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Home » TV » Weekly TV


RECAP: ‘THE SERPENT QUEEN’ SEASON 2 KICKS INTO A NEW GEAR IN EPISODE 4

By Jonathon Wilson
Published: August 4, 2024 (Last updated: 3 weeks ago)
0

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The Serpent Queen | Image via STARZ

WARNING: THIS ARTICLE CONTAINS MAJOR SPOILERS

One of the appeals of historical fiction is that knowledge of real-world events
can do a lot of dramatic heavy lifting. It’s easy to fret for a character, say,
when you know that they’re due to die soon. The Serpent Queen turns this
expectation on its head. Here, knowledge of what happened to figures like
Catherine de Medici’s son, Hercule, will only cause you problems, since he dies
about five minutes in Episode 4 of Season 2, over a decade earlier than
expected.

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This is one of the outgrowths of the climactic events of the previous episode
when Hercule was hit in the head by a rock after Anjou drowned a Protestant
peasant for no reason at all. What happens to Anjou as a result of this, not to
mention the religious tension the event exacerbates, powers the narrative of
“Judas”.


HERCULE IS DEAD, CATHERINE IS BACK

Thanks to Hercule’s head injury, Catherine has teleported back to France, and
while the Duke of Florence, Alessandro, will shortly follow her to oversee the
palace-building efforts, it does feel like we skipped a good chunk of possible
characterization between episodes. No matter, though, since Hercule
unfortunately succumbs to his injuries in short order.

Despite Hercule ostensibly being her favorite, Catherine takes the loss rather
lightly, at least in part because she has already resigned herself to losing all
of her children at the cost of securing her power. Another kid popping his clogs
is kind of last season, in that regard.

But the death leaves Catherine with a host of problems. In the half an episode
she was gone, Hercule was fatally wounded, the Duke of Guise was imprisoned, a
trade agreement with England was signed, and the Holy Roman Emperor was invited,
all under Charles’s watch.

Charles, needless to say, is an idiot, and when Catherine tells him as much, he
finally grows a backbone and insists that he’s King and will ask for her opinion
when he desires it. Of course, it isn’t very Kingly of him not to realize that
now is precisely when he needs his mother’s input since as we’ve just
established, he’s a moron.


HOLY MOLY

The arrival of the Holy Roman Emperor – played with a world-weary cynicism by
Rupert Everett – is very significant, since Charles de Guise is convinced he’ll
back a plan to have Anjou slaughter Sister Edith and her followers. Anjou has
gone from “deviant” to a local hero for his impulsive religious terror, and he
has started a trend of Catholics drowning Protestants.



Instead, the Emperor tells Catherine about the plan. Since everyone wants to
kill Edith for one reason or another, her demise is virtually inevitable, but it
has to be done the right way, and making a martyr of her isn’t it. The Emperor
is ready to retire, but he can’t quite yet since his son and successor, Phillip
II of Spain, is a nutcase sadist, so he has become a dab hand at quiet scheming,
which is right up Catherine’s street.

But it’s easier said than done to upend this plan and requires a lot of deft
maneuvering from Catherine. Her first order of business is to see Ruggieri and
tell him about the recurring dream she keeps having symbolizing the deaths of
her children, but he reinterprets it to mean that maybe she just needs to kill
one of her children so he doesn’t taint the rest, and it has to be Anjou since
he’s the worst.

Catherine cooks up a scheme to have the Duke of Guise released from captivity
and Anjou placed under house arrest at Charles’s orders, and she manipulates him
into doing it by using Margot, whom he has a thing for. This is news to me, but
it’s implied that Margot not only knows about this but has egged it on for years
to control him. Okay, if you say so!


ELIZABETH IS SAUCY

The Serpent Queen | Image via STARZ



I said earlier that everyone wants Sister Edith dead, but I missed someone out.
Minnie Driver’s Elizabeth I would instead rather use her to usurp the French
crown with Louis de Bourbon, who has shown up to negotiate the trade deal, as a
convenient avatar.

Louis is hilariously stupid, which Elizabeth picks up on immediately, so in the
couple of scenes she has in “Judas” she manages to completely rattle and
manipulate him. After laying out her plan in no uncertain terms after quizzing
Louis about the strength of his faith, she later shows up in his chambers with a
pact he would prefer to have his solicitors give a once-over before he commits
to signing. She strips off and he signs it immediately.

Elizabeth I was pretty famously a virgin, but to be fair the real-life version
didn’t look like Minnie Driver, so I’m not mad at this particular swerve.


MIRACLES DO HAPPEN

The end of The Serpent Queen Season 2, Episode 4 sees the tables turning in
Sister Edith’s favour once again. Aabis tries to poison her with a tincture
provided to her by Angelica. Edith catches her in the act and forces her to
“toast” first, but luckily the poison’s non-lethal. However, Edith, who also
drinks from the cup, takes their mutual survival as a miracle, and Aabis is
carried away to be baptized in the new religion.

Oh, and Phillip II gets kicked, possibly fatally, by a horse. Someone might have
to answer for that.

4


Summary

“Judas” is a really good episode of The Serpent Queen, with a ton of deft
political manoeuvring that kicks the drama into higher gear.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



RELATED:

 * The Serpent Queen Season 2 Episode 5 Recap



ARTICLE BY JONATHON WILSON

Jonathon is one of the co-founders of Ready Steady Cut and has been an
instrumental part of the team since its inception in 2017. Jonathon has remained
involved in all aspects of the site’s operation, mainly dedicated to its content
output, remaining one of its primary Entertainment writers while also
functioning as our dedicated Commissioning Editor, publishing over 6,500
articles.

View All Articles from Jonathon Wilson

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