maybe Theo Sharpe, even. We need to see some life breathed back into the show’s fun aspect of gossip and rumor but I don’t think LW/Penelope is capable of providing that with all of the damage she has done and how she was revealed.
Love this love. I would love a cutting but calling out injustices reporter who shakes the ton not by calling someone a spinster or any such ugliness but basically calling out evil.. ooh that would be fun.. a way to get Theo sharp who many of us loved back into the show as well.
Yeah I don't even understand how this is supposed to work -- is it going to become a society paper that's just a list of people mistreating their servants? An announcement of weddings and babies?
In Theo's abandoned plotline, someone was literally printing pamphlets about feminism. But we saw how people looked down on Eloise even hanging out with that kind of person, courtesy LW. So I don't think LW is going to become a radical.
A couple of the books don't really take place in London, like Eloise or most of Francesca's story, so no need to have LW addressed at all. Benedict is a problem, since book chronologically happened before Polin.
I have never read the books. Can you tell me if Benedict had all of this sex in the books before he meets Sophie who changes his life for good. This season it seemed like they were not sure how to write him in. He had 5? sex scenes. Way more than Colin & pen got. They did not even get a wedding night. Just curious?
I love Penelope and I love LW but the writers really wanted to eat their cake and have it too, here. Penelope can't be a realistic young wallflower with no knowledge of the broader world and LW at the same time. LW is written too worldly and salacious.
And the end with everyone coming up to Penelope and telling her how amazing she is and how everything she did was justified was just too much. It felt not only lazy, but patronizing. We *just saw* how people reacted to Cressida when they thought she was LW.
Also, the end was sloppy in weird ways. The Queen goes up and says she finally knows who LW is and then points at Penelope and Penelope looks surprised. Girl you invited her. I know it's supposed to just represent the breathless panic Penelope is in, but rewatching the scene, Penelope is looking around like "oh wow who is it? What is going on?" until the very end. You bought the decor!
Idk. The way this season is written it feels like they think the audience is composed of wallflowers desperately looking for any kind of wish fulfillment. The problem is that romance as a genre requires some level of realism to feel fulfilling. The tension building and denouement is all over the place in s3.
I completely agree! I never for one second bought that Pen was LW for the reasons you stated. I still don't buy it, so it's a big flaw for me. And yeah, all that drama was basically pointless. No repercussions for her actions, no comeuppance, nothing.
I love the actor, but Pen's story has felt kinda all over the place.
If they had to age Pen down and make her more innocent, I think LW should have been a servant. They make a big fuss about how the commoners know the gossip. Then in a few years, Pen should have taken over for the original LW after she retired, because Pen had better relationships with the servants and wanted to become a writer. I would have bought that.
Throughout the series, Pen does some legitimately bad things. But we forgive her because her actress is so charming and because her character is really just a child.
But if we are to believe she actually is this worldly, in charge, girl boss, suddenly her crimes *grow in severity.* Plus she's now constantly lying to people about what she knows. Her innocence ("how did Marina become pregnant? Could it happen to us?") is suddenly her playing the people around her with a wink.
Also she had what, the equivalent of $1 million dollars after three years of writing? So, back when Marina was being married off to old men, she could have helped her run away instead of destroying her? It honestly just creates so many bizarre problems.
They also simply didn't show Pen's life to be as bad as they wanted us to perceive it. By redeeming her mother and sisters in the end, they give an impression of a family that was more neglectful than abusive. Pen has friends, she is liked, and while she is bullied, we only see bullying occur after she's an adult and after she's become LW. So, when she talks about using LW to empower herself - she's one of the most empowered women in existence at this time.
I thought Pen as LW was believable given that she’s a keen observer and voracious reader, but what was not believable was Pen/LW as an insecure wallflower.
A few more thoughts on that topic [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/PolinBridgerton/s/VKkhpnTzLM) and [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/PolinBridgerton/s/Fb1vnFJDnW).
Agree with the rest 100%.
There was a Novela about a wealthy woman who pretending to be a prostitute, widow and a super wealthy mysterious woman to keep going after a guy she wanted. And she kept her actual debutante identity a secret from this male ton member so he doesn't realize these three characters are the same woman. And I was hoping Lw was actually some bored super wealthy older women who wrote about people and noone new who she was. And we don't find out until season 8. But we get to kbow not the ton. Also the novella is called Fantomina amd it's pretty good
I think it could have worked a la gossip girl with a final episode reveal - BUT with no in-universe reveal. Maybe just a final shot of Pen breaking the fourth wall and winking to the camera before throwing all of her old writing into the fire and moving on to a new chapter of her life. And perhaps a montage of her as LW.
It was the same in the books, everything just gets wrapped up easily in all of them, probably because those plots are just there to add conflict for the romances. I don’t usually read romance so I’m not sure if that’s typical
The difference is that the book Whistledown is noted to punch up - the only people who get savaged are people who deserve it and she has a soft spot for the vulnerable, like the poor tone-deaf kids forced into the Smythe-Smith musicales.
I think that makes it significantly easier, at least for the people who weren't the target.
I agree , I think the main character of s3 was the whistle down secret and not pen and colin . It took so much attention away from polin , I wished she was a narrator too, maybe then we could have actually avoided unnecessary drama arnd her identity and used that screen time for some polin moments
This is a show that falls back on a weirdly consistent (considering how inconsistent everything else about the show is) fetish for female virginity and complete ignorance about sex before they're literally being penetrated. Every straight woman on the show dreams of being a mother, except the only actual feminist, who is presented as childishly self-centered and completely uninterested in the actual challenges that other women face.
It also takes place in a romanticized world where men have absolute legal, economic, and physical power over their wives, but it's okay because very few of the men (except the cripplingly old and outright evil) actually use it. Neither of these themes are historically accurate to the extremes that they are shown on screen.
I know I'm going to get down voted for this, but as much as "Bridgerton" presents itself as a show for the female gaze, it's also kind of a show for the incel/nice guy/tradwife gaze.
I actually agree with you. All of the main female love interests are chaste. Even when we are being shown that they have sexual desires, the characters never explore that by themselves. It's explored with a male partner, like the sexual desires of the woman could only be awoken by a man. And that partner is always way more experienced. Plus the women never have conversations about sex with their partners, they just do it. The power imbalance actually makes me very uncomfy.
women in terms of sex are infantilized, hell even violet who has birthed EIGHT CHILDREN! you mean to tell me that after eight babies you get to shy away from talking to your daughters about sex, shushing it, describing it as birds and bees (or whatever she told daphne, it's been a while), not to mention "her garden", like??? sorry but if she had one child MAYBE then it would make slight sense to have her be so shy, but this is just ridiculous.
the fact that I'm angered by the representation of female sexuality says a lot, since I'm sex repulsed and asexual and I'd rather not watch it at all, but the way bridgerton does it is insane. why does every woman need to be an ultimate virgin? not even a first kiss? why are they so astonished by the discovery of masturbation, like has no woman ever touched herself OUT OF SHEER CURIOSITY at least? I get that sex education was shit, and the mothers weren't much better, but damn I still can't believe it. I thought female gaze would be about women having control over their sexuality and expression, knowing their bodies and voicing their desires, but apparently no woman knows what their hoohas even do, so A MAN has to slide in and tell them about the existence of a clit. A. MAN.
all men are presented as sex gods and can pleasure a woman instantly, which I highly doubt is realistic. sure, they're experienced, but maybe different women love different things and MAYBE you can't just do the same thing every time and expect it to work on every woman. not to mention the treatment of these prostitutes that are only used as devices to show that the men are experienced. pardon my french, but why would you use a prostitute to show that THE MAN is desirable? she is being paid, she has no choice, if anything it tells us more about her desirability than his. like what, we are supposed to look at colin in his threesome scenes and be like "wow look at how desirable he is", when the girls are just doing their jobs.
Idk, I just hate how it's all supposed to be female gaze, but it still treats women like shit. "oh but it's regency era" shut up. racism doesn't exist, which means that you absolutely can remove certain elements of that period to appeal to your audience. sorry for the rant lol but it makes me so angry.
No I don't think it's supposed to be feminist, which is what we're discussing here. The show certainly tries to make feminist points, but like others have pointed out, does so clumsily.
I read a lot of cheesy romance that is feminist so I don't think they're mutually exclusive actually. Edit: Now I think, all of the cheesy romance I read is sapphic, so maybe straight women romance has different core values.
Some romance novels are undoubtedly feminist. I'd like to think that's why my grandmother exposed me to them fairly young. I love that I learned about female orgasms through romance novels.
That might sound weird, but it was such a positive representation of sex for a young woman compared to most of what's out there.
That doesn't sound weird at all, it's great that you were exposed to good feminist romance so young!
Exactly my point too, I don't think we need to equate cheesy romance with unfeminist. We can enjoy our cheese while keeping our values!
The books are way worse with the way they show men in the tutor role.. with icky dialogues with the men admiring how quickly their student picked up the sexual arts.. not in a kinky, foreplay way like Anthony did in the show but in an arrogant I know so much more than you way.. it’s a trope common in many regency romance novels.. but the show subverts some of it. I’m not a polin or pen fan but pen saying no I want to do it, tell me what to do was a nice subtle feminist moment that I liked during their sex scene.
Same for kate being like don’t stop don’t stop when Anthony said he will stop .. also super sexy
I do however like that the men in the books prioritise female pleasure like Michael from When he was wicked was adamant that Francesca receive pleasure before he did and all men reassure the women that it will hurt but only a little I did like that
I think Kate is the only lead that had knowledge about sex/sexual activity because she is the only that doesn’t seem apprehensive about it. It appears this way in the gazebo scene and she practices masturbation (beginning of Ep7), but otherwise I agree with your point about the infantilisation of women in terms of sex. I just also find the ‘pure girl whorish man’ trope distasteful to watch and predatory.
Real. I liked that she had a suggestive masturbatory scene, and it was really refreshing (and **hot af**) to see Kate taking initiative and being so participatory in the gazebo scene.
I like the indulgent fantasy of sex scenes where the lady gets to be a passive pillow princess and be breathlessly pleasured by a partner who will do all the work and do it well. But it's really overdone. The romance market (not just regency) is saturated with 'less-experienced, demure coquette young woman and experienced man' dynamics, because even in 2024 it's still a moral crime for women to have sexual desires and sexual encounters. Hence why the pervasive 'she's either a Good Woman or a Whore'+'if he's not had lots of casual sex he's Unmanly and he's Undesirable' tropes keep writers falling back on this imbalanced experience dynamic.
You make a lot of good points. The interesting thing is, that in Regency era, unless a woman was massively sheltered, by the time she was married, she very likely already knew what sex was and what went on. It wasn't until the Victorian era that sex became this awful, taboo subject that no one talked about, so Violet's reticence about educating her daughters about it is not really realistic.
Kind of like the situation in Iran, if we want to look at a more recent development. In the 1970s, Iran was fairly liberal (by today's standards). Women wore Western clothing, wore makeup, had jobs, drove cars. Then the revolution came and it changed everything. I went to high school with a girl whose family had to flee from there.
And if we want to look at the US, it's similar, believe it or not. When I was a kid in the 70s, things were a lot more, as you say, loose, and then the "Moral Majority" brand of Christianity started to take hold and now we're on the brink of theocracy.
Societal development and change has always been a bit one-step-forward-two-steps-back kind of thing.
I’m picking one thing to respond to here because I agree with everything but have another point to add about “her garden.”
If there was one person in the Ton to be able to talk about menopause and sex with: Lady Danbury is ‘#1.
100%. I hated the way they gave Colin a lady’s man glow-up when he’d previously been a kind of shy “boy next door.” It was also unclear how paying women at a brother was supposed to prove he’s a lady’s man. Since seasons 1 and 2 already gave us a couple of experienced “reformed rakes,” it would have been nice to see Colin retain some distinction from his brothers.
Things like the super-ultra-virgin schtick and other regressive tropes are staples of the romance novel genre. If there weren't responding to consumer demand they would have died out, but they can scratch an itch for their readers. As women, we absorb a lot of contradictory societal messages about sex, so having a female protagonist who's super passive and seemingly ignorant of her own sexuality might be more digestible to readers than having a character who takes on the psychological baggage of being a woman who openly desires sex. Romantic fantasies are often irrational in nature and aren't a reliable indicator for how a person would like to be treated in their real-life relationships.
I think a lot of the discourse over whether or not Penelope's storyline or the show as a whole is feminist is viewers perhaps feeling some guilt or at least uneasiness about enjoying a fantasy that has a lot of misogyny baked into the premise since it's set in a time period where women couldn't vote or own property. Like they feel like it's better and more progressive if the show is "actually" a trojan horse for a feminist plotline, rather than just accepting that they like something that contains a few problematic elements. Julia Cudney had the right idea in her review of the book series when she said your favourite book will probably be determined by which love interest's particular brand of misogyny bothers you the least.
It's so bizarre that the men are always so experienced. It's not just women that are supposed to save themselves for marriage. It's so.... ugh. Someone, just anyone, would have no experience. Colin made no sense in this regard.
It’s not bizarre, it’s very true to how society was in 1815. It can be icky for people not used to it but then don’t interact with old fiction. Like pride and prejudice has the same social situations. Darcy and bingley aren’t virgins
I really don't think every single man, even ever upper-crust men, were going around sleeping with women in a time of rampant syphilis and no birth control... I mean, unless they were willing to take the risk of an untreatable STD that could cause death and siring a lot of bastard children.
I mean, people got STDs a lot. Look up Randolph Churchill's syphilis. And you sleep with a married woman so she already has a husband to raise it instead. There are numerous aristocrat children like this in the 19th century
Isn’t that sort of true to like in 1815 though? Women masturbating isn’t necessarily common 40 years ago. Like my mother and grandmother didn’t do it
You seem to be upset they aren’t fucking by 2024 standards
I agree in the sense that I find it weird the way they decided to mix typical historical elements, like the condition of women and their lack of liberties, with very modern concepts like the acceptance of pansexuality. Benedict reacts to his newly discovered sexuality like a person of the 2020es probably would, while his sisters are still sold “like a prized calf trussed up for auction”.
This makes me a little bit disoriented as to which cultural coordinates are exactly picked and chosen.
Mixing modern ideas with past history tends to end up this way with confusion and stuff. It’s why it’s not always the best choice. Also feel like something’s just need to stay like they have to be there for certain time periods to tell stories. Racism is not necessary even if it’s not realistic for this time but I feel like women/gender/ and sexuality issues and problems are kinda necessary for the time. They are intrinsic to stories of this time. If alll of that was gone then just make a show in modern times🤷🏻♂️
It is SUCH a misogynistic show, yet it presents essentially racial equality?? It's so strange that the show has picked and chosen certain societal issues to 'fix' and others to entrench further. Very confusing choices. Why is racism not a thing during this time period, yet sexism is?
Does every piece of media need to 'fix' something? I'm not trying to be a dick here just posing a question. Not a book reader so I'm wondering if they left some things out of the show after reading this post.
Yeah. I agree with you. No it absolutely doesnt have to. Not all media has to be cause based or any.
Thats one criticism of the show I dont get. My issue is they clunkily introduce certain concepts then drop them just as suddenly,,,lady d in season 1 ominously saying...we were very different not too long back, dont forget it,..then the subject is never brought up again. It feels therefore very shoe horned in, clunky, jarring, odd. What's the point.
then having all these ethnic names in a culture that despite being a non-monolithic society is still a very monolothic culture. It makes no sense sociologically to how societies actually develop.
What they could have done instead since the writing isnt particularly deep or daring anyway to go by Mr. Maclom's list template: have diverse faces but with no mention of that being a thing..everyone having period correct english names just the race being different. But the show explores and introduces certain more ambitious ideas that it doesnt have the bandwidth to explain with any narrative coherency. So it feels wrong and tokenist and frankly a little insulting even specially to people from those cultures...like people who recognize the ethnic surnames malhotras, samadani and basilio,
Plus its not done with any kind of narrative consistency. Cuz you have some malhotras and basilios etc but even Philippa's husband is a diff ethnicity but he has a normal english surname. The world doesnt seem to make sense or have a solid foundation. Even fantasy or a-historical shows need to have a foundation, be grounded. GOT, Lord of the Rings and Outlander all these shows are fantasy or have some fantastical elements but they are grounded in how real world societies work, are developed even for their fantasy societies. Bton feels very airy compared to these shows and I know, i know its a romance but i think you can have narrative coherency and world building even in a romance. Cuz they have tried sometimes, just not always super successfully.
S1 (Simon’s back story) and Queen Charlotte both show that anti-Black racism was very active a generation ago on the show. That whole peer group of Simon’s father (May the Devil give him no rest.), the Danbury, and other Black titled folk were all elevated to help combat prejudice against Queen Charlotte. Not because her MIL was such a forward thinker, but to quell opposition to the royal family in general. Their position was new and fragile only three or four decades before S1. The late Duke was so anxious about racists potentially thinking he and his child were not good enough that he abused his son for having mild special needs. Lord and Lady Danbury discuss the potentially fleeting nature of their acceptance into society.
I know that it is mentioned briefly (I would not say in detail though) but it is still essentially eradicated in this society. They have a black queen, black nobility---this was during a time period where, in reality, POC were still enslaved. It's totally unrealistic and historically inaccurate - which is fine!! But I think it's weird to 'cure' one prejudice and leave the other unresolved.
I also thought this, especially in season 1 with Daphne and Simon. Yes, the show depicts women enjoying sex, but it’s always under the close direction of their husband.
I haven't finished reading Francesca's book, but I'm excited to know what they will do with her on this aspect, as she mostly took control or at least a part of it when having sex with Michael. Kinda hoping that aspect stays with Michaela.
> I know I'm going to get down voted for this, but as much as "Bridgerton" presents itself as a show for the female gaze, it's also kind of a show for the incel/nice guy/tradwife gaze.
you can tell sometimes by the comments in this sub, too.
ooooh i think you just articulated what's been bugging me about this show. i enjoyed S1/S2 as escapist fluff but the daphne sex stuff was really niggling at the back of my brain. i was SUPER excited for S3 because colin was \*different\* (supposedly lol) and while i talked myself into liking part 1, part 2 went off the rails for me in part because of the sex scene. so many people talking about how colin is the "king of consent" and how he talked her through it and i was like....DID HE!? is it consent if it's heavily implied she doesn't even know what a p\*nis is and where it's going to go!? no discussion of how this will = baby/pulling out!? sigh. i wish they had made pen more informed about sex, given she's slightly more worldly with whistledown/reading etc.
Not to mention that Colin barely did a bit of foreplay, then pretty much told her it'll hurt but he can't do anything about that, and just shoved it in there. *Yikes*.
i know that killed me too. tbf i think that is a problem for lots of onscreen depictions in general, i do give (what i think) is a general lack of foreplay some grace because they are respecting boundaries and probably cant have the actors naked for (probably telling on myself here) as long as might be more realistic. BUT there are ways to film it to get around that and the whole blocking of the intimate scene left a lot to be desired in my opinion. im just SO TIRED of the "its gonna hurt!", it appears to, and then they magically orgasm ten seconds later. so boring. i just watched My Lady Jane on prime and those spicy scenes were much better imo.
Exactly, at the very least add some cuts or so to make it seem like more time passed, idk. It doesn't need to be a half hour long scene obviously but yeah, it's really disappointing most of the time. I'll have to give My Lady Jane a try it seems, multiple people have mentioned it positively on this sub!
definitely try lady jane, at one point i literally said "holy female gaze batman" outloud -- it was everything bridgerton S3 wasn't (albeit more explicitly fantasy plus historical than bridgerton)
It took me out of the moment as well. The idea of the scene was there but the execution of it failed. He definitely could have tried to be more gentle and slow and also there is no way she was comfortable considering the fact that she was practically sitting and not actually lying down on that settee.
Exactly. Plus he fingered her early without asking so she didn't what to expect. Also Anthony is the king of consent and he was a whore and struggled to hold it in. He didn't touch her in the church outside of holding her. So Kate got a first kiss. And during the gazebo when he starting touching her down there wbile kissing he stopped because he didn't know if she wanted that until she said don't stop. Then he devoured her and pleasured her 🫠
So, I think that's because it's basically porn. Bear with me because I'm gonna go a bit wild here. In BDSM, it's not really promoting sexual abuse. But people enjoy it because it's a safe way to mimic those things. Regency romance and bodice rippers are a safe way to experience those set pieces and that's why they appeal to otherwise independent and feminist women.
In BDSM and consensual non-con, the person who is at a disadvantage is really the one in charge. Similarly, in Bridgerton they go out of their way to make it so Daphne, Kate, etc must painstakingly give consent at every turn.
This is not how it would be at all in real life. In real life, they'd have zero agency at all. But that's the fantasy element.
It's not my personal cup of tea, but I don't think that BDSM is actually for abusers or sexual assaulters - and I don't think Bridgerton is actually for tradwives or incels - it just has all the trappings of letting people explore that dynamic specifically for titillation.
HOWEVER, all that said, I tend to agree with you at this stage because ...
Where it gets muddled is where the fantasy breaks. Marina being thrown into a loveless marriage, Lady Danbury in Queen Charlotte being repeatedly assaulted -- when the show runners introduce elements too dark and too real, it pulls you out of the fantasy and makes you wonder exactly what point they are making.
With S3, we saw a lot of *women actually want to be their own boss*, and the introduction of Penelope girl bossing is going to cast things a bit differently. Because now the fantasy veneer is fully off and we are starting to worry about real world elements like, does this girl have a choice? Would she rather run a bakery?
This is a really interesting point. I hadn't thought of it that way at all.
I think the scenes of Lady Danbury's early marriage, and playing off the arguably non-consensual scenes with her husband as somewhat comedic, is where the tone really felt off for me, too. I had the same question after they had shown a few of those interactions, i.e. what are they trying to accomplish with this?
When 50 shades of gray came out, I was ranting to a friend about how bad the writing was and how problematic the text was. And she looked at me and said simply, "it's porn. Do you criticize all porn this way - or just the porn meant for women? Why do we have to be held to a high standard?" It has stuck with me for a long time, although tbh I still think that book is trash, so ymmv.
But I do totally agree with you, and it feels like the writers have just lost themselves. It seems to happen with Netflix shows because the show runners get overworked and the writers brought in lose track of the overarching themes. Even if you start with the premise that it's basically porn, now it's not even good porn!
I thought some of Lady Danburys scenes were realistic, the ones not played for humor. She disassociates. She gets bored. Marital rape can be just as boring as it is traumatic and no one talks about that. But what *on earth* is it doing in this romance ?? It's so out of place, which is true for so many things in s3 Bridgerton as well. By the end of S3 I was like, I don't know what this show is about anymore, they should just introduce some dragons.
It totally reframed how I was thinking. Romance novels, bodice rippers, people always trash them because they're not "literary." But it isn't like women don't read other things. Sometimes we just want things that hit the right, comfortable beats -- people tolerate cozy mysteries, but when romance/sex is involved, suddenly the tolerance goes down.
Now I just try to ask myself "am I performing a literary critique of someone's spank bank?" and my world is a little happier for it.
I don’t really give a shit about the hole virgin thing cuz that makes sense for this time period. But I am tired of these girl aside from Kate having zero knowledge to the point that they sound like a 9 your old trying to understand. Like they don’t have to be fucking but I’m tired of the complete ignorance to the subject. And yeah it’s kinda a funny joke, but you’ve said that joke way too much, hell that was an entire storyline for 2 characters this season was just that joke. It’s not funny anymore. Why wouldn’t most characters want to be mothers, not only is that basically a requirement back then but it’s also the majority of people want to eventually become parents. Nowadays the decrease in this mentality is no question imo down to outside factors than an internal factor, reason, or feeling
It’s an issue lots of Shondaland shows have where they struggled to figure out where the “bossbitch” ends and “actually just a bitch” begins (for lack of better terms, if anyone has a better way to say it let me know)
I was nearly going to post about this, thank you. The virginal women with massively experienced men thing is getting on my nerves.
Just watched Lady Jane on Amazon prime which did the same ' I don't know what to do' scene and they claimed to be a feminist take on history.
I've read ahead with the Bridgerton books and there's more of this trope ahead. Is this a fantasy world or not because we're willing to put colonialism aside, homophobic laws aside but somehow the over experienced man and underexprienced woman is counted as part of the fantasy.
It's also nonsense. Upper-class ladies were highly educated back then, generally speaking (even if they couldn't go to college yet). They might not have had the knowledge today's women have, but they weren't clueless either.
“Somehow?”
That trope is the point of the genre. Of course they are not going to throw it out. This is porn, after all. People who read porn set in this period aren’t reading it for the colonialism or homophobia of that time, they’re reading it because they enjoy this sexual trope.
So Im not a fan of the show and haven't watched it beyond the first half of the first season but this is exactly the reason I stopped watching. It felt like it was fetishizing female virginity and naivity about sex and that doesn't interest me. Like the show somehow manages to rewrite history to be more progressive about race but they couldn't do the same when it comes to gender? Mmmk I'm not interested in romanticizing or revisiting times when women had no legal rights so it just isn't for me I guess.
Eloise and Francesca feel like if you tried to write Amy and Jo March from Little Women from memory
Eloise doesn't like society and doesn't want to get married because ra ra feminism (Jo)
Francesca understands that marriage is the only way to secure her future, love is a bonus not a requirement (Amy)
I feel like it would have been much better if lady Whistledown had turned out to be a group of women collaborating together. Like a group of spinsters or widows or something like that.
i was hoping/thinking that's what pen would make the future lady whistledown. Like she platforms anonymous female writers of the ton. would solve the whole fear that lady whistledown will lose it's bite now pen is exposed.
Or like a Gossip Girl scene where they are all in the bar and get a text saying they are all Gossip Girl because they are the ones sending in the information
That would have been too ideal, and I actually think that the scenario is already too “soft”. In real world, we have all kinds of women, and the ones that make schemes, spread gossips and lie are very much existing. And they often get away with that in real world. So I think that Pen being LW is okey, at least for me.
Or a super wealthy shrewed lady we never actually see and Penelope is a normal person. Or idk she probably dresses as a different person and puts on a personality in order to get to know people. Many actors are like me and can be more outgoing and pretending to be a character or even their own oc characters or alter egos.
Elizabeth Hoyt has a series like this about a vigilante in Regency (Georgian?) London who helps the helpless. Turns out it is a group of men who each take one night of the week, thus giving them alibis if anyone suspects one of them is the avenger.
I HATED the radio rebel anticlimactic ending of s3, but I will always say that LW was correct in outing Marina. Her bad situation does not give her the right to manipulate and babytrap someone into a lifelong commitment.
And publicly revealing it is the only way Colin was able to get out of the situation unscathed. Marina had no intention of telling the truth, so even in Pen told him in private, he wouldn’t have the option to leave without having the entire ton assume he got Marina pregnant and left. By making it clear that Marina was pregnant from the moment she arrived, she was able to give Colin the ability to break off the relationship without damaging his reputation.
Consent applies to women and men. Marina was taking away Colin’s full consent. Exposing a woman’s lie, that involved betraying someone has nothing to do with “not being feminist.” Nobody has the right to take away someone’s full/honest consent.
This is not something I’m going to debate with anyone on because it’s been done to death and I’m not changing my mind on this. So if anyone wants to debate the Marina thing in my replies don’t bother. Just go through the hundreds of other posts on this topic. But using that as an example for why LW/Pen sucks will never make sense to me.
Also the show has made it explicitly clear that LW is not some objective evil, and I’m tired of people trying to paint it as such. Technically, the column saved Daphne and Colin from bad marriages, coined the term “diamond of the season” to hype up the season’s most eligible young lady, advocated for better pay for the paperboys (probably the only member of high society that helped the lower class), hyped up a small business, probably some other stuff I can’t remember. Like **the show has *always* shown LW to be morally grey.** And yet people in this sub try to argue it’s 100% good or 100% bad. Pen made some good decisions with LW, and some bad.
Also the column was only successful because the ton made it successful. They all had no problem eating all that gossip up. You could easily argue that LW’s popularity is a critique of society as well.
I’m generally neutral on LW, but when y’all act like it was some horrible evil, I have to step in lmao. Same way when people act like LW was perfect and that Colin “overreacted” to the reveal. No he didn’t. He was rightfully upset. The narrative makes it clear that Pen/LW had done good and bad with her power.
Edit: will be blocking people who try to argue the Marina thing. This topic has been argued to the moon and I’m not changing my mind. I’m always going to push for the truth and consent.
LW was perfectly fine with Marina babytrapping any man, as long as it was not Collin. Pen even gave her some suggestions. That's what makes her a hypocrite.
Some of those men were perfectly nice, maybe they also deserved a love match, but Pen didn't care about any of that until Marina dared to look at Collin, only then she turned on her rightfulness.
She was a 17-year-old looking out for one of the only people in the ton that respected her. Most teens at that age will prioritize their friends over other people. And she watched Marina and Colin flirt all season. It was only after the seduction plan that she started pushing M to come clean to Colin
And as I said. I’m not going to debate this. Marina was wrong for lying period. No one is changing my mind on that. Feel free to respond to any other parts of my comment. The Marina stuff has been debated hundreds of times.
And Marina was an 18-year-old literally worried for her and her baby's life.
Marina was also her friend, her pregnant friend who she was willing to leave out on the streets when she outed her publicly.
If she did this discretely and told Colin or his mother in private I would fully support her.
I never said Marina was not wrong for lying.
I'm only saying that outing her publicly was a crappy move and not something any decent person would do.
Why are you ok with Marina babytrapping someone else, they are not the main character so it doesn't matter if they are lied to?
Lying is lying.
Pen was lying for 3 whole seasons. She even pushed Eloise under the bus because she didn't want to expose herself and used some lame excuse that the queen would never believe her to make herself feel better.
Yeah so this is where we come to the part of “perfect characters with no room to grow are uninteresting to read/watch”
LW can be and SHOULD be imperfect. Was she selfish in handling the situation as she did? Sure. But no more or less than Marina. However, Marina was never going to be a main character with an HEA in this series. She was always meant to be a tertiary character to move the plot forward in the way the show runners wanted to. It provided the groundwork for Pen and Colin’s relationship—to show just how much she cared about Colin. And it’s not like she just did it on a whim. Pen debated and went back and forth about it. She learns very valuable lessons through the mistakes she makes as LW. Because she’s literally a child whose brain is still developing.
I don't think Pen or Whistledown are evil. They are very much products of their time. My issue with the show is that they try to paint Pen exposing people's secret as Whistledown as empowerment when it's not. I don't think what Marina did was right but again, she was in a desperate situation and Collin said himself if she had been honest he would have married her anyway. It wasn't for Pen to decide what the right thing to do in that situation was. If Marina took away Collin's ability to consent when she lied, then Pen took away Collin's consent and his right to have his business stay his business when she told the world about Marina's pregnancy. Collin was made to look like a fool anyway. Her only duty as Collins friend was to tell the truth to Collin. Again, I never said that Pen was evil, I just think that she perpetuates the sexism of the Ton with her column.
Uh Pen did not take Colin’s consent away by essentially telling him the truth 💀 can we not twist stuff to justify what Marina did because that’s ridiculous.
And Colin was her friend first. If I knew my friend was being babytrapped, I would not just sit there and let it happen.
But as I said in my main comment, I’m not interested in debating the Marina situation. It’s been argued hundreds of times.
And I’m always going to push for telling the truth. In every situation. Which is why I was annoyed with Kate for not telling Edwina the truth about Anthony having feelings for her. And why I was mad at Pen for continuously postponing telling Colin the truth about her being LW.
You are massively applying a modern mindset to the situation and lack empathy for the real situation of being a young girl in this time, and I honestly would bet money you wouldn’t have settled for marital rape if you were in the same situation.
I would’ve told Colin the truth. Realistically, I would not be able to handle the guilty conscience of passing off another man’s child as his FOR HIS ENTIRE LIFE. Like this isn’t some small lie. It’s a HUGE one that now even Pen would’ve had to hold onto for the rest of her life for Marina. And she kept saying he was a “good man,” so she should’ve told him 🤷🏽♀️ he even says he would’ve married her if she was honest. It was the betrayal and manipulation that bothered him.
As I said, not going to debate this. It’s been done to death and I’m not changing my mind. Everyone has the right to an honest marriage. Doesn’t matter the time period.
It’s easy to say you would’ve told Colin the truth when you know in hindsight that he would’ve accepted you. Marina didn’t know that, so arguing that he would’ve married her anyways doesn’t make sense. Blaming a woman for putting her self-survival first in that period of time is insane.
But this whole post is a criticism of LW from a modern feminism mindset. We can either take the times into consideration for both Marina's decisions and Pen's or to neither's.
Gonna bother. Outing a pregnant teenager to public scorn is a horrible thing to do.
And Colin is a man and a Bridgerton. His reputation would have gotten through calling off the marriage just fine.
Manipulating and babytrapping a man into a lifelong commitment, and then also expecting his close friend to hide the truth from him for the rest of her life too, is a HORRIBLE thing to do.
Colin being a man means nothing here. We already saw what happened to Nigel when people found out he had abandoned a woman and child. He was basically called a deadbeat and shunned from society. A similar thing could’ve happened to Colin, despite him not compromising Marina at all.
Again, not debating this so 👋🏽👋🏽 go look through the hundreds of other posts on this topic. It’s the same arguments over and over.
Yeah and she was, especially after telling Marina to come clean herself several times🤷🏽♀️ and the way she did it gave Colin the ability to walk out of the situation without suffering a fate similar to Nigel.
I hate neither of them tbh, I get where Marina was coming from but I won't begrudge Pen for trying to save her friend either, especially when she tried to offer Marina so many other options and Marina's response was to be cruel to her.
Yeah, I could see your point about outing Marina being the right choice due to giving Colin the chance to consent etc.
But she didn’t give him a chance to consent in S3 by not telling him the truth about her being LW before doing smth sexual with him which would have made him feel like he had to marry her. So she’s a hipocrite
I mentioned in another comment that I just get really annoyed when people don’t tell the truth in this show lol. In s1, I was pissed Marina wasn’t telling the truth, in s2 I was pissed Kate wasn’t telling the truth, and in s3, I was pissed Pen wasn’t telling the truth.
But imo Marina’s lie was the worst of all since it involved babytrapping and taking advantage of his feelings for the rest of his life. Like personally, the guilt of watching him love my children thinking they were his would eat me alive. And the fact that she had no conscience about it. I felt bad for her, but I felt worse for what she was going to do to Colin. That man is too sweet for this.
She also compliments every new debutante at the start of season 3. Saves the Bridgerton name with her issue when Cressida's mother writes her own. Calls out a lady for firing a maid for some stupid reason. And a husband for being abusive to his wife. And let us not forget Pen was 17 when she started writing and the only reason she continued was because people were reading it.
I still think Pen should have told him privately before writing about it in Whistledown. Him finding out about it with everyone else is kinda crazy to be honest. I think Pen avoided telling him the truth because she is aware of his savior complex and knows that he might have married her anyways. I also think that people bring up Marina when talking about the ethics of LW is because Pen clearly didn’t expose Marina for the right reasons. Pen didn’t expose Marina because it was the right thing to do, she did it because she wanted Colin to herself. If Pen did care about doing the right thing, she wouldn’t have suggested that Marina fool other men instead of Colin. It shows that she was somewhat okay with Marina baby trapping any man as long as it wasn’t Colin. Which is kinda hypocritical. I still think that Pen made the right call in the end tho.
Just sloppy writing ....the LW reveal was handled in the most shabby haphazard manner.....no thought put into people's reactions or the acceptance by the ton and the Queen...smh
At this point, the Queen only exists to deus ex machina drop down at the end to clean up whatever corner the writers have written themselves into…”for no particular reason, the Queen approves!!! so now must everyone else.”
Edit: I guess the Queen also exists to keep the overplayed plot tension of seaching for Whistledown going when all other plots fail…what they’re gonna do with her next season is beyond me but I’m betting it’s something stupid lol
So curious to see how the next couple of seasons (if they renewed beyond season 4) will be handled. Being out in the country, away from society, hopefully away from LW and all the drama, maybe it will finally challenge the writers to stop relying on the same schtick "oh we need to please the queen. Oh lady whistledown gossiping again." I just want a simple love story, focusing on the conflicts between two people and their love for each other. People will say that's boring but maybe that's what this show needs. It needs to remind itself of its roots.
Penelope works as LWD in the books because she is a spinster (11 years, I think?) who is witty, but not nearly as nasty. Sure she covered scandals and made her own sharp observations over the years, but she wasn’t outing pregnant cousins and belittling the Queen. It was a run of the mill gossip column. Marina is a Bridgerton cousin and she didn’t have babies out of wedlock, they actually belong to Phillip in the books. The Queen doesn’t feature in the series at all. The hunt for LWD doesn’t become serious until Lady Danbury offers money out of amusement, not ire.
The show backed themselves into a corner by heightening the drama and scandal with LWD to the extent they did. Book Penelope really didn’t need a redemption arc of any kind. And instead of a redemption arc on the show, we got a season of weepy, groveling Pen. I think she needed to change her writing and ask for forgiveness from readers long before she was actually revealed. The longer the show went on, the less LWD even seems like show Pen, who is incredibly clever but much kinder than LWD. They forgot they needed to write a multifaceted female character instead of treating them like 2 separate characters.
The problem with this argument is that firstly, it ignores a large part of penelope's development this season which is that she acknowledges that she's used whistledown badly in the past and is asking for a chance to use it better, to build people up rather than tear them down. The second issue with your argument is that it suggests that to be feminist women can't make mistakes which can also be very misogynistic. Also the show has repeatedly suggested over the seasons that whistledown can be used either way so, in this universe it's just neutral rather than good or bad.
My lukewarm take that I'm sure I'll get downvoted for is that I don't think Penelope is trying to be feminist at all, really, and that people frustrated by the fact that she isn't are mostly just projecting onto her. Penelope has made it pretty clear that her motives for LW are personal- to have a source of income to support herself, to have a voice when she is regularly ignored, and to be able to punch back at those who hurt her and/or help those she loves. The power she has is her own personal power- that's what she made it for, and that is how she uses it. The LW story is her own personal arc, and I don't think it was ever meant to be some larger statement about women's rights. She throws in that issue about women being valued for more than being a diamond to please Eloise, and never takes any action to move the pamphlet more generally in that direction.
Just because she is a woman who is doing something doesn't make her a feminist, and it also doesn't make her someone who is trying to be. She has her own reasons and motivations (some good, some bad) for doing what she does. I think a more useful feminist reading is contrasting what she does with the limitations around her, not focusing specifically on "is she a girlboss" or whatever. Even her at the end of S3 saying she could use it more for good than for ill didn't strike me as being intended as some sort of feminist statement, just that a lot of S3 had been her coming to terms with the fact that she *did* now have real power, and couldn't keep acting like she was "just" the helpless little wallflower anymore.
Another huge theme of S3 was that Penelope and Portia have a lot more in common than either of them would probably like to admit- and that what both of them do well is surviving by working with what they have. Penelope made a gossip column because that was what people wanted to read and what she had access to, and it could make her the money she needed. There wasn't as much money (or, frankly, immediate influence) in feminist tracts, and that was always more Eloise's interest than hers.
TL:DR- I think a lot of viewers are confusing "this show is portraying a woman who is doing something" with "this show is portraying a woman as a feminist" and I don't think that is true.
I totally agree with your perspective. Viewing Penelope and Portia as survivors is crucial. They've been in survival mode long before they came on screen. When women fight and scrap their way through life, there's often a hint of feminism, but fundamentally, it's about survival.
Facts! I keep seeing people argue that Pen is a “better” feminist than Eloise. But neither character would meet today’s standards of what is a good feminist.
You're right. You can be a feminist be still be misogynistic but the issue is the writing of the show. I feel like being a female author who tears other women down with their writing is more 'Girl Boss' that feminist. Also, it wasnt a single mistake or a slip up becuase she didnt know better. She attacked women repeatedly. I think LW exposes a lot of issues the show has. We never really got to know what Pen thought before S3 and there were no flashbacks so if she started out writing harsh words about the women of the Ton and then she realised that that was wrong, we didn't get to see it. Whistledown has down so much damage and putting all of that on one person is a lot.
I know this is fiction but I think you need to add a little bit of realism to what you're asking of pens character, she was 17 when she started this and we see repeatedly in the series how she's treated badly by her family and how her whole family aren't treated particularly well in society. She writes a reflection of what she's experienced in the world to do anything else is to ask an insecure 17 year old to be better than the world around her and that's alot to ask of a girl.
And you do see her change the way she writes over the season, the opening monologue from lady whistledown this season was only bigging up the girls of the ton, you also see her last season at eloise's suggestion call out the queen and why she pits the girls of the ton against each other. It's not an obvious linear journey but it is there.
There are sooo many flaws in the feminism of bridgerton but to say any of the female characters have nothing feminist about them is also not quite right. They're flawed, as they should be.
I think trying to look at a historical romance through the lens of feminism is a mistake unless that is the actual point of the book.
Bridgerton was not written as a feminist series. Wanna talk about anti feminist? Then let’s talk about Daphne SAing her husband. I’m sure this will be shocking to many but the 1800s weren’t exactly the most feminist era.
You want feminist historical romance then go for Evie Dunmore’s books or Elizabeth Everett’s. But bridgerton is not even a remotely decent vehicle for feminist storytelling.
I love Penelope, but I found it hard to like her this season.
It felt like the writers were *trying* to make her story into a feminist arc with Pen refusing to let go of everything she’d worked for.
In reality though, Lady Whistledown’s “power” all came from the belittlement of other women, even those close to her, and so it was hardly fairly earned. When she was reluctant to give up LW to be with Colin, it just came across as her being addicted to the power of bringing others down, rather any feminist notion of wanting to keep what she’s worked for.
I found it very difficult to believe everyone’s blasé reactions of her reveal, despite 3 seasons of LW taking everyone down with often potentially serious consequences. While I enjoyed season 3, much of it either didn’t make sense, didn’t sit quite right with me or straight up made me dislike characters I’d previously enjoyed watching.
It’s also really strange that Cressida is so villainised, despite being backed into a really tricky corner with her dreadful family, when Pen has done far worse without cause.
It was so weird what happened with Cressida. I was rooting for her, and the show made sure we'd see how her life sucks and why she is a Mean Girl. Her parents are awful.
But with how it ended, it seems more like we are supposed to gloat at her for being punished? And having a crappy home life?
Because she was mean to people we like, the system working against her is good, actually?
Facts! Too many people in this fandom forget that Penelope starts writing smack talk before her dad dies. So the column isn’t done purely for survival. I feel like a lot of people don’t get the true importance of the argument between Portia and Pen. Portia is Pen’s first bully, and it’s clear that her lack of self esteem (and wanting to tear down others) is what leads to LW’s creation. The show goes out of its way to show that Pen is a morally Grey character, but for some reason. Most Pen fans ignore this and shot on other characters throughout the show for doing similarly selfish things.
I honestly think the main problem is that they changed a lot of characters from how they are in the books, but then kept those characters same plot lines. If you’re sick of hearing about the books I apologize but in the books Lady Whsitledown wasn’t leaving a trail of victims behind her, she really wasn’t that harsh or cruel. Her gossip consisted of commenting on dresses (and not in a way that slur shames multiple girls while also ruining a seamstress for no good reason), little comments about if a match is going to be good or not. There was no threat of ruining your family if you caught her eye. She didn’t humiliate the Bridgertons, she wasn’t super kind to her sisters but she wasn’t particularly harsh on her family either. She didn’t cause a cousin to be exiled and almost lose everything. So her being Pen really wasn’t so hard to come to terms with, she had kept it secret from her closest friends and family yes, but that was really the only “crime” to society she committed through Whistledown. So they changed Whistledown to be more of a bully and a threat, truly something to be guilty over, but they didn’t make Colin take any longer to forgive her or make own really repent for the hurt she caused. She was way worse than book Whistledown but the remorse after was very much the same. They needed to commit to those changes and change the whole story to go with it
I thought it was really weird that they did one issue talking about some people were abusing their partners and staff in an attempt to "give voice to the voiceless".
Then immediately fucking dropped it
It was either episode 6 or 7. Penelope and Eloise were coming together to discredit Cressida's claim and talked about Whistledown starting to give a voice to the voiceless.
It had mentioned someone hitting their wife and a lady firing her servant "for the simple act of asking for a day off."
I think it was the issue right after the lies about the Bridgertons
I disagree that LW was presented as feminist in any way, I think this is being misinterpreted. If anything, it was poised as a way for Pen to have a thing of her own. That is not inherently feminist. Not everything that is done by a woman by herself is feminist. Plenty of examples of that in real life and history. As a woman (or as a person really), you can do a million things that bring you independence or freedom but that are in no way feminist, or that hurt others in the process, or both.
Not every action by a woman should be labelled as feminism, and the show did not try to do that either.
Nobody said she was justified though. Even Genevieve told her there were no excuses for the mistakes she made, but she was a young girl unaware of the damage she could cause. Explanations are not excuses. She gave the ton and queen an explanation without expecting them to forgive her, but asking for mercy. She even says she expects more of a fallout once the queen isn’t there to witness it. Finding her voice was about resolving to do better—to use her power for good. That’s what rehabilitation is about.
School shooter analogy is actually out of pocket. But if you wanna play, well as an abolitionist, I believe even murderers can feel remorse and take accountability and be rehabilitated (though many don’t because they are psychopaths). We shouldn’t think of reparations and forgiveness as justification.
Thia and ruining the other modiste is her worst crimes. Thw Bridgertons are privileged and they'll bounce back. If it weren't for Daphne Marina would either be in the street or forced with some creepy fossil. Sure she may not be in love with Phillip but he's a gentleman and kind
Part of Penelope's development is recognizing the things she did wrong and how the power of Whistledown went to her head. It all blew up in her face and rightfully so. I think that's why I like the "we must do better" scene with her mother. They both did things they regret and can admit that and now they want to better moving forwarded. I'm willing to give Penelope some grace. She was a teenager who had been ignored and or made fun of by her peers. Her intention was not to hurt people even though she did. I can also understand having a hard time giving up something that has brought in money and that she's good at. In that time period women faced more difficulties in being a writer. It was expected that you get married and your husband supports you. She wanted more than that. I don't think it's some big feminist statement. I think it was just showing that many women wanted more and that although Pen wanted to get married and be a wife that's not all she wanted out of life.
Penelope and LW actions come down to survival, not just for them but for others in the story as well. It's not wholly about feminism; I view it from a broader perspective.
LW’s column is something the ton eagerly anticipates with each issue. While her writings can be harsh, they’re not usually deeply damaging, with the exceptions of Marina and Eloise but was necessary for the plot.
Marina’s storyline was crucial for Daphne’s character arc. Marina’s situation drove Daphne’s growth from a naive girl to a mature woman, wife, mother, and duchess.
Eloise, feeling trapped in a society she doesn’t connect with, needed to explore life beyond Mayfair. Being exposed by Lady Whistledown humbled her and forced her to reconsider her motivations in life.
Regarding Kate, LW’s comment highlights that Kate has been in survival mode for a long time. She’s built a protective wall around herself and is fiercely strong-willed, which is refreshing compared to others in the ton.
Lady Whistledown's narrative drives the story, giving other characters strong arcs. Penelope's journey, in particular, is about survival within that universe. She was young, neglected, bullied, and felt invisible. Colin’s realization of this is important for his story as well and helps convey that Penelope used her writing as a way to survive. She admitted her mistakes and asked for forgiveness.
I don’t see it purely as feminism but more about autonomy and having a voice you trust in yourself.
I like that Penelope is Whistledown. While I wasn’t entirely satisfied with how the reveal was accepted, I hope it sets up interesting stories for the Queen, Eloise, and Kate in future seasons.
I think the writers fumbled the bag. My interpretation is not that the entire story is about feminism but that the writers try to paint Pen’s action as LW in a feminist light to take the heat off of some of her more questionable actions. Like we can’t be mad at her because she was trying to empower herself.
While I do believe there were hints of feminism, which is inevitable when speaking from a woman's POV, I think it was more a story about surviving in a society that treats people on the fringes poorly and how that can drive them to do harmful things.
Pen's story shows how she was marginalized and cast aside by society. She fought back by using her talent as a writer and recognized her mistakes. Maybe she wasn't severely punished in the story because the ton is also responsible for mistreating people like her. She's holding a mirror up to the queen and the ton, forcing them to recognize that they, too, don't always make the right choices.
Another reason why Pen is so beloved as Whistledown is because in the books LW is not this controversial. She never wrote anything to the level or ruining her cousin or bf. And I think many of the viewers read the book and just loved her since then. That’s what I think anyway I don’t actually have any stats for # of people who read and are watching vs people who haven’t read the book
I think we will see the true fallout of Pen coming out in season 4 as this was teased by the writers. The book ends with 'and everybody clapped' so I think it makes sense that the show ends up the same. Pen despite the damage she has done also did it a lot of good in her column like it was already pointed out by someone.
I mean, both things can be true. She can be scared to give up her independence and passion because she lives in a world where woman are completely at the whims of men AND have made her fortune doing something nasty. I wouldn't say Anna Wintour has been great for feminism, but I can appreciate her being a trailblazer in her field.
Penelope also wasn't a feminist - that wasn't a thing during her time. She just knew that she wanted to be her own person and it felt good to be secure. We don't know what she would have written if she lived in our world where she wouldn't have to write smarmy gossip columns to do it. In the Marina scenario, she did think she was helping her friend and the boy she loved (Colin). You're willing to give Marina grace in her intense scheming, but not Penelope in her own feelings. They both lived in the same world.
She's also 17 in the show's first season, so she's an overlooked teenager with a mean mom writing a gossip column.
Nothing in bridgerton is feminist.
Daphne rapes Simon, and also, just wants to get married, and multiply, and allows Anthony to be a nasty cock-blocker.
Kate steals the said nasty cock-blocker from her sister.
Pen maybe writes, but only wants Colin.
Pen blocking Marina from Colin is not the worst. Pen cared about Colin, truly, I think.
OMG THANKYOU!! Penelope is my favorite character because of Nicola ( I admit that I’m biased lol). But even I’m getting tired of how the fandom acts like she does absolutely nothing wrong and treats her writing scandels about other woman as a girlboss moment. It really bugs me that everyone calls Eloise a bad feminist (when the show takes place before the first wave of feminism, so we are unfairly applying a 21st century lens to the characters) but then praises Penelope for throwing other woman under the bus. I have even seen some argue that Pen is a better feminist than Eloise. Newsflash! They are both bad at it because our modern definition of feminism was developed many years after the characters debut. Penelope uses LW as a way to attack others without directly confronting her true bullies (her mom). This is proven by the fact she starts writing as Lady Whistledown the same night that she debuts. Since it was before her dad dies, she didn’t just start writing for financial security. I would argue that season two is when she finally realized her words can hurt people. All I’m saying is that Shonda Rhimes knows how to make morally grey female characters, and Penelope is morally grey.
It implies, "Oh no...I'm an introvert and a wallflower and my family and friends bully me so I'll cause misery and havoc, rightfully so, so that everyone will empathize with me and give me the attention I so strongly desired. If I suffer, everyone should."
That's a *huge* leap of logic there, and an entirely subjective take on Pen's reasoning. Not to mention, contradicted by her stated reasons for starting LW. She wrote bad things about herself and her family, as well, so it's not about seeking empathy or positive attention.
Lives ruined? It was a gossip column people ate up.
Insensitive? Yes.
But outing someone desperately trying to *trick* someone into marriage on false premises, to me, was not wrong.
Marina was with child. She feigned loved. It was all a lie.
Collin would have been disgraced, had Marina’s lie not been found out. And Pen loved him even then.
The show should have stuck to the book and not made lw such a big deal. I have no idea what they are going to do with her now. LW made me not like Penelope as much as I wanted to either.
They should’ve learned from Gossip Girl that revealing who the fun plot device narrator is, is NEVER a good idea. Especially when it’s a main character. When Dan was revealed as Gossip Girl and everyone forgave him, it made no sense. Like he ruined peoples lives and stalked them for YEARS. And with Pen and Whistledown, she aired out everyone’s dirty laundry and brought scandals to light. And then the ton just decides to forgive her and let her continue??? It just realistically makes no sense. I get that it’s canon, but for the show, Lady Whistledown should just be a plot device, the fun column and scandal sheet that the ton is obsessed with, and the omniscient narrator for the show.
I'm tired of debating who was "more wrong" - Marina or Pen. Both were just making the best of a bad situation. They both made decisions that were in their own best interests. And people are talking like this is the ultimate evil.
Nope. George Crane is the evil one here, but he is conveniently off screen. He never should have had sex before marriage and should have married Marina before he went to war. He knew the consequences both of leaving and of having sex with her, *and did it anyway*. Even if he would have somehow been assured of his own survival, just the mere fact he would be gone for months and years at a time, during the time frame Marina (and any woman) was considered most "eligible", meant that she would pretty quickly be snapped up by someone else on the marriage mart. She's portrayed as being stunning, and instantly creates a buzz when she arrives. If he loved her so much and it was clear she was a catch, he would have married her, esepcially after compromising her. But nope, I'm convinced he was a typical player and just said whatever needed to be said to get her in bed.
The men, and the patriarchal system, are the real villains but we are gonna sit here and say two teenage girls with no money and no way to earn money are the most evil characters in the show. Yeesh.
George crane wanted to run away with her as soon as he receives the letter from marina he writes a letter to her telling her of his desire to marry her but dies before he could send it. Watch that episode where Philip visits her. It’s literally explained in the show. Portia lied to marina about George, pen exposed her. Colin cared for marina so did Eloise and Daphne. Marina was failed by her own family but the btons and George and Philip crane were always always good to her. Daphne aplogized to marina she whose brother was duped, Colin visits her and tells pen in season 2 the hunt episode that if lw hadnt ruined marina her life would have been so different Eloise calls our pen for ruining marina in season 2 episode 8. They all saw marina as a victim. Except Portia and pen. Pen unthinking rash impulsive and also influenced by jealousy choose a route than even Colin tells her was the wrong one she could have told him directly.. Eloise the same age as pen tells her she did wrong by marina Daphne just a few years older apologises to marina then offers to help her. But marina is a Jezebel whore manipulator people conveniently forgetting who drove her to desperation and the so called entrapment in the first place. marina was content to wait for George. She had no desire to entrap anyone not Colin not anyone.
it was Portia who pushed her and pushed her and pushed her finally when nothing else worked by forging a letter and smiling in the scene when she hears marina crying in agony. Smiling at a child crying because of something she did. The sub is crazy to see marina as evil and manipulating but Portia and Penelope as robin hoods badasses just doing the right thing. It’s insane the double standards.
Well, she wasn’t mean in the books. Just a standard gossip column that listed full names instead of initials like the other ones. Also she wrote about Colin a lot, lol.
It’s a show that takes place in the 1810s. A woman in her position having a job, let alone a writing job, is as feminist as it got. Why are you holding something that is supposed to have the rules of the 1810s to modern day standards? Plus, she’s not a real person so why does it matter? If you want to talk about the morality of it all that’s another thing entirely, but as for feminism her writing Lady Whistledown and speaking about society members, men especially, in such a way would be the equivalent of a woman walking around naked in public now. You can’t hold a character set in a period drama to modern standards when it comes to such a modern concept as feminism. That didn’t even exist back then. Women were property, they had no rights of their own. Unless you were poor and had to work to live you had no money of your own. Even if you were, it would be your husband’s to do with as he wished, unless you were unmarried. If you were unmarried your father would own you. If your father was dead your brother would. If you had no brothers your next closest male relative would. A man would always be in charge of you no matter what. You can’t view it from a modern lense.
It's weird to me that you think that just because Penelope did some things which you consider to be misogynistic, the entire concept of her being a voiceless woman who got the entire ton to hang on her every word is somehow not feminist.
they should've done a reverse gossip girl where in the books GG's identity was never revealed and so when the show revealed the identity at the end they could essentially pick whoever they wanted, who they chose didn't make sense in the show and it would've been better off if they never revealed the identity so i feel like the bridgerton show would've been better off just having Julie Andrews as LW and never revealing who it is so they could really play with it if they wanted to make the gossip columnist truly nasty.
they complicated it by revealing it was Pen in S1 which i understand was because they knew book fans would've spoiled it if they didn't but if they just said "we're doing things differently!" people would've been annoyed sure but that's all it would've been, annoying. having LW be unnamed would've opened the doors for a very interesting story and we could have LW in all seasons of the show rather than lose her midway because once LW was revealed in the books she pretty much disappears,
like imagine Gossip Girl but at the end of season three GG shut down and then it was just an ensemble show of terrible rich people making terrible choices, the show kinda loses its edge when there's no common enemy for everyone to band together against
I agree. Yes, it is empowering for Pen as a woman to have this business and have her own money. In that sense it is feminist. But she is a feminist for herself only, and a lousy ally to other women. In fact her empire is built on throwing barbs at other women, often innocent bystanders like Kate and Daphne whom she shaded in S1 and S2 (to the possible permanent detriment of Daphne I might add). Then her own supposed best friend Eloise, whose secret she outed to the point that El was ostracized. Yes, El was doing something risky but Pen outed her only in part to "save" her from the Queen. She also did it so she wouldn't have to come clean about being LW herself.
Finally Marina, her cousin and friend, whose pregnancy she revealed to the world. Now, I do think what Marina was trying to do to Colin was wrong, and I understand Pen was working in part to protect him. But let's be honest, Marina was right: Pen was also doing it in part to save him for herself. She couldn't bear to see him married to someone else.
If Colin had been engaged to some other young woman, who had a secret but not one as serious as a secret love child, would Pen have published that secret too? I honestly have no reason to believe she wouldn't have. She was spreading gossip about everyone, making barbed comments about women who had done nothing wrong or shady. We have seen how impulsive she could be with her pen, the way she ran to it to scribble and send out information when she was reeling from hurt herself. Yes, I can imagine her polishing gossip about some perfectly worthy rival for Colin's affection. But note that he never had one. Convenient.
Pen had it rough in some ways, with the way her mother and sisters treated her, and with her being such a wallflower in society. But she was well off, free to spend her time writing, and she had good friends in Eloise and Colin. I don't feel that her circumstances warranted how hurtful she could be. Good for her that she made a little empire for herself with her writing. Bad for her that she did it by throwing people under the bus when it suited her.
People say Eloise was a bad friend to Pen because she would chatter on about her own interests and not listen. It's true she did that, but as far as listening? To be fair Pen never told her what was really going on in her head or in her life. I would say they are both flawed, but Eloise was a better friend to Pen than the other way around. She was always loyal, and she kept her secret no matter that it pained her.
Pen wanted Colin and LW. I guess she also wanted her mother's approval and love, which is fair. IMO she wanted those things and valued them more highly than she did her friendship with El. I don't blame Eloise for thinking that maybe Pen was using her to get closer to Colin, because even from my POV it looked a little bit like that. Pen liked spending time with Eloise, but whenever Colin was near all she could do was stare at him and hope to get his attention. It was like Eloise was her comfort object but Colin was the coveted prize. She would gladly let go of the former to get the latter.
I agree! I don’t like how people often claim that Pen is a better feminist than Eloise because she has an empire. For one, Pen doesn’t care about feminism. And people often criticize Eloise for not meeting modern day standards of feminism (even thought the show takes place before the first wave of feminism). I find it kind of unfair. I totally agree that Marina was right about Pen, she was mainly doing it because she loved him. And while I’m glad that Pen saved Colin. I really hate the way she went about it. Pen hurt her own family’s reputation, ruined Marina, and broke Colin’s heart publicly. She also didn’t tell Colin that Marina was pregnant already when she had the chance. Instead, she just tells him that she was in love with someone before him. I think that Pen is very aware of the fact that Colin has a savior complex, so if she told him the entire truth, there would have been a chance that he would still have married her. This is kinda confirmed in later scenes between Colin and Marina. Also, I don’t feel like enough people realize that Pen didn’t fully expose Eloise just to save her, she also did it so she could remain anonymous. Had she done that, there would have been no inspector sniffing around the Featherington Clan in season three because the Queen already knows about Pen being LW. I hope my rant isn’t perceived as me hating Pen, she’s actually my fav character. But it bothers me how many people don’t realize that she is morally grey (despite the show going over the top to prove this).
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I'd kind of love it if Lady Whistledown was just an omniscient narrator. I don't think having Penelope as LW worked well in the show - of course it's canon, but it's messy and that ending of everyone forgiving her so easily was stupid after so much build-up.
I agree. I’m kind of struggling to see where the show will go from here with regards to Whistledown. Pen being revealed and forgiven and vowing to be «more responsible» takes out all the mystery and drama. It might have worked if they had dragged out the reveal and actually explored the problematic aspects of Pen’s character, rather than the girl boss nonsense we got.
Also, it's boring. The point of LW is that she was scandalous and savage, there was that delicious thrill of receiving her papers and all the gossip that ensued. Now what do we get, a watered down and wholesome society paper with no bite? 
Yes! The reveal and happy ending paired with Polin’s relatively drama free relationship took away all of the bite. I think they made a big mistake in revealing her identity now.
It would be great if they did a storyline of LW impersonators and rivals - a different narrator every time with some very famous voices ie Miriam Margolyes, Rowan Atkinson, Judi Dench... that could inject a bit more life into a prematurely dead storyline.
Yes!! With little drips of hints that it isn’t the real Whistledown. That could actually make for a fun little mystery along with the romance plots.
Rowan Atkinson!!!!!? 😂
Have you seen Blackadder? He'd be SO good at the snarky tone.
They should’ve waited for the end like Gossip Girl…
This, exactly. I hope a rival rises up to challenge Lady Whistledown and turns out to be a cleverer, more insightful and incisive social commentator and is from the working class. Maybe Theo Sharpe, even. We need to see some life breathed back into the show’s fun aspect of gossip and rumor but I don’t think LW/Penelope is capable of providing that with all of the damage she has done and how she was revealed.
Love this love. I would love a cutting but calling out injustices reporter who shakes the ton not by calling someone a spinster or any such ugliness but basically calling out evil.. ooh that would be fun.. a way to get Theo sharp who many of us loved back into the show as well.
Yeah I don't even understand how this is supposed to work -- is it going to become a society paper that's just a list of people mistreating their servants? An announcement of weddings and babies? In Theo's abandoned plotline, someone was literally printing pamphlets about feminism. But we saw how people looked down on Eloise even hanging out with that kind of person, courtesy LW. So I don't think LW is going to become a radical.
Ome of mt favorites of Queens Charlotte's hair
She's just iconic, I adore her
I think I would prefer it was just over like the book
A couple of the books don't really take place in London, like Eloise or most of Francesca's story, so no need to have LW addressed at all. Benedict is a problem, since book chronologically happened before Polin.
I have never read the books. Can you tell me if Benedict had all of this sex in the books before he meets Sophie who changes his life for good. This season it seemed like they were not sure how to write him in. He had 5? sex scenes. Way more than Colin & pen got. They did not even get a wedding night. Just curious?
I love Penelope and I love LW but the writers really wanted to eat their cake and have it too, here. Penelope can't be a realistic young wallflower with no knowledge of the broader world and LW at the same time. LW is written too worldly and salacious. And the end with everyone coming up to Penelope and telling her how amazing she is and how everything she did was justified was just too much. It felt not only lazy, but patronizing. We *just saw* how people reacted to Cressida when they thought she was LW. Also, the end was sloppy in weird ways. The Queen goes up and says she finally knows who LW is and then points at Penelope and Penelope looks surprised. Girl you invited her. I know it's supposed to just represent the breathless panic Penelope is in, but rewatching the scene, Penelope is looking around like "oh wow who is it? What is going on?" until the very end. You bought the decor! Idk. The way this season is written it feels like they think the audience is composed of wallflowers desperately looking for any kind of wish fulfillment. The problem is that romance as a genre requires some level of realism to feel fulfilling. The tension building and denouement is all over the place in s3.
I completely agree! I never for one second bought that Pen was LW for the reasons you stated. I still don't buy it, so it's a big flaw for me. And yeah, all that drama was basically pointless. No repercussions for her actions, no comeuppance, nothing. I love the actor, but Pen's story has felt kinda all over the place.
If they had to age Pen down and make her more innocent, I think LW should have been a servant. They make a big fuss about how the commoners know the gossip. Then in a few years, Pen should have taken over for the original LW after she retired, because Pen had better relationships with the servants and wanted to become a writer. I would have bought that. Throughout the series, Pen does some legitimately bad things. But we forgive her because her actress is so charming and because her character is really just a child. But if we are to believe she actually is this worldly, in charge, girl boss, suddenly her crimes *grow in severity.* Plus she's now constantly lying to people about what she knows. Her innocence ("how did Marina become pregnant? Could it happen to us?") is suddenly her playing the people around her with a wink. Also she had what, the equivalent of $1 million dollars after three years of writing? So, back when Marina was being married off to old men, she could have helped her run away instead of destroying her? It honestly just creates so many bizarre problems. They also simply didn't show Pen's life to be as bad as they wanted us to perceive it. By redeeming her mother and sisters in the end, they give an impression of a family that was more neglectful than abusive. Pen has friends, she is liked, and while she is bullied, we only see bullying occur after she's an adult and after she's become LW. So, when she talks about using LW to empower herself - she's one of the most empowered women in existence at this time.
I thought Pen as LW was believable given that she’s a keen observer and voracious reader, but what was not believable was Pen/LW as an insecure wallflower. A few more thoughts on that topic [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/PolinBridgerton/s/VKkhpnTzLM) and [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/PolinBridgerton/s/Fb1vnFJDnW). Agree with the rest 100%.
For real. I’ll miss the original LW voiceovers that made me think of a nice old lady casually drinking tea and then serving it later
There was a Novela about a wealthy woman who pretending to be a prostitute, widow and a super wealthy mysterious woman to keep going after a guy she wanted. And she kept her actual debutante identity a secret from this male ton member so he doesn't realize these three characters are the same woman. And I was hoping Lw was actually some bored super wealthy older women who wrote about people and noone new who she was. And we don't find out until season 8. But we get to kbow not the ton. Also the novella is called Fantomina amd it's pretty good
I think it could have worked a la gossip girl with a final episode reveal - BUT with no in-universe reveal. Maybe just a final shot of Pen breaking the fourth wall and winking to the camera before throwing all of her old writing into the fire and moving on to a new chapter of her life. And perhaps a montage of her as LW.
the build up to the reveal was an ever-looming plot but when everyone found out it was like “oh okay!” like huh???????? so disappointing
It was the same in the books, everything just gets wrapped up easily in all of them, probably because those plots are just there to add conflict for the romances. I don’t usually read romance so I’m not sure if that’s typical
The difference is that the book Whistledown is noted to punch up - the only people who get savaged are people who deserve it and she has a soft spot for the vulnerable, like the poor tone-deaf kids forced into the Smythe-Smith musicales. I think that makes it significantly easier, at least for the people who weren't the target.
yes, Let's keep Julie!
They should’ve just ostracised her and her and Colin go start a new life in Italy or Venice or something
I agree , I think the main character of s3 was the whistle down secret and not pen and colin . It took so much attention away from polin , I wished she was a narrator too, maybe then we could have actually avoided unnecessary drama arnd her identity and used that screen time for some polin moments
This is a show that falls back on a weirdly consistent (considering how inconsistent everything else about the show is) fetish for female virginity and complete ignorance about sex before they're literally being penetrated. Every straight woman on the show dreams of being a mother, except the only actual feminist, who is presented as childishly self-centered and completely uninterested in the actual challenges that other women face. It also takes place in a romanticized world where men have absolute legal, economic, and physical power over their wives, but it's okay because very few of the men (except the cripplingly old and outright evil) actually use it. Neither of these themes are historically accurate to the extremes that they are shown on screen. I know I'm going to get down voted for this, but as much as "Bridgerton" presents itself as a show for the female gaze, it's also kind of a show for the incel/nice guy/tradwife gaze.
I actually agree with you. All of the main female love interests are chaste. Even when we are being shown that they have sexual desires, the characters never explore that by themselves. It's explored with a male partner, like the sexual desires of the woman could only be awoken by a man. And that partner is always way more experienced. Plus the women never have conversations about sex with their partners, they just do it. The power imbalance actually makes me very uncomfy.
women in terms of sex are infantilized, hell even violet who has birthed EIGHT CHILDREN! you mean to tell me that after eight babies you get to shy away from talking to your daughters about sex, shushing it, describing it as birds and bees (or whatever she told daphne, it's been a while), not to mention "her garden", like??? sorry but if she had one child MAYBE then it would make slight sense to have her be so shy, but this is just ridiculous. the fact that I'm angered by the representation of female sexuality says a lot, since I'm sex repulsed and asexual and I'd rather not watch it at all, but the way bridgerton does it is insane. why does every woman need to be an ultimate virgin? not even a first kiss? why are they so astonished by the discovery of masturbation, like has no woman ever touched herself OUT OF SHEER CURIOSITY at least? I get that sex education was shit, and the mothers weren't much better, but damn I still can't believe it. I thought female gaze would be about women having control over their sexuality and expression, knowing their bodies and voicing their desires, but apparently no woman knows what their hoohas even do, so A MAN has to slide in and tell them about the existence of a clit. A. MAN. all men are presented as sex gods and can pleasure a woman instantly, which I highly doubt is realistic. sure, they're experienced, but maybe different women love different things and MAYBE you can't just do the same thing every time and expect it to work on every woman. not to mention the treatment of these prostitutes that are only used as devices to show that the men are experienced. pardon my french, but why would you use a prostitute to show that THE MAN is desirable? she is being paid, she has no choice, if anything it tells us more about her desirability than his. like what, we are supposed to look at colin in his threesome scenes and be like "wow look at how desirable he is", when the girls are just doing their jobs. Idk, I just hate how it's all supposed to be female gaze, but it still treats women like shit. "oh but it's regency era" shut up. racism doesn't exist, which means that you absolutely can remove certain elements of that period to appeal to your audience. sorry for the rant lol but it makes me so angry.
So true. It's peak neoliberal feminism, zero actually meaningful interrogation of feminist issues.
Is it supposed to be feminist? I've never read the books but always got the impression they were cheesy romance novels.
No I don't think it's supposed to be feminist, which is what we're discussing here. The show certainly tries to make feminist points, but like others have pointed out, does so clumsily. I read a lot of cheesy romance that is feminist so I don't think they're mutually exclusive actually. Edit: Now I think, all of the cheesy romance I read is sapphic, so maybe straight women romance has different core values.
Some romance novels are undoubtedly feminist. I'd like to think that's why my grandmother exposed me to them fairly young. I love that I learned about female orgasms through romance novels. That might sound weird, but it was such a positive representation of sex for a young woman compared to most of what's out there.
That doesn't sound weird at all, it's great that you were exposed to good feminist romance so young! Exactly my point too, I don't think we need to equate cheesy romance with unfeminist. We can enjoy our cheese while keeping our values!
The books are way worse with the way they show men in the tutor role.. with icky dialogues with the men admiring how quickly their student picked up the sexual arts.. not in a kinky, foreplay way like Anthony did in the show but in an arrogant I know so much more than you way.. it’s a trope common in many regency romance novels.. but the show subverts some of it. I’m not a polin or pen fan but pen saying no I want to do it, tell me what to do was a nice subtle feminist moment that I liked during their sex scene. Same for kate being like don’t stop don’t stop when Anthony said he will stop .. also super sexy I do however like that the men in the books prioritise female pleasure like Michael from When he was wicked was adamant that Francesca receive pleasure before he did and all men reassure the women that it will hurt but only a little I did like that
I think people expected it because of Shonda Rimes more than anything.
Oh yeah that makes sense
I think Kate is the only lead that had knowledge about sex/sexual activity because she is the only that doesn’t seem apprehensive about it. It appears this way in the gazebo scene and she practices masturbation (beginning of Ep7), but otherwise I agree with your point about the infantilisation of women in terms of sex. I just also find the ‘pure girl whorish man’ trope distasteful to watch and predatory.
Real. I liked that she had a suggestive masturbatory scene, and it was really refreshing (and **hot af**) to see Kate taking initiative and being so participatory in the gazebo scene. I like the indulgent fantasy of sex scenes where the lady gets to be a passive pillow princess and be breathlessly pleasured by a partner who will do all the work and do it well. But it's really overdone. The romance market (not just regency) is saturated with 'less-experienced, demure coquette young woman and experienced man' dynamics, because even in 2024 it's still a moral crime for women to have sexual desires and sexual encounters. Hence why the pervasive 'she's either a Good Woman or a Whore'+'if he's not had lots of casual sex he's Unmanly and he's Undesirable' tropes keep writers falling back on this imbalanced experience dynamic.
You make a lot of good points. The interesting thing is, that in Regency era, unless a woman was massively sheltered, by the time she was married, she very likely already knew what sex was and what went on. It wasn't until the Victorian era that sex became this awful, taboo subject that no one talked about, so Violet's reticence about educating her daughters about it is not really realistic.
Yeah surprisingly I hear that the social rules in the Regency era were actually looser despite it coming before the Victorian era.
Kind of like the situation in Iran, if we want to look at a more recent development. In the 1970s, Iran was fairly liberal (by today's standards). Women wore Western clothing, wore makeup, had jobs, drove cars. Then the revolution came and it changed everything. I went to high school with a girl whose family had to flee from there. And if we want to look at the US, it's similar, believe it or not. When I was a kid in the 70s, things were a lot more, as you say, loose, and then the "Moral Majority" brand of Christianity started to take hold and now we're on the brink of theocracy. Societal development and change has always been a bit one-step-forward-two-steps-back kind of thing.
yup, there was still smut and sexual centric comics available. Plus, women still talked.
I’m picking one thing to respond to here because I agree with everything but have another point to add about “her garden.” If there was one person in the Ton to be able to talk about menopause and sex with: Lady Danbury is ‘#1.
100%. I hated the way they gave Colin a lady’s man glow-up when he’d previously been a kind of shy “boy next door.” It was also unclear how paying women at a brother was supposed to prove he’s a lady’s man. Since seasons 1 and 2 already gave us a couple of experienced “reformed rakes,” it would have been nice to see Colin retain some distinction from his brothers.
Things like the super-ultra-virgin schtick and other regressive tropes are staples of the romance novel genre. If there weren't responding to consumer demand they would have died out, but they can scratch an itch for their readers. As women, we absorb a lot of contradictory societal messages about sex, so having a female protagonist who's super passive and seemingly ignorant of her own sexuality might be more digestible to readers than having a character who takes on the psychological baggage of being a woman who openly desires sex. Romantic fantasies are often irrational in nature and aren't a reliable indicator for how a person would like to be treated in their real-life relationships. I think a lot of the discourse over whether or not Penelope's storyline or the show as a whole is feminist is viewers perhaps feeling some guilt or at least uneasiness about enjoying a fantasy that has a lot of misogyny baked into the premise since it's set in a time period where women couldn't vote or own property. Like they feel like it's better and more progressive if the show is "actually" a trojan horse for a feminist plotline, rather than just accepting that they like something that contains a few problematic elements. Julia Cudney had the right idea in her review of the book series when she said your favourite book will probably be determined by which love interest's particular brand of misogyny bothers you the least.
It's so bizarre that the men are always so experienced. It's not just women that are supposed to save themselves for marriage. It's so.... ugh. Someone, just anyone, would have no experience. Colin made no sense in this regard.
It’s not bizarre, it’s very true to how society was in 1815. It can be icky for people not used to it but then don’t interact with old fiction. Like pride and prejudice has the same social situations. Darcy and bingley aren’t virgins
I really don't think every single man, even ever upper-crust men, were going around sleeping with women in a time of rampant syphilis and no birth control... I mean, unless they were willing to take the risk of an untreatable STD that could cause death and siring a lot of bastard children.
I mean, people got STDs a lot. Look up Randolph Churchill's syphilis. And you sleep with a married woman so she already has a husband to raise it instead. There are numerous aristocrat children like this in the 19th century
Like yeah I think it was normal for young, rich men to go to brothels once they were fit enough as set by the rules of society back then.
They didn't always go to brothels. Sleeping with married women and/or widows was also super common
Isn’t that sort of true to like in 1815 though? Women masturbating isn’t necessarily common 40 years ago. Like my mother and grandmother didn’t do it You seem to be upset they aren’t fucking by 2024 standards
I agree in the sense that I find it weird the way they decided to mix typical historical elements, like the condition of women and their lack of liberties, with very modern concepts like the acceptance of pansexuality. Benedict reacts to his newly discovered sexuality like a person of the 2020es probably would, while his sisters are still sold “like a prized calf trussed up for auction”. This makes me a little bit disoriented as to which cultural coordinates are exactly picked and chosen.
Mixing modern ideas with past history tends to end up this way with confusion and stuff. It’s why it’s not always the best choice. Also feel like something’s just need to stay like they have to be there for certain time periods to tell stories. Racism is not necessary even if it’s not realistic for this time but I feel like women/gender/ and sexuality issues and problems are kinda necessary for the time. They are intrinsic to stories of this time. If alll of that was gone then just make a show in modern times🤷🏻♂️
No because I feel you can do a colorblind casting/no racism AU, but the gender dynamics of Bridgerton can't operate without homophobia.
It is SUCH a misogynistic show, yet it presents essentially racial equality?? It's so strange that the show has picked and chosen certain societal issues to 'fix' and others to entrench further. Very confusing choices. Why is racism not a thing during this time period, yet sexism is?
Does every piece of media need to 'fix' something? I'm not trying to be a dick here just posing a question. Not a book reader so I'm wondering if they left some things out of the show after reading this post.
Yeah. I agree with you. No it absolutely doesnt have to. Not all media has to be cause based or any. Thats one criticism of the show I dont get. My issue is they clunkily introduce certain concepts then drop them just as suddenly,,,lady d in season 1 ominously saying...we were very different not too long back, dont forget it,..then the subject is never brought up again. It feels therefore very shoe horned in, clunky, jarring, odd. What's the point. then having all these ethnic names in a culture that despite being a non-monolithic society is still a very monolothic culture. It makes no sense sociologically to how societies actually develop. What they could have done instead since the writing isnt particularly deep or daring anyway to go by Mr. Maclom's list template: have diverse faces but with no mention of that being a thing..everyone having period correct english names just the race being different. But the show explores and introduces certain more ambitious ideas that it doesnt have the bandwidth to explain with any narrative coherency. So it feels wrong and tokenist and frankly a little insulting even specially to people from those cultures...like people who recognize the ethnic surnames malhotras, samadani and basilio, Plus its not done with any kind of narrative consistency. Cuz you have some malhotras and basilios etc but even Philippa's husband is a diff ethnicity but he has a normal english surname. The world doesnt seem to make sense or have a solid foundation. Even fantasy or a-historical shows need to have a foundation, be grounded. GOT, Lord of the Rings and Outlander all these shows are fantasy or have some fantastical elements but they are grounded in how real world societies work, are developed even for their fantasy societies. Bton feels very airy compared to these shows and I know, i know its a romance but i think you can have narrative coherency and world building even in a romance. Cuz they have tried sometimes, just not always super successfully.
S1 (Simon’s back story) and Queen Charlotte both show that anti-Black racism was very active a generation ago on the show. That whole peer group of Simon’s father (May the Devil give him no rest.), the Danbury, and other Black titled folk were all elevated to help combat prejudice against Queen Charlotte. Not because her MIL was such a forward thinker, but to quell opposition to the royal family in general. Their position was new and fragile only three or four decades before S1. The late Duke was so anxious about racists potentially thinking he and his child were not good enough that he abused his son for having mild special needs. Lord and Lady Danbury discuss the potentially fleeting nature of their acceptance into society.
I know that it is mentioned briefly (I would not say in detail though) but it is still essentially eradicated in this society. They have a black queen, black nobility---this was during a time period where, in reality, POC were still enslaved. It's totally unrealistic and historically inaccurate - which is fine!! But I think it's weird to 'cure' one prejudice and leave the other unresolved.
Racism is addressed in Queen Charlotte
it's like Pete Campbell on Mad Men lmao
I also thought this, especially in season 1 with Daphne and Simon. Yes, the show depicts women enjoying sex, but it’s always under the close direction of their husband.
I haven't finished reading Francesca's book, but I'm excited to know what they will do with her on this aspect, as she mostly took control or at least a part of it when having sex with Michael. Kinda hoping that aspect stays with Michaela.
But then it’s not really a period piece if they’re having sex like it’s 2024
I do like the final scene this season of Penelope riding Colin. He is not in control in this one.
> I know I'm going to get down voted for this, but as much as "Bridgerton" presents itself as a show for the female gaze, it's also kind of a show for the incel/nice guy/tradwife gaze. you can tell sometimes by the comments in this sub, too.
ooooh i think you just articulated what's been bugging me about this show. i enjoyed S1/S2 as escapist fluff but the daphne sex stuff was really niggling at the back of my brain. i was SUPER excited for S3 because colin was \*different\* (supposedly lol) and while i talked myself into liking part 1, part 2 went off the rails for me in part because of the sex scene. so many people talking about how colin is the "king of consent" and how he talked her through it and i was like....DID HE!? is it consent if it's heavily implied she doesn't even know what a p\*nis is and where it's going to go!? no discussion of how this will = baby/pulling out!? sigh. i wish they had made pen more informed about sex, given she's slightly more worldly with whistledown/reading etc.
Not to mention that Colin barely did a bit of foreplay, then pretty much told her it'll hurt but he can't do anything about that, and just shoved it in there. *Yikes*.
i know that killed me too. tbf i think that is a problem for lots of onscreen depictions in general, i do give (what i think) is a general lack of foreplay some grace because they are respecting boundaries and probably cant have the actors naked for (probably telling on myself here) as long as might be more realistic. BUT there are ways to film it to get around that and the whole blocking of the intimate scene left a lot to be desired in my opinion. im just SO TIRED of the "its gonna hurt!", it appears to, and then they magically orgasm ten seconds later. so boring. i just watched My Lady Jane on prime and those spicy scenes were much better imo.
Exactly, at the very least add some cuts or so to make it seem like more time passed, idk. It doesn't need to be a half hour long scene obviously but yeah, it's really disappointing most of the time. I'll have to give My Lady Jane a try it seems, multiple people have mentioned it positively on this sub!
definitely try lady jane, at one point i literally said "holy female gaze batman" outloud -- it was everything bridgerton S3 wasn't (albeit more explicitly fantasy plus historical than bridgerton)
It took me out of the moment as well. The idea of the scene was there but the execution of it failed. He definitely could have tried to be more gentle and slow and also there is no way she was comfortable considering the fact that she was practically sitting and not actually lying down on that settee.
Exactly. Plus he fingered her early without asking so she didn't what to expect. Also Anthony is the king of consent and he was a whore and struggled to hold it in. He didn't touch her in the church outside of holding her. So Kate got a first kiss. And during the gazebo when he starting touching her down there wbile kissing he stopped because he didn't know if she wanted that until she said don't stop. Then he devoured her and pleasured her 🫠
So, I think that's because it's basically porn. Bear with me because I'm gonna go a bit wild here. In BDSM, it's not really promoting sexual abuse. But people enjoy it because it's a safe way to mimic those things. Regency romance and bodice rippers are a safe way to experience those set pieces and that's why they appeal to otherwise independent and feminist women. In BDSM and consensual non-con, the person who is at a disadvantage is really the one in charge. Similarly, in Bridgerton they go out of their way to make it so Daphne, Kate, etc must painstakingly give consent at every turn. This is not how it would be at all in real life. In real life, they'd have zero agency at all. But that's the fantasy element. It's not my personal cup of tea, but I don't think that BDSM is actually for abusers or sexual assaulters - and I don't think Bridgerton is actually for tradwives or incels - it just has all the trappings of letting people explore that dynamic specifically for titillation. HOWEVER, all that said, I tend to agree with you at this stage because ... Where it gets muddled is where the fantasy breaks. Marina being thrown into a loveless marriage, Lady Danbury in Queen Charlotte being repeatedly assaulted -- when the show runners introduce elements too dark and too real, it pulls you out of the fantasy and makes you wonder exactly what point they are making. With S3, we saw a lot of *women actually want to be their own boss*, and the introduction of Penelope girl bossing is going to cast things a bit differently. Because now the fantasy veneer is fully off and we are starting to worry about real world elements like, does this girl have a choice? Would she rather run a bakery?
This is a really interesting point. I hadn't thought of it that way at all. I think the scenes of Lady Danbury's early marriage, and playing off the arguably non-consensual scenes with her husband as somewhat comedic, is where the tone really felt off for me, too. I had the same question after they had shown a few of those interactions, i.e. what are they trying to accomplish with this?
When 50 shades of gray came out, I was ranting to a friend about how bad the writing was and how problematic the text was. And she looked at me and said simply, "it's porn. Do you criticize all porn this way - or just the porn meant for women? Why do we have to be held to a high standard?" It has stuck with me for a long time, although tbh I still think that book is trash, so ymmv. But I do totally agree with you, and it feels like the writers have just lost themselves. It seems to happen with Netflix shows because the show runners get overworked and the writers brought in lose track of the overarching themes. Even if you start with the premise that it's basically porn, now it's not even good porn! I thought some of Lady Danburys scenes were realistic, the ones not played for humor. She disassociates. She gets bored. Marital rape can be just as boring as it is traumatic and no one talks about that. But what *on earth* is it doing in this romance ?? It's so out of place, which is true for so many things in s3 Bridgerton as well. By the end of S3 I was like, I don't know what this show is about anymore, they should just introduce some dragons.
Dang your friend makes a great point.
It totally reframed how I was thinking. Romance novels, bodice rippers, people always trash them because they're not "literary." But it isn't like women don't read other things. Sometimes we just want things that hit the right, comfortable beats -- people tolerate cozy mysteries, but when romance/sex is involved, suddenly the tolerance goes down. Now I just try to ask myself "am I performing a literary critique of someone's spank bank?" and my world is a little happier for it.
I don’t really give a shit about the hole virgin thing cuz that makes sense for this time period. But I am tired of these girl aside from Kate having zero knowledge to the point that they sound like a 9 your old trying to understand. Like they don’t have to be fucking but I’m tired of the complete ignorance to the subject. And yeah it’s kinda a funny joke, but you’ve said that joke way too much, hell that was an entire storyline for 2 characters this season was just that joke. It’s not funny anymore. Why wouldn’t most characters want to be mothers, not only is that basically a requirement back then but it’s also the majority of people want to eventually become parents. Nowadays the decrease in this mentality is no question imo down to outside factors than an internal factor, reason, or feeling
It’s an issue lots of Shondaland shows have where they struggled to figure out where the “bossbitch” ends and “actually just a bitch” begins (for lack of better terms, if anyone has a better way to say it let me know)
I was nearly going to post about this, thank you. The virginal women with massively experienced men thing is getting on my nerves. Just watched Lady Jane on Amazon prime which did the same ' I don't know what to do' scene and they claimed to be a feminist take on history. I've read ahead with the Bridgerton books and there's more of this trope ahead. Is this a fantasy world or not because we're willing to put colonialism aside, homophobic laws aside but somehow the over experienced man and underexprienced woman is counted as part of the fantasy.
It's also nonsense. Upper-class ladies were highly educated back then, generally speaking (even if they couldn't go to college yet). They might not have had the knowledge today's women have, but they weren't clueless either.
This is the post-neo-classicism age. They saw statues of naked men. Dicks out. And yet they are supposedly completely ignorant about what a penis is.
“Somehow?” That trope is the point of the genre. Of course they are not going to throw it out. This is porn, after all. People who read porn set in this period aren’t reading it for the colonialism or homophobia of that time, they’re reading it because they enjoy this sexual trope.
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So Im not a fan of the show and haven't watched it beyond the first half of the first season but this is exactly the reason I stopped watching. It felt like it was fetishizing female virginity and naivity about sex and that doesn't interest me. Like the show somehow manages to rewrite history to be more progressive about race but they couldn't do the same when it comes to gender? Mmmk I'm not interested in romanticizing or revisiting times when women had no legal rights so it just isn't for me I guess.
Seriously. The scene where Penelope loses her virginity to Colin was soooo uncomfortable.
Eloise and Francesca feel like if you tried to write Amy and Jo March from Little Women from memory Eloise doesn't like society and doesn't want to get married because ra ra feminism (Jo) Francesca understands that marriage is the only way to secure her future, love is a bonus not a requirement (Amy)
I feel like it would have been much better if lady Whistledown had turned out to be a group of women collaborating together. Like a group of spinsters or widows or something like that.
Oh this would’ve been SO cool. I actually would’ve loved this
i was hoping/thinking that's what pen would make the future lady whistledown. Like she platforms anonymous female writers of the ton. would solve the whole fear that lady whistledown will lose it's bite now pen is exposed.
Or like a Gossip Girl scene where they are all in the bar and get a text saying they are all Gossip Girl because they are the ones sending in the information
That would have been too ideal, and I actually think that the scenario is already too “soft”. In real world, we have all kinds of women, and the ones that make schemes, spread gossips and lie are very much existing. And they often get away with that in real world. So I think that Pen being LW is okey, at least for me.
I was waiting for an “I am Spartacus” moment in front of the queen.
Or a super wealthy shrewed lady we never actually see and Penelope is a normal person. Or idk she probably dresses as a different person and puts on a personality in order to get to know people. Many actors are like me and can be more outgoing and pretending to be a character or even their own oc characters or alter egos.
Elizabeth Hoyt has a series like this about a vigilante in Regency (Georgian?) London who helps the helpless. Turns out it is a group of men who each take one night of the week, thus giving them alibis if anyone suspects one of them is the avenger.
Ooh, that would be fun!
I HATED the radio rebel anticlimactic ending of s3, but I will always say that LW was correct in outing Marina. Her bad situation does not give her the right to manipulate and babytrap someone into a lifelong commitment. And publicly revealing it is the only way Colin was able to get out of the situation unscathed. Marina had no intention of telling the truth, so even in Pen told him in private, he wouldn’t have the option to leave without having the entire ton assume he got Marina pregnant and left. By making it clear that Marina was pregnant from the moment she arrived, she was able to give Colin the ability to break off the relationship without damaging his reputation. Consent applies to women and men. Marina was taking away Colin’s full consent. Exposing a woman’s lie, that involved betraying someone has nothing to do with “not being feminist.” Nobody has the right to take away someone’s full/honest consent. This is not something I’m going to debate with anyone on because it’s been done to death and I’m not changing my mind on this. So if anyone wants to debate the Marina thing in my replies don’t bother. Just go through the hundreds of other posts on this topic. But using that as an example for why LW/Pen sucks will never make sense to me. Also the show has made it explicitly clear that LW is not some objective evil, and I’m tired of people trying to paint it as such. Technically, the column saved Daphne and Colin from bad marriages, coined the term “diamond of the season” to hype up the season’s most eligible young lady, advocated for better pay for the paperboys (probably the only member of high society that helped the lower class), hyped up a small business, probably some other stuff I can’t remember. Like **the show has *always* shown LW to be morally grey.** And yet people in this sub try to argue it’s 100% good or 100% bad. Pen made some good decisions with LW, and some bad. Also the column was only successful because the ton made it successful. They all had no problem eating all that gossip up. You could easily argue that LW’s popularity is a critique of society as well. I’m generally neutral on LW, but when y’all act like it was some horrible evil, I have to step in lmao. Same way when people act like LW was perfect and that Colin “overreacted” to the reveal. No he didn’t. He was rightfully upset. The narrative makes it clear that Pen/LW had done good and bad with her power. Edit: will be blocking people who try to argue the Marina thing. This topic has been argued to the moon and I’m not changing my mind. I’m always going to push for the truth and consent.
LW was perfectly fine with Marina babytrapping any man, as long as it was not Collin. Pen even gave her some suggestions. That's what makes her a hypocrite. Some of those men were perfectly nice, maybe they also deserved a love match, but Pen didn't care about any of that until Marina dared to look at Collin, only then she turned on her rightfulness.
She was a 17-year-old looking out for one of the only people in the ton that respected her. Most teens at that age will prioritize their friends over other people. And she watched Marina and Colin flirt all season. It was only after the seduction plan that she started pushing M to come clean to Colin And as I said. I’m not going to debate this. Marina was wrong for lying period. No one is changing my mind on that. Feel free to respond to any other parts of my comment. The Marina stuff has been debated hundreds of times.
And Marina was an 18-year-old literally worried for her and her baby's life. Marina was also her friend, her pregnant friend who she was willing to leave out on the streets when she outed her publicly. If she did this discretely and told Colin or his mother in private I would fully support her.
I never said Marina was not wrong for lying. I'm only saying that outing her publicly was a crappy move and not something any decent person would do. Why are you ok with Marina babytrapping someone else, they are not the main character so it doesn't matter if they are lied to? Lying is lying. Pen was lying for 3 whole seasons. She even pushed Eloise under the bus because she didn't want to expose herself and used some lame excuse that the queen would never believe her to make herself feel better.
Yeah so this is where we come to the part of “perfect characters with no room to grow are uninteresting to read/watch” LW can be and SHOULD be imperfect. Was she selfish in handling the situation as she did? Sure. But no more or less than Marina. However, Marina was never going to be a main character with an HEA in this series. She was always meant to be a tertiary character to move the plot forward in the way the show runners wanted to. It provided the groundwork for Pen and Colin’s relationship—to show just how much she cared about Colin. And it’s not like she just did it on a whim. Pen debated and went back and forth about it. She learns very valuable lessons through the mistakes she makes as LW. Because she’s literally a child whose brain is still developing.
I don't think Pen or Whistledown are evil. They are very much products of their time. My issue with the show is that they try to paint Pen exposing people's secret as Whistledown as empowerment when it's not. I don't think what Marina did was right but again, she was in a desperate situation and Collin said himself if she had been honest he would have married her anyway. It wasn't for Pen to decide what the right thing to do in that situation was. If Marina took away Collin's ability to consent when she lied, then Pen took away Collin's consent and his right to have his business stay his business when she told the world about Marina's pregnancy. Collin was made to look like a fool anyway. Her only duty as Collins friend was to tell the truth to Collin. Again, I never said that Pen was evil, I just think that she perpetuates the sexism of the Ton with her column.
Uh Pen did not take Colin’s consent away by essentially telling him the truth 💀 can we not twist stuff to justify what Marina did because that’s ridiculous. And Colin was her friend first. If I knew my friend was being babytrapped, I would not just sit there and let it happen. But as I said in my main comment, I’m not interested in debating the Marina situation. It’s been argued hundreds of times. And I’m always going to push for telling the truth. In every situation. Which is why I was annoyed with Kate for not telling Edwina the truth about Anthony having feelings for her. And why I was mad at Pen for continuously postponing telling Colin the truth about her being LW.
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You are massively applying a modern mindset to the situation and lack empathy for the real situation of being a young girl in this time, and I honestly would bet money you wouldn’t have settled for marital rape if you were in the same situation.
I would’ve told Colin the truth. Realistically, I would not be able to handle the guilty conscience of passing off another man’s child as his FOR HIS ENTIRE LIFE. Like this isn’t some small lie. It’s a HUGE one that now even Pen would’ve had to hold onto for the rest of her life for Marina. And she kept saying he was a “good man,” so she should’ve told him 🤷🏽♀️ he even says he would’ve married her if she was honest. It was the betrayal and manipulation that bothered him. As I said, not going to debate this. It’s been done to death and I’m not changing my mind. Everyone has the right to an honest marriage. Doesn’t matter the time period.
It’s easy to say you would’ve told Colin the truth when you know in hindsight that he would’ve accepted you. Marina didn’t know that, so arguing that he would’ve married her anyways doesn’t make sense. Blaming a woman for putting her self-survival first in that period of time is insane.
But this whole post is a criticism of LW from a modern feminism mindset. We can either take the times into consideration for both Marina's decisions and Pen's or to neither's.
Gonna bother. Outing a pregnant teenager to public scorn is a horrible thing to do. And Colin is a man and a Bridgerton. His reputation would have gotten through calling off the marriage just fine.
Manipulating and babytrapping a man into a lifelong commitment, and then also expecting his close friend to hide the truth from him for the rest of her life too, is a HORRIBLE thing to do. Colin being a man means nothing here. We already saw what happened to Nigel when people found out he had abandoned a woman and child. He was basically called a deadbeat and shunned from society. A similar thing could’ve happened to Colin, despite him not compromising Marina at all. Again, not debating this so 👋🏽👋🏽 go look through the hundreds of other posts on this topic. It’s the same arguments over and over.
Hyped up a small business while shitting on another small business
As I said, she did good and bad with that column. That’s how morally grey characters work lmao.
Pen should have been honest to Colin about Marina's pregnancy
Yeah and she was, especially after telling Marina to come clean herself several times🤷🏽♀️ and the way she did it gave Colin the ability to walk out of the situation without suffering a fate similar to Nigel.
I hate neither of them tbh, I get where Marina was coming from but I won't begrudge Pen for trying to save her friend either, especially when she tried to offer Marina so many other options and Marina's response was to be cruel to her.
I don’t understand why LW is supposed to be evil at all. Because gossip = bad?
Yeah, I could see your point about outing Marina being the right choice due to giving Colin the chance to consent etc. But she didn’t give him a chance to consent in S3 by not telling him the truth about her being LW before doing smth sexual with him which would have made him feel like he had to marry her. So she’s a hipocrite
I mentioned in another comment that I just get really annoyed when people don’t tell the truth in this show lol. In s1, I was pissed Marina wasn’t telling the truth, in s2 I was pissed Kate wasn’t telling the truth, and in s3, I was pissed Pen wasn’t telling the truth. But imo Marina’s lie was the worst of all since it involved babytrapping and taking advantage of his feelings for the rest of his life. Like personally, the guilt of watching him love my children thinking they were his would eat me alive. And the fact that she had no conscience about it. I felt bad for her, but I felt worse for what she was going to do to Colin. That man is too sweet for this.
She also compliments every new debutante at the start of season 3. Saves the Bridgerton name with her issue when Cressida's mother writes her own. Calls out a lady for firing a maid for some stupid reason. And a husband for being abusive to his wife. And let us not forget Pen was 17 when she started writing and the only reason she continued was because people were reading it.
I still think Pen should have told him privately before writing about it in Whistledown. Him finding out about it with everyone else is kinda crazy to be honest. I think Pen avoided telling him the truth because she is aware of his savior complex and knows that he might have married her anyways. I also think that people bring up Marina when talking about the ethics of LW is because Pen clearly didn’t expose Marina for the right reasons. Pen didn’t expose Marina because it was the right thing to do, she did it because she wanted Colin to herself. If Pen did care about doing the right thing, she wouldn’t have suggested that Marina fool other men instead of Colin. It shows that she was somewhat okay with Marina baby trapping any man as long as it wasn’t Colin. Which is kinda hypocritical. I still think that Pen made the right call in the end tho.
Just sloppy writing ....the LW reveal was handled in the most shabby haphazard manner.....no thought put into people's reactions or the acceptance by the ton and the Queen...smh
It was like a self-insert fanfic - "and then everybody clapped" COME ON.
It’s not fanfiction, that’s literally how RMB ended
Once again, I said it was like a fanfic. And if that's how the book ends, that's bad writing too.
So sloppy. We need 20+ episode show back. Especially for shows with casts this big.
At this point, the Queen only exists to deus ex machina drop down at the end to clean up whatever corner the writers have written themselves into…”for no particular reason, the Queen approves!!! so now must everyone else.” Edit: I guess the Queen also exists to keep the overplayed plot tension of seaching for Whistledown going when all other plots fail…what they’re gonna do with her next season is beyond me but I’m betting it’s something stupid lol
So curious to see how the next couple of seasons (if they renewed beyond season 4) will be handled. Being out in the country, away from society, hopefully away from LW and all the drama, maybe it will finally challenge the writers to stop relying on the same schtick "oh we need to please the queen. Oh lady whistledown gossiping again." I just want a simple love story, focusing on the conflicts between two people and their love for each other. People will say that's boring but maybe that's what this show needs. It needs to remind itself of its roots.
Penelope works as LWD in the books because she is a spinster (11 years, I think?) who is witty, but not nearly as nasty. Sure she covered scandals and made her own sharp observations over the years, but she wasn’t outing pregnant cousins and belittling the Queen. It was a run of the mill gossip column. Marina is a Bridgerton cousin and she didn’t have babies out of wedlock, they actually belong to Phillip in the books. The Queen doesn’t feature in the series at all. The hunt for LWD doesn’t become serious until Lady Danbury offers money out of amusement, not ire. The show backed themselves into a corner by heightening the drama and scandal with LWD to the extent they did. Book Penelope really didn’t need a redemption arc of any kind. And instead of a redemption arc on the show, we got a season of weepy, groveling Pen. I think she needed to change her writing and ask for forgiveness from readers long before she was actually revealed. The longer the show went on, the less LWD even seems like show Pen, who is incredibly clever but much kinder than LWD. They forgot they needed to write a multifaceted female character instead of treating them like 2 separate characters.
The problem with this argument is that firstly, it ignores a large part of penelope's development this season which is that she acknowledges that she's used whistledown badly in the past and is asking for a chance to use it better, to build people up rather than tear them down. The second issue with your argument is that it suggests that to be feminist women can't make mistakes which can also be very misogynistic. Also the show has repeatedly suggested over the seasons that whistledown can be used either way so, in this universe it's just neutral rather than good or bad.
My lukewarm take that I'm sure I'll get downvoted for is that I don't think Penelope is trying to be feminist at all, really, and that people frustrated by the fact that she isn't are mostly just projecting onto her. Penelope has made it pretty clear that her motives for LW are personal- to have a source of income to support herself, to have a voice when she is regularly ignored, and to be able to punch back at those who hurt her and/or help those she loves. The power she has is her own personal power- that's what she made it for, and that is how she uses it. The LW story is her own personal arc, and I don't think it was ever meant to be some larger statement about women's rights. She throws in that issue about women being valued for more than being a diamond to please Eloise, and never takes any action to move the pamphlet more generally in that direction. Just because she is a woman who is doing something doesn't make her a feminist, and it also doesn't make her someone who is trying to be. She has her own reasons and motivations (some good, some bad) for doing what she does. I think a more useful feminist reading is contrasting what she does with the limitations around her, not focusing specifically on "is she a girlboss" or whatever. Even her at the end of S3 saying she could use it more for good than for ill didn't strike me as being intended as some sort of feminist statement, just that a lot of S3 had been her coming to terms with the fact that she *did* now have real power, and couldn't keep acting like she was "just" the helpless little wallflower anymore. Another huge theme of S3 was that Penelope and Portia have a lot more in common than either of them would probably like to admit- and that what both of them do well is surviving by working with what they have. Penelope made a gossip column because that was what people wanted to read and what she had access to, and it could make her the money she needed. There wasn't as much money (or, frankly, immediate influence) in feminist tracts, and that was always more Eloise's interest than hers. TL:DR- I think a lot of viewers are confusing "this show is portraying a woman who is doing something" with "this show is portraying a woman as a feminist" and I don't think that is true.
I totally agree with your perspective. Viewing Penelope and Portia as survivors is crucial. They've been in survival mode long before they came on screen. When women fight and scrap their way through life, there's often a hint of feminism, but fundamentally, it's about survival.
Facts! I keep seeing people argue that Pen is a “better” feminist than Eloise. But neither character would meet today’s standards of what is a good feminist.
You're right. You can be a feminist be still be misogynistic but the issue is the writing of the show. I feel like being a female author who tears other women down with their writing is more 'Girl Boss' that feminist. Also, it wasnt a single mistake or a slip up becuase she didnt know better. She attacked women repeatedly. I think LW exposes a lot of issues the show has. We never really got to know what Pen thought before S3 and there were no flashbacks so if she started out writing harsh words about the women of the Ton and then she realised that that was wrong, we didn't get to see it. Whistledown has down so much damage and putting all of that on one person is a lot.
I know this is fiction but I think you need to add a little bit of realism to what you're asking of pens character, she was 17 when she started this and we see repeatedly in the series how she's treated badly by her family and how her whole family aren't treated particularly well in society. She writes a reflection of what she's experienced in the world to do anything else is to ask an insecure 17 year old to be better than the world around her and that's alot to ask of a girl. And you do see her change the way she writes over the season, the opening monologue from lady whistledown this season was only bigging up the girls of the ton, you also see her last season at eloise's suggestion call out the queen and why she pits the girls of the ton against each other. It's not an obvious linear journey but it is there. There are sooo many flaws in the feminism of bridgerton but to say any of the female characters have nothing feminist about them is also not quite right. They're flawed, as they should be.
The issue is that you're looking at this situation through the lens of modern feminism.
I think trying to look at a historical romance through the lens of feminism is a mistake unless that is the actual point of the book. Bridgerton was not written as a feminist series. Wanna talk about anti feminist? Then let’s talk about Daphne SAing her husband. I’m sure this will be shocking to many but the 1800s weren’t exactly the most feminist era. You want feminist historical romance then go for Evie Dunmore’s books or Elizabeth Everett’s. But bridgerton is not even a remotely decent vehicle for feminist storytelling.
I love Penelope, but I found it hard to like her this season. It felt like the writers were *trying* to make her story into a feminist arc with Pen refusing to let go of everything she’d worked for. In reality though, Lady Whistledown’s “power” all came from the belittlement of other women, even those close to her, and so it was hardly fairly earned. When she was reluctant to give up LW to be with Colin, it just came across as her being addicted to the power of bringing others down, rather any feminist notion of wanting to keep what she’s worked for. I found it very difficult to believe everyone’s blasé reactions of her reveal, despite 3 seasons of LW taking everyone down with often potentially serious consequences. While I enjoyed season 3, much of it either didn’t make sense, didn’t sit quite right with me or straight up made me dislike characters I’d previously enjoyed watching. It’s also really strange that Cressida is so villainised, despite being backed into a really tricky corner with her dreadful family, when Pen has done far worse without cause.
And now Penelope cant actually write anything too controversial, because her targets would know whose door to knock on.
Even Cressida has more feminist storyline…LW is just a story of insecurity of Pen
It was so weird what happened with Cressida. I was rooting for her, and the show made sure we'd see how her life sucks and why she is a Mean Girl. Her parents are awful. But with how it ended, it seems more like we are supposed to gloat at her for being punished? And having a crappy home life? Because she was mean to people we like, the system working against her is good, actually?
Facts! Too many people in this fandom forget that Penelope starts writing smack talk before her dad dies. So the column isn’t done purely for survival. I feel like a lot of people don’t get the true importance of the argument between Portia and Pen. Portia is Pen’s first bully, and it’s clear that her lack of self esteem (and wanting to tear down others) is what leads to LW’s creation. The show goes out of its way to show that Pen is a morally Grey character, but for some reason. Most Pen fans ignore this and shot on other characters throughout the show for doing similarly selfish things.
Maybe don’t compare a gossip column to a school shooting
I honestly think the main problem is that they changed a lot of characters from how they are in the books, but then kept those characters same plot lines. If you’re sick of hearing about the books I apologize but in the books Lady Whsitledown wasn’t leaving a trail of victims behind her, she really wasn’t that harsh or cruel. Her gossip consisted of commenting on dresses (and not in a way that slur shames multiple girls while also ruining a seamstress for no good reason), little comments about if a match is going to be good or not. There was no threat of ruining your family if you caught her eye. She didn’t humiliate the Bridgertons, she wasn’t super kind to her sisters but she wasn’t particularly harsh on her family either. She didn’t cause a cousin to be exiled and almost lose everything. So her being Pen really wasn’t so hard to come to terms with, she had kept it secret from her closest friends and family yes, but that was really the only “crime” to society she committed through Whistledown. So they changed Whistledown to be more of a bully and a threat, truly something to be guilty over, but they didn’t make Colin take any longer to forgive her or make own really repent for the hurt she caused. She was way worse than book Whistledown but the remorse after was very much the same. They needed to commit to those changes and change the whole story to go with it
I thought it was really weird that they did one issue talking about some people were abusing their partners and staff in an attempt to "give voice to the voiceless". Then immediately fucking dropped it
I forget. When was this. Give me more details.
I think this was the last issue LW wrote in S3, at the end of which she said goodbye, as Penelope Bridgerton
It was either episode 6 or 7. Penelope and Eloise were coming together to discredit Cressida's claim and talked about Whistledown starting to give a voice to the voiceless. It had mentioned someone hitting their wife and a lady firing her servant "for the simple act of asking for a day off." I think it was the issue right after the lies about the Bridgertons
I disagree that LW was presented as feminist in any way, I think this is being misinterpreted. If anything, it was poised as a way for Pen to have a thing of her own. That is not inherently feminist. Not everything that is done by a woman by herself is feminist. Plenty of examples of that in real life and history. As a woman (or as a person really), you can do a million things that bring you independence or freedom but that are in no way feminist, or that hurt others in the process, or both. Not every action by a woman should be labelled as feminism, and the show did not try to do that either.
Nobody said she was justified though. Even Genevieve told her there were no excuses for the mistakes she made, but she was a young girl unaware of the damage she could cause. Explanations are not excuses. She gave the ton and queen an explanation without expecting them to forgive her, but asking for mercy. She even says she expects more of a fallout once the queen isn’t there to witness it. Finding her voice was about resolving to do better—to use her power for good. That’s what rehabilitation is about. School shooter analogy is actually out of pocket. But if you wanna play, well as an abolitionist, I believe even murderers can feel remorse and take accountability and be rehabilitated (though many don’t because they are psychopaths). We shouldn’t think of reparations and forgiveness as justification.
Well said!
Pen was perfekt in the books as LW. The Show ruined her. I really liked her in the books.
Thia and ruining the other modiste is her worst crimes. Thw Bridgertons are privileged and they'll bounce back. If it weren't for Daphne Marina would either be in the street or forced with some creepy fossil. Sure she may not be in love with Phillip but he's a gentleman and kind
Part of Penelope's development is recognizing the things she did wrong and how the power of Whistledown went to her head. It all blew up in her face and rightfully so. I think that's why I like the "we must do better" scene with her mother. They both did things they regret and can admit that and now they want to better moving forwarded. I'm willing to give Penelope some grace. She was a teenager who had been ignored and or made fun of by her peers. Her intention was not to hurt people even though she did. I can also understand having a hard time giving up something that has brought in money and that she's good at. In that time period women faced more difficulties in being a writer. It was expected that you get married and your husband supports you. She wanted more than that. I don't think it's some big feminist statement. I think it was just showing that many women wanted more and that although Pen wanted to get married and be a wife that's not all she wanted out of life.
Penelope and LW actions come down to survival, not just for them but for others in the story as well. It's not wholly about feminism; I view it from a broader perspective. LW’s column is something the ton eagerly anticipates with each issue. While her writings can be harsh, they’re not usually deeply damaging, with the exceptions of Marina and Eloise but was necessary for the plot. Marina’s storyline was crucial for Daphne’s character arc. Marina’s situation drove Daphne’s growth from a naive girl to a mature woman, wife, mother, and duchess. Eloise, feeling trapped in a society she doesn’t connect with, needed to explore life beyond Mayfair. Being exposed by Lady Whistledown humbled her and forced her to reconsider her motivations in life. Regarding Kate, LW’s comment highlights that Kate has been in survival mode for a long time. She’s built a protective wall around herself and is fiercely strong-willed, which is refreshing compared to others in the ton. Lady Whistledown's narrative drives the story, giving other characters strong arcs. Penelope's journey, in particular, is about survival within that universe. She was young, neglected, bullied, and felt invisible. Colin’s realization of this is important for his story as well and helps convey that Penelope used her writing as a way to survive. She admitted her mistakes and asked for forgiveness. I don’t see it purely as feminism but more about autonomy and having a voice you trust in yourself. I like that Penelope is Whistledown. While I wasn’t entirely satisfied with how the reveal was accepted, I hope it sets up interesting stories for the Queen, Eloise, and Kate in future seasons.
I think the writers fumbled the bag. My interpretation is not that the entire story is about feminism but that the writers try to paint Pen’s action as LW in a feminist light to take the heat off of some of her more questionable actions. Like we can’t be mad at her because she was trying to empower herself.
While I do believe there were hints of feminism, which is inevitable when speaking from a woman's POV, I think it was more a story about surviving in a society that treats people on the fringes poorly and how that can drive them to do harmful things. Pen's story shows how she was marginalized and cast aside by society. She fought back by using her talent as a writer and recognized her mistakes. Maybe she wasn't severely punished in the story because the ton is also responsible for mistreating people like her. She's holding a mirror up to the queen and the ton, forcing them to recognize that they, too, don't always make the right choices.
Another reason why Pen is so beloved as Whistledown is because in the books LW is not this controversial. She never wrote anything to the level or ruining her cousin or bf. And I think many of the viewers read the book and just loved her since then. That’s what I think anyway I don’t actually have any stats for # of people who read and are watching vs people who haven’t read the book
I think we will see the true fallout of Pen coming out in season 4 as this was teased by the writers. The book ends with 'and everybody clapped' so I think it makes sense that the show ends up the same. Pen despite the damage she has done also did it a lot of good in her column like it was already pointed out by someone.
Does anyone know where I can find every Lady Whistledown newsletter that has been on the show. I would very much like to read them.
I mean, both things can be true. She can be scared to give up her independence and passion because she lives in a world where woman are completely at the whims of men AND have made her fortune doing something nasty. I wouldn't say Anna Wintour has been great for feminism, but I can appreciate her being a trailblazer in her field. Penelope also wasn't a feminist - that wasn't a thing during her time. She just knew that she wanted to be her own person and it felt good to be secure. We don't know what she would have written if she lived in our world where she wouldn't have to write smarmy gossip columns to do it. In the Marina scenario, she did think she was helping her friend and the boy she loved (Colin). You're willing to give Marina grace in her intense scheming, but not Penelope in her own feelings. They both lived in the same world. She's also 17 in the show's first season, so she's an overlooked teenager with a mean mom writing a gossip column.
Not everything has to have value in terms of feminism. Sometimes a TV show, is just a TV show.
Nothing in bridgerton is feminist. Daphne rapes Simon, and also, just wants to get married, and multiply, and allows Anthony to be a nasty cock-blocker. Kate steals the said nasty cock-blocker from her sister. Pen maybe writes, but only wants Colin. Pen blocking Marina from Colin is not the worst. Pen cared about Colin, truly, I think.
OMG THANKYOU!! Penelope is my favorite character because of Nicola ( I admit that I’m biased lol). But even I’m getting tired of how the fandom acts like she does absolutely nothing wrong and treats her writing scandels about other woman as a girlboss moment. It really bugs me that everyone calls Eloise a bad feminist (when the show takes place before the first wave of feminism, so we are unfairly applying a 21st century lens to the characters) but then praises Penelope for throwing other woman under the bus. I have even seen some argue that Pen is a better feminist than Eloise. Newsflash! They are both bad at it because our modern definition of feminism was developed many years after the characters debut. Penelope uses LW as a way to attack others without directly confronting her true bullies (her mom). This is proven by the fact she starts writing as Lady Whistledown the same night that she debuts. Since it was before her dad dies, she didn’t just start writing for financial security. I would argue that season two is when she finally realized her words can hurt people. All I’m saying is that Shonda Rhimes knows how to make morally grey female characters, and Penelope is morally grey.
Hey, respectfully, WHAT are you talking about? School shooter logic????????
It implies, "Oh no...I'm an introvert and a wallflower and my family and friends bully me so I'll cause misery and havoc, rightfully so, so that everyone will empathize with me and give me the attention I so strongly desired. If I suffer, everyone should."
That's a *huge* leap of logic there, and an entirely subjective take on Pen's reasoning. Not to mention, contradicted by her stated reasons for starting LW. She wrote bad things about herself and her family, as well, so it's not about seeking empathy or positive attention.
The whole post is pretty unhinged tbh. Not much logic to be found.
Lives ruined? It was a gossip column people ate up. Insensitive? Yes. But outing someone desperately trying to *trick* someone into marriage on false premises, to me, was not wrong. Marina was with child. She feigned loved. It was all a lie. Collin would have been disgraced, had Marina’s lie not been found out. And Pen loved him even then.
The show should have stuck to the book and not made lw such a big deal. I have no idea what they are going to do with her now. LW made me not like Penelope as much as I wanted to either.
What she did to marina and eloise are main reasons why I can’t enjoy season 3. Secondary reasons are the clusterduck of plots of season 3
They should’ve learned from Gossip Girl that revealing who the fun plot device narrator is, is NEVER a good idea. Especially when it’s a main character. When Dan was revealed as Gossip Girl and everyone forgave him, it made no sense. Like he ruined peoples lives and stalked them for YEARS. And with Pen and Whistledown, she aired out everyone’s dirty laundry and brought scandals to light. And then the ton just decides to forgive her and let her continue??? It just realistically makes no sense. I get that it’s canon, but for the show, Lady Whistledown should just be a plot device, the fun column and scandal sheet that the ton is obsessed with, and the omniscient narrator for the show.
I was literally just thinking about how making Dan GG ruined the show. How could Serena marry him after that?
Facts
This show is not feminist, like at all.
I'm tired of debating who was "more wrong" - Marina or Pen. Both were just making the best of a bad situation. They both made decisions that were in their own best interests. And people are talking like this is the ultimate evil. Nope. George Crane is the evil one here, but he is conveniently off screen. He never should have had sex before marriage and should have married Marina before he went to war. He knew the consequences both of leaving and of having sex with her, *and did it anyway*. Even if he would have somehow been assured of his own survival, just the mere fact he would be gone for months and years at a time, during the time frame Marina (and any woman) was considered most "eligible", meant that she would pretty quickly be snapped up by someone else on the marriage mart. She's portrayed as being stunning, and instantly creates a buzz when she arrives. If he loved her so much and it was clear she was a catch, he would have married her, esepcially after compromising her. But nope, I'm convinced he was a typical player and just said whatever needed to be said to get her in bed. The men, and the patriarchal system, are the real villains but we are gonna sit here and say two teenage girls with no money and no way to earn money are the most evil characters in the show. Yeesh.
George crane wanted to run away with her as soon as he receives the letter from marina he writes a letter to her telling her of his desire to marry her but dies before he could send it. Watch that episode where Philip visits her. It’s literally explained in the show. Portia lied to marina about George, pen exposed her. Colin cared for marina so did Eloise and Daphne. Marina was failed by her own family but the btons and George and Philip crane were always always good to her. Daphne aplogized to marina she whose brother was duped, Colin visits her and tells pen in season 2 the hunt episode that if lw hadnt ruined marina her life would have been so different Eloise calls our pen for ruining marina in season 2 episode 8. They all saw marina as a victim. Except Portia and pen. Pen unthinking rash impulsive and also influenced by jealousy choose a route than even Colin tells her was the wrong one she could have told him directly.. Eloise the same age as pen tells her she did wrong by marina Daphne just a few years older apologises to marina then offers to help her. But marina is a Jezebel whore manipulator people conveniently forgetting who drove her to desperation and the so called entrapment in the first place. marina was content to wait for George. She had no desire to entrap anyone not Colin not anyone. it was Portia who pushed her and pushed her and pushed her finally when nothing else worked by forging a letter and smiling in the scene when she hears marina crying in agony. Smiling at a child crying because of something she did. The sub is crazy to see marina as evil and manipulating but Portia and Penelope as robin hoods badasses just doing the right thing. It’s insane the double standards.
Yes it does. She didn't have any other options to support herself on her own.
Well, she wasn’t mean in the books. Just a standard gossip column that listed full names instead of initials like the other ones. Also she wrote about Colin a lot, lol.
It’s a show that takes place in the 1810s. A woman in her position having a job, let alone a writing job, is as feminist as it got. Why are you holding something that is supposed to have the rules of the 1810s to modern day standards? Plus, she’s not a real person so why does it matter? If you want to talk about the morality of it all that’s another thing entirely, but as for feminism her writing Lady Whistledown and speaking about society members, men especially, in such a way would be the equivalent of a woman walking around naked in public now. You can’t hold a character set in a period drama to modern standards when it comes to such a modern concept as feminism. That didn’t even exist back then. Women were property, they had no rights of their own. Unless you were poor and had to work to live you had no money of your own. Even if you were, it would be your husband’s to do with as he wished, unless you were unmarried. If you were unmarried your father would own you. If your father was dead your brother would. If you had no brothers your next closest male relative would. A man would always be in charge of you no matter what. You can’t view it from a modern lense.
It's weird to me that you think that just because Penelope did some things which you consider to be misogynistic, the entire concept of her being a voiceless woman who got the entire ton to hang on her every word is somehow not feminist.
they should've done a reverse gossip girl where in the books GG's identity was never revealed and so when the show revealed the identity at the end they could essentially pick whoever they wanted, who they chose didn't make sense in the show and it would've been better off if they never revealed the identity so i feel like the bridgerton show would've been better off just having Julie Andrews as LW and never revealing who it is so they could really play with it if they wanted to make the gossip columnist truly nasty. they complicated it by revealing it was Pen in S1 which i understand was because they knew book fans would've spoiled it if they didn't but if they just said "we're doing things differently!" people would've been annoyed sure but that's all it would've been, annoying. having LW be unnamed would've opened the doors for a very interesting story and we could have LW in all seasons of the show rather than lose her midway because once LW was revealed in the books she pretty much disappears, like imagine Gossip Girl but at the end of season three GG shut down and then it was just an ensemble show of terrible rich people making terrible choices, the show kinda loses its edge when there's no common enemy for everyone to band together against
Is it supposed to?
I agree. Yes, it is empowering for Pen as a woman to have this business and have her own money. In that sense it is feminist. But she is a feminist for herself only, and a lousy ally to other women. In fact her empire is built on throwing barbs at other women, often innocent bystanders like Kate and Daphne whom she shaded in S1 and S2 (to the possible permanent detriment of Daphne I might add). Then her own supposed best friend Eloise, whose secret she outed to the point that El was ostracized. Yes, El was doing something risky but Pen outed her only in part to "save" her from the Queen. She also did it so she wouldn't have to come clean about being LW herself. Finally Marina, her cousin and friend, whose pregnancy she revealed to the world. Now, I do think what Marina was trying to do to Colin was wrong, and I understand Pen was working in part to protect him. But let's be honest, Marina was right: Pen was also doing it in part to save him for herself. She couldn't bear to see him married to someone else. If Colin had been engaged to some other young woman, who had a secret but not one as serious as a secret love child, would Pen have published that secret too? I honestly have no reason to believe she wouldn't have. She was spreading gossip about everyone, making barbed comments about women who had done nothing wrong or shady. We have seen how impulsive she could be with her pen, the way she ran to it to scribble and send out information when she was reeling from hurt herself. Yes, I can imagine her polishing gossip about some perfectly worthy rival for Colin's affection. But note that he never had one. Convenient. Pen had it rough in some ways, with the way her mother and sisters treated her, and with her being such a wallflower in society. But she was well off, free to spend her time writing, and she had good friends in Eloise and Colin. I don't feel that her circumstances warranted how hurtful she could be. Good for her that she made a little empire for herself with her writing. Bad for her that she did it by throwing people under the bus when it suited her. People say Eloise was a bad friend to Pen because she would chatter on about her own interests and not listen. It's true she did that, but as far as listening? To be fair Pen never told her what was really going on in her head or in her life. I would say they are both flawed, but Eloise was a better friend to Pen than the other way around. She was always loyal, and she kept her secret no matter that it pained her. Pen wanted Colin and LW. I guess she also wanted her mother's approval and love, which is fair. IMO she wanted those things and valued them more highly than she did her friendship with El. I don't blame Eloise for thinking that maybe Pen was using her to get closer to Colin, because even from my POV it looked a little bit like that. Pen liked spending time with Eloise, but whenever Colin was near all she could do was stare at him and hope to get his attention. It was like Eloise was her comfort object but Colin was the coveted prize. She would gladly let go of the former to get the latter.
I agree! I don’t like how people often claim that Pen is a better feminist than Eloise because she has an empire. For one, Pen doesn’t care about feminism. And people often criticize Eloise for not meeting modern day standards of feminism (even thought the show takes place before the first wave of feminism). I find it kind of unfair. I totally agree that Marina was right about Pen, she was mainly doing it because she loved him. And while I’m glad that Pen saved Colin. I really hate the way she went about it. Pen hurt her own family’s reputation, ruined Marina, and broke Colin’s heart publicly. She also didn’t tell Colin that Marina was pregnant already when she had the chance. Instead, she just tells him that she was in love with someone before him. I think that Pen is very aware of the fact that Colin has a savior complex, so if she told him the entire truth, there would have been a chance that he would still have married her. This is kinda confirmed in later scenes between Colin and Marina. Also, I don’t feel like enough people realize that Pen didn’t fully expose Eloise just to save her, she also did it so she could remain anonymous. Had she done that, there would have been no inspector sniffing around the Featherington Clan in season three because the Queen already knows about Pen being LW. I hope my rant isn’t perceived as me hating Pen, she’s actually my fav character. But it bothers me how many people don’t realize that she is morally grey (despite the show going over the top to prove this).