Lle Llywela

Stable

We cut to a nice, quiet location somewhere unspecified – looks like a stable – where Dujon has a bag pulled off his head to find Porthos and Aramis towering over him, grim-faced.

ARAMIS: Time to pay the reckoning for Cornet.
PORTHOS: I bet he's going to say, "I have no idea what you're talking about."
ARAMIS: And then we'll have to hurt him.
PORTHOS: At which point, he'll suddenly remember he killed him.



PORTHOS: Why wait? Let's just hurt him now.
ARAMIS: It could go like that. Or we can just skip to the confession part. It would save us time, and you pain. A lot of pain.

Porthos and Aramis are a well-oiled team, we see here, functioning almost like two halves of the same brain. They've got this down to a fine art, don't have to lay a finger on the man, they are so good at being intimidating just by using their words. D'Artagnan can only watch and marvel at the performance, wondering what sort of madmen he's fallen in with.

Dujon protests that he was just following orders. He doesn't want to say whose orders, though, in fear of his life, so the oh-so determined musketeers set about ensuring that he becomes more afraid of them than anyone else. While Porthos ties Dujon to a post, Aramis makes a big show of prepping his musket while casually discussing both its efficacy as a weapon and his own proficiency as a marksman.

ARAMIS: You know, people say I'm quite good with these.
PORTHOS: Good? He's the best. He's so modest.
ARAMIS: But the musket isn't the most reliable weapon. From 100 yards, I'll probably miss as often as I hit. From 50, well, I rarely miss. But from ten? It's just a matter of which vital organ do I choose to hit first?



The cinematography and lighting here is beautiful. That light, humorous tone Aramis often affects has taken on a steely undertone, ruthless as all heck – terrifying, from where Dujon is standing, while d'Artagnan stands there wide-eyed with alarm at the prospect of being made witness to a murder. He's having one heck of a week. He doesn't do anything to stop it, though, but stands back and lets the musketeers get on with what they do. They are playing for high stakes here, after all. Aramis gets ready, lines up the shot, pulls the trigger…



PORTHOS: Bang.

The gun wasn't loaded. Dujon breathes again. So does d'Artagnan.

Then Aramis makes a big show of actually loading the gun this time…and Dujon starts to talk. A very effective interrogation strategy; Porthos and Aramis are very good at what they do.

DUJON: It was Captain Gaudet. Of the Red Guards. He told us to do it. He said he wanted a few men for a special mission. Something unofficial. An ambush to steal the King's letters. But Gaudet went mad. He killed them all. None of us knew it would be murder.

I'm not convinced. Those were experienced musketeers. One man couldn't have killed them all. Gaudet's men were as involved as he was.

They took the Spanish gold from Cornet, Dujon says, who had it in his saddlebags, which…okay, I'm a bit confused now, because neither Cornet nor Mendoza made it to their rendezvous at the monastery, so how did Mendoza get the letters and why did Cornet have a bag of Spanish gold? We have been assured of Cornet's integrity, and implying that he sold out in any way would cast a shadow over the rest of the Musketeers, so what gives? It's a wrinkle in the plot that never gets ironed out satisfactorily, because the Musketeers are no longer investigating the missing letters but are interested only at this point in seeking justice both for Athos and their slaughtered comrades.

Anyway. D'Artagnan gets in on the action now. Not being an experienced interrogator like Porthos and Aramis, he gets physical at once, demanding to know who killed his father – he's got a lot of pent up rage and grief to work through still. Porthos has to drag him away as Dujon frantically shouts that it was Gaudet and that he did it to blacken Athos's name. Dujon insists that he isn't like Gaudet, that he's a soldier like them, but neither of the musketeers takes kindly to this comparison and it is Porthos's turn to get physical, grabbing the man by the throat as Aramis demands to know where Gaudet is now. Camped in some ruins outside the city gates, says Dujon, who offers to show them where. He really is more afraid now of the musketeers than of his captain! Either that or he's hoping to stitch them up the first chance he gets.

Ruins outside Paris

So our intrepid trio, with a securely bound Dujon in tow, arrive at the ruins and recce the joint, which is crawling with Red Guard.



Don't the Red Guard have actual duties they should be getting on with? Why hasn't the absence of so many soldiers been noticed and commented on, even allowing for the fact that their commander-in-chief is in on the plot?

ARAMIS: The bridge is the only way in and out. There's too many of them for a frontal assault. I could take a couple of them out from here...
PORTHOS: No, by the time you've reloaded, the rest will be long gone. Now, if we're going to capture Gaudet alive and get back those uniforms, it'll have to be by stealth. We need a distraction, something they'd never expect.
D'ARTAGNAN: I know something that might work…

Brain-storming for the win! Next thing we know, a scantily clad and thus very chilly Constance is nervously picking her way through the snow to the guard on the bridge, muttering under her breath about what an idiot she is to agree to this. How the hell did d'Artagnan convince her to do it, and why did we not get to see that no doubt priceless conversation? She puts on a good act, playing the part of a hooker for all she's worth.



CONSTANCE: Fifty sous and I'll take you to heaven.
GUARD: Are you one of those religious nutcases?
CONSTANCE: It was a metaphor.

Heh, her indignation here is priceless – bettered only by her still greater indignation when he haggles for five sous instead! She gets him turned around…and Porthos takes him out, silently and swiftly. Job done...and then indignation again when Aramis teases her in passing about agreeing to ten sous; this will be the tone of their friendship going forward!



D'ARTAGNAN: I'm in your debt.
CONSTANCE: I'm doing this for Athos.

Again, how well does she know Athos and how? We are never told. At this point we've never even seen them share a direct conversation to establish the nature of the connection we've been told about, and although they remain friends throughout the show they never seem especially close. Passing acquaintances only at this stage, perhaps – yet Constance is going to fairly great lengths here to help him. Perhaps that says more about who she is than it does the nature of her connection to Athos.

Despite having spent last night with Milady, d'Artagnan is already well on his way to falling for Constance, married woman or not, can't take his eyes off her here…although she smacks him down for it, being a respectable married lady and all. She likes him, though, it isn't one sided. He directs her to a hiding place nearby and gives her a pistol to defend herself if need be, although judging by her dismayed reaction, she has never even held a gun before, still less fired one.



Damn, but Constance deserves a medal for agreeing to help them with this. She's so far outside her realm of experience here, and it speaks such volumes to who she is, that she is willing to go to such lengths to help someone in need. She's having one hell of a day!

Guard down, the intrepid trio make their way into the ruins to check out the lie of the land. Goodness only knows what they've done with Dujon. Left him tied up somewhere, no doubt. Lurking in the shadows, they identify Gaudet strolling around among his men, confident that nothing can touch him.

ARAMIS: Wait for my signal. Surprise is everything.

But the sight of his father's killer strolling around out there is too much for d'Artagnan, who at this stage has no control over his emotions, he simply reacts to his circumstances; he's at the very start of his journey here, with a steep learning curve ahead of him. So, having identified his father's killer, he stops thinking – and he certainly isn't listening to the seasoned soldiers planning their strategy at his side. He just shoves past them and charges at Gaudet, yelling loudly, thus alerting the entire camp to the intruders before they are ready and endangering more lives than just his own.



ARAMIS: Surprise would have been everything.

So Aramis and Porthos are forced to break cover to both provide back up to the hothead and fight for their lives, since their position has been so comprehensively blown. Battle ensues: lots of shooting and clashing of swords, big action sequence, yada, yada. While Porthos and Aramis again function as a well-oiled team, fending off the bulk of the Red Guard, d'Artagnan has eyes only for Gaudet, swiftly engaging him in combat, determined to avenge his father's death. I'll say this for him: he's not easily swayed from a goal, having set his mind on it!

I notice here that while Porthos wields two pistols, Aramis has a pistol in one hand and musket in the other, despite the fact that a musket is a really inconvenient weapon to use at such close quarters, and then I remember that Aramis left his second pistol behind at Adele's and hasn't managed to retrieve it yet. That's a nifty little note of continuity to have woven into the background of this scene, unremarked upon.

Having fired their guns, they move to the sword-fighting phase of the battle. Porthos, being the strapping chap he is, wields a schiavona, although he is quick to switch to physical brawling when he gets the chance, prepared to use anything that comes to hand as a weapon, including his own belt.



Aramis, meanwhile, fights with a rapier, taking on as many as three opponents at once.



This is our first opportunity to see these two in action, and both put up an excellent show for themselves, demonstrating clearly the superiority of the Musketeers over the Red Guard! It is also the first time we see Aramis crossing himself after a kill, hinting at the devout religious beliefs which sit so uneasily alongside the violence of his profession.

The thing that always strikes me during these action sequences is this: they fight with guns first, one shot per weapon only, then switch to swords because there's no time to reload during pitched battle. But how come everyone runs out of shot at the same time? How fortunate for Our Heroes that having discarded their pistols and drawn their swords, they don't then get shot down on the spot by a canny opponent who kept a spare pistol at hand! With this thought in mind, I really appreciate the moment where d'Artagnan, sword in hand, charges through an arch in pursuit of Gaudet (who is running away from his opponent like a coward) only to find himself confronted by a Red Guard who hasn't yet fired his pistol. D'Artagnan's turn to bring a sword to a gunfight. It looks like curtains for our young hero…but then his opponent is shot down from behind just in the nick of time. But who fired the shot?



It was Constance, of all people, standing a short distance away looking horrified at what she's just done. Shaken, d'Artagnan gives her a brief nod of recognition and then charges off after Gaudet once more, single-minded as he is. They are both lucky none of the other Red Guard notice Constance there, given that she no longer has a useable weapon.

While d'Artagnan is busy chasing Gaudet around the place, Porthos and Aramis between them manage to subdue the entire rest of the camp, just the two of them. Just goes to show what the Musketeers are capable of, the King's elite guard! Man, the rival regiment is going to be depleted come morning. They never seem to have any trouble replacing their miscreant soldiers, though. And we already know that there will be no consequences to this nighttime raid, which will go down on the record as a fair fight in the name of justice...so long as the charges levelled against the Guardsmen can be proved. The Cardinal could make a fuss about precipitate action and the killing of his men, but by doing so he'd run the risk of implicating himself, which he would never allow, so no, if the charges can be proved, he will distance himself from them and let his men take all the blame.

Having caught up with Gaudet, d'Artagnan engages him in combat once again, unleashing all his grief and rage on the man, which lends him strength but robs him of control. He's still a better swordsman than Gaudet, however, successfully disarming him, knocking him to the ground and getting a pair of crossed swords to his throat – but just at that moment Aramis comes rushing over bellowing for d'Artagnan not to kill the man because they need him alive. Gaudet is the man accused of the crimes for which Athos was sentenced to death; they will need to produce him as evidence, or better still 'persuade' him to confess.

We can see the struggle in d'Artagnan's eyes here, visibly shaking with emotion, torn between wanting to kill and knowing he shouldn't. At last he makes a decision.



D'ARTAGNAN: Death in combat is too honourable for you. I'd rather see you hang.

It's the right choice, and important for d'Artagnan as hero of the story that he chooses to do the right thing instead of pursuing revenge at all costs…but he then makes a fatal mistake. He turns his back and walks away from his downed opponent instead of securing him. Gaudet promptly pulls out a dagger and rushes after him, while Aramis, too far away to intervene, shouts a warning.

D'Artagnan swings around just in time for Gaudet to run onto his sword. He slumps to the ground dead, and both Aramis and d'Artagnan stare at his body in dismay, Aramis wondering if they've just lost their last chance of clearing Athos's name, while d'Artagnan is conflicted, because he wanted the man dead but achieving it clearly doesn't bring the satisfaction he might have expected. Killing Alexandre's murderer doesn't bring him back – and might even prevent justice from being done.

But Porthos, meanwhile, has been busy rifling around the joint while the others were otherwise occupied, and whistles now for attention – he's found the stolen uniforms. Just as earlier it was Porthos who was sharp-eyed enough to spot that Spanish coin in the mud; his focus and observational skills are a consistent little character detail that will be seen again and again as the series continues.



Aramis brightens at once, certain that with Dujon's confession that's all the proof they need to clear Athos's name; Gaudet alive and talking not necessary after all. And presumably any other Red Guards left alive after the battle can also be leaned on for a confession, although we never see or hear of such, so I guess they were pretty thorough about killing them all. The two musketeers busy themselves about the place, apparently in no rush whatsoever to get the evidence back to the authorities, leaving d'Artagnan standing there all lost and bereft, wondering where he goes from here, since he really hasn't thought any further ahead than avenging his father's death. He turns to see Constance nearby, looking traumatised by all the violence and bloodshed she just experienced, and that's all the incentive he needs to set his own woes aside in favour of looking after her. He finds a cloak and drapes it around her, and takes the pistol from her hand, as gentle as if he were handling a skittish horse. It's a side of him we haven't seen yet, he's been so fuelled by rage and grief throughout.

CONSTANCE: I killed him.
D'ARTAGNAN: You saved my life.



But Constance is not reassured. All she wants now is to go home, knowing that her husband will be back soon – and we already know that she can't tell him about any of this. He would never understand what she has experienced here or why she did it. D'Artagnan puts an arm around her and leads her away.

Chatelet Prison

It is dawn, and Athos is led from his cell, quiet and defeated and accepting of his fate. He isn't expecting any kind of rescue or reprieve.

He is taken outside to a small courtyard to face a firing squad, chained to the wall so he can't make a run for it, and we see that someone is watching from an upper window. It is Milady de Winter, but Athos doesn't see her.



As the firing squad take aim, Athos braces himself, and Tom Burke does an excellent job here – you can see the defeat and despair pouring off him as he faces his doom.



Athos closes his eyes, prepares himself – then grows impatient as the seconds silently tick by, yells at them to shoot already…but then comes another shout, ordering the gunmen to hold their fire. It's Aramis, waving an all-important piece of paper.

ARAMIS: If I were you, I wouldn't be in such a hurry to die. Your release. Signed by the King.

And now I'm picturing the King's reaction to being woken up in the middle of the night to have to deal with all this. Good thing he was willing to be woken, I suppose. How awful it would be for an innocent man to be executed just because the King wanted a lie in and gave orders not to be disturbed!

Also, shouldn't there be reprisals against the Red Guard for being involved in such a business en masse the way they were? If such extensive Musketeers involvement in such a scheme had been proved so conclusively, Richelieu would have had them shut down in short order! Yet the Red Guard, however corrupt and incompetent they prove to be, always go on to antagonise another day.

Anyway, Athos slumps against the wall in relief, can't even speak for a moment, he's so overcome by the last second reprieve, while Aramis and Porthos busy themselves freeing him of his chains.

ATHOS: I thought I'd finally shaken you two off.
PORTHOS: Believe me, there are easier ways.



D'Artagnan has followed the musketeers into the yard, hanging back all awkward, since the last time he saw Athos he was trying to kill him. Athos pauses in passing, catches his eye and nods, a silent little moment of acknowledgement between the two...even though Athos has no way of actually knowing that d'Artagnan played a part in securing his release, since he's been in prison and out of the loop and all, but we'll go with it. This little moment they share here perhaps follows on from their earlier encounter to symbolise Athos recognising something of a kindred spirit in d'Artagnan, who he will take under his wing as a protégée going forward…despite the fact in this episode it has actually been Aramis who's had the most direct interaction with the youth and put the most effort into mentoring him, a dynamic that doesn't get much follow-up.



D'Artagnan smiles, satisfied that he did something good here, at the end of it all, while up at the window, Milady withdraws, thwarted.

And that's the end of the main episode plot, but there's still a bit of mopping up to be done before the story concludes.

Country road

A carriage with a couple of Red Guards on the back is driven along a snowy track through the woods. Cardinal Richelieu is taking Adele on a little outing. Uh oh.

ADELE: Where are we going? Is it a surprise?
RICHELIEU: I would imagine so.

He seems almost nervous. And sinister. Adele, though, doesn't seem to notice anything amiss. Not yet, anyway.

The carriage stops at a fairly random spot along the road. It's the middle of nowhere, quiet and still. No witnesses. As the Red Guards help Adele down from the carriage, she begins to realise that something is very wrong here.

ADELE: What's this?
RICHELIEU: Your surprise, my love.



She turns to see Aramis's pistol in the hands of one of the guards, primed and ready to fire, and realises that she is going to die here – executed with her lover's gun, no less.

RICHELIEU: You're a traitor and a spy.

I'm not sure how he figures that, just because she's got a fancy man, but it tells us a lot about his paranoid, suspicious mind that he'd think it. That to him, his mistress can't simply have taken a lover because she fancied another man (younger, prettier, more charming and more fun), there has to be some deeper meaning; if she has betrayed him physically then of course she must have also betrayed every secret he ever confided in her. Or perhaps that's just what he tells himself to justify murder – and he knows he is committing cold-blooded murder, or rather, having cold-blooded murder carried out on his behalf, that's why he took the trouble to come all the way out here to the middle of nowhere, nice and private.

ADELE: Have you no mercy?
RICHELIEU: Mercy belongs to God.
ADELE: You pious hypocrite! You'll burn in hell!
RICHELIEU: I have work to do here first.

So he does expect to go to hell, man of religion though he is. He knows what he is, and he doesn't care. Richelieu lives in the here and now, untroubled by thoughts of the hereafter.



He won't even look at her as the Red Guards drag her into a clearing nearby – not until she shouts that she loves Aramis, and loves him with her last breath. That gets the Cardinal's attention, piquing his pride. He doesn't say another word, but watches with morbid fascination as the guardsman pushes her to her knees and raises the gun. "I love Aramis, I love Aramis," Adele whispers to herself, over and over, until the fatal shot is fired.



Damn. Alas poor Adele, fridged as a plot device to facilitate the stories of the men in her life. And I'm not sure Richelieu finds his revenge any more satisfying than d'Artagnan did earlier.

Also, I am very disturbed by the willingness of the Red Guard to commit murder on the whim of the Cardinal. It is supposed to be disturbing, I know. The Red Guard are deliberately drawn as bad guys as a direct contrast to the heroics of the Musketeers. Still. It's disturbing.

Parisian Bar

Aramis is in a bar having a drink with Porthos and their new friend d'Artagnan, blissfully unaware that his lover was just murdered in cold blood, and at this point, the stage seems set for an explosive ongoing storyline, since the Cardinal knows that Aramis had an affair with his mistress and is well established as a dangerous and vengeful man, so surely we might expect him to have in for his rival from here on. We might be forgiven for expecting to see an ongoing vendetta of some kind, perhaps masked at first by the Cardinal's well-known hatred of all things Musketeer, only gradually becoming clear that a very personal grudge against this musketeer in particular is in play, the connection to Adele's disappearance eventually becoming clear…

Sad to say, as ticking time bombs go, this one turns out to be a bit of a damp squib, in the end, and perhaps it was meant to be a slow burn storyline that then never came to fruition because Capaldi left the show after season one, but there was still a whole season to play with, yet the potential built into the storyline is never really tapped into, not until it is far too late. I may be misremembering, so this re-watch might throw up details I'd overlooked, but I don't recall any especial antagonism from Richelieu toward Aramis, not of a kind that might be related to Adele, anyway. In the end, we are left with the general impression that the Cardinal doesn't really care who Adele's lover was after all, he only cares that Adele betrayed him, an attitude that punishes the woman while letting the man get off scot free. Period-typical misogyny, perhaps, but still. Opportunity wasted!

ARAMIS: You come to Paris to kill Athos and end up saving his life. After a few drinks, I'm sure you'll come to appreciate the irony.

To be honest, d'Artagnan seems fairly comfortable with the irony already. Athos is sitting apart from the group, brooding into his wine, and d'Artagnan wonders what's wrong with him, as if having come within seconds of being executed for a crime he didn't commit isn't enough to make any man contemplate the meaning of life. Porthos blames it on 'woman trouble', and there's a bit of clumsy exposition around the fact that Porthos and Aramis only know that Athos was once in love and the woman died, he's never told them any more than that, but they do know it's the reason he likes to drink himself into a stupor whenever he gets the chance. It tells us a lot about Athos as a character, his intensely private nature, that even his closest friends know so little about the source of his deep and abiding melancholy, that he has never been willing to tell them any more.

Porthos cheekily remarks that he'd better stay behind, as Athos will need someone to carry him home, and it is implied that this is something Athos's friends have to do for him regularly. That's Aramis's cue to leave, he has other plans for the evening, but before he goes he takes the trouble to ask if d'Artagnan has a place to stay. I wonder what he'd have done if d'Artagnan said no. Offered the use of his own room, perhaps, since he clearly has no intention of using it tonight! As it is, d'Artagnan says he already has a place to stay, whereupon Aramis teasingly guesses that he'll be in the arms of Madame Bonacieux. D'Artagnan protests that she's a married woman, but Aramis only grins at the naivety of the boy.

ARAMIS: You really are from Gascony, aren't you?
D'ARTAGNAN: Besides, there's someone else. A woman I've only met once. The most beautiful I've ever seen. We have unfinished business.
PORTHOS: She sounds lively.
D'ARTAGNAN: You have no idea.

Heh, it's a nice attempt at deflecting the teasing, but he mostly just comes across as a little boy trying to play in the big leagues but not quite succeeding!



Aramis heads off, leaving Porthos to propose a game of cards – with no one there to warn d'Artagnan about his cheating!



Chatelet Prison

Dujon has the luxury of a cell to himself, and is paid the dubious honour of a visit from Cardinal Richelieu.

RICHELIEU: I'm grateful for your loyalty, Dujon. I thought you might talk, if only to save your own skin.
DUJON: Still could. Unless you're here to save me.
RICHELIEU: A drink to your freedom. The formalities are being arranged, as we speak.
DUJON: And to think...if I told them it was you who gave Gaudet his orders, it would be you in here instead of me.
RICHELIEU: Everything I do, I do for the good of France.

And he really, truly believes that. He proposes a toast and Dujon drinks, not noticing until it is far too late that the Cardinal is not partaking.

Poison, of course. It works fast. He's dead in seconds. A more hands on killing for Richelieu this time.

Adele Bessette's house

Aramis is smiling in anticipation of sexy fun times ahead as he knocks for entry and explains to the maid that he has an appointment with Mademoiselle Bessette.



The maid, stone-faced, tells him that Adele has gone to the Cardinal's estate in the country and won't be returning for some time. Aramis is taken aback – all the more so when the maid hands him a package and slams the door in his face. He unwraps the package, and finds his pistol inside.

Aramis is dismayed, wondering what this means, and steps back to shout up at the window for Adele…but of course she is not there to answer him. And I have a few thoughts here. The first is that if Richelieu really wanted to know about Adele's lover, he didn't actually need Milady to identify the pistol's owner at all, he could have just asked the maid! She will have let him in every time, and doesn't seem to approve of him, from what we see in this scene, so I've no doubt she'd have spilled everything the moment the Cardinal asked, especially since he pays her wages. The thought probably never crossed his mind, however, because to a certain class, servants are invisible.

My second thought relates to the fact that Aramis doesn't learn the truth about Adele's death until season two – far too late for the revelation to have any real impact, because Capaldi had left the show by then – and he never finds out that his own gun was used to kill her. Yet it wasn't exactly a private murder. There were two Red Guard standing right there, plus a carriage driver. One of them pulled the trigger. They heard Adele name Aramis as her lover as she died, and they know the Musketeers well enough to know who he is. The Red Guard hate the Musketeers, as much as the Musketeers hate the Red Guard. You're telling me they never gossiped about it among themselves, not even when deep in their cups? That the gossip never spread, until the rumour at last reached the ears of the Musketeers? I'm not sure I buy that.

Church

Elsewhere in Paris, Milady de Winter strides through a stunningly beautiful church to the confessional, where the priest is slumbering.

MILADY: Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned, often. I lay with many men. I killed some of them. In the world's eyes, I've done terrible, unforgivable things. But I once loved a man…and he loved me.

Inn

Back at the inn, we see Athos drunkenly playing with the locket he wears around his neck, dreaming again of carrying a forget-me-not flower in his hand, walking up to a woman…who we now see and recognise as Milady. Back in the here and now, he opens the locket and we see within it a pressed forget-me-not flower, which we will soon come to know well as Milady's motif.

Church

Milady wonders why God has abandoned her and not answered her prayers, and I wonder what her motivations are here. Why has she come to confession? What did she hope to gain? Is she genuinely looking for absolution, wanting to offload her conscience? Or is she just spoiling for a fight? Based on what she's told him so far, the priest tells her she is a child of the devil, an abomination…which is a bit of an extreme response, so no wonder she is enraged, but her reaction merely proves his point. She smashes the screen between them and throttles him with his own chain.

MILADY: I know what I am! You don't understand. I'm not looking for absolution! I want revenge!

Revenge is the theme of the episode, I guess, and this scene might be a bit clumsy, but it does convey its point, both absolutely confirming the connection between Milady and Athos, and establishing that she chose him for the Cardinal's plot as revenge for what happened in their shared past – a revenge attempt that was unsuccessful, meaning that she will try again.

Having murdered the priest basically out of sheer temper, Milady stalks out of the church as the final shot of the episode.



And that's it: our introduction to the show and to the world of the Musketeers.

THE END

Does it pass the Bechdel test? 
Not really. There are four named women in the cast – the Queen, Milady, Constance, Adele – plus two unnamed women with speaking parts – the innkeeper and Adele's maid. This compares to, count 'em, 13 named men, plus seven male characters with lines but no names.

Six women to twenty men is both a large cast and a pretty poor ratio, but would be enough to pass the test if only those six women intersected in any way. As it is, though, they are mostly split off into entirely separate sub-plots and never meet, apart from a very fleeting encounter between Milady and the innkeeper, but it really can't be considered a conversation, since it's just Milady making demands while the innkeeper doesn't reply to her, so we can't justify scraping a pass there.

On the other hand, the women are far more richly written here than in the original novels, so there's that…but given the nature and content of those novels, that's not exactly a high bar to pass!

I was going to add the question "is a woman dressed 'for the dads'?" but then I realised that would be pointless and redundant, as the female costumes, while gorgeous, are almost universally revealing throughout the show, pushing up and exposing the breasts to a frankly absurd extent; low necklines might have been fashionable in the 1630s, but not to this extent. So we'll just accept right up front that the answer to that question is 'yes' for every episode!

Is a woman captured? 
Yes, Adele, right at the end.

The flip side sees Athos arrested halfway through the episode, the remainder of which he spends in jail.

Does a man have to rescue a woman from peril? 
No. Alas poor Adele, no one comes to her rescue.

On the flip side, Constance saves d'Artagnan's life, which makes for a nice reversal. And of course Athos is the primary damsel in distress of the episode, half of which he spends in jail awaiting execution with no hope of escape, wholly reliant on his friends to clear his name.

Is a woman threatened, harmed or killed? 
Yes. Adele is murdered by the Red Guard at the command of the Cardinal. Also, a random nameless extra is murdered alongside her husband by Gaudet.

On the flip side, Alexandre is murdered to further d'Artagnan's story, so there's equal opportunity fridging going on here. Plus an entire squad of Musketeers is murdered, along with any number of Red Guard, and that chap Alexandre was debating politics with at the inn.

Does a woman have to deal with a sexual predator? 
Well…a bit. D'Artagnan kisses Constance against her will when he is trying to hide from the mob; that probably counts even if it is intended as a meet-cute for an endgame couple. Also Constance is groped by a Red Guard, but she invited it as part of a deliberate distraction, so that may not count.

On the flip side, Milady is fairly predatory, seducing Mendoza in order to first steal the King's letters from him and then kill him, and d'Artagnan so she can frame him for murder.

Is a woman 'spared' the ordeal of having to do/witness something unpleasant by a man who makes a decision on her behalf/keeps her deliberately ignorant?
No.

Does a man automatically disbelieve or belittle something a woman says?
Yes. Louis is very dismissive of Anne.

Does a man talk over a woman or talk about a woman as though she isn't there? 
No.

Is a woman the first/only person to be (most gratuitously) menaced by the episode's antagonist(s)?
No. The first menacing of the episode award goes to Alexandre d'Artagnan and the other men at the inn. And Athos is the most gratuitously menaced throughout the episode, framed for murder and locked up to await execution.

Does a woman come up with a plan?
Yes. Milady wins all the awards here, taking the Cardinal's instructions and turning them into working strategy.

Does a woman get to be a badass?
Yes. Constance breaks up a fight, goes undercover to facilitate a Musketeer raid, and then scores a kill the first time she ever fires a pistol, saving d'Artagnan's life. Plus, obviously, Milady; she might be a shady spy and murderess, but she's definitely a badass.

Did a woman write/direct/produce this episode? 
No, no, and yes. Jessica Pope is executive producer of the show, and Carmel Maloney co-produced the episode.

Is Paris colourful?
Yes and no. The core four pass the diversity test: of the four lead actors, only Tom Burke is your classic white Englishman. Howard Charles is mixed race, deliberately cast in homage to Dumas, while Santiago Cabrera is Chilean and Luke Pasqualino is of Italian heritage. Of their characters, however, only Porthos is ever acknowledged on-screen as non-white. Everyone else in this episode is white.

Who Saved Who?
Constance saved d'Artagnan twice in this episode, really speaking: the first time rather against her will, the second time very directly and deliberately, killing a man for his sake. D'Artagnan, Aramis and Porthos all worked together to save Athos from the firing squad.

Verdict

As introductory episodes go, it isn't perfect, and I do remember being a little unsure when it first aired, it was so different in tone from what I'd come to expect of a costume drama, but I adjusted quickly and when I look back on this episode now, I really I love it.

I love the pace, the humour, the cinematography, the gorgeous sets and locations, and the world-building. I love how sharply-drawn and well-acted the characters are, and come away with a real sense of immersion in their world. Some characters play a bigger role in this story than others, but by the end of the episode all the major players in the show have been established and feel like real people inhabiting a real world. It's a show with plenty to admire, critique and snark about, which is all to the good. It's a fun ride and I am left wanting to come back for more.



*Screencaps made by me; gifs in my collection made by very clever other people on the internet. These include Tumblr-users Tatzelwyrm, Marigoldfaucet, Ofthemusketeers, Doortotomorrow, Polyportamis, Evennstars, Iamanathemadevice, Sweetladylucrezia, Angelicaliza, Ladyofglencairn, Roseroberts, Kingsmusketeers, Nineteeninetyeightt, Sylviesathos, Musketeersbbc, Duckodeathreturns, Themusketeersdaily, Runakvaed, Unkindness313, Sigurism, Berniestark, Kynikey, Deivixxx, Harrveyspecterr, Lochiels, Walterobrien, Annamisdaily, Captaindamerica, Dealingdreams, Borgiapope, Iriswestt, Themusketeersgifs-blog, Morimundo, Punksteves, Spaceshoup, Rrueplumet, yurioplisestky, padmecat. All credit to them and anyone else whose name I have failed to capture!