The musketeers are back! The perfect antidote to the cold, rainy evenings of January, Athos, Porthos, Aramis and d’Artagnan are back on BBC One to get your blood pumping and your face grinning as they swash their buckles. The Musketeers might have lost its main antagonist to Doctor Who, but in this first episode of season two, that didn’t seem to be holding them back, with a story combining political intrigue with daring rescues. With the Cardinal causing trouble from beyond the grave, and a treacherous new villain on the scene, it’s all systems go!
by Helen Langdon
The musketeers are back! The perfect antidote to the cold, rainy evenings of January, Athos, Porthos, Aramis and d’Artagnan are back on BBC One to get your blood pumping and your face grinning as they swash their buckles. The Musketeers might have lost its main antagonist to Doctor Who, but in this first episode of season two, that didn’t seem to be holding them back, with a story combining political intrigue with daring rescues. With the Cardinal causing trouble from beyond the grave, and a treacherous new villain on the scene, it’s all systems go! by Helen Langdon Sundays are going to be a lot less swashbuckling from here on out, at least until next year and series two of The Musketeers. The final episode saw resolution for most of the major season arcs, and the musketeers managed to ride off blithely into the sunset at the end of the episode. But, oh, they took a convoluted route to get there. by Helen Langdon With a punny title (the knight certainly is taking the queen, wink wink nudge nudge), The Musketeers was back to combining all its best elements this week – action, political scheming and a healthy dose of sex. While Queen Anne was off taking a ritualistic dip in a lake, her husband got drunk and accidentally ordered her death. Like you do. by Helen Langdon At first glance, this week’s Musketeers might seem to be weaker than previous episodes. Other weeks, there’s been mysteries and actual plots and characters not being idiots, whereas The Challenge was eight fights interspersed with some romance scenes. Maybe the plot was thin in the actual episode, but it was full of much-needed development for series-long plots given how late in the series it’s getting. by Helen Langdon For once, last week’s preview gave the basic plot away; it really was about French suffragette witches! Well, kind of – a Comtesse with a strong line in feminism wanted to teach women about astronomy, anatomy and so on. Unfortunately, one of her acolytes came over all Emily Dickinson and ended up dashed on the cobblestones after trying to give a petition to the queen. So, to curb Comtesse de Larroque’s power, the Cardinal accused her of witchcraft. by Helen Langdon After last week’s relative dearth of women, this week’s episode of The Musketeers was fairly bursting at the corset seams with female characters. It was a week where motherhood was the main point of interest, in various forms, with the musketeers generally just along for the ride. Generally, Musketeers adaptations aren’t kind to their womenfolk. They tend to get minor roles, romantic interests to the men, swooning and needing rescuing from every dastardly villain in France. by Helen Langdon Everyone’s had one of those nights where they get absolutely wasted and then wake up sprawled in the mud next to a melon and a corpse. No? Possibly just Porthos then, who in this week’s episode found himself sentenced to death and rescued in the space of a couple of minutes. But it wasn’t our usual brave boys doing the rescuing – this week Porthos’ past came back to haunt him in the form of the Court of Miracles. By Helen Langdon The Good Soldier, episode four of The Musketeers, might as well have been named “The One With All The Capes.” Capes were out in full force this week, swirling around the Cardinal as he did something particularly Machiavellian and smartening up the musketeers on parade. d’Artagnan still isn’t a musketeer, and so didn’t get a cape, but for some reason he was still on parade. It’s starting to feel like he’s the regiment mascot. After Athos' destructive trip to the past last episode, it was Aramis' turn to flashback to a psychologically traumatising incident. It was a lot less sunny and a lot more tinged with blue. By Helen Langdon In this week's Musketeers, our intrepid band was escorting a dodgy customer to Paris and the waiting Cardinal. But, as luck would have it, a lot of Europe wanted to kill him. On the plus side, it had finally stopped snowing, so the musketeers got to ride through some green countryside. This week’s episode was crammed full of plot, including several daring escapes, and a lot more character work for the boys in various shades of brown (or black if you’re Athos). |
TV Editor: Graham Osborne
TVReviews on the best TV has to offer, as well as retrospective looks at the shows of yesteryear we miss so much. Email: [email protected]
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