The Crown - series 3

[southeastdweller]

I'm so looking forward to seeing this when it returns next Sunday!

Haven’t watched the Aberfan episode yet but, for those who are interested in finding out more, I really recommend this long read from the BBC. It is a breathtaking piece of journalism. It’s three years old now and I’ll never forget it.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-150d11df-c541-44a9-9332-560a19828c47

Aberfan.

Bloody heartbreaking.

The Princess Anne actress is perfect

Meant to say, the speech at the art exhibition in ep1 was pretty terrible, wasn’t it? I can’t imagine the Queen breaking character (as it were) to berate the traitor in a not-very-subtle way. And then for it to turn into a back and forth, with the man correcting her? Nah.

PA is bloody excellent.

Just seen Aberfan - so emotional
very very good episode

I’ve watched the first 3 - thought the writing in ep 1 was shite, with the queen essentially flirting and doing “aren’t I just a silly ignoramus” with Anthony Blunt, followed by the weird speech. Totally agree with Haworthia. Plus slightly heavy-handed moaning about looking older at the beginning. Yawn. And I got the dates muddled and thought we had genuinely jumped forward 20 years because Olivia Colman and HBC look so much older than Clare Foy and Vanessa Kirby. Prince Edward was born in 1964, for Pete’s sake - but the children were conspicuous by their absence, and rightly so, because OC would have looked totally unrealistic as mother of a newborn.

Aberfan was heartbreaking, though. And I love Harold Wilson.

Placemarking - I got half way through episode 1 before Netflix crashed.

Conclusions so far:
Tobias Menzies is everything I hoped for.
With the squillions of quid they spent on this I think they should have saved a bit for better airbrush foundation or even some subtle digital de-aging of OC and HBC for the first couple of episodes. My big UHD telly is very much not making them look 38 and 34.
I like the MI5 bloke. Even though he’s a rather unsubtle Voice of Wikipedia giving us the facts he’s quite fanciable with it. Who’s the actor?
Some problems with the writing. Clunking exposition for Philip to explain to Liz who Gaitskell was - I realise that he’s not a well known figure nowadays but it really jarred. And when Liz picked the sleeping Churchill’s glasses from his hand to put them safely away I thought “oh that’s a lovely subtle and believable gesture. A lesser drama would have done something naff and out of character like having her kids his forehead”. Oh dear.
I know my emotional limits and I’m skipping episode 3 completely.

I think they should have transitioned the actors midway into the series when it was more appropriate age wise. OC in that hair and clothes looks way older than her real age

Did anyone else see the miniseries Cambridge Spies? Simon West played Antony Blunt in that, too.

I’m not sure I agree the OC looking too old. The Queen has never looked young or certainly not since she was very young in the early 50s. Part of this is probably how she dresses too. I also think that OC will grow into this part. Here’s a comparison of the real Queen at Aberfan next to OC. Yes, the Queen does look a little too fresh faced for OC to be believable as her. But then a few years later here’s a comparison and if anything OC looks younger than the Queen, certainly much more of a similar age. I just think these couple of early episodes have maybe started a bit early in the timeline. Maybe more realistic to have started with this new cast circa 1970.

And I do think HBC looks too old to be believable as 34 year old Margaret, but she’s got that dislikeable/lost thing down perfectly that Princess M was so famous for.

I’m only up to episode 3 but enjoying it so far. The A.V. club are reviewing two episodes a day for The next five days and have agreed with their take so far www.avclub.com/c/tv-review/the-crown/season-3?/c/tv-review/the-crown/season-3

Some peopleon this thread seem mainly gleeful about being able to legitimately tell two women in the public eye they look 'too old'.

I really think the Peter Pan obsession our society is gripped with has a great deal to answer for. It's the quality of acting that counts. Tobias Menzies also looks far older than Philip at that age but not one person has mentioned it until now. I wonder why

And it's especially galling as both women are quite likely to be on this forum, as MC mums from the UK themselves, reading these comments from their own peers.

Thought episode 1 terrible, episode 2, OKish but nothing special.

Then Aberfan, and it took off. Agonising, especially when OC is meeting the relatives and all she can do is shake hands and say something stilted and move on.

It was interesting her comments about only getting in the way in a crisis. Because the character shows someone who, while holding firmly onto the idea of the symbolic value of the monarchy (which is irrational), becomes terribly rational about not being able to 'do' something practical. Very believable, and very acute.

From what I have read it was the Queen (real, not CF/OC!) who insisted on 'joining up' when she turned 18. She wanted to do something practical to help, rather than take on a role of visiting people/making speeches. Equally, you could argue that any other 18 year old girl could have wielded a spanner, but only she could do the symbolic stuff.

Well, maybe they think he doesn't.
I don't think OC looks too old but HBC definitely does.
And nobody is saying "OC and HBC look old" They're saying "too old to play the role for which they have been cast".

Oh give over Ruffle. Have you read the ongoing thread calling various famous women (and men) every name under the sun? Or are Holly Willoughby and Meghan Markle easy meat because they're not MC? Or the threads about what a shit actress Emma Watson is?
We're just talking about the telly, not the sisterhood fgs.

I've been binge watching. It's great.

The cast is wonderful.

I don't get on board with your race to the bottom @thecanterburywhales.

Feminism doesn't magically stop being a responsibility when you switch on a screen in your living room. Interesting name btw.

I'm only on.episode one so reserving judgement. The queen is a lot less posh now though- it's a bit weird, she is suddenly talking to people more much more than she did in S1 & 2. Maybe because it's now the 60s, maybe different actress but it is making the transition harder for me.

How many episodes are there? I'm trying to save it.

I liked a lot of it and I’m on board with OC and HBC. But far more than last time we found ourselves saying ‘she wouldn’t have said/done that’. It also feels like the dynamics with Philip have pretty much disappeared. He feels like a bit of a cypher character. The only flash of old Philip was in the Aberfan episode (which is as far as we’ve got). So I miss that element.

Menzies (45) doesn’t look much too old for Philip (45 at the date of episode 1 and heavily balding by the time of Aberfan). He does have a more lined face but that’s a) not such a problem as we’re not so intimately familiar with Philip’s face at all ages b) less fixable with makeup - given that HMQ and Margaret would have been wearing makeup at all times then you’ve got more room for manoeuvre.

I agree the issue is marginal with OC, and only there for a couple of episodes. It’s arguably an artistic choice to elide details of HMQ’s age as a reflection of changing attitudes to women’s ages to make it more relatable to a modern audience: almost nobody would think of a 38 year old as an old bat nowadays but in the cultural background of sixties she may well have felt over the hill.

For HBC I think it is more of a problem at this point in the show because the dynamics of Margaret’s marital crisis depend on her age precisely due to those social attachments of value to a woman according to her youth and fertility.

Not an OC fan at all, and was really concerned about her as Queen but I think she’s fabulous. HBC not so much

I think that's the thing about the public/private persona @Doubleraspberry. Those who have met the queen in an informal setting tens to report someone much warmer and wittier than those who meet her on a formal engagement or see her on tv. But as members of the the general public we only ever see her in the last context.

And @TheyMostlyComeOutAtNightMostly as if a woman with those sort of deep set wrinkles would be given such a free pass! Philip may have been balding at that point but he was still relatively baby faced.