Showtime’s The Tudors

Sunday, 13 of May , 2007 @ 5:13 am

Tags: The Tudors, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Showtime, King Henry VIII, The Tudors screencaps

photo from the Internet Movie Database

While everybody else is blogging about the latest episodes of Grey’s Anatomy and Heroes, here I am writing about a lesser known, but equally superb (if not better) television series - Showtime’s The Tudors.

No words can express how much I love this show. It’s absofuckinglutely brilliant television right there. Maybe I’m just biased because I’m a sucker for historical fiction. But what’s marvelous about this show is its portrayal of King Henry VIII - as a desirable, sexy young king in his prime years as the 25 year old overlord of England and Ireland.

I remember when I was a child, there was a scroll hanging in my parents’ bedroom, with the portraits of a grotesquely obese Henry VIII and his six wives embroidered on it. My mom had bought it from one of her trips to England and she told me the story of a fat king who married six times, divorced two of his wives and executed two others. And I remember thinking, “What an asshole” (okay, I didn’t exactly think the word “asshole”). For many years, that’s all I knew about him. I bet it’s the same for a lot of people. The opening credits of the show is right - what do we know about King Henry VIII before he became an overweight, womanizing, syphilis-infested wreck?

Well, apparently, he was like a fricking rock star.

(spoilers below the cut)

I am still reeling from Episode 5, the most emotional episode to date - at least, for most of the show’s protagonists. Here’s a run down of the many unfortunates that happened in this episode, with accompanying screencaps:

1. Holy Roman Emperor Charles V was supposed to be King Henry’s ally, but he turned against him by releasing his prisoner, their supposedly mutual enemy King Francis I of France. King Henry was very, very pissed.

2. Poor Catherine of Aragon, Henry’s first wife. He wanted to annul their marriage. Since Catherine was the widow of his brother, Arthur, their marriage was doomed from the beginning (according to some passage in Leviticus, anyway). Her not producing a son for Henry was proof of that. Whether or not this was his real reason for ending things with Catherine, we’ll never know. And around that time, Henry had already found a ready, convenient replacement - Anne Boleyn.

By the way, this show will make you feel sorry for Catherine and hate Anne Boleyn. Personally I’ve always hated the “other woman” (in fiction and otherwise), but I think I hate her father, Thomas Boleyn, even more for whoring both his daughters to the king.

3. Princess Margaret, Henry’s sister (historically, her name is Mary Tudor), killed her aging husband, the King of Portugal, because she was in love with Charles Brandon, Henry’s best friend. Of course, the people did not know she killed him. She was sent back to England accompanied by Charles. Upon their arrival, they got married in secret. And again, Henry VIII was very, very pissed at this. Mostly for diplomatic reasons rather than brotherly love; he wanted his sister’s marriage to be to his advantage. Henry banished Margaret from Court, and contemplated on whether he wants to have Brandon executed.

Charles Brandon and Margaret are the horniest couple in the series.

4. The Holy Roman Emperor, invaded Rome and held the Pope captive. He was in total control over the Pope’s actions, and would not allow him to do anything that displeased him - including the approval of the annulment of Henry VIII’s marriage to Catherine. See, Charles V was the nephew of Catherine. Now Henry was even more pissed at her.

5. The king’s illegitimate son, Henry Fitzroy, dies. Henry was devastated. There were even talks of making Henry Fitzroy the heir to the throne. He was very fond of him, even if he was a bastard.

Ah. I love it. And you should love this show, too! Watch it! Download the torrents or whatever. It has every element of a good story - action, love, sex (a lot of sex. And nudity), fashion, gold, riches, and hot men and women. And personally, in spite of minor historical inaccuracies, I think the best stories are the ones with characters that actually walked this earth.

Besides, isn’t Jonathan Rhys Meyers (the most good-looking guy on the planet) as King Henry VIII enough reason to make you want to watch The Tudors? I mean, c’mon. Just look at him!

Click to enlarge. I know you want to

Convinced yet?

EDIT 8:12 PM: If burning you a CD of the torrents is what will take for you to watch The Tudors, I’ll do it! Just email me. I turned Tiff into a convert already. Ha ha

Category: Pictures, Random Sharing, TV

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