Anna @cloudful-sky - Tumblr Blog

💅The idea of Colin swaggering back into town with his hot boy summer glow up, only to immediately get his dick caught in a door because of Penelope is sending me. 💅

#bridgerton #colin bridgerton #penelope featherington #lmao

simplyalexeiofficial

Penelope and Eloise (and Marina!) are such interesting characters who’s interpersonal situations are truly grey and I think that who’s “side” fans tend to lean toward really depends on whether or not they ascribe to the individual or the greater good.

For me, I obviously lean more towards Penelope’s perspective. This is because, as much as understand and sympathize with Eloise’s feelings of hurt and betrayal, I also see so many of her comments and actions as ignorant and willfully naive. She does things without fully thinking through the consequences, putting both herself and her family at risk. !BOOK SPOILER START! In her story, this is literally the cause of her marrying — she decides to run off ALONE to a man’s home whom she’s never actually met without telling her family, leaving herself stuck in the situation where she has to marry him not only to protect her own reputation but also that of her entire family. !BOOK SPOILER END!

Marina was very much the same in season 1. I sympathize with her perspective, and while I don’t think her actions were as naive as Eloise, I think that she was so focused on trying to grasp the best option for herself that she refused to acknowledge that by doing so she would absolutely ruin BOTH the Featherington’s and Bridgerton’s with a scandal much less recoverable for either family than the one penned by Whistledown.

Meanwhile, the reason that I agree more with Penelope over the others is precisely the reason anti-Penelope fans dislike her. She is fully knowledgeable about the potential consequences of her actions. She considers all of the angles and tries to find alternatives, and even her most controversial decisions are made with such tangible regret that we see her sobbing on screen multiple times, but they are decisions that she makes the way she does because they limit the damage to all parties involved as much as possible. Now, could she have done things differently if she thought bringing in someone to her secret was an option? Absolutely! But she didn’t think it was — something that, given what we see of her home environment and how her friendships are largely reliant on her supporting the other individual, makes sense for her character.

Anyway, all that is to say that I think people who tend to view these scenarios from the perspective of the individual also tend to agree with Eloise/Marina, where as those who tend to view from the perspective of the greater good also tend to agree with Penelope.

Philosophically speaking, neither perspective is “wrong”, but I don’t know that everyone contributing to the conversation fully understands that, which is where we get the black and white hot takes that blatantly attack these characters as awful people.

cloudful-sky

I agree with you! Actually, the unexpected depth of the characters is one of the things that attracted me to the show in the first place. Is not just a simple show where they add drama just for the sake of it even if the conflicts are stupid or not what "real" people would do.

I've never read the books but all of the conflicts make sense to me, you know? Not just about Marina, Penelope and Eloise, but also for the other characters.

For example, I can't exactly place blame on Daphne when she forced herself on Simon when the girl barely knew how sex works just five minutes ago nor can't I blame Simon either for not telling her why he specifically didn't want to have kids considering at the time, you first married your intended and after that you started to get to know them and be vulnerable with them.

Kate's dilemma also makes sense. If they're three women who recently lost the man who took care of them and they have nothing else, of course she's going to accept the grandparents' offer to marry Edwina to nobility and not tell her to give her a chance to fall in love.

Even Portia makes sense; with her husband being of no help and making things worse and later on, dying and leaving them to fend for themselves, I can't blame her for doing anything in her power to take care of her daughters with any means necessary.

All the woman in this show have done the best they could with the very few options given to them considering their individual circumstances and the show writers have done an incredible time showing that.

To finish this rant, of course the characters should have flaws! Eloise is a naive rich girl with little to no life experience! Marina was working against the clock to find a husband (basically the only option at the time) before her pregnancy was more obvious and she was shunned by the community! Penelope is just a teenager who, as far as she knows, has no dowry, will end up a spinster and the only way forward is to protect her only source of income!

Plus, they want to release at least enough seasons for all of the Bridgerton siblings, we need to see the characters grow otherwise its going to get really boring.