An Estella scene analysis
Months later, I’m still thinking about that scene with Estella in Around the world in 80 days (careful, spoilers for the last episode).
This scene is so incredibly beautiful and sad and true. It’s not the found love trope that the whole show had made us expect. It’s a lost love. A real lost love, that we so rarely got to see on screen. It’s over.
I love that it destroys every expectations we could have.
Sure, it’s over, but they still care deeply about each other, even after all this time.
When Estella approaches him, there’s so much pent up emotions between them, the what-almost-but-didn’t-happened is nearly palpable. We know next to nothing about their relationship, but it’s so clear that these two have a history together, good and bad, full and complex. There’s already so much emotional intimacy between them. It’s nothing like a tension or longing-after-a-woman-from-afar.
When Estella approaches him, she’s not just angry at him. It’s not the first emotion, nor the second, nor even the third. She’s sorta happy, and proud, and hurt. Happy to see him, proud of who he had finally become, but there’s still this lingering hurt about how they parted. She used to be so mad at him, for probably a very long time. But now he’s there, finally, and he looks just like when she left him, a hopeful young man, but now tinted with 20 years of longing and sadness in the small lines of his face. She can’t help but hit him, because it hurt so much, you know? She’s somehow had to make her point.
The Mr. Fogg we know from the begining had been so closed up. Sure, we saw him opened up more and more to his friends: first by accident in India; then in Hong Kong for a bit (but barely, we mostly see him hurt by the betrayal); then he tries and opens himself up when there are just them, lost on an island, maybe doomed to die, but he’s still so alone on that rock, still very guarded, still afraid of what it could cost him; then a bit lost in America but his confidence’s improved so much already.
But here? The moment he sees Estella, all his barriers come crashing down and he’s suddenly completely bare in front of us, in front of her. There’s no Mr. Fogg here, there’s only Phileas.
I won’t analyse every single sentence from their dialogue because it would be too long (and it already is) but I could. There’s such subtlety, and openness, and good communication there. Apologies, well deserved and freely offered, admissions of broken hearts, reminiscience of what used to be and of what matters. Acknowledgement of all that could have been, the happiness they could have had—they don’t shy away from it. I can’t believe how much is said (aloud or not) in such few minutes. Every important thing is covered, but never forced, and it just flows naturally. And don’t get me started on the body language and the touches. It could deserve its own post.
It’s also a beautiful representation of someone trapped in the past, in a relationship that is no longer relevant. Phileas’s feelings are still there and they’re never diminished, but they’re not reciprocated anymore and have not been for a long time. But Estella never chastises or shuns him for that. Nor does she make him think it’s still possible. There are barely no misunderstanding, not ones that last more than a few seconds. She’s abundantly clear that their story is over, because… well, it is. What they have now are only remnants of what used to be. It’s still strong, and they obviously care very much, but it’s not love anymore, not exactly.
This conversation does wonders to Phileas. It’s breaking his heart and mending it at the same time. Because it sets him free. He’s been living in the past for 20 years, never doing anything and all clammed up, because he’s too attached to her, to the idea of her, of what might have been but never was. Now all is left is forward, his very own adventure, with his friends—not alone. His whole life awaits before him. And he can finally face it head on, nothing holds him back.
It really got to me. I consider this scene perfection, both in writing and delivery from both actors. It was emotional and heartfelt, and I was on the verge of tears.
And of course, it has to be said that actually giving a character in desperate need of a hug and connection, a platonic hug that intense is… the absolutely perfect way to conclude that scene. Needless to say, that was the push I needed to dissolve in a pool of tears.
