Sometime Monday afternoon, sites began reporting that The White Princess had been canceled based on a tweet from one of the stars. While there has been no official word from Starz, after watching the Season 1 finale, "Old Curses," I say cancellation would be the merciful thing to do. I don't think I've ever seen a more lackluster finale. It was painful watching as they turned one of their lead characters into an unrecognizable, unlikeable and unredeemable character. Truth be told, even if the show should somehow be granted a second season I don't think I could bear to watch. What makes this move even more tragic is that the character in question is their title character, Lizzie (Jodie Comer), the white princess herself. By the end of the episode, she has so much blood on her hands, that the title of the show became irrelevant.
Plagued by nightmares of the curse her mother, the Dowager Queen invoked, Lizzie lives in constant fear that the lives of her children and husband are in danger. She begins making seriously questionable choices.
Henry (Jacob Collins-Levy) now knows, from an emissary sent from Spain, that the betrothal of Arthur to Princess Catherine will not happen as long as the challengers to his throne exist. He's torn between his mother, Lady Margaret (Michelle Fairley) who urges him to execute Richard (Patrick Gibson) and the Earl of Warwick, Teddy (Albert de Jongh) and his wife. He instead has a fake Richard executed in front of crowds that unbeknownst to him included the Duchess of Burgundy (Joanne Whaley) intent on a rescue.
When the ruse is revealed to the Spanish emissary, it puts the betrothal and Spanish alliance in danger, Lizzie is at the center of several reprehensible acts that lead to the ultimate beheading of both her brother and cousin.She joins the Bishop (Kenneth Cranham) and tricks the mentally challenged Teddy into signing his name to a blank parchment, on which they later write a supposed full confession of a plot with Richard to kill King Henry. This gives Henry justification to order the beheadings. For some inexplicable reason, Lizzie is there to witness the execution, but her brother has the last word, shaming her for closing her eyes when Teddy is beheaded. He faces his death valiantly knowing the last vestiges of the House of York in his sister are gone. After the beheadings, in a scene as symbolic as any, Henry kneels before Lizzie as she places the crown upon his head. With that act, the rebellion is over and the House of York dead. Now they may rule. Long, live King Henry and Queen Elizabeth, but the signs are there that it is true indeed that heavy is the head that wears the crown.
While some may argue that Lizzie was protecting her family, I'll say that is was another character who showed the greatest growth and loyalty to family. That character was Maggie. In these final episodes, Rebecca Benson was a stand-out as it shows Maggie becoming more and more her own person, agreeing to help the Duchess of Burgundy, playing spy getting the message of the fake Richard to the Spanish emissary, and having the courage to stand up to her cousin Lizzie as no one else would. And she did it all, as she tells her husband in an impassioned speech, that she had been quiet for too long, had been too biddable, but she wasn't going to be biddable any longer because all she wanted was her brother back.
Who was more fitting of the title, the White Princess- Lizzie or Maggie? What did you think of the season and likely series finale of The White Princess? Discuss in the comments below.
