Emily Bader as Lady Jane Grey, Robyn Betteridge as Margaret Grey, Isabella Brownson as Katherine Grey, and Anna Chancellor as Frances Grey in My Lady Jane.Photo: Jonathan Prime/Prime Video
I love a good historical adaptation (actually, if it’s beautiful and fun enough, I’ve even been known to appreciate a bad historical adaptation, i.e. Sofia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette), so naturally, I was more than ready when I read that My Lady Jane, a historical fantasy-slash-romance series about Lady Jane Grey, was in the works.
The show—which stars Emily Bader, Dominic Cooper, and Edward Bluemel—debuted on Prime Video last week, and I couldn’t resist the temptation to record every single thought I had while watching its first episode. Read them all below:
- I love when a show begins with a map.
I’m not being ironic; I do, actually, love this. Take me somewhere!
I could have used this little English-lineage recap when I was trying to pass world history in high school!
“What if history were different?” Indeed.
Sort of a Fleabag–meets–Drunk History vibe here.
I am nostalgic for the era when the girlies just hung out and made curative potions out of herbs together, TBH.
I don’t hate this 10 Things I Hate About You–esque intro sequence either.
I really like the Grey Widow’s brocade coat.
The child actor playing Margaret rocks.
“Stupid women are tedious.” Well, yes!
I’m not saying there has to be a queer plotline, but I won’t be mad if there is one.
Whatever luminizer Lady Jane is wearing has me frantically googling.
Wow, a book-draft-burning plotline straight out of Little Women.
Sorry, now I’m mad again about Amy burning Jo’s book.
Like, don’t come for her publishing career!
Corset sex!
Ooh, cloaks set against the sunset.
Very this lesbian wedding!
Did Jane’s friend just…turn into a hawk?
Alright, whats going on here, actually?
Okay, the narrator is oversimplifying it for me.
So the fancy people in this society can’t change into animals, but the less-fancy people can? I’m just trying to understand!
Why does everyone else have relatively normal hair, but the Grey Widow has this puffed-up situation?
This guy’s one-ear, pearl-drop earring is very Harry Styles, if I may.
Okay, the man in ornate peach frills is Guilford Dudley, who is apparently important.
The Ethian resistance plotline is heating up, but I still haven’t 100% figured out what that means.
Jane tries to charm the king into intervening on her mother’s planned arranged marriage, but he’s a misogynist like all the rest of them and won’t help.
The king has the affliction!
Is that…the plague?
God, I really wasted my education.
Okay, I like the First Wives Club energy of Princess Mary and Princess Elizabeth.
This castle looks like that one former armory building in Crown Heights.
Lots of palace intrigue about Mary that, again, I’m not totally following.
Okay, hate some of these anachronisms. Isn’t the one redeeming factor of the Tudor era that men didn’t use the word toxic?
OMG, is Dominic Cooper going to kill this dog?
I’m no horse girl, but this white one Jane is riding is very pretty, I must admit.
Once again, I’m so charmed by the indie-rock girl pop music over the Tudor setting.
Ooh, Jane’s falling hard for this hot poet being annoying on a table.
Once you hear “You are the rudest man I have ever met” in a Tudor drama, you know it’s going down.
Bear-knight fight…?
Who will win, the bear or the knights?
This is very “Bear and Robot Talk Show” from 30 Rock.
Hawk vibes again!
Hawk tuah, if you will.
Oh, okay, I very belatedly just realized that the king was being poisoned.
Is he also gay?
Jane almost gets drowned for being a suspected Ethian, but her mother rescues her.
But she’s still making her marry Guilford Dudley, so she still sucks!
These two desperately need to work it out on the remix.
Ooh, fancy evening dresses.
Oh shit, Guilford Dudley isn’t that douchey guy, it’s…the hot table poet! Slay!
Okay, I enjoyed that
