#tmatl

[cinemaocd]

[stilltrails]

congrats to wolf hall/tmatl for being the first form of media that allows audiences and characters in-universe to unapologetically & seriously mourn thomas cromwell.

for his death to be less of a "ha ha ha, you deserved it" and more of a "this is a horrible thing being done to a man, and it's not pleasant to see".

like we know his death is wrong, it makes us sad.

we haven't had that before.

[period-dramallama]

I have my criticisms of Wolf Hall and The Mirror and the Light and I am not shy about voicing them lmao.

But I will say, the interrogation scene in the final episode is one of the best scenes in the show (if not the best) and one of the best scenes in all of Tudor drama.

Yes, yes, Rylance is amazing, but everyone else in that scene was on top form. Jennings, Spall, Melling, Mothersdale- there isn’t a single weak link, a single moment where I was like "ooh. That was off" or "ouch, clumsy dialogue". I could just sit back and appreciate a well-crafted scene. Also, it's our good friends Setup and Payoff!

[ymabdarogan]

Tatler crowns the new Wolf Pack: introducing the young royal courtiers of Wolf Hall who have Gen-Z gripped

[period-dramallama]

Tudor drama costume designers will see a nice-looking actor and go "great! Y'know what colour doublet we should put Sir Gorgeous in? POND. GREEN."

[stilltrails]

Thomas savored Brandon's touch, and I really appreciated that. I don't know if he realized that Brandon liked him, genuinely, until then. At the end of everything, Brandon risked a lot to at least attempt to save him, and even though it didn't worked, he tried.

Thomas looked genuinely stricken. And I feel like the relationship he could have had with Brandon was something that he mourned in that moment.

[stilltrails]

i'm starting to think some people don't actually dislike wolf hall, they just dislike the fact that Thomas Cromwell is portrayed as something other than a villain.

Like people who do not like him are having to contend with the fact that the person they've hated for years is getting a more accurate portrayal, and said portrayal is actually not the villainous person he's been painted out to be.

Like he's not perfect at all. He did some really, shitty evil things. But so did all the other couturiers, even Thomas More. And clearly we understand that the latter is not just his bad deeds.

But i think that people are unwilling to understand that this same logic applies to Thomas Cromwell as well, and they're angry that people are daring to do that. He's not just his bad deeds, and people are going to explore that. And they're allowed to. And I hope they continue to do so.

Like you trace most of the hate back and you realize it's from folks who stan historical figures who were enemies of Cromwell and who're problematic in their own right.

Like stop interacting with WH just to hate watch it because you hate the man. Why put yourself through that. Go watch reruns of the Tudors or A Man for All Seasons. There's a wealth of evil cromwell content out there.

Also anyone who vague blogs about me owes me a dollar because I know for certain this'll be on certain people's blogs.

and also i do think there is legit critics of the show, but lots of the ones i've seen are from very biased people who might not have liked Cromwell to begin with

[stilltrails]

I do think it's strange how Wolf Hall continues to ignore Thomas's very deep interpersonal relationships with men, both platonic and queer coded.

His relationship with Jane Seymour was not that detailed in the book, but the relationships he had with men--bordering queercoded--were. From Wriothersly, to Chapuys, his relationships were more than whatever this surface level stuff the show is trying to push.

His relationship with Rafe is being sidelined too, as with Gregory and Richard. And these relationships with men are the largest and most crucial in the book because they play into what eventually happens to him.

his sense of safety is tied to men, his sense of belonging is tied to men. It's men who stay with him when he is about to die, it's men who fight for him until the end.

There's something so queer about that, but yet it's being left out.

It's certainly a choice...how a book with such queer themes (and whether that was intentional or not, idk) has been changed into a show with a man pinning over every woman he sees with not even a whiff of his complex relationships with men

it's losing it's queerness lol