Lady Whistledown: Friend or Foe

[Door County Cherry]

Please discuss the events surrounding Lady Whistledown and Penelope as Whistledown here.

The discussion should surround the actions and motivations the character takes as Whistledown and their ramifications as the topic has been taking over some other threads.  

Book talk needs to be spoiler tagged but all episode action is fair game. 

 

[libgirl2]

Okay, I will add, Marina didn't seem to be madly in love with Colin regardless. He seemed to be the most pleasant of her choices as he is young and handsome. He even was angry when he found out. How would that have worked out for a long term marriage? 

[Nidratime]

Okay, from the book and show thread....

Yes, Penelope probably wouldn't have done anything to try and prevent Marina from marrying any other man without telling him of her pregnancy. For instance, I don't think she would've tried to prevent that old codger from marrying Marina. After all, he was just as manipulative about the situation as Marina was to become. It definitely wouldn't have been a love match on either side.

Colin was Penelope's friend -- first -- the young man she fell in love with -- later -- and was being completely manipulated without knowing why. He believed himself in love with Marina and thought Marina was desperate to marry him because she loved him as well. I don't think Penelope ever thought Colin would fall for her or that she felt entitled to him. Maybe she dreamed of that happening, but in actuality, I don't think she ever expected it.

 

[Door County Cherry]

3 minutes ago, libgirl2 said:

Okay, I will add, Marina didn't seem to be madly in love with Colin regardless. He seemed to be the most pleasant of her choices as he is young and handsome. He even was angry when he found out. How would that have worked out for a long term marriage? 

It probably would be a gold mine.  Finding one's spouse pleasant and attractive is better than many got back then as marriage was largely viewed as a business transaction.  Marina did like Colin a lot.  And he was in lust with her.  Not wanting to have to close her eyes and think of England (as she would have with the older dude) is why her choosing Colin over the old guy makes so much sense to me.

There's an absolute physical toll she'd have to pay. 

[Nidratime]

Book talk here, so spoilers. (Should add: book talk for a later book, not the Duke and I.)

Spoiler

I don't know if you've read Romancing Mister Bridgerton, but in that book, when Colin finds out that Penelope is Lady Whistledown, he gives her a really hard time, castigating her, and wants her to stop.

 

Edited December 27, 2020 by Nidratime

[BlackberryJam]

5 minutes ago, Door County Cherry said:

It probably would be a gold mine.  Finding one's spouse pleasant and attractive is better than many got back then as marriage was largely viewed as a business transaction.  Marina did like Colin a lot.  And he was in lust with her.  Not wanting to have to close her eyes and think of England (as she would have with the older dude) is why her choosing Colin over the old guy makes so much sense to me.

There's an absolute physical toll she'd have to pay. 

I think it would be pleasant for Marina, sure. Colin wasn’t abusive or gross, like Rutledge. 

But this is what really bothered me about the, “I’d have married you if you’d just told me,” scene. It costs Colin nothing to say that after the fact. It’s easy for him to hold himself out as the noble suitor, but it’s just as likely that he would have been shocked, appalled, offended, by Marina being both “sullied” (it grosses me out even saying that) and tricking him. His brothers would not have let the marriage have gone through. The Colin of the show is about as deep as bird bath. 

What happens when Colin falls out of lust? Or (again this is so gross, but we are taking about a particular period in time here) his boner dies because he’s not her first?

A Marina/Colin marriage was likely not a recipe for contentment.

[ursula]

@Nidratimewell I hope that since in the books (from what I've gleaned) Lady W never did anything as malicious as show Lady W, the consequences would be graver. This sounds more like a protofeminist arc than a "your alter ego is a villain" quarrel.

[ursula]

2 minutes ago, BlackberryJam said:

His brothers would not have let the marriage have gone through.

Which is why it was important to Penelope to expose the scandal as Mrs W. She didn't want to risk telling Colin privately and Marina talking him into accepting it. She was selfishly banking on the shame of the scandal stopping the marriage, regardless of who got trampled on in the process as long as she kept Colin free for herself.

[ouinason]

I don't think Pen is trying to keep Colin for herself, she's trying to keep him from being trapped for the rest of his life with someone who is lying to him and using him.  Divorce wasn't exactly something you could just get back then.  He couldn't have regrets and just leave her.  He would be stuck with her, or at least paying for her household and her child, for the rest of his life.

Penelope should have been straighter with Colin about Marina's intentions instead of writing about it in Whistledown, but I don't know if she really had much of an opportunity to do so.  She couldn't be sure that he'd read a letter from her, or see her, between the time she found out about Gretna and the time he ran off.  She could be DAMNED sure that someone in his family would read Whistledown first thing in the morning and have more of a shot of stopping him.

I understand taking Marina's side with how she's trapped and the wrong done her by Penelope, but it's not Pen vs. Marina here, it's Marina vs. Colin.  

I'm on his side.

Edited December 27, 2020 by ouinason

[BlackberryJam]

3 minutes ago, ursula said:

Which is why it was important to Penelope to expose the scandal as Mrs W. She didn't want to risk telling Colin privately and Marina talking him into accepting it. She was selfishly banking on the shame of the scandal stopping the marriage, regardless of who got trampled on in the process as long as she kept Colin free for herself.

I saw nothing in the show that indicated that Penelope thought she was actually ever  had a chance with Colin. Colin threw her a pity dance to cut Cressida and then chatted with her while romancing other women. So I’d agree with your last sentence pulling out “selfishly” and ending at process. 

3 minutes ago, ouinason said:

I understand taking Marina's side with how she's trapped, but it's not Pen vs. Marina here, it's Marina vs. Colin.  

I'm on his side.

I don’t want to be on the side of a Regency era privileged white man, but he is the only innocent in the situation. 

[ursula]

4 minutes ago, ouinason said:

Penelope should have been straighter with Colin about Marina's intentions instead of writing about it in Whistledown, but I don't know if she really had much of an opportunity to do so

It's not the same as posting on Facebook and having it go viral. Mrs W's missives literally need to get written, sent to the printers (discreetly), proofed, printed and circulated. So yeah, if Penelope had the time to publish and distribute, she had the time to communicate with Colins privately. She chose to use Mrs W because she wanted the scandal exposed so that he couldn't decide to go through with it anyway.

7 minutes ago, ouinason said:

it's not Pen vs. Marina here, it's Marina vs. Colin.  

Penelope would have been fine with any young man but Colin so yeah, it's definitely Pen vs Marina.

[ursula]

4 minutes ago, BlackberryJam said:

I saw nothing in the show that indicated that Penelope thought she was actually ever  had a chance with Colin.

So? That didn't stop her from feeling entitled to him. This argument would have more weight if Penelope had been against the arrangement from the start. It only became a problem for her when it was Colin. That's the literal definition of entitlement.

[BlackberryJam]

I don’t get where Penelope felt entitled to him. Did I miss a scene? She doesn’t want Marina to trick him, but nothing where she’s cutting out other women, encouraging him not to dance, talking other women down in his presence, telling other women not to talk to him, nothing. In fact, Penelope is the one who encourages Colin to leave England and travel. 

[ursula]

18 minutes ago, Featherhat said:

 

I kind of got the feeling that Marina was like the Sheffields in the books. Gentry/nobility but not part of high society, still extremely acceptable to society provided they can pay for the season and the Cranes in the books much the same way (with a bit more money).

 

Marina at several points in time in the story calls the Fs for being wealthy and privileged in a way she's not so while the show doesn't explicitly define her social status, it's clear that she's of lesser status than the Fs. 

 

18 minutes ago, Featherhat said:

The way she described falling in love with George sounded as equal as it can be for a woman at that time and she didn't seem confused about how she got pregnant or think she was forced, again within the strict confines of society/morals at the time and girls lack of knowledge.

I'm not saying Marina was raped or otherwise coerced to have sex with George (as much as she understood what it involved or led to) but compare Marina to Daphne who was also compromised by the man she loved and desired ("why did you think I went to the garden?"). Marina didn't have a brother coming to her rescue and demanding satisfaction or a family hunting down the man who ruined her. She didn't have a mother spreading rumours to shame George to take responsible for his child. She didn't have a Mrs F in her corner (at least not from the start) telling her she needed to work it and score a replacement ASAP. It took Daphne, basically being unhappy in her own marriage, to help her. 

And while it's clear George loved her, he could have done right by her and married her before leaving for the Army. He could have told his own family what had happened and Marina needed to be looked after. He loved her but he also failed her.

The show clearly indicates all the ways Marina is at a disadvantage yet somehow Penelope is the underdog because she is less conventionally attractive. 

 

Edited December 27, 2020 by ursula

[ursula]

3 minutes ago, BlackberryJam said:

I don’t get where Penelope felt entitled to him. Did I miss a scene?

??? The fact that Penelope was OK with Marina doing the same plot with any other man but the one she wanted??? That she didn't take her information to Colin so he could make an informed choice (but risk her as the bearer of bad news falling out of favour) but published an expose that would force him not to go through with the marriage while keeping her nose clean???

[BlackberryJam]

Spoiler tagging this for Book Info:

Spoiler

I think everything else about Marina happens off screen. Her terribly unhappy marriage to Phillip (which very well might have been how things went with Colin had they married), to the mental health issues to the suicide. That’s all told to Eloise by Phillip, right? It’s been a while since I read these. 

I don’t think the series is going to continue Marina’s story unless they get to putting Eloise and Phillip together. She’s in the carriage and off the show. 

Because in the books she’s a side character, and one who dies off, I think that’s why the show writing for her is so terrible. 

And as to Colin and Penelope, not wanting your friend to be tricked into a marriage and feeling entitled to a romance with that friend are two different things. 

[ursula]

4 minutes ago, BlackberryJam said:

as to Colin and Penelope, not wanting your friend to be tricked into a marriage and feeling entitled to a romance with that friend are two different things

And again if all she wanted was for George to make an informed choice - she could have just told him herself. She chose an option that would shame him out of going through with the marriage regardless of what he'd have decided and would keep her in his good books as the not bearer of bad news, and possible shoulder to cry on. 

[Neurochick]

Spoiler

 

That spoiler pisses me off, because it's just like television/movies to have a Black female character only to kill her off at the end.  How fucking typical.  Shonda should be fucking ashamed of herself.  

Of course Marina dies so her husband can be with a White woman...why not?  The only Black debutante screwed over by a privilaged White girl....how typical.

And that means that Penelope indirectly caused Marina's death.

 

 

Edited December 27, 2020 by Neurochick

[ursula]

5 minutes ago, Neurochick said:

  Hide contents

 

That spoiler pisses me off, because it's just like television/movies to have a Black female character only to kill her off at the end.  How fucking typical.  Shonda should be fucking ashamed of herself.  

Of course Marina dies so her husband can be with a White woman...why not?  The only Black debutante screwed over by a privilaged White girl....how typical.

And that means that Penelope indirectly caused Marina's death.

 

 

Yeah, this is really dark if the show decides to go this route. So I’m hoping... banking... on someone having some common sense about this. Also Eloise gave out such strong asexual vibes (or at least not conventional straight-leaning vibes) that I want to believe they already taken this into account. There’s no reason why after all this Trauma Conga, Marina can’t have a happy ending. Phillip seems kind and honourable. Her baby gets a father who’d be devoted to his late brother’s child. Marriages have thrived on less. It’s a recipe for a HEA if the show just let her have it. 

[BlackberryJam]

Well, no @Neurochick

Spoiler

I’m trying to remember the details, but book Marina may have been schizophrenic. That’s not Penelope’s fault. If I remember correctly, the twins tell Eloise that Marina would talk to people who weren’t there and have screaming fits. I did wonder if they were laying the foundation for Marina’s mental health issues by having her motivations and decision whiplash so badly. 

But I agree; shame on Shonda or whoever did the casting. 

 

[TheOtherOne]

Penelope didn't do anything wrong, so there's nothing to whitewash.

Others seem to be attempting to justify Marina's actions as "she had no choice." You know how you can tell when someone has no choice? When their actions cost them something, they have to do something they don't want, and it's not just other people being screwed over for their actions.  If she had married an old man in a blatant business transaction, it would be believable that she had no choice. But that would have cost her something, and she was too selfish for that. Marrying Colin would have cost her nothing. It would have cost him--in having to give his name to a child that wasn't his, in having to be married to someone who didn't love him--and his family, if the truth came out.  But she would have gotten everything she wanted at no cost to herself. A person who decides to screw over someone else rather than have to give up anything or deal with a situation of their own making (a lady in 1813 certainly knows better than to give it up before getting a ring.) has no excuses.

By revealing Marina's pregnancy as Whistledown, Penelope hurt her family's reputation--and since she's part of that family, she hurt herself. She didn't just sacrifice Marina's reputation, she sacrificed her own--and her own future prospects, as far as she knew. She did it to save someone she has no reason to believe she has any future with, and who she knows doesn't love her, from an unjust marriage. Because she loved him. Doing something that costs you, for someone who doesn't even return your feelings--that's love. That's someone who has no choice.

It's something the self-absorbed, selfish, and completely awful Marina (my lover's brother is offering to marry me and take care of my child and I? Waaaaaah! No way! I don't wuv him! Pout pout, mope mope) would never understand.

[ouinason]

If Marina had just told the truth, I wouldn't have any issue with her actions.

Edited December 27, 2020 by ouinason

[Neurochick]

3 hours ago, TheOtherOne said:

By revealing Marina's pregnancy as Whistledown, Penelope hurt her family's reputation--and since she's part of that family, she hurt herself. She didn't just sacrifice Marina's reputation, she sacrificed her own--and her own future prospects, as far as she knew. She did it to save someone she has no reason to believe she has any future with, and who she knows doesn't love her, from an unjust marriage. Because she loved him. Doing something that costs you, for someone who doesn't even return your feelings--that's love. That's someone who has no choice.

How is it love if someone is willing to hurt their family?  It's not love when you choose to fuck someone over. 

No one will ever make me believe that Marina was in the wrong.  Sorry.

Edited December 27, 2020 by Neurochick

[BlackberryJam]

I agree with someone who said it's not Marina v. Penelope. One doesn't have to be the hero for the other to be the villain. They are two teenage girls with crap options making poor choices. Marina is no innocent, but she's not a villain either. Marina was totally in the wrong for trying to trick Colin. The fact that she had limited options doesn't make her actions right. Some view Penelope's choice as fucking Marina over. Some view it as saving Colin. It's all in your perspective.

[Nidratime]

Quote

No one will ever make me believe that Marina was in the wrong.  Sorry.

It isn't wrong to not tell a man who says he loves you and wants to marry you that you're pregnant with another man's child? In fact, you are going to try and trick him into thinking the child is his?... This is someone you allegedly like, by the way.

[ursula]

4 hours ago, TheOtherOne said:

It's something the self-absorbed, selfish, and completely awful Marina (my lover's brother is offering to marry me and take care of my child and I? Waaaaaah! No way! I don't wuv him! Pout pout, mope mope) would never understand.

Woe betide Marina for wanting to marry the man she was in love with (who she was poisoned against by Penelope’s scheming family) and not settle for a man who was marrying her out of duty. She also refused to marry Sir Phillip when she thought she wasn’t pregnant. Even though the scandal was already out and it would have made her respectable. 
 

Now thanks to Marina’s marriage, Penelope and her mother get to continue enjoying their comfortable life after doing everything to ruin Marina’s. But let’s not get caught up in little details like that. 
 

4 hours ago, TheOtherOne said:

Doing something that costs you, for someone who doesn't even return your feelings--that's love. That's someone who has no choice.

Only outing Marina as Mrs W didn’t cost Penelope. She had her income and agency and still got to keep her nose clean and be the “good girl” in this story. She also didn’t give a crap who got “duped” into marrying Marina as long as it wasn’t the boy she felt entitled to. If she really wanted to risk herself, she’d have told Colin in person and risked being the bearer of bad news instead of sneaking around like the two faced snake that she is. There’s nothing noble or heroic about what Penelope did. She just gets away with it because apparently being “fat” covers all failings.

Edited December 27, 2020 by ursula

[ursula]

28 minutes ago, Neurochick said:

How is it love if someone is willing to hurt their family?  It's not love when you choose to fuck someone over. 

Apparently the fact that Penelope was willing to screw over her own family means she’s noble, and not, you know, more petty and entitled than she already is. 
 

 

21 minutes ago, Nidratime said:

It isn't wrong to not tell a man who says he loves you and wants to marry you that you're pregnant with another man's child? In fact, you are going to try and trick him into thinking the child is his?... This is someone you allegedly like, by the way.

No, it wasn’t right but Penelope was down with this plan until it involved the guy she felt entitled to. So basically she was ok with screwing over any other innocent shmuck. This wasn’t some ethical problem for “Saint Penelope”. She outted Marina for no other reason but her own selfishness . And we’re supposed to root for her because hey, she’s fat so it’s OK when she uses her privilege to wreck someone else’s life.

Edited December 27, 2020 by ursula

[ouinason]

they can both be wrong

[ursula]

5 minutes ago, ouinason said:

they can both be wrong

No one’s arguing Marina was right to trick Colin. But the point is that Penelope approved of the plan until it was Colin and outted Marina in the most underhanded way possible, while keeping her own hands clean. She used her agency and privilege to wreck someone less than her because the man she liked was involved, not because she had any moral objection to what Marina did. The fact that her family ultimately ends up benefiting from Marina’s situation just makes her doubly disgusting.

Edited December 28, 2020 by ursula

[Atlanta]

On a different tack, (I'm only on ep 3), please tell me Julie Andrews has a cameo!

[bubble sparkly]

I think the show did a poor job making sense of the motivations for a lot of characters, but I found Penelope to be the strangest. Now I have seen people say that Lady W was not as viscous in the books, but in the show she is downright brutal and seems to be purposely and gleefully peddling gossip that could ruin the reputations and lives of numerous women (and by extension their families).

I could maybe understand why Pen would be purposely trying to ruin lives if she was specifically targeting people like Cressida who had been hateful to her and this was her way of exacting revenge. But we didn’t see Daphne do anything to Pen and she was Lady W’s biggest target. Not to mention, if Pen truly considers Eloise to be her friend and is in love with Colin, how can she sit there and lie to their faces everyday whilst actively targeting their sister and possibly bringing about the ruination of their family? What exactly is her motivation for this???

Then, after deciding to go nuclear with the Marina reveal, instead of just telling Colin to his face, she is sobbing and in hysterics over the ruination of her family that she deliberately caused! Honestly, Pen came off as having a split personality disorder or something.

[ursula]

9 minutes ago, bubble sparkly said:

I could maybe understand why Pen would be purposely trying to ruin lives if she was specifically targeting people like Cressida who had been hateful to her and this was her way of exacting revenge. But we didn’t see Daphne do anything to Pen and she was Lady W’s biggest target.

Yes, it’s easy to focus exclusively on Marina but many forget that Lady W was targeting people that were supposed to be Penelope’s friends. Saying the Bridgerton’s naming order was “banal” might have been a witty joke if it was left at that, but her singling out Daphne makes it mean spirited in retrospect. It’s either the power went into her head and she became meaner and meaner with each missive... or the missives are really just her way of expressing the true nature that her family/society want her to suppress.  

9 minutes ago, bubble sparkly said:

Honestly, Pen came off as having a split personality disorder or something.

Or two faced. Her naïveté vs Mrs W’s worldliness for one. 

Edited December 28, 2020 by ursula

[RachelKM]

1 hour ago, ursula said:

Only outing Marina as Mrs W didn’t cost Penelope. She had her income and agency and still got to keep her nose clean and be the “good girl” in this story.

It cost her family their standing which includes her.  As this is the beginning of Lady Whistledown, she doesn't yet have much income and her family is in dire straits.  At this point they've already been cut-off by the modiste at least. Just saying, again, Pen exposing Marina (in any format) meant taking down her family. 

Even had she not published it, as soon as Colin broke off the engagement, assuming he would have and I can't think that he would not have if the news didn't come from Marina herself, Marina, and Penelope's family by association, would have been ruined.  A broken engagement, when the woman was not the one to break it off, was a ruining event.  Plus, the fact of Marina's pregnancy would be outed when she did not eventually marry. If she was sent away, it might only be speculation.  But it would be assumed that she made herself unmarriageable in some way no matter what. 

Using Lady W was still a full nuclear option.  If kept reasonably quite, Marina would have been ruined, but the details would have been only a matter of speculation and more likely to die down by the end of the season.  So it was still extreme.  And she eliminated the small chance that, if kept quite, Colin might allow Marina to break it off staving off some of the scandal.  Marina would be back to square one, however. 

52 minutes ago, ursula said:

But the point is that Penelope approved of the plan until it was Colin and outted Marina in the most underhanded way possible, while keeping her own hands clean. 

I don't know that Penelope actually approved of the plan, just understood that marrying was a necessity. She never came out and said she thought trapping an unsuspecting dupe was a good idea.

She just didn't voice an objection until it came with ruining the happiness of her friend and exposing him and his family to extreme ridicule (far more than questioning Daphne's standing as a Diamond could ever do) when Marina gave birth 9 months from a time before Colin met her. 

 

Edited December 28, 2020 by RachelKM

[BlackberryJam]

Lady Whistledown isn't particularly worldly. She just repeats gossip. She only seems worldly because she's voiced by Julie Andrews.

[EyewatchTV211]

1 minute ago, BlackberryJam said:

Lady Whistledown isn't particularly worldly. She just repeats gossip. She only seems worldly because she's voiced by Julie Andrews.

And people spill a lot within her hearing since they don't even notice her existence. 

[RachelKM]

3 minutes ago, EyewatchTV211 said:

And people spill a lot within her hearing since they don't even notice her existence. 

Taking my reply to the Book vs. Show thread.

 

[ursula]

28 minutes ago, BlackberryJam said:

Lady Whistledown isn't particularly worldly. She just repeats gossip. She only seems worldly because she's voiced by Julie Andrews.

She knows enough about babies to know that a widow’s baby looking like the footman is weird. And this is stuff she pointed out as Penelope. 

[BlackberryJam]

Right....

Just now, ursula said:

She knows enough about babies to know that a widow’s baby looking like the footman is weird. And this is stuff she pointed out as Penelope. 

Yes, but that has nothing to do with the biology of sex. It has to do with repeating the tittle tattle she overhears.

[ursula]

36 minutes ago, RachelKM said:

She just didn't voice an objection until it came with ruining the happiness of her friend and exposing him and his family to extreme ridicule (far more than questioning Daphne's standing as a Diamond could ever do) when Marina gave birth 9 months from a time before Colin met her

I’m not going to rehash the rest as I feel I’ve discussed this at length but this is just one of those “split personality” problems with Penelope/Mrs W. She’s naively just repeating “tittle tattle” as @BlackberryJam said but she also understands the implications of a 9 months gestation period? 

Edited December 28, 2020 by ursula

[ursula]

37 minutes ago, BlackberryJam said:

Lady Whistledown isn't particularly worldly. She just repeats gossip. She only seems worldly because she's voiced by Julie Andrews.

Lady W is worldly because she’s connected enough to run a secret publishing enterprise despite the supposed restrictions of her sex and class. That she manages to write witty repartee -  she’s not just repeating gossip, she’s embellishing it and putting her own spin on events, an 18th century influencer so to speak - is just one more indication of her worldliness.

 

Honestly, if this weren’t an adaptation, I’d say this suffers from Gossip Girl syndrome where we’re supposed to just accept that this person had a split personality and roll with it. The woman who’s running her business, ruining lives and pocketing her cut, simply can’t be the same as the girl who is asking her Mom to go and “play” with her friend.

But without evidence of a medical disorder, it’s more likely that Penelope feigns her “innocence”, plays up her “bumbling wallflower” personality to throw would be suspicion. 
 

 

 

[RachelKM]

31 minutes ago, ursula said:

I’m not going to rehash the rest as I feel I’ve discussed this at length but this is just one of those “split personality” problems with Penelope/Mrs W. She’s naively just repeating “tittle tattle” as @BlackberryJam said but she also understands the implications of a 9 months gestation period? 

The gossip columns and gossip generally referencing babies born early (referring to, at minimum, anticipating the wedding night) was I believe common enough for a lady to glean that babies were not supposed to come less than 9 months after marriage. How exactly the mechanics of that occurred was not discussed. Ladies knew that to have a baby out of wedlock was the height of ruination and that early in a marriage was tolerated but worthy of tittering behind your hand. Beyond that, not so much.

ETA:

Within the show, Penelope's mother shouted about it often enough that, even had Penelope somehow missed references in the past, it was pretty clear that Marina's pregnancy could be timed to well before her appearance in London.

Edited December 28, 2020 by RachelKM

[ouinason]

hopefully in season 2 they can get into Penelope's motivation and maybe even out the characterization.  

[Door County Cherry]

Just a reminder, book talk that is from future books or specific details which did not appear in the series, are considered spoilers and belong behind spoiler tags or in the Book vs. Show thread.  

So if you notice a post disappearing, it's a good bet that's why.  If you think I've missed spoilers, feel free to report and I'll take a look at them. 

[Chicago Redshirt]

11 hours ago, BlackberryJam said:

I don’t get where Penelope felt entitled to him. Did I miss a scene? She doesn’t want Marina to trick him, but nothing where she’s cutting out other women, encouraging him not to dance, talking other women down in his presence, telling other women not to talk to him, nothing. In fact, Penelope is the one who encourages Colin to leave England and travel. 

Entitlement can take on various forms. 

As herself, Pen is timid and quiet. She would never in a hundred years publicly scheme or attempt to outmanuever women solo. 

As Lady W, she clearly feels free to say whatever she wants and let the chips fall where they may.

She doesn't care about the damage that telling the truth will do to Colin and the Bridgertons or her own family. All of which she had to be able to anticipate.

All she cared about was it scuttled the chance for Marina to take Colin off the market. Mission accomplished. 

[Chicago Redshirt]

I am proud of myself for picking up  at least some of the clues that Pen was Lady W on just watching. 

1. That she seemed hostile to Eloise's plans to unmask Lady W.

2. That she was one of the handful of name characters who knew about Marina's pregnancy

3. That Lady W didn't have any info as to the Queen's event that Pen didn't attend

4. That Pen was perceptive enough to see that the "George" letter was a forgery.

There were probably more that I missed. I may re-watch to see.

The question I'm left wondering is whether Pen is a mask and Lady W is who she really is deep down (conniving, sharp-witted, indifferent as to the effect that her gossip has on the people around her), or if Lady W is just a mask, and she really is sweet, well-meaning Pen who for some reason has adopted this Mean Girl persona.

Thoughts?

[ursula]

Just now, Chicago Redshirt said:

I'm left wondering is whether Pen is a mask and Lady W is who she really is deep down (conniving, sharp-witted, indifferent as to the effect that her gossip has on the people around her), or if Lady W is just a mask, and she really is sweet, well-meaning Pen who for some reason has adopted this Mean Girl persona.

You are who you are in the Dark.

[RachelKM]

2 hours ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

All she cared about was it scuttled the chance for Marina to take Colin off the market. Mission accomplished. 

This assumes her motivation was preventing Colin being taken off the market as opposed to protecting him from being duped into a loveless marriage, being made a fool, and a lifetime of misery to follow.

[BlackberryJam]

3 hours ago, RachelKM said:

This assumes her motivation was preventing Colin being taken off the market as opposed to protecting him from being duped into a loveless marriage, being made a fool, and a lifetime of misery to follow.

Penelope sobbed near hysterics after. So obviously she does care about the damage done 

[Slakkie]

I feel like this is one thing they never really addressed - the WHY.  I hope the show does more of that than the books ever did.  I wish they had not done the reveal so quickly.

[Jess14]

19 hours ago, ursula said:

Which is why it was important to Penelope to expose the scandal as Mrs W. She didn't want to risk telling Colin privately and Marina talking him into accepting it. She was selfishly banking on the shame of the scandal stopping the marriage, regardless of who got trampled on in the process as long as she kept Colin free for herself.

Yep, it’s the outing of Marina as Lady W that completely gets me off of the “Pen is a decent person who was just looking out for her friend” train. By outing the fact that Marina was pregnant when she arrived, Pen wanted to make sure that Colin didn’t even have the choice to stay with Marina - whether he wanted to or not (and I don’t think he would’ve stayed, but that’s not Pen’s choice to make). It wasn’t about just saving Colin from being tricked, which could have been achieved by simply telling him the truth - I would’ve supported that because Marina was wrong in what she was trying to do. Rather, it was about making the situation so public and scandal-worthy that any chance at Colin/Marina was over. If that’s what “friends” do, who needs enemies.