DCWash

I came here to let people know (though there's a good chance they already do) that Tom Burke (Athos in The Musketeers and a lot of other good parts in good productions previously) is going to be playing the detective Cormoran Strike in a BBC adaptation of J.K. Rowling's (aka Robert Galbraith) mystery novels. I'm not clear if the adaptation is of one book, or of all of them--all the more confusing because the press talks about four books, but I thought there were only three so far. At this point, it's scheduled to air on BBC1 in August. For a pictures, go here and scroll down: https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2017/jun/12/the-top-tv-shows-of-summer-2017-jk-rowling-glow-poldark Now, I love Tom Burke. I've seen him in a number of quite different things and he was very good in every one. But I also love these books, and Cormoran Strike...and Tom Burke is not Cormoran Strike! For one thing, he's far too young--Strike is (or sounds to be) about 50, Burke is 36. Strike is described as kind of big, lumbering, bear-like man; Burke isn't. There's supposed to be a significant age difference between Strike and his secretary/partner (maybe in more ways than one) Robin, and the age difference between Holiday Grainger, who plays Robin, and Tom Burke really isn't enough to be obvious, at least when you consider the age differences that so often occurs between actors that's supposed to not be noticeable with regard to their characters. Etc. I really don't know what I'm going to do about this. I usually can let differences between books and movies/TV shows slide, but I have a feeling I'll be yelling at the screen the whole time with this one.

I'm sorry to hear that. I really liked his work in Musketeers. I knew he came from the stage, as opposed to TV or film, and assumed that, since I hadn't heard anything from him, he had simply returned to the stage. Here's hoping he makes a full recovery and lands on his feet.

See, I'm almost the exact opposite. I wan't wild about Sylvie, and I never understood why Athos would fall for her (except for maybe because she plays along with his rape fantasies!), but I liked the effects of her presence, I guess you'd say, so, sooooo much better than that of Milady. I think they went as far as they could go with the Milady/Athos relationship (or non-relationship...) and her hanging around and assassinating people in the background would just muddle things. Funnily enough, some of the "domestication" that you talked about followed the fanfiction that's in my head. I imagined Porthos with a young daughter--like, five or six years old--who he didn't know existed until her mother popped her clogs and left the child to him. When he delivered that baby, I thought, "Well, there you go!" Marriage to the mother wasn't in my scenario, but makes sense.

Digital Spy has run several articles lately about the end run of the series. This one has some comments from the writer of the last episode that blew me away! First of all, Tom Burke, who played Athos, seemed to have a lot to do with the final script. But mainly, it seems they cut some rather pertinent stuff from one of the last episodes that, I think, would have gone a long way towards making the whole Grimaud story arc make a lot more sense. (Not that it was terrible, mind you, just that by the end I was wondering more and more about his issues, and if they hadn't made these cuts, maybe I wouldn't have wondered.) The Musketeers' final ever episode: Here's why the show's writers decided not to kill off the foursome

I do, but having just watched it last night, I'm still gathering my thoughts. It doesn't help that I have to take my GREs tomorrow after being out of school for almost 30 years. Right now, my struggle with basic math concepts like how to add square roots is overwhelming my Musketeer love.

Just a note: I don't know if the BBC is advertising it, but the finale is TONIGHT, not Saturday! Somebody should put that on the Episode 10 page, I guess, but I'm afraid of spoilers.

Treville! TREVIIIIIILLE!!!! I weep.... Otherwise, it was a good episode. (And I don't really mean "otherwise." His death made dramatic sense, he got to go out in a blaze of glory, and, hey, at this being episode 9 of the last 10-episode season, he had a good run.) It was interesting how Treville trusted Porthos, as opposed to the others, with the biggest, most delicate stuff. I'm not surprised he didn't hand anything over to Aramis, but I'd have thought he would have sent Athos, a fellow nobleman, to deal one-on-one with Lorraine and Gaston. Of course, Porthos was the closest musketeer body at hand when Treville needed to hand off the kinglet before his last scene, so gentlemanly manners had nothing to do with it, but still. In previous seasons, you could tell that they kind of rotated scripts so each character had "his" episode; I haven't noticed it that much this season--the feel better integrated--but at the same time I don't think Porthos has had as much of a chance to shine as the others have, so maybe they saved his turn for last. I was amazed Louis died so quickly, not just at the very beginning of the episode but immediately after vigorous fencing instead of after the slow fade you're used to seeing with TB. Granted, we saw him sick last week. I'm just surprised he wasn't STILL sick. I did get tickled at how many dead scenes Ryan Gage had to play. Not a bad way to earn an episode's pay, just lying there with your eyes closed! I had really hoped all the shenanigans with young Louis (who looks SO much nicer without that wig!) would involve Sylvie and Constance fighting off bad guys with their swords and guns. I mean, we know they can do it, or at least can hold their own until the professionals arrive. Kind of sad and irksome that all they did, really, was cluck around like hens with a chick. Funny how D'Artagnon can fight so well immediately after being stabbed, twice, in the shoulder/back by a long sword, but Marchaux was left a stumbling wreck by a big punch in the belly in that first fight. I can kind of excuse them letting Marchaux and Grimaud escape because I can never tell who's who in those big fights, so it may not be completely fair for me to expect them to keep track of who's who and where, either, especially as the bullets are flying at their heads. Speaking of which, have you noticed how much more gunfire there is in the fight scenes this year? That may be part of what appears to be a bigger budget: surely everything involved with staging gunfire costs more than staging guys with swords, what with the cost of the equipment and extra safety measures and all. I read where the show runners said the fights would be bigger and better this year because everybody's been together for three years and is comfortable with each other and better coordinated than at the first. They meant both the characters--though I guess they'd be at least seven years for them--as well as the actors, who are so much more practiced at stage combat, especially state combat with each other, than they were when they started. You can really see that on screen. My question now is, what do Grimaud and Marchaux want or expect to get without the Duke of Lorraine's armies to back them up, and Gaston in jail? Marchaux, more than Grimaud, has always seemed a little unhinged, so I can kind of see him going for just bloody chaos, along the lines of, "If I'm going down, I'm taking all of you [including the citizenry of Paris] down with me!" Marchaux, less so. The dispute with the musketeers, as opposed to anybody else having to do with the royal administration, is obviously personal, for both of them, which may be enough to carry the last episode, but wouldn't it be better if The Future of France was at stake? I just don't see how it could be at this point, though. Even if they capture young Louis, what could they possibly expect in return? There hasn't been any mention of "the nobility" being willing to follow them that far. That said, who's funding Grimaud? Didn't they say he was the one paying for Lorraine's army? I can't imagine him getting that kind of money except from a foreign power, but the writers haven't suggested that, have they? Apropos of very little, did you notice how Marchaux couldn't even get the erstwhile Red Guard's attention when he wanted them to join him in looking for child Louis? Compare that to the respect Treville commanded. And how drunk and ill-disciplined the the Red Guards were? Compare that to...well, maybe you'd better NOT compare that to the musketeers!

I'm sorry, but I just can't. STAND. Milady, either as a character (her role in the plots, etc.) or for herself. Did we really need her to return, with her Snowwhite's Stepmother outfits and all? Though it was interesting to see how quickly Athos went from tenderly hugging her to grasping her neck. That, more than Athos' actions for Sylvie on the scaffold, should have told her all she needed to know. She's never had a rival for Athos' affections, has she? At least one that we've seen? This may be new for her. (I've just finished all four seasons of "Spiral" on Netflix. If you've seen it, tell me, does Milady remind you of Josephine?) Speaking of costumes, I've not been pleased with the women's costumes, at least. Queen Anne's gowns don't just seem generically Olde Times sumptuous, which I could live with if they're not going to try for 17th century semi-accuracy; they, especially along with her hairdo, seem pretty specifically 18th century, which is just wrong. Gaston was much the same way; I thought he looked like he belonged at Versailles or fending off revolutionaries. And Milady, like I said, looks like a cartoon character. The men are better. Louis' dangly earring should be a character in itself. I hadn't noticed that The Boyz had whole new costumes, just noticing the familiar leather...epaulettes? Those leather guards they wear on one shoulder, presumably their shooting shoulder. I do think Athos only owns the one shirt, the blue one. I was kind of amused to see him lolling around, post coitus, with Sylvie wearing only the shirt and no pants--it made him look kind of silly and vulnerable at the same time more real than if he was lolling around in leather pants and no shirt, which is what you usually see on TV. I also noted he had changed out of his leathers (and into that same shirt, though I think that was maybe coincidental) to tend to Sylvie's wounds. That said...something. Something gentle and humble, but I'm not sure what. I also noticed early on that Treville, when he was sitting with the ailing king, called him "Louis." Not "Your Majesty," which he did a second earlier, but simply "Louis." And King Louis XIII didn't chastise him at all. There have been all kinds of indications of intimacy this season--"Louis," the blue shirt, Constance plucking straw out of D'Artagnon's hair after he finished grooming his horse, D'Artagnon and Porthos' confessional chat in the abandoned farmhouse.... It's added some poignancy and depth to the show that we haven't had before. Or really needed, if I'm being honest--I've been content with it being a not-too-smart swashbuckler, though I supposed an honestly-earned deepth is better. I like that we're getting a little more of everybody's back stories this season, or are being reminded of the back stories already given. D'Artagnon still has family in Gascony! He's from a farm! The bad guys burned it down! Aramis grew up in a brothel! I also like that they're doling it out in kind of small doses. I'm trying to figure out where we go from here. They wouldn't have brought Milady back as a state-sponsored assassin unless they planned on her killing somebody. Marchaux? Gaston? Surely they're leaving Grimaud for Athos. I know! There's some kind of Mexican standoff where Grimaud kills Milady and Athos kills Grimaud, thus getting her out of his system for good. (She's dead, won't pop back up in his life, but he honorably avenged her so that lifts a burden off his shoulders.) It probably also ends with Constance pregnant, just because that seems to be what they've been telegraphing all season.

!!!!!! Does Aramis know? If so, what does he think? (I can't imagine he'd react badly, given that this is, you know, the Musketeers and all.)

Which may be the thing Athos does best....

A hundred women around who've given birth, and it takes a Musketeer to deliver a baby? I wasn't that enamored with this episode. I didn't see much point of Athos' delirium, or at least I didn't see the point of us having to watch as much of it, or in the detail that we did. (Though I did find it amusing that last week, Porthos and D'Artagnon had a two-story building collapse on their heads yet were able to jump on their horses and gallop off in hot pursuit as soon as they were pulled from the ruble, and Grimaud pried bullets from his guts on two different occasions and just kept going, but Athos was laid low by a sword slash on his back the likes of which he seems to get every day.) I do like that the running theme of this series seems to be the true costs of war. We've had refugees; now we have stories of rape and desertion.

I had read the BBC precis of this episode, where they said it Grimaud and Ferron had decided to kill the Musketeers (or at least The Big Four), and that the result was the "death of a hero." Otherwise, I've worked really had, though not completely successfully, to remain unspoiled for this season. I'm watching the series via iPlayer, and trying to keep up with the BBC schedule, but I kept delaying this episode and I came to realize it was because I was convinced the "hero" was Treville, and I didn't want to see him go! My reasoning was that he was generally recognized by the audience as "heroic" one one of the all-round good-guys we care about, but they couldn't kill off one of Our Boyz this early in the season, and in fact probably wouldn't kill one off at all. It then occurred to me that maybe Grimaud was actually the "hero," based on actions in earlier wars, and we'd learn the truth about his history tonight. (Okay, in this episode.) As the episode went on, though, I threw all caution to the wind and started going, "It's him! No, it's him!" including everybody short of D'Artagnon. I even included the king on the list for a brief second, until I decided they couldn't mess with history THAT much. Now I have to watch the thing over again, enjoying it for itself instead of trying to get ahead of the plot. Because I did enjoy it. I agree, this is one of the best episodes the show has had, certainly one of the best of the season. I don't know that I'd call Ferron's death "heroic," though. Not without a certain bravery, but I don't think he seriously expected to get the shiv from Grimaud, and firing the shot didn't cost him anything. I also agree in thinking Ryan Gage has really strutted his stuff this season, not the least because this year's Louis is so much more mature and complex than we've seen him before. I can't think of a step Louis took wrong this episode, and I don't know when I've been able to say that before. I'm rather glad Aramis saw that side of him. Okay, maybe pinning Aramis down on the whole Queen Anne issue wasn't such a wonderful idea, but it was an understandable one, and he could have handled it a lot worse. Maybe Aramis' answer about the "loneliest woman in Paris" will have an effect.... Otherwise, the whole episode was a tease about who was going to bite it, but a very well done tease, and given the nature of the show, that's just fine. In its way, I think it pointed to a happy ending for the conclusion of the season, and of the show as a whole, though it's too late to credibly set Porthos up with a wife. Oh, and Aramis isn't really a priest, is he? He spent some time in a monastery, which they alluded to, but that doesn't make him an actual priest, qualified to grant absolution in confessions. (I think, but I may be wrong, that, given the generally recognized need people have to get things off their chests when death looms, the church allows anybody to hear a confession, just not to grant absolution. They may even be able to suggest absolution have been given, so long as they make it clear they're not giving it themselves. As in, "Judging from your obvious contrition, and God's mercy, I'm betting He's absolved you, but I'm not making any promises!" Whereas the whole point of confessing to priest is that he can, indeed, make those promises.) However, I doubt if Louis has looked that closely into the resume's of his Musketeers, so his confusion on this matter may be understandable. I'm not so sure I like the fact that the show didn't straighten that out for the audience, though.

I was getting a "Man in the Iron Mask" kind of vibe, too (though I admit I barely know the outlines of that story). I knew better, but I did wonder early on if Mr. Madman (Borel? Was that his name?) might have some kind of legitimate claim to the throne. Or at least a reason to believe he had a legitimate claim, like Henry Tudor or something. In the process, I thought for a while that the locksmith--who wasn't immediately identified as a locksmith, in particular, though you did get the impression that he was some kind of skilled craftsman--was going to be forced to make an iron-ish mask for Mr. Madman. I don't know that it was "brushed aside," if you mean nobody asked questions when a corpse was staring them in the face. I think it was easy, and actually not unreasonable, for the Musketeers to assume Mr. Madman had killed him, given that he had already killed at least two nuns and was believed to be in the garden, where the corpse was found. In fact, they saw Mr. Madman right there mere moments after they found the corpse. I also think that, between Feron and his henchmen and everybody else who seemed interested in the documents, you could pretty much expect the loan document to disappear. I'd rather Mr. Madman hadn't been the one to do it--that seemed kind of grotesque to me--but I knew it wasn't long for this world as soon as it landed on the king's desk. I enjoyed parsing that profession of loyalty, to see if the actual words could be interpreted as meaning he supported somebody other than the dauphin. I think they could. I didn't see the emotion that you did, and if fact wondered if he was faking the fall, but I can understand how you read the performance differently. I think it could be argued--in fact, kind of expected Aramis to make the argument--that killing Borel was putting him out of his misery, and in a way an act of mercy. Can't say I fully agree with it, but it seems to be a legitimate point. I was surprised to hear this was the dauphin's SIXTH birthday. The said at the start that four years have passed since the end of Series 2. But he wasn't two years old when we saw him in that last episode. So are they giving us a kind of timeline to this season? Letting us know much time is passing between episodes, kind of?

Think there's a connection between this episode and this story? (Though that's a layman's article, I got it from an internet forum that specializes in historic dress. I can get you some WAY more detailed information if you want.) So, do you think we would have heard the phrase "coitus interuptus" if this show was still airing before 9:00? Not overly enamored with this episode, though it wasn't really bad, either. I do think we got to see a bit more of The Boyz as individuals, though--Aramis being both Athos and Porthos' penance, D'Artagnon the farm boy, Aramis' back story (though I had a bit of a hard time believing it), Athos seemingly wanting a friend-with-benefits while Sylvie wants more. (He didn't seem too pained at her "you don't want to know me better" remark, did he? Because, I'm assuming, no, he doesn't want to get to know you better, missy! At this point, he's just not that into you, ya know?) I'm a little bothered by all the class conflict--it just doesn't seem true for this period (give it 150 years and it's a different matter), and feels forced. Another thing I liked was the interactions between Louis and Queen Anne, vs. Louis and Queen Henrietta Maria. There were a couple of times in earlier seasons when Anne made some comment that alluded to she and Louis essentially growing up together, and that she as well as he, both being royal from birth, really have no idea how else to live and think except as royals, which separates them even from the nobility. I like that, and saw it a lot tonight. I really enjoy it when she and Louis are on the same page. Some of the looks they exchanged when Henrietta Maria was ranting said, "Now, that's no way for a queen to behave, is it?" which they could only exchange with each other. Then there was the more prosaic, unspoken, "I'll handle her; she's MY sister after all." "Yes, she is. And I've got your back." Which is something most married couples could relate to, if they only knew.

Which is just what I was looking for. I remember there was a lot of discussion about the legal/historical accuracy or possibilities in both cases--which I do find interesting!--but after a year I was sure I was getting those discussions jumbled up in my mind with what the limits of what the show actually told us. It's good to know my fuzzy memory is at least partly the way it is because the scripts themselves were fuzzy. Thank you.