It's official: my last assignment has been completed and handed in. I have finished my diploma, and there is no more studying left for me to do.
That means there's also no excuse left to keep putting off the last three episodes of The Musketeers, which I've been procrastinating over partly because I don't want to say goodbye, and partly because the fandom seems to be extremely ticked off by what occurs in its final stretch. I've set my expectations accordingly, and all I'm really worried about at this point is Constance. It hasn't been a good year for fictional ladies, and if these writers kill her off they can easily point to the book as justification.
DON'T DO IT.
But I've wasted enough time; let's get this done.
In hindsight, this episode renders Fool's Gold a little odd; a strange detour into the villain's backstory that's ultimately not all that relevant – though at least there's some continuity when Aramis mentions Grimald's mother to him. After spending the entire last episode just out of reach, he's the first person to show up on-screen in this one.
Meanwhile, the King of Spain is ready to hear France's terms for peace; something that Anne is sending to him via Aramis. She doesn't want to tell Louis and Aramis isn't going to inform the other Musketeers, because both got the memo that there needs to be a miscommunication crisis halfway through this episode in order to make the plot work.
Louis is now officially on his death-bed, watched over by Treville (sniffle) as the Musketeers hand over Spanish generals to Marcheaux in order to face trial and execution. Aramis is taken hostage by Grimauld at the place he was meant to meet the ambassador, and Anne's letter given to Gaston who is preparing for his coup. Grimauld then sends a ransom to the Queen, demanding the Spanish general in exchange for Aramis.
That's the setup for yet another very busy episode (which also reintroduces Milady and squeezes in a subplot concerning D'artagnan's cousin) though it hinges on a solid moral conundrum: whether or not to release the enemies of France in exchange for one of the Musketeers, something Anne argues will also be a gesture of goodwill to her brother. The problem is, it's a pretty bad PR move to rescue such men from the gallows in front of an indignant crowd – especially when French criminals are being hanged at the same time.
Things get more complicated when D'artagnan springs his cousin Espoir from the scaffold along with the generals. Let's get this subplot over with as it's rather superfluous – D'artagnan brings him along on the prisoner exchange, he helps out in the ensuing fight, and they say their farewells afterwards. It's not bad, just largely pointless.
The fight scene goes as you'd expect: Aramis has an aborted escape attempt (using his crucifix as a lock-pick, no less), D'artagnan realizes Grimauld is there after recognizing his horse (because for reasons no one ever figured out, Grimauld flaunted it earlier in the season), Espoir saves Athos's life in an attempt to justify his presence in this episode, Aramis yells out the number of guards and their weapons in a move I'm pretty sure he picked up from one of the Die Hard sequels, Porthos can't bring himself to shoot his bestie, and Grimauld inevitably escapes.
Meanwhile, Constance arrives at the palace to try and help Anne salvage the situation, and they rope in Sylvie to teach the poor to read and write under the Queen's patronage. This was a great development! There's finally a decent scene between Constance and Sylvie in which the former brings the latter provisions, and both women work together to help Anne. I'm just sorry it took until this late in the season to see this to happen.
***
Louis's medication is making him go for unchaperoned walks in the palace grounds, and it gets a little weird when we hear the whispering of a woman somewhere in the grounds. It's not entirely clear what goes on in this sequence: presumably Milady approached him since a handkerchief with a forget-me-not is found in his possession, and he speaks about her incoherently – though the best part of the scene is when you realize she's slept with all three of these men:
As a result, Treville isn't at all surprised when Milady turns up (whoohoo!) in his office and offers to hire her as an assassin. The saddest thing about all this is that Milady isn't at all interested in returning to that life, and what follows is some genuinely poignant material as she begins to grasp what she's missed in the last three years.
First of all, Milady learns from one of the cadets that Athos is seeing another woman – and after inquiring as to whether she's a whore, she's told Sylvie is: "good...kind..." On investigating the schoolroom, Milady identifies Sylvie simply through the way she advocates for compassion. The implication here is that Sylvie is perhaps the kind of person Athos thought Milady was when they first meet: someone genuinely good, and you can see the flicker of alarm in Milady's eyes as Sylvie goes from a minor nuisance to a legitimate rival.
Back in Athos's office, she opens a box and sees that he's kept the glove she dropped at the crossroads, revealing that he did go after her three years ago. Dammit show, don't do this to me! Athos arrives and nearly faints at the sight of her – but I suppose it says a lot about their relationship that Athos immediately kisses her, only to have his hands around her neck five seconds later. I like Athos, but I'm beginning to realize that the downward spiral of their relationship was definitely a joint effort.
All subplots converge when the Queen's papers to Sylvie are used to create propaganda against her. The reason for Athos's sudden violence against Milady is that he believes she's harmed Sylvie, and bad timing means that her life is in danger, having been blamed for the anti-Queen pamphlets. And yet this time nothing is Milady's fault, and she ends up back in a situation where her claims of innocence are doubted by the man she loves.
 |
| Ouch. |
Then she has to watch Athos do for Sylvie what he never did for her: save her from the law. Damn. It's heart-breaking, but you can't say it's not beautifully constructed, especially in regards to her history with Athos.
Perhaps the saddest thing is that Milady clearly hangs her entire identity on Athos. When he puts his hands on her throat she insists: "this is who you are, this is who you'll always be", and yet when he walks away from her, she goes to Treville and tells him: "I accept what I am" in taking his offer to kill for him (which eerily reminds me of a similar claim, with equally devastating results, from Vanessa Ives on Penny Dreadful).
But she's clearly not accepting herself: she's accepting Athos's rejection of her, and identifies herself accordingly. In her mind she's a good person when Athos loves her, and a bad one when he doesn't.
***
Okay, let's talk a bit more about Milady. I was warned in advance that she wouldn't have a big role in this season due to Mamie McCoy's pregnancy, and was later spoiled over the fact Athos/Milady was not endgame. Whether the latter was due to the former is unclear, as I recall an interview from the writers that suggested Sylvie was always planned for season three, and that Milady was originally going to interact a lot more with her. What their initial plan was remains a mystery.
There was (apparently) some kerfuffle in fandom on learning that the Athos/Milady ship would sink, and I have a lot of mixed feelings about it, largely based on Doylist and Watsonian perspectives.
When looking at the relationship from a Watsonian viewpoint (that is, from within the story itself) then it's pretty clear that Athos/Milady is simply too fucked up to be salvaged. They had a passionate love affair, and it all went to shit due to their own actions. Some relationships can weather the storm, but these two have actively tried to kill each other on more than one occasion. The chemistry is still there, but it speaks volumes that it's only a matter of seconds after Athos kisses his wife that he's got his hands around her throat.
With this in mind, Sylvie is clearly the better choice for Athos. They have shared goals, shared interests, shared friends. It's impossible to imagine Milady opening up a school for the poor, or hanging out with Constance and D'artagnan. She's spent the better part of the last eight years (at an estimate) killing people for a living – many of them completely innocent.
But when we look at the entire thing from a Doylist perspective (based on the choices that the writers have made across the last three seasons) it becomes incredibly frustrating that they've decided to drop Athos/Milady like this. They built an incredibly interesting and complex dynamic between two characters, and then squandered it – a choice that makes little sense given the characterization of Milady that they themselves came up with.
The Athos/Milady of this show is a relationship of escalating sins against one another – yet as written, I can't help but sympathise with Milady more. She lied to Athos about her background as a thief/street urchin so that she could marry him. This was bad, but given her history, forgiveable. She claims she killed Athos's brother in self-defence – and for what it's worth, I believe her.
Yet it was her earlier dishonesty about her past that damns her, and Athos responds by (and I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt here, even though there's no way he had any authority to hang a woman) putting her on trial and agreeing to the sentence that was (presumably) set for her: execution. He did the lawful thing, even the understandable thing, but clearly not the right thing. Even if he no longer trusted Milady, even if he truly believed she killed his brother, he should have helped her escape justice.
By not doing so, Milady is set on her vengeful path. This is the worst thing of all – understandable but not excusable, and definitely falling into the "great motive, still murder" category.
So it's a great setup: that of two people that loved each other passionately who BOTH did the other wrong. The writers put a lot of effort into giving Milady this sympathetic backstory, establishing that the situation surrounding her fall was highly ambiguous, and suggesting that there was room for a redemption arc (she took the crucial first step of recognizing that she had done terrible things post-execution). And if nothing else, Athos clearly still loved her.
So what's left? I have no idea what's in store for Milady in the last two episodes (there's a good chance she'll be killed off) but Athos-the-person chose the purity of Sylvie over the passion of Milady, and I can't blame him for that. It's the sensible choice, and he's freed himself him his self-imposed purgatory.
However, Athos-the-character has been written as someone defined by his relationship with and treatment of Milady. As awful as it may sound, I would have been happy if they'd haunted each other for the rest of their lives, together or apart. That's just who they are – and certainly how they've been written.
Miscellaneous Observations:
There was surprisingly good continuity throughout this episode: a reminder that D'artagnan comes from Gascony, a mention of Cardinal Richelieu, and a reappearance from Rochelle.
Aramis speaking Spanish: thank you! He also got in some pretty good digs, particularly the one about how his crucifix doesn't protect him from other people, but from himself.
Of course, it doesn't compare to D'artagnan's remark to Athos: "If I let him die my conscious will never be clear – surely you of all people can understand that." Was this in reference to Milady's sentencing? Because... damn. That's way harsh, D'artagnan.
Why on earth did Grimauld arrange to have the prisoner swap take place only a few feet away from his hideout? Things would have gone off without a hitch had Espoir and D'artagnan not wandered away from the group and stumbled across it.
I'm not happy with the way Queen Anne was portrayed here. After finally making a political move of her own – one that's in the best interests of everyone – she's scolded for it. Not only that, but she's haughty and impatient in the face of her failure. Why didn't she ask Treville for advice in the first place? Why didn't she let the rest of the Musketeers in on Aramis's mission? Oh right, plot. Unfortunately it makes her look ineffectual at a stage when her character should have long since moved from naivety to savviness. That was the whole point of her learning curve in season two, but this show has consistently let her down when it comes to her development.
Heck, the Merlin writers did better with Guinevere's arc, and that's really saying something considering they cared less about her than these guys apparently do about Anne.
I appreciated that the general sentiment on seeing Grimauld was "just take him out" and not "leave him to me." Because seriously, the goal should just be killing the guy.
Nice bit of character development when Athos orders wine – not for himself, but for the Spanish prisoners. Unfortunately this is immediately undone when he tells Milady: "you don't know what I want." Um, you've just kissed her passionately. I think she's got a pretty good idea of what you want, oh Master of the Mixed Message.
And then I liked him again when it came to that sweet moment with Constance. It's tough being a fan of Athos.
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