Watch it for the butts.

 Netflix’s hot period drama was released Christmas 2020 to the joint swooning of women all over the world over the show’s lead actor Regé-Jean Page

Taking a glance at the viewer’s review, you expect a filler show with lots of bodice ripping – the perfect show to watch when you are stuck at home on Christmas. The problem is, the Netflix-Shondaland love-child forgets that it’s a filler and constantly seeks to rise above its station only to fail woefully.

 Because it’s a period drama, you know to expect pale skin, glitzy balls, whispered scandals, corsets and  female characters forced into a certain role (reduced to arm-candy hostesses who moonlight as baby making factories) which Bridgerton gladly delivers with the occasional opportunity for the female characters to break the mold. The hiccup is, every time one of the show's female characters is given the chance to rise beyond society’s myopic view of women, they do something incredibly shallow or callous or both.


Female Character 1, Violet Bridgerton (Ruth Gammell) gets into a battle of words with her son, Anthony (Jonathan Bailey) insinuating that he’s not up to the task as head of family and that she might be able to do a better job. Violet wants to be able to make important family decisions like who her first daughter should marry. Asides the fact that this woman barely aimed for the shelf when attempting to break the mold, her dream is for her daughter to marry for love which she thinks is best achieved by leaving her out of the decision.

Female Character 2,  Lady Featherington (Polly Walker) is sneaky enough to go through her husband's study when she suspects he's hiding something and knows enough to understand the bookkeeping of her house and confronts her husband about gambling their money away. When by expensive luck, her husband is able to get money back, rather than be more involved in the house’s finances, she chooses to go out and buy more elaborate dresses.


Bridgerton also does a rather great job of infantilizing their female characters who make decisions knowing all the details and then do it anyway only to blame a man for the decision. Knowing the dangers of walking in the garden without a chaperone, newly announced debutante Daphne Bridgerton (Phoebe Dynevor) walks to the garden (not once, but twice!), makes out with the Duke and then acts surprised when she finds out the consequences and then escapes said consequences by guilt-tripping the Duke and strong-arming him into a marriage he never wanted. She later finds that the dreamworthy Duke tricked her into believing he couldn’t have a child, and decides to take his seed by force by refusing to stop when they have sex despite hearing him say “Wait!” If only there were a word for this type of act – oh I know, it’s called rape.

Another female character willingly gets involved with a man who she knows will never marry her because of their difference in societal standing and stays anyway only to abruptly dump him when he decides to give their relationship a chance. A different character willingly beds a man she’s not married to, finds out she’s pregnant with an unreachable baby-daddy, resolves to seduce and trap another man with the pregnancy and only feels remorse when she’s found out.

Asides its problematic and shallow depiction of women, Bridgerton also tries to be very “aware” while being a period drama by touching on hefty situations like a woman who’s not willing to go the marriage/family route favoring academics instead, the heir who would rather not shoulder the responsibilities he was born with, the gay man who has to marry a woman and act less than friendly towards his lover because society’s view on love was very binary, the society that only momentarily accepts people of color because of the King’s choice in wife – Bridgerton touches on these issues (via off-hand mentions) and then drops them by the wayside in favor of Daphne’s relationship with the Duke that’s as well written as one of the stories on interactive games, – and of course extremely long sex scenes and a tantalizing close up of the Duke’s derriere.

While we are on the Daphne/Simon "love story",  might as well ask, whatever happened to the bloody necklace?

In order to provide some semblance of competition for Daphne's affections (more likely as an instrument for petty jealousy), a new character, the Prince of Prussia is introduced. Enamored by Daphne's daintininess and lack of interest in him, he pursues her and later gifts her with a luxurious necklace. Daphne wears this necklace to one of the show's many balls, rips it off her neck when she feels overwhelmed only to leave it behind before getting into a heated argument/scandalous makeout session with Duke Hastings. 

You would expect this necklace to come up when her rival for the Prince's attention, Cressida (Jessica Madsen) confronts her about her tryst and  perhaps presents the necklace as evidence  or when she finally has to face the Prince and confess that she was never interested in him. But like everything else that is not related to Daphne's tiresome pursuit of love, that tidbit is hastily dropped to make room for lengthy sex scenes. 

Bridgerton has little in the way of suspense or any kind of aroused interest as all cards are on the table almost immediately. The only subplot vaguely resembling suspense – the identity of the narrator and Gossip Madame, Lady Whistleblower – is revealed at the last minute with zero flair.

 For a show set in 1800 London High Society where there is always drama, there’s very little in the way of drama , you may be generous and call it romance or a love story but it’s hardly a well written one with its cliché ‘bumping into love interest’ scene and a very predictable fake relationship. I’m inclined to file it under “very soft porn” where you have to settle for titillating glances, an occasional show of ass, and wait 8 hours for the climax to a somewhat disappointing release.