So, Belgravia: The Next Chapter turned out to be... not quite what I hoped for. Firstly, it wasn't written by Julian Fellowes. I was surprised by how much I ended up minding this. After all, Fellowes isn't the kind of a-zinger-a-minute script writer where you actively think: "Wow, this is so good". That other costume drama supremo, Andrew Davies, farmed out the script-writing of Mr Selfridge and Sanditon to no ill effect; there's clearly plenty of talented telly writers out there. What Fellowes has, though, is a knack of making his characters interesting and/or likeable. That's a talent this series would have benefited from.
Another disappointment was that the series didn't follow the adventures of the offspring of the main couple from the first Belgravia series, Charles Pope/Bellasis and Lady Maria Grey, which would have made it a proper "next generation" sequel. Instead, the connection to the original Belgravia is rather tenuous. Frederick, aka Lord Trenchard, is the bastard child that side character Oliver Trenchard from the first series decided to acknowledge as his own. We see the grown-up Frederick meet and marry the romantically minded Clara. However, he's so troubled by his upbringing and his "father's" disdain that he has a hard time accepting Clara's love, and much marital strife ensues.
I was sorry that Oliver Trenchard, one of the few links to the original series, was portrayed in such a bad light. Accepting his unfaithful wife's child was part of his redemption arc in the first Belgravia, and it detracts from his characterisation there to see him turn against Frederick from the moment he surprisingly gets a son of his own. For all that, I did manage to get into Belgravia: The Next Chapter after a bumpy start. But for seven of its eight episodes, the supposed connection to the first Belgravia was a hindrance rather than a help.
The series is in fact a competently crafted and well-acted (especially from the secondary characters) marital drama with a couple of amusing side intrigues. Some problems remain, though, the major one being that the two protagonists just aren't very engaging. Now, don't get me wrong, it's quite convincing that a naïve, impulsive girl and an emotionally stunted man would experience these kinds of romantic problems in 1870s Belgravia (perhaps even in modern Belgravia). But there's only so much of Frederick sitting around looking miserable in a repressed way, or Clara confiding in a society doctor who clearly has the hots for her, that this viewer can take.
The other problem, as I've hinted, is the branding. From a series called Belgravia: The Next Chapter, it's not unreasonable to expect the same kind of comfort viewing as from its parent series. For most of its run time, though, this drama isn't particularly comforting. I started thinking that I would have liked it more if it hadn't had any connection to Belgravia whatsoever, and if I'd known roughly what kind of story I could expect from the start.
But – and here's the rub – episode eight was really strong, and tied back to the events of Belgravia in a way I would have been sorry to miss. Finally, after seven episodes of distraught flailing, the characters managed to get their act together in a supremely satisfying way.
Also, the secondary characters add spice to the story throughout. I wasn't always convinced by Elaine Cassidy's Katherine in The Paradise – though she could act up a storm all right, especially in the second series, she just wasn't the spoilt heiress type – but she absolutely slays as the loyal lady in waiting Davison. Sophie Winkleman and Miles Jupp manage to wring every drop of pathos they can out of the ducal couple with an epileptic heir (I know this is the late 19th century, but sometimes the characters in this series seem to know less about epilepsy than Marco Polo). There's a fun French marquise who's obviously up to no good and spinning intrigues seemingly just for the heck of it. Clara's envious sister has a solid character arc, and Frederick's brother James is such a pretty parson in distress you wonder how any thug could have the heart to blackmail him, especially when there are more worthwhile things they could be doing.
So in the end I was quite torn about this drama. I do think it would have benefited either from being shorter, or from giving more time to the side plots. What is the shared history (clearly not of the romantic kind) of Davison and the gimlet-eyed servant Fletcher? Why does the marquise meddle in Frederick's and Clara's marriage, something she does not have to do to further her financial goals? I wouldn't have minded spending more time with these characters and less with silly Clara and stuffed shirt Frederick.
All in all, though, the ending was strong enough to cancel out many of my gripes, and it was nice to see John Bellasis getting just a bit of a redemption (though not too much). It's just too bad it had to be at the expense of Oliver's.
