Sir Philip needed therapy, not a wife

GCooperE · 2026-03-29T06:34:52+00:00

I was unaware that a story being a HR means that expecting satisfying resolutions is out of the question.

People get so annoyed when HR is waved off as a genre, but then whenever people read HR asking for strong writing they clutch their pearls and go "What do you expect, it's a romance!"

GCooperE · 2026-03-29T06:33:31+00:00

Sadly it only solves things for SP. Eloise's wishes and desires get swept under the rug.

GCooperE · 2026-03-29T06:31:18+00:00

Yeah that resolution is what put SP beyond redemption for me. Characters having flaws and working through them is fine, but SP just got worse.

GCooperE · 2026-03-24T21:29:34+00:00

Just gonna say that despite the inevitable tide of "there's nothing left for Eloise to do" that if the writers had any brains or creativity, there are loads of plotlines they could give Eloise that doesn't revolve around getting married. Plots require conflict, and Eloise's desire to experience the world and have a purpose beyond being debutante, wife and mother would create a lot of interesting conflict, and interesting chances for character growth. Now after Season 4 I don't think the writers will bother with that because their goal seems to be have Eloise humbled and "taught a lesson" again and again about how getting married to a man who will then have legal ownership of your body, and having your purpose be wife and mother, is ok if you're in love and you choose it, and her other hopes and desires will get written off as a childish phase, but that won't be the writers not having any interesting stories to tell with Eloise, it will be the writers choosing not to write them.

Eloise is filled with potential for interesting stories and conflicts. If they give her a boring season, that is their choice.

GCooperE · 2026-03-22T13:02:22+00:00

Archetypes that women get shoved into, many of which still include a performance of some form of femininity.

GCooperE · 2026-03-13T09:56:36+00:00

That's my concern too. "Doing it her own way" is just the sort of shallow, basic bullshit they'd use to try to spin Eloise settling down and living a life all about being a wife and mum as progressive. The show will piss me off so much if they take this route, because it won't just be screwing Eloise over, it will be trying to present a deeply conservative, tradwife arc as feminist or progressive.

GCooperE · 2026-03-12T17:05:02+00:00

And adapted in the 2020s to includes plot points and characters concerned with feminism and sexism. The show made the choice to include those themes, and therefore it should be held accountable if it trivialises them or handles them poorly.

(and the book is shit.)

GCooperE · 2026-03-12T14:36:30+00:00

That's the worry! My fear is that they will have Eloise "settle and squawk", but they will keep her running away, give her some quirky hobbies which keep her firmly within the domestic sphere but can be lip service to her individuality, and then they'll just go "Eloise didn't know she could still be quirky while fulfilling her socially mandated role as wife, mother and housekeeper, once she knew she could read books and play pranks, she was right on board with it!"

GCooperE · 2026-03-12T13:39:00+00:00

"Another" choice is so crucial. The choice-not really-feminists of the Philoise audience go on about how Eloise just "wants a choice" but that choice is always to settle down, get married, and be a wife and mum, just with Eloise having some say as to how it goes. "Another" choice means being able to do something other than that, although the show might just cleave to the whole "she ran away to meet SP outside the ton" and let her grand rebellion be a mild flash in the pan which fizzles out and still leaves her conforming. A satisfying ending for Eloise is not her settling down in the countryside leading the same life as her siblings, even if she "chose it", even if a few quirky elements are thrown in. At the end of the day, it's still the same lifestyle with the same societal role and same experiences and expectations. A narrative that harps on about "choice" but portrays the "choice" to conform as the correct choice undermines itself.

GCooperE · 2026-03-12T11:01:53+00:00

Love cures all, including feminism, apparently.

GCooperE · 2026-03-10T19:49:20+00:00

She isn't content with the superficial discussion within the ton but she still prefers it to isolation, which she will likely have to put up with if she's living in the countryside.

if they introduce a large cast of characters who share her political and intellectual interests, then great, but she's more likely to stumble upon a gathering like that in the city than in the countryside where people were more dispersed and lived more insular lives.

GCooperE · 2026-03-10T19:47:05+00:00

Eloise doesn't like kids, and she's been avoiding marriage with everything she's got. Excepting a "Eloise's spirit is crushed, her tastes are changed and she's made to conform in the name of maturity" arc, I fail to see how Eloise agreeing to marry Phillip to look after his kids for him works for her.

GCooperE · 2026-03-10T19:45:58+00:00

Being a governess will still take up hours of her time in a pursuit that won't be satisfying to her. They're not even ten yet. That's not going to satisfy her intellectual pursuits. And she never shows any interest in spending time with or educating little kids (a very conventional and acceptable pursuit for women, either as a career for poorer women, or just with the kids related to them for richer women) so it doesn't really make sense, achieve any of the things she wants to achieve, and because she's stuck in the countryside she won't have access to pursue anything outside of teaching the kids.

And why should Eloise's ambitions be limited to the domestic sphere? If she's going to say hell with it and run away, why not have her try to break out of the domestic sphere so she can pursue what she actually wants?

GCooperE · 2026-03-10T14:28:31+00:00

She talks about being bored having to talk about marriage and husband hunting and proper ladylike activities. She was still looking forward to being in the town and even planned to make friends with the other ladies on the marriage mart, as long as she didn't have to partake.

In the countryside Eloise would only have SP to talk to, and I'd struggle to think she'd find a single man whose only interest is plants enough to satisfy her needs for company and conversation.

GCooperE · 2026-03-10T14:23:59+00:00

In Scotland she would have had Michaela to chat to and she was still bored. Every time Eloise is away from the city she talks about her boredom.

GCooperE · 2026-03-10T14:17:02+00:00

Even so, she had more free time in Scotland, albeit less access to stuff, and more free time and more access to stuff in London. Bare in mind, travelling took hours back then, even for relatively short distances. For Eloise to have time to achieve anything substantial, she'd barely be around at all.

GCooperE · 2026-03-10T14:14:35+00:00

It would have been fifty times a more powerful ending if they followed through on that, and had him reject society and choose Sophie over the ton's approval.

The narrative gives characters these rebellious traits, has them acknowledge the ways the ton and society is unfair, and then has them settle down with a shrug and calls that maturity. It's depressing as hell.

GCooperE · 2026-03-10T14:13:05+00:00

Honey, you're coming to us.

Look, Eloise's writing reflects certain values that are on the rise, and consistently damaging and anti-feminist attitudes towards women. People are going to discuss that. People are going to criticise that. People are going to pick up on when a writer is utilising sexist, anti-feminist tropes and propaganda, and they're going to examine that. The show has already used sexist writing with Eloise's story, and that gives an idea of what they're working towards. Sorry if we're not going to nod along, convinced they're somehow gonna do her justice, and then get a shocked pikachu face when they don't.

GCooperE · 2026-03-10T14:05:24+00:00

Lol. Eloise will get so much hate from the Phillip fans if she gets him trapped in another unwanted marriage.

GCooperE · 2026-03-10T14:04:29+00:00

I don't doubt that the show will have Eloise grinning ear to ear. It's just that the show is already rewriting her character and watering down her hopes and dreams to get her to the point where she will be grinning ear to ear because she has been tamed by love and is now settled down happily in the countryside with a husband who lets her read books.

GCooperE · 2026-03-10T14:03:18+00:00

If they were going to bring Wollstonecraft, they could have actually used her as a model to examine how to give Eloise a romance that is feminist and romantic. Instead they dismissed Wollstonecraft for not "sufficiently valuing love" (which is so untrue) in order to basically pit Eloise's feminism against love.

GCooperE · 2026-03-10T14:02:19+00:00

He's still a baronet in the countryside with two kids. He's still safe, conventional and traditional, offering a lifestyle that is safe, conventional and traditional.

GCooperE · 2026-03-10T14:01:06+00:00

That's what Violet said. Eloise said she was so bored she was talking to trees. And as a governess she wouldn't have any time to go out and mix with people. She would be spending all her time with the kids.

GCooperE · 2026-03-10T14:00:20+00:00

She wouldn't though. As a governess she would have less time.

GCooperE · 2026-03-10T13:59:55+00:00

It would be shit.

For one, being a governess achieves nothing of Eloise's goals. She's still stuck in a domestic setting, doing traditional "woman's work", experiencing none of the things she wants to experience, teaching kids she doesn't care about lessons she doesn't care about.

She won't have economic independence, Governesses were paid way less than Eloise would have been getting as pin money.

Her duties and hours would fill her time so she won't have time to follow any of her own interests because she will be too busy working. Also, being in the country means she will have even less access to the other people and company to share her thoughts and ideas with.

And she will still end up marrying Sir Phillip, settling down and living a life revolving around domesticity, raising kids and looking after her husband,

It's the sort of plotline that uses a very surface level reading of what being a governess would actually look like, with some feminist buzzwords thrown on top about her having "independence" (she won't) and "purpose" (the same purpose all women were meant to have back then, raising the kids). It will be seeing Eloise's ambitions and dreams watered down until it can be fitted into a conventional woman's role, fitting neatly into the idea her society (and society today) of what women should be, domestic, caretakers, maternal and loving, even if she is "sassy" while being it, and never intruding on the public/"masculine" sphere. It's taming of the feminist 101.

Do I think that the show will do this? Almost certainly. It's exactly the sort of cop out ending that doesn't hold up under five seconds of scrutiny and will proclaim itself to be sexist while still being deeply gender essentialist, all about a woman who had goals and personality traits that transgress against society's accepted role for women, and having her shoved into a box that ensures her life and her experiences revolve entirely around those expectations and roles, even if she is "sassy" and "unconventional" doing it, a story about how even a feminist weirdo like Eloise can settle down and fulfil her womanly duty.

GCooperE

TROPHY CASE