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| The Borgias |
So we will see the classy Duke again when Vice Chancellor Sforza pays him a visit, and sees him poison his nephew as he gives him a big dinner. Oh, and he also seems to enjoy sleeping with his relatives; or so he tells Pope Borgia when he stops by to tell him to go chat w/his crazy cousin the Duke.
How did the Vice Chancellor end up in Milan? Well Papa is feeling guilty about Lucrezia, has a nightmare about it and meets with Vice Chancellor Sforza. He wants to ensure the safety of his daughter, and naturally Sforza comes up with some poetic crap about how she is in good hands.
Cesare has now met with his lady love in the confessional and he seems really flattered, that she cares for his well being so much. When you think about it, the only person who says she loves him, is Lucrezia, but she has been taken from him. Then he and Ursula do this sexy breathing thing through the holes in the confessional. Which would be hot, if she were even remotely sexy. I will give her that her costume in the market was stunning.
Anyway I digress.....well Cesare's side was looking pretty hot; in fact I kind of forgot she was even there. I swear he could have chemistry with a piece of wood; kind of like John Barrowman, he has the same, well lets call it a gift. I digress; so to sum up Ursula for the epi, she rides a white horse, so she has got the pure thing going on (Lucrezia). She also kept asking him to liberate her, as she is in an abusive marriage. Our Cesare, who is very vulnerable after losing his Lucrezia, really, really wants to do for Ursula, what he could not do for his beloved. She then does the whole, I care for you, I don't want you to fight for your mother's honor against my husband as he is a brute, and so on and so forth throughout the episode. Blah, blah, blah.
So Cesare goes to speak to Vanozza about it, and he tells her that he has met a woman who is married. She says he could leave the Church and defy his father?! Cesare says he is afraid of nothing.
So our darling Cesare has found one thing in his life he can control: claiming a new lady love by getting rid of her husband, or "impediment" as he calls him. So, he takes his first life, with the fine training of his good assassin. Micheletto tells Cesare that he should just let him do it for him, but Cesare decides to defend the honor of his mother, and throw in the bonus of impressing his new lady love.
That was an amazing scene: the pouring rain, Cesare and Micheletto hiding in the side street, both wet and in black. The Baron (he is a Baron right?) also incensed Cesare by calling his mother a whore at least two more times. Cesare standing there in front of the Baron, not even flinching, kills him in minutes. He looks dangerous, strong and scary; not like a man of the cloth. Micheletto tells him that you always remember your first, and Cesare said he could feel the life pour out of him. MIcheletto simply says "Better you than him". Wise words, my friend.
So they pick up the body, dump it in the sewer? some kind of drainage system, with the swords. Cesare asks if he will be thanked for what he has done, and Micheletto says that in his experience, usually not. I have to say, that their scenes together are fantastic.
Before I move on to Lucrezia, I have to say that Ursula is poorly cast. I had thought she was using Cesare to get rid of her husband, which would be very juicy. He would be enraged if he felt used, and things would get ugly. However, now I am thinking she wanted to have an affair, and having one with a Cardinal, would be win-win. Meaning that he can't leave the church, and he most certainly would not threaten her position as they would have to be very discreet. She came on to him so quickly after he got all flirty, it made me wonder if she saw him with his sister, ie. a good target to get her dirty work done
Lucrezia
We must remember is that she is 14 years old, and Cesare is about 17 years old, and her husband is most likely close to 50. After he rapes her, and she is crying, he realizes that she is a virgin, and he cannot believe it!?! He had thought for sure she was not, due to the Borgia rep around town. The insult to her and her family only made her cry more. We see her on what I assume is the second night , hyperventilating as she hears his footsteps down the hallway.
Sforza is a sick bastard, and the way he rapes her nightly, in all manner of ways, is horrendous. The scene where she begins counting and the way he was banging her head against the headboard was horrifying. She has shown how strong she is, as not many 14 year olds could endure that torture nightly and not wither away. Her maid tells her in the bath about counting, which made him angrier, but gave her more power for some reason.
Honestly I do not know how she can even walk after a night after all that beating and abuse. But she gets her fine self down to the stables, seduces the stable boy and preps him for step one: getting her husband off and out of her. I was shocked when she asked him not to alert her father of her abuse, but then I knew what she was thinking. She is going to use this to finally have some control over her life; as she was always in the dark at home. But seeing her play that childhood game with the stable boy, after the manner in which she was seducing him, was an intersting dynamic.
So, she brilliantly, I might add, manipulates her adorable stable boy to loosen her Lord's saddle, so that he has a hunting accident. In fact, I believe, she gets him to suggest it; corrct me if I am wrong. And so we get to a wonderful moment: her maid alerting her that Sforza has had an accident, as Lucrezia sits upon the bed playing with a pet, and smiling slyly. So Lucrezia goes to her husband, and says "My Husband, be brave", and asks him to count 1,2 3 as they crack the bone back into place. Priceless! As she looks at him and her maid with a look of triumph! No more nightly abuse for our Lucrezia; well done. She has begun to show her Borgia colors, I can't wait to see them develop!
Finally, a few last comments: Juan and the Pope looking at the portrait of the unattractive princess. Juan decides only royalty is good enough for him....it was a funny moment. Odd for a show that had murder and Papa Borgia deciding that getting that crazy monk in Florence burned for heresy would be a lovely plan. We also saw the first meeting between Machiavelli and Cesare. It was a short moment, but we see that Machiavelli recognizes the brilliance of Cesare, and wonders why he is a cardinal. Cesare just says that's just the way it is....
So until next week my friends! See all of the Borgias recaps:
http://koft2009.livejournal.com, see tag: tv: the borgias, s.1
*Image courtesy of Showtime's "The Borgias"
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