Poldark Series 3, Episode 1: Recap and Review

Photo: BBC

A breezy gallop along a cliff. The horse is out of control and heading straight for the edge. Is Ross in one of his moods again? No, it’s a pregnant Elizabeth.

Fortunately, Captain Poldark happens to be in the vicinity and saves Elizabeth from her peril. “You could have been thrown!” This from the man who raped her.

“Is it any of your concern?” asks Elizabeth? Quite.

George too resents Ross sticking his oar in. “Lay hand or set foot on anything of mine again and you will find the battle has barely begun,” says he. Ooh, the dramatic irony: we the audience know that Ross has of course laid plenty on Elizabeth, not just his hand. Off Ross trots for a huffy, pouty gallop.

Blimey. And the opening titles haven’t even started yet. When we meet Ross again, he’s thriving. His finances are healthy, he has a prospering mine, his family is well — and he’s rocking a cool look in a billowing shirt and leather boots. “What could possibly go wrong?” asks Harris Pascoe, his solicitor.

It’s almost a meta-reference. Brooding anti-heroes at the top of their game have only one way to go. But for the time being, Ross and Demelza form a charming pastoral tableau, carrying bundles of straw for thatching. It’s sweaty work, which Ross is of course used to. “I would rather there was one day in seven that you did not rise before dawn!” says she, with one of those down-it-in-one lines that Poldark is becoming famous for.

Fnaar, fnaar. But back to the plot. Elizabeth is due to give birth to a Warleggan heir in a month — “Unless,” says Aunt Agatha, “it comes sooner.” Haunted by the words, Elizabeth is increasingly desperate to make the old crone’s prediction a reality. Not only has she been charged with reckless galloping, but she has also been walking long distances and lifting heavy books. George is too dim to see what’s going on.

And so, with the prospect of a birth, shall there be a death, it’s TV drama Law. In fact, it’s death times two. Both John Nettles of Bergerac and old man Carne are about to succumb to the most common cause of TV deaths: superfluousness.

Only at the last minute does Demelza decide to visit her father. But she doesn’t have much time because — hurray! — she’s a wedding to go to. I was wondering why she and Ross were looking so smart. How lovely it is finally to see dishy doctor Dwight and Caroline tie the knot. Oh! I think there’s something in my eye…

May their marriage be happier than George and Elizabeth’s, not that that would be hard. Elizabeth’s next attempt to bring on her baby’s birth is a strange one. Picking up a pot, she throws it down the stairs. The next we see, she’s lying at the bottom and her birthing pains have started. Long and agonising, her labour this time is different from when she gave birth to Geoffrey Charles, when she barely broke into a sweat. Not only that, but there’s the black moon, the shadow of death.

It's all very gothic and spooky — and not a good omen for a new baby. When the poor mite is put into her arms, Elizabeth makes sure to remark how like George he is.

“The babe doesn’t look at all like me,” says young Geoffrey Charles, who is turning out to be quite precocious. Like Aunt Agatha, he has a knack of at once stating the truth and the blindingly obvious.

His presence is resented by George. Ostensibly to take the pressure of Elizabeth, but really part of his cunning plan to wean Geoffrey Charles off his dependency on her, George has found his stepson a governess: Morwenna Chynoweth, who is introduced with a clumsy piece of exposition from George: “I have the honour to be your relative since I married your cousin, Elizabeth.”

So far so straightforward, until she catches the attention of Drake. He has, according to Prudie, “a fitty physog” — a fact that’s not lost on Morwenna, either. But, oh dear. Now that Ross has removed himself from George’s life on condition that George does not harm Aunt Agatha or Geoffrey Charles, this burgeoning romance already seems doomed. The Warleggans aren’t going to be best pleased about a member of their clan fraternising with one of Demelza’s lot. I’ve deliberately not read the Poldark books, but it would seem to me that a Romeo and Juliet storyline would seem to be afoot. I daren’t look!

To matters more pleasant, as Harris Pascoe might say. Demelza is with child again. “You’re not displeased?” she asks Ross, as if expecting him to blame her. Not that her news comes as a surprise. It’s all that rising before dawn.