If you haven’t been watching Parade’s End, the five-part adaptation of Ford Madox Ford’s tetralogy of novels starring Benedict Cumberbatch, then I seriously suggest you do. As it stands at the start of the episode, the somewhat conservative and brilliant Christopher Tietjens (Cumberbatch), has resigned from the imperial office of statistics, and away from both his bitterly frustrated wife Sylvia (Rebecca Hall) and his potential saviour-cum-hopelessly smitten suffragette Valentine (Adelaide Clemens). So far, so Downton. But this episode was a reward for patiently enjoying the foundations set in the first two episodes- whilst we see less of the levity of Tietjens’ friend MacMaster (Stephen Graham) and his affair with Edith Duchemin (Anne-Marie Duff), we instead shift focus to three different themes- 1. What Titetjens really means to the women who love him, 2. The Tietjens dynasty and Christopher’s place in it, and 3. The effects of the war on society
First off, we discover that in actual fact Sylvia does love Christopher. Rebecca Hall is given more of an opportunity to show she is completely frustrated with Christopher, desperate for him to be more human, and more flawed. He is on a pedestal she wants to knock down, because she wants to love this man, but knows her wish will never come true. Her character became someone I really empathised with, rather than just an acid-tongued delight and the token villain. Clemens’ Valentine became less simpering and showed a little more depth- her sheer disappointment when her brother (Freddie Fox, playing the one character in the mini-series I have no time for) shows up and she can’t be Christopher’s mistress for the night makes her more than just a token suffragette. I am beginning to warm to her a lot more, and as Rupert Everett says as Christopher’s brother, “You’re good for him”, and she is. As both women develop, so does Christopher- he is not uptight, merely trapped. He does not know what to do as everyone of worth in London discredits him, spreading rumours, which are the catalyst for Sylvia realising how much she cares for him. Christopher is forgetting things, and he looks set to rebuild himself as a more modern man, and realising what is in front of him- a real chance for happiness, and a chance to rebuild his marriage. What happens next will be very interesting.
READ MORE: http://whatculture.com/tv/tv-review-parades-end-episode-3-review.php
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