Season One

We have finally arrived to the show I’ve been looking forward to re-watching for weeks, biding my time! It’s more historically accurate than some other shows *coughRobinHoodcough* but there are times they take some liberties. It’s the entertainment business, gotta let it slide. I adore the characterization in this production; gives the fanwriters lots of brotherly love moments to play with. The action is superb, the costumes are grand (properly worn in leather, which may not be completely period accurate, but it looks cool).

The show ran for three seasons, only ten episodes each season, since it ran in the summer, between the main programs. Aramis’s Santiago Cabrera was previously in BBC’s Merlin series as Lancelot (we’ll be getting to that series shortly), and Alexandra Dowling, who plays Queen Anne, was also in one episode of Merlin. Ryan Gage plays King Louis, though he’ll show up later as Alfrid in the Hobbit trilogy. The first season features Peter Capaldi as Cardinal Richelieu; Capaldi would go on to be the Twelfth Doctor in Doctor Who.

The series is set in Paris, 1630. We’re first introduced in Friends and Enemies to Alexandre D’Artagnan and his son, Charles when they stop at an inn on their way to Paris. Masked riders stop as well and end up killing Alexandre while Charles was taking care of the horses. Charles gets the name “Athos” from his dying father and sets out on revenge. Meanwhile, in Paris, each Musketeer starts their day. One man (Athos) has bottles strewn across his floor and uses a bucket of water, covered in ice, to dunk his head into in order to properly wake up. Another (Porthos) is playing cards against a Red Guard. They get into a duel and Porthos mockingly defends himself with a fork. And another man (Aramis) is in bed with a beautiful woman. Turns out, she’s the mistress of Cardinal Richelieu (this Cardinal doesn’t really claim to be pious). Richelieu returns early and so Aramis must jump out the window to escape. Adelle kicks his pistol under her bed for the time being. Aramis lands in front of his friends and they report to Captain Treville at the musketeers’ garrison. He has a new mission for them, another regiment of musketeers have gone missing. However, it’s much more than that when the Cardinal and the king get involved. King Louis had sent letters with the musketeers of sensitive nature to the Spanish. And now, the Spanish envoy is missing.

Catching up with D’Artagnan, he has stopped at a lodging house where he meets a beautiful dark-haired woman, and her pompous male accompaniment. The woman joins D’Artagnan in bed, where he discovers scars on her neck. The cocky young man offers to kill the man who caused them. Come morning, the lady is gone, though there is a bloody knife left in the pillow. When D’Artagnan investigates a scream, the man from the previous night is found dead. Bloody knife in his hand, everyone blames D’Artagnan and he has to jump out a window in order to escape (must be a trend amongst musketeers). He runs through a market and comes across a young woman, whom he asks to kiss him as a diversion. She takes offense afterwards and sends him on his way. He passes out at her feet. Next, he wakes with her over him. She had taken him back to her home. D’Artagnan thanks her for her assistance, but he must find Athos. She is familiar with the musketeer and introduces herself as Madame Bonacieux – Constance.

The three musketeers are at the garrison when D’Artagnan strides in, loudly challenging Athos to a duel. He doesn’t listen when Athos insists he did not murder the boy’s father. Young D’Artagnan holds his own well against Athos. The duel pauses, but he starts again against all three, until Constance calls a halt. Treville next arrives with guards for Athos’s arrest. Even at the trial, Athos insists he is innocent; he did not murder anyone at an inn, nor did he attack a carriage. But the witnesses have his name. Louis, at Richelieu’s urging, makes an example of Athos and orders his execution. Aramis and Porthos pick up D’Artagnan to help clear Athos’s name, and to find proper justice for Alexandre D’Artagnan.

For brevity’s sake – they do solve the case. We find out that Milady, the woman from the inn, was the one who killed the man, apparently the Spanish envoy. She has Louis’s letters and reports to Richelieu. Louis demonstrates how desperate he is for the Cardinal’s advice, agreeing to disband the Musketeers if it will make the older man happy (that does not happen…yet). The true culprit? A band of Richelieu’s guards who went a bit too far. The musketeers, including D’Artagnan attack and D’Artagnan faces the man. At Aramis’s call, he does stop from killing the man, but when a knife is pulled, he acts defensively and stabs the man. All three arrive at the prison in order to stop Athos’s execution. Richelieu takes Adelle to the country; Milady had discovered that the pistol in her room belonged to Aramis, so he has her shot with the pistol, while she screams “I love Aramis” until the end.

D’Artagnan’s next adventure, Sleight of Hand has him going undercover to prison in order to discover a suspected terrorist’s plan. By this point, Athos has started to take an interest in D’Artagnan; he argues against sending the boy in, not because he doubts his skills, but because he doesn’t want the young man to die. Constance Bonacieux has also become fond of the young Gascon. When she visits the garrison with her husband, she confronts the three older musketeers and slaps Aramis for betraying their friend. Aramis is fine with the young woman slapping him. They get a chance to see their friend when they accompany to queen to pardon a few prisoners. Vadim, the terrorist, uses the queen’s visit in order to escape, taking her hostage for a moment. D’Artagnan accompanies him and does talk the other man out of killing the queen. During the ensuing firefight, Aramis covers the queen from bullet fire. Queen Anne is deeply impressed with the musketeer’s bravery and rewards him later by gifting a jeweled cross of hers to Aramis.

Vadim, however knows that D’Artagnan is in league with the musketeers. He ties the boy to kegs of gunpowder in tunnels beneath the palace. Our hero has fifteen minutes to get free. He just scrapes by, but when he goes to leave the room, the door ignites other lines. He gets a bit of distance between him and the blast, but is still thrown off his feet, as are the other musketeers. (After Aramis recklessly jumps on a grenade in order to save the queen; he’s lucky it was a dud). D’Artagnan confronts Vadim and mortally wounds him. We also start seeing a connection between Milady and blue forget-me-nots.

Commodities brings Athos’s past to light. It starts with the musketeers having to escort a trader, Emile Bonaire to the king; Spain claims he is violating their trade agreement with France. Emile is the first to call attention to Porthos being black (this is an homage to Alexandre Dumas’s father being a half-black Frenchman). Porthos admits that his mother was a slave who died when he was five. The musketeers are ambushed and Porthos suffers a deep wound from an axe. At first, Athos wants to ride on, but Aramis (the medic of the group) angrily states that Porthos will not survive that long; he needs stitching which cannot be done in their present position. Athos eventually admits he knows a place. They ride to an estate, Athos begins opening doors and shutters. When D’Artagnan inquires how Athos knew of the place, the older man confesses that he owns it. He was once the Comte de la Fere, nobility.

Porthos, after being expertly stitched by Aramis’s fine needlework, discovers that Emile is more than a simple trader. He is a slaver. The cheap labor he brags about in the colonies are slaves. Emile tries to argue that it’s simply business. Athos regrettably has to point out that while slaving is disgusting, it is not a crime.

Poor Athos (this is why he is a favorite character, a wooby that we want to hug and put to rights) is haunted by memories of the house and his former life. He had a younger brother, Thomas, who died, and was apparently the family favorite. He cries at his old bed, wine spreading on the cover. He later throws a wine bottle at his portrait. He remembers his wife pressing forget-me-nots into a locket. Yes, his wife is Milady (whom we know is still alive). He sends the rest of his companions on to Paris. Athos falls asleep, then wakes to smoke, discovering a fire set in his old bedroom. He turns and Milady is standing there with a torch. She’s surprised to see him there and he’s looking at a ghost. She hits him with the torch; she’s there to erase the past, destroy it completely. She’s more than willing to kill Athos. Athos brings up that she murdered his brother. Her retort is that she did it to save her love with Athos; Thomas was a fool and a hypocrite; he deserved to die. Athos begs for Milady to kill him. But she finds that he still wears the locket she gave him. D’Artagnan (having disobeyed orders) has returned and calls for Athos. Milady flees and D’Artagnan races in to save his friend. Athos brokenly divulges that he had had his wife taken from the house and hanged. But she’s not really dead.

“It was my duty! It was my duty to uphold the law, my duty to condemn the woman I love to death. I clung to the belief that I had no choice. Five years learning to live in a world without her.”

The episode ends with Bonaire and the Cardinal becoming business partners, but the musketeers get the last laugh. They set Bonaire up to be trapped by the Spanish.

The Good Solider exposes a secret of Aramis’s past. As assassin breaks up a meeting between the king and the Duke of Savoy (who is married to Louis’s sister). Louis and Richelieu are trying to persuade Savoy to sign a peace treaty with France. Hints are dropped about a massacre in Savory five years prior, of which Aramis is a survivor. Aramis discovers the would-be assassin to be his old friend Marsac. Marsac was a musketeer alongside Aramis, until he deserted after the massacre at Savoy. Marsac claims he knows the truth and blames Captain Treville. Aramis’s friends don’t believe Marsac, but for Aramis’s sake, investigate the claims. In the meantime, they hide Marsac at Bonacieux’s. Constance is not pleased to discover that she was harboring a criminal, angrily telling D’Artagnan to leave. Later, D’Artagnan promises to never lie again. Constance doesn’t want protection, she wants to be treated like an equal. When Marsac goes after Constance, D’Artagnan punches him. He once again apologizes to Constance. In return, she wants something that her husband can never find out about: she wants D’Artagnan to teach her to shoot, and sword fight, complaining “why do men have all the fun?” (this is why we like Constance)

The four confront Treville, but he will not admit anything. He has several angry discussions with the Cardinal, one of which Aramis overhears. Treville does not out his man to Richelieu and wearily admits to Aramis that he did hand over the musketeers’ orders, but knew nothing about a massacre until afterwards. Aramis is furious, punching his commanding officer and threatening to go to the authorities. When Marsac finds out, he punches Aramis and leaves with the intention to kill Treville. Aramis catches up to him and tries to talk his old friend down, but when Marsac starts firing, Aramis has to fire back. He hits his friend. “Better to die a Musketeer than live like a god,” Marsac states with his last breath. Treville and Aramis bury their comrade at the end of the episode.

The Duke is trying to discover whether France has been hiding his old councilor for the past five years. He thinks he has evidence, but when he goes to visit the prison, the musketeers have arrived first and switched prisoners. Humiliated, the Duke is forced to sign the peace treaty. As Treville admitted to Aramis and Marsac, the massacre was ultimately on the king’s orders; protecting their most important spy in Savoy, his sister. The Duke’s councilor, a Spanish loyalist, began to suspect her, so the musketeers were used to make the Duke believe there was an assassination attempt while the councilor was abducted. Louis even hints to Anne that there may always be an accident that kills the older Duke, putting his son in charge (and more liable to be sympathetic to French influence).

We discover more of Porthos’s background in The Homecoming. In the aftermath of his birthday celebration, where he shoots a melon off Aramis’s head, while drunk, Porthos wakes in the street, next to a body, with no memory of what happened. Red Guards assume he is the culprit and arrest him. The judge shows no leniency, calling Porthos a mongrel and orders him executed. He’s rescued, but not by the musketeers. Masked men take him to the Court of Miracles (it was brought up in Disney’s Hunchback of Notre Dame). Turns out, Porthos grew up in the Court. His old friend, Charon is king now. And his old friend, Flea is still there and now hooked up with Charon. (That doesn’t stop her from sleeping with Porthos; those two had been an item, but she won’t leave the Court).

The other musketeers investigate the young man’s death, connecting it with a plot to destroy the Court. The boy’s father was intent on regaining the wealth of the family, bought the land and with the denizens gone, would be able to collect rent once new houses had been built. And, Charon was his inside man, arranging powder kegs and allowing outsiders, disguised, to enter and blow the place up. (The man signs a confession, then shoots himself rather than be arrested.) Porthos eventually recalls the evening’s events and Charon’s part and confronts his friend. Flea takes a bullet to the shoulder for protecting Porthos, and Porthos and Charon fight. Aramis, Athos, and D’Artagnan have come to their friend’s rescue and Aramis ends up stabbing Charon when he tries to stab Porthos in the back. While Porthos misses Flea, he is happier as a Musketeer and has a new family.

In The Exiles, we once again hit upon the idea of King Louis having a secret twin. As Father Duval [who is played by the real life father of Tom Burke, who plays Athos] tells Cardinal Richelieu, Marie de Medici (yes, from the House of de Medici) had gone into labor before being able to return to Paris. A secret son was born before the rest of the council arrived; the boy was deformed and so whisked away when it was apparent a sibling was arriving. Philippe went on to live a quiet life, cared for by Father Duval. A young nurse was hired and she eventually fell in love with Philippe. They married and had a child. When they went walking about as a family, the villagers beat Philippe to death for his deformity. All the musketeers know is that Aramis and D’Artagnan were ordered to retrieve the mother and child and deliver them to Richelieu. But another group of men kidnap the baby.

Marie de Medici presents herself to her son, despite having been ordered to stay away after a coup she had set up to overthrow him (not quite what happened historically, but French history is not my strong suit). Louis can’t decide how to handle affairs. “Decapitating one’s mother is rarely popular with the people, sire, it always looks a touch ungrateful,” Richelieu informs Louis. She is sent away with a musketeer escort and then ambushed. This brings her to the palace (she has an unusual fashion style, for the period. I’ve noticed the heroes tend to be more accurate while the villains have a bit of a modern flair).

Aramis and D’Artagnan manage to locate the infant and D’Artagnan has the brilliant idea to send Constance in as a nurse maid, and get them information. They’re surprised when Marie de Medici shows up and Agnes, Philippe’s wife, informs them that she is Philippe’s mother. Constance keeps her cool until Marie leaves. The musketeers then sweep in, though Constance holds her own with a sword against one of the guards, to Aramis’s surprise. Treville still orders that Agnes and her baby, Henri must be taken to the Cardinal, though he states he will conveniently be busy with paperwork for a time. Aramis whisks Agnes and Henri away, intent on getting them to Spain. His friends follow him, Athos snarking about keeping the plan suicidal. They throw barrels of fine brandy into a fire to provide a distraction from Marie’s guards. Aramis takes a bundle across the bridge, but drops it in the water.

Richelieu informs Marie that her plans have failed. She will not be able to overthrow Louis and put Henri on the throne, thus ensuring another regency for her. She walks away with tears, though I’m not sure if she’s more upset about her plans falling apart or the loss of her grandson. The Cardinal kills Father Duvall and destroys the documents so there can be no further questions of Louis’s legitimacy.

Never fear, the episode ends happy; the bundle had not really been Henri. The musketeers and Constance meet Agnes and reunite mother and son. Aramis insists they leave France (funny enough, there is a sign to Avalon in the background of the shot), there are too many threats to the small family.

Early feminism gets a voice in The Rebellious Woman. The name Comtess Ninon de la Roque is brought up when a young woman is killed by the royal carriage, attempting to deliver a petition to the queen. Ninon educates women of all stations, teaching them scholarly pursuits, in the face of men saying it was a danger to fragile female minds. The Cardinal orders Milady to find evidence against Ninon, suggesting that Ninon’s interests in girls is not entirely wholesome. “How like a man,” Milady retorts (okay, I’ll cheer for her for that bit). The Cardinal wants her money to fund the country.

The musketeers visit Ninon and she’s attracted to Athos; there’s a battle of wits and he persuades her to allow a search of her rooms. The missing girl is not found, but Athos agrees to dinner with the woman. Neither of them are interested in marriage; Ninon will not be bound to a man, and Athos is opposed to the idea after the disastrous results of Milady. Their pleasant evening is interrupted when Aramis declares trouble at Ninon’s; the Red Guard are ransacking her library and have found several missing girls in a hidden room.

At the same time, Father Luca Sustini [the actor was also in BBC’s Merlin, there is a joke filtering about the various fandoms that BBC reuses actors and sets] has arrived to visit Richelieu from Rome. He gifts the Cardinal with a saint bone and informs his colleague that there is talk of who the next Pope may be; there are those who would support Richelieu’s bid for the position. When the subject of Ninon arises, Sustini declares her a witch for her progressive ideas and poisoning the minds of other girls. He urges Richelieu to be decisive; Rome will be watching with great interest.

Milady speaks out against Ninon at her trial, lying. Athos is furious; loudly declaring that she cannot be trusted. The court finds Ninon guilty and orders to be executed. The queen arrives with word from the king that Ninon will not be killed; unless she confesses by her own hand. Yet when Richelieu falls ill during the proceedings right after Ninon declares she’s looking at the Devil when she looks at him, Sustini loudly proclaims her a witch. Aramis rushes to save the Cardinal’s life. Milady continues with the plan, blackmailing Ninon that her friends will suffer the same fate unless Ninon confesses.

Preparations are made for a pyre while the musketeers search for the true culprit of the Cardinal’s poisoning. They trace it back to Sustini and arrive back at the monastery in time to save the Cardinal from being stabbed. Richelieu suspected it was Sustini, it’s an old papal trick to poison relics. He much rather keep his position and influence in France than become Pope. His vision is clearer now; no person, no nation, no god, will stand in his way. With his brush with death, he’s less liable to send someone else to theirs. Athos frees Ninon, but the woman must leave Paris. Her wealth will be taken by the crown, but she will receive a small stipend to live on. The Comtess de la Roque is officially dead. Ninon will still promote female education, but far from the Cardinal’s ear. Athos and Ninon share a tender moment, Ninon urging Athos to be careful of the dark-haired woman; she has the Cardinal’s protection. She could have loved a man like Athos, pity they’re neither the marrying kind. And the episode ends with a tender moment between D’Artagnan and Constance, admitting their love and kissing…and leading to other activities.

I enjoy the ending of The Challenge; it goes back to the simple dichotomy of Red Guards vs. Musketeers. After the musketeers escort a dangerous criminal back to Paris for the Red Guards to claim, LaBarge (played by Vinnie Jones, whose credits include King Gareth in Galavant, the bad guy in the first episode of rebooted MacGyver, and the Juggernaut in X-Men) kills the captain of the Red Guards. Richelieu and Treville start arguing over which is the better regiment in front of the king; Louis takes their wager and sets up a challenge; the winner will definitively prove which group is superior.

Treville announces to his musketeers there is a 30 livre entry fee, to create a winner’s purse (and cover the wagered amount). Aramis and Porthos must find patronesses. D’Artagnan hasn’t been receiving funds from his farm and turns out, it was one of the ones destroyed when LaBarge was working as a cruel tax collector in Gascony. Constance tries to help, but D’Artagnan eventually receives the needed money from Milady. She’s trying to play an angle with the Cardinal, claiming that D’Artagnan is a key in destroying the musketeers.

Richelieu begins stacking the deck in his favor. He has Bonacieux spy on D’Artagnan. Bonacieux catches the young Gascon in an affair with his wife and threatens Constance with D’Artagnan’s death if she doesn’t break it off with the boy. Constance does as she’s commanded and utterly breaks D’Artagnan’s heart; and her own. She silently sobs after D’Artagnan leaves, her husband watching in the next room. Richelieu also commissions LaBarge as the new captain of his guards, guaranteeing the musketeer champion will lose. Treville finds out what Richelieu is up to and declares himself the champion for the musketeers. Athos is furious on D’Artagnan’s behalf; the lad has it in him to become the greatest musketeer and Treville just took his best chance of being noticed by the king and winning a commission.

The day of the contest, when LaBarge steps out, the musketeers realize what Treville had done. The fight between LaBarge and Treville is intense; Treville lands a hit. LaBarge retaliates by stepping on Treville’s shoulder. Treville’s musketeers loyally come to his defense and a short fight breaks out between them and the guards. The king calls a halt. He will allow Treville to choose another champion since LaBarge broke the rules. Treville names D’Artagnan. Heeding Athos’s lessons of keeping a level head, D’Artagnan faces LaBarge. D’Artagnan fights with a ferocity and ultimately defeats the large man. Louis orders him to kneel and commissions him into his musketeers; his friends give him his own pauldron (it’s what they use as uniforms instead of blue tunics, though blue capes are a part of the uniform). D’Artagnan doesn’t get the purse; the king declares that the wagered money will go to the treasury since the rules were in fact broken.

D’Artagnan’s first mission as a full musketeer is to guard the queen as she bathes in a lake known to increase fertility in Knight Takes Queen. While Anne is away, Louis flirts with visiting Charlotte Melandorff. She comes with a large dowry (which would help the treasury) and her sisters have bore sons to their own husbands. Louis whines to Richelieu that he wishes Anne was dead, so he could marry Charlotte; it would be better for France. Anne must be barren since there have never been any children. Thus, the musketeers’ quiet mission becomes a lot more interesting. One of Anne’s maids is killed while borrowing her robe. She is spirited away by the musketeers, a whole troop of men on their tail. Porthos and D’Artagnan are ordered by Athos to return to Paris for reinforcements; Athos and Aramis will take the queen to the safety of a nearby convent.

Adding intrigue, one of the sisters knows Aramis. She was his intended from years pervious; he had gotten her pregnant and he was due to marry her. But the babe was lost and she left him, entering the convent. When she reveals herself to Aramis, she claims that she did it as a favor for Aramis; they would have never been a good match, she felt. By entering the convent, she allowed him a life of adventure and freedom. Sadly, the young woman is killed when two of the mercenaries (who, for some reason are Irish. Not sure I quite understand why they had to be Irish) enter the convent. Anne, already attracted to Aramis, comforts him in his grief, in her bed. Mother Superior is awesome really; ready to help defend her convent, loading pistols for Athos while he and Aramis keep the mercenaries at bay. Aramis’s parents at one time wanted him to become a priest; he found he was better at dispatching people to hell.

Unfortunately, when Porthos and D’Artagnan arrive at the garrison, the rest of the musketeers are away on a hunt with the king and his guests. They are left with an injured Treville, the young stable boy, an old solider with one eye, and the cook. Richelieu is furious at Milady when he discovers that the man she hired to kill the queen did not succeed. He orders her to fix her mistake. She manages to pin the crime on Charlotte’s father, with sketchy evidence. Porthos, D’Artagnan, and Treville take their misfits and manage to mount a rescue attempt, arriving just when Athos and Aramis are out of bullets. When searching the mercenaries’ things afterwards, they discover the mark of a woman who is in lead with the Cardinal; Milady’s blue forget-me-nots. They begin to suspect that the Cardinal was truly behind the attempt on the queen’s life. Louis is quite pleased when his wife returns (he really is childlike; siding with whoever can hold his attention).

The first season ends with Musketeers Don’t Die Easily. All the plots are coming to a head. Athos drunkenly confronts his wife, threatening to kill her. His friends stop him, D’Artagnan coming forward when Milady pleads for the young man to save her, like he promised. Athos shoots D’Artagnan – in the side. Milady tries to persuade D’Artagnan to leave the musketeers and join the Cardinal. Richelieu has charged Milady with silencing Athos and his friends for good. Treville shows up to tell D’Artagnan that Athos will not serve with the boy; Treville has chosen his best swordsman, D’Artagnan must leave. D’Artagnan promises Milady he will does as she asks; he will kill Athos.

When D’Artagnan arrives at the garrison, he joins Athos, Porthos, and Aramis in Treville’s office. Turns out, this is all a ploy to catch Milady. They plan out their next step, to “kill” Athos. They make sure Milady is watching and do it in public. Aramis and Porthos shout insults at D’Artagnan after they spill blood on Athos. D’Artagnan goes to Richelieu, telling him that Treville is in possession of evidence against the Cardinal for the attempt on Queen Anne’s life. Aramis and Porthos will trade the letter for D’Artagnan. Richelieu arranges the exchange. Porthos confronts Cardinal about the attempted murder. Richelieu admits “I alone can make the decisions no one else can stomach.” One woman’s death is worth sacrificing to prevent civil war when the king dies without an heir. Richelieu snatches the letter. It is blank. Anne appears, alongside Treville; they heard everything. Richelieu begs mercy; everything he has done has been in the best interest of France. Only because she believes he is true in that sentiment, does Anne spare Richelieu (I believe him as well; the only reason he went after Anne was because his king wished it. It suited his own purposes as well, but Richelieu is ultimately loyal to France, putting its best interests first. This is what makes him a more complex villain that other adaptations give him credit for). Queen Anne’s influence now though with the king is higher than ever.

Richelieu gives up Milady to the musketeers; she is of no further use to the Cardinal. But Milady has her own insurance for her plans; she arranges for Constance to be abducted. When the musketeers confront her, she tells them where to be to retrieve the young woman. It is undoubtedly a trap. But they prepare. As the bonus feature states, it is their finest hour. Gun shots, explosions, and sword fights, the four of them take on dozens of bandits. D’Artagnan ferociously takes on the man holding Constance. Constance try to flee, but is caught by Milady. The four stride over to her, knowing she won’t kill Constance despite her threat. Athos steps towards his wife and Constance breaks free, flinging herself into D’Artagnan’s arms. Athos faces his wife. She begs for death; but he cannot. He orders her out of Paris. He departs, dropping the locket.

All seems right, but a servant comes running to Constance that Monsieur Bonacieux has tried to kill himself. Constance cannot leave her husband now, so D’Artagnan’s heart is broken again. The Cardinal is called before the king and queen and a small audience. Louis had “never expected this, after so long.” Anne is pregnant. Athos and Aramis exchange a look. The Cardinal later oversees a tender moment between Aramis and Anne; the musketeer promises to look over her son.

Fraternity, brotherhood; a huge theme of these Musketeers. Fans have deemed them the “Inseparables,” it’s always those four going on the most dangerous missions, those four appearing before Richelieu or the royal couple (yes, as some fans have pointed out, a bit like the Golden Trio in Harry Potter, “why is it always you three?”). And I am a huge fan of brotherly love, that friends can choose each other as family [I could go into a whole Supernatural spiel, but I shan’t at this moment. Maybe later in ‘Random Fandom.’] At the end of this season, while the Musketeers do not have glory, or money, or love; they do have honor.

My impressions of these characters after one season; Treville is honorable. Louis is whiny. I like Anne, even though she slept with Aramis; she is a kind woman. It is plain that her marriage with Louis is strained; I feel she only wanted a little bit of love for once in her life. Aramis could have stopped her, but was not in a place emotionally to be able to do that. Porthos is the most loyal friend someone could ask for. D’Artagnan is working on curbing his recklessness, but he’s young. Athos will make sure he doesn’t get himself killed. Athos is a tragic character who wants to see justice done. And I can respect Richelieu as a villain.

Next Time: Season Two