Editor’s note: The below article contains spoilers for Season 2 of Bridgerton.Bridgerton, the hit romance series, is back for another season of drama and scandal. Where the first season of the Netflix series focused on Daphne Bridgerton (Phoebe Dynevor) and her search for love, Season 2 pivots to her eldest brother, Anthony Bridgerton (Jonathan Bailey), and his hunt to find his viscountess. His world turns upside down when he meets Kate Sharma (Simone Ashley) and her family. Adapted fromJulia Quinn’s novelThe Viscount Who Loved Me, Anthony finds himself at odds with Kate when he begins to court her younger sister, Edwina (Charithra Chandran). These rivals can’t tame the heat between them and fall in love. Unfortunately, Kate and Anthony’s love story this season is unsupported by its pace; after wading through eight episodes, Kate and Anthony’s happily-ever-after epilogue is met with exhaustion rather than excitement.
The first three episodes of Season 2 start strong, laying out where its main characters are heading. However, as the season develops, the central story of Kate, Anthony, and Edwina weakens — in part due to the multiple storylines of the season. While there are other story threads and characters that need attention given the show’s big ensemble cast, it comes at a cost to the primary love story. More often than not, scenes of Kate, Anthony, and Edwina are soon followed by moments featuring the Featheringtons and their scheming cousin Jack (Rupert Young). Instead of uplifting and complementing the main storyline, the B-plot, weighed down by whether Jack can get away with tricking the ton, undercut and distract from the emotional development of the season.
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In the Season 2 finale, Edwina tells Kate that she doesn’t really know her sister nor herself, and it’s an apt statement. Once the season reaches its midway point, any characterization of Kate and Edwina slows down and then comes to a dead stop by Season 2, Episode 6, “The Choice,” in favor of driving the plot forward. Edwina describes Kate in the season finale as “funny, brave, and feeling”; this description should be a confirmation after witnessing her arc throughout the season. For much of the season, Kate is stoic and independent; her overprotective nature clashes with Anthony’s stubborn persistence. Outside her duty to her family, we’re left wondering just who exactly Kate Sharma is. Likewise, Edwina is everything a diamond of the season should be, but lets the opinions of everyone around her determine her actions. Apart from this, she drifts from scene to scene. The middle episodes should not serve just as filler or solely plot-driven, but represent an opportunity to enrich the audience’s understanding of these characters.
A great example of this dilemma is found during Pall Mall at Aubrey Hall in Season 2, Episode 3’s “A Bee in Your Bonnet.” Edwina’s uncomfortable participation in the game is juxtaposed against Kate’s competitive nature and how successfully she fits in with the rest of the Bridgertons. This makes it apparent how much of a better match Kate is for Anthony. Edwina finds herself out of place among her prospective fiancé and in-laws after Pall Mall; this could’ve led to a moment of introspection for Edwina to start seeing that Anthony isn’t the match she was looking for. However, this does not lead to further character growth for Edwina by the next episode. If she cares about true love the way Kate was always pushing for her to find, then Edwina would have benefited from a solo scene or one with her mother where she starts to contemplate this for herself. Instead, she pushes this aside, blindly marching on towards the wedding altar.
“The Choice,” one of the longest episodes of the season, drags out a pivotal turning point in the season at a glacial pace; as a result, it forces audiences to sit in the tension for an unbearable amount of time. It’s here where Edwina discovers the truth about Anthony and Kate’s feelings — in the middle of her own wedding ceremony. Just an episode before, Kate has told Anthony that Edwina is “all things good and true, a kinder soul you will never find." Yet in “The Choice,” Edwina’s actions completely contradict Kate’s description of her. Anything loving and good is thrown out as soon as Edwina calls Kate her half-sister. An argument could be made that Edwina herself is young and naive to be the reason why she has such tunnel vision on marrying Anthony. However, if the expectation of the season is to clearly define which love story it’s telling, then Edwina is reduced to nothing more than a plot device and a victim of poor characterization.
“You do know that you cannot show someone your best without allowing them to see your worst,” Bridgerton patriarch Edmund (Rupert Evans) says to Anthony via flashback, and while Anthony shows his fair share of bad moments with Kate, the same can’t be said about her. We don’t know the fears she hides or the insecurities she feels. In one scene, Kate comforts Anthony during his panic attack after a bee stings her, triggering the memory of his father’s untimely death. However, Anthony doesn’t have an opportunity to care for Kate similarly. He rescues her after her accident, but she isn’t given a comparable moment of vulnerability. Similarly, after Kate and Anthony find each other in the library at Aubrey Hall, Anthony reveals the reason behind his father’s death; her response to this is to apologize to him and take in the information. This could have been a great opportunity for Kate to be vulnerable with him, perhaps sharing in his pain by telling him how her own father died (of which the cause remains unknown). These moments are vital in romance, meant to deepen the relationships and build on the love growing between them.
Out of the three lead characters of the season, Anthony Bridgerton walks away less scathed than the Sharma sisters. His characterization this time around benefits from his involvement during the first season. After a season of enjoying his rake lifestyle, he puts it all aside so that he can find his viscountess. In Season 2, Anthony’s primary character trait is duty: duty to his family, duty as the viscount, duty to play his part in society. Even the word “duty” is reiterated to the point that it could turn into its own drinking game (this author would not recommend this). The expectations he puts on himself for the sake of his family add layers to what’s already been established. However, it does seem to ignore much of what occurred in Season 1, a fact that Daphne reminds him of multiple times. Daphne catches Anthony and Kate right before they kiss, and she reminds Anthony that had he been a woman, he would’ve been forced to marry her; this is exactly what happened last season when Anthony caught her kissing Simon (Regé-Jean Page). His connection with his family, especially with Violet (Ruth Gemmell), carries Anthony’s character arc. Through these conversations and interactions with them, audiences can see beyond the exterior of a gentleman consumed with duty.
For how well off his character growth is in the season, there are some discrepancies between the beginning vs the end of the season. In Season 2, Episode 7, “Harmony,” Anthony is seen affected by the lily soap Kate uses; however, when he talks with her in the gazebo toward the end of the episode, he confesses that her lily scent has consumed him since they conversed at the ball hosted by Lady Danbury (Adjoa Andoh) in the season premiere. However, without Anthony’s admission, it wouldn’t have been clearer that Kate has used this soap more than once. The inclusion of this detail comes across as though it were an afterthought of dialogue, and the admission could’ve held more weight if there had been more hints of this dropped throughout the season — especially during the early Season 2 scene Anthony refers to.
Looking back at Season 1, Daphne and Simon were seen apart and together for five episodes before exchanging their wedding vows. On her own, Daphne is everything a diamond should be, yet she carries the expectations of her family as the first daughter out in society; she even gets frustrated at her brother’s interference in her marriage prospects. Meanwhile, Simon acts as a carefree rake but internally carries anger toward his father’s cruel treatment of him and wants to punish him further by not conceiving a child. Separately and together, they laugh, argue, and confide in each other, allowing audiences to see their chemistry grow before we reach their first night of marital bliss. Season 1 establishes who their main couple is not just through the plot, but by conveying who they are with an intentional pace.
By comparison, Season 2 lacks on that front. It’s not enough to just advance the plot forward to create drama; there needs to be a reason to root for this love story and the characters it involves. Kate and Edwina have very few scenes where they’re allowed to just be, giving the audience a look behind the curtain of their outward projections and actions. The Sharma family, who are described as fiercely loyal to each other, are also not given the space to demonstrate that devotion until the end of the season. In favor of raising the stakes and the drama for the latest season, Anthony and the Sharma sisters coast through a love story that values plot over pace.
This is not to suggest thatBridgertonshould keep to the same formula season to season; on the contrary, we should reward shows that experiment with their structure to keep the audience on their toes, especially when based on a beloved book series. Even if the series is switching its approach from the anthology format, the season still needs to stand strong on its own instead of relying on future installments. It’s a risk to wait for your primary couple to finally hook up in the back half of the season, let alone get married offscreen in the final episode. When a risk is held up by its pacing and characterization, the payoff is well worth the journey. Unfortunately, for this season ofBridgerton, the payoff of Kate and Anthony’s love story falls flat.
