A night of miracles as Poldark returns
IT’S a rule in TV dramas, just as it is in global populations. If someone dies, someone else has to be born.
Few babies pop up (or out) on soap operas without someone else, across the square, down the street or just downstairs, breathing their last.
Poldark was no different except that the birth of Valentine Warleggan was so momentous it required two people to die, along with a full lunar eclipse. Aunty Agatha, who’d been reading the cards and muttering darkly for most of the episode, had much to say about babies born “under a black moon”.
So unfavourable did the happy new father, George Warleggan find Agatha’s prophecies, that he had her carried upstairs and locked in her room. (If he thinks that’ll make a difference, he doesn’t know Aunty Agatha).
Post-labour, Elizabeth’s blankeyed look of horror had less to do with 19th-century obstetrics and more to do with having produced a perfect, miniature version of her monstrous husband.
George, instantly besotted with the tiny reflection of himself in his arms, whispered, “He favours me.” (“Someone has to,” Aunty Agatha could have said). Affairs at the Warleggans’ were easy to follow, which was a mercy, because elsewhere there seemed to be a logjam of people rushing to be at other people’s bedsides.
Demelza’s father’s dying wish was that his two sons go forth and spread the Word.
Fortunately for the plot, one of them, Drake, is good-looking, more interested in wenching than redemption, and has just showed up at his big sister’s house. Meanwhile, lovely old Ray Penvennan was also dying round the corner, his last wish being for his ward, Caroline, to marry Lord Coniston.
She’d married Dr Enys, moments before, unfortunately, but Ray either died in ignorance, or turned out to be not that bothered, which made us wonder why the scriptwriter bothered either.
Same went for Ross’s extraordinary “deal” with his archenemy George: You be nice to Elizabeth, my nephew Geoffrey and my Aunty, it went, and I’ll stay away.
Not to be outdone, Demelza announced she was pregnant, and, in a night of miracles, the lawyer said Poldark’s accounts were looking healthy. Now that we struggled to believe.
The waiting was finally over for Poldark fans last night as the Cornish saga of love, war and topless scything returned to BBC One...