As much fun as Mary & George can be, what with all of Julianne Moore’s plotting and perversion as the devious Mary Villiers, it surprises when it reminds us that a soul is lurking somewhere beneath all of the show’s delectable lechery. After a bout of orgies and murder in last week’s episode, the limited series returns tonight with an installment that’s slightly more tempered, though no less packed with sex and manslaughter—you’ve got to give the people what they want! Episode 4 sees the show continuing to operate at a level higher than contemporary series ever reach. It’s a deftly written, droll chapter in the life of Mary and her second-born son George (Nicholas Galitzine), one that pushes the show past its halfway point, but still promises plenty more action to come.
Episode 4 opens in 1617, just before the show’s normal timeline, with two lowly gravediggers in Scotland tasked to dig up something from an unmarked grave. The men unearth a human heart below the soil, and, shocked, wonder what kind of demented man this organ has been passed down from. The episode makes no secret of that, cutting immediately to a sight of King James I (Tony Curran) and George in the king’s bed, naked. Why James is preoccupied with getting his hands on someone else’s ventricles and vessels we don’t yet know, but a bare heart resting six feet underground doesn’t bode well for George. James stirs and lifts George’s arm around him, stroking his soft skin, before bringing George’s forearm to his mouth and biting it like a hungry dog.
When Mary meets George at the royal palace’s grounds, she balks at George’s bite mark, while George likens the force of the king’s nibble to a hunting terrier. The king approaches, overhearing their conversation, and asks who the terrier among them is. Mary, always quick on her feet, responds, “Me!” and begins to bark and growl like a dog. She’s happy to embarrass herself in this fashion if the king can remain unaware of their discussion, but when James invites Mary to toss a mouse at his prized hawk and the hawk has no response, she recoils. Whether or not the bird takes any interest in the rodent is no concern of the king’s, but Mary reacts to any social blunder like a life-threatening injury.
