The Wars of the Roses is one of the most intriguing periods in British history with enough material to even make several seasons of a well written series, so I had great hopes for this one. What we get is a boring history lesson. Faction A fights faction B and then someone changes sides, they have couple of battles and then they switch sides again. Never we get a proper explanation as to why things happen. Where's the politics, where's the machinations? The whole script lacks depth and is devoid of intrigue. The characters are underdeveloped and feel like cardboard figures. The viewer has to make do with some badly written, phony dialog and a unnecessarily high emphasis on witchcraft. Did they really think this mumbo jumbo can make up for the lack of actual storytelling? It does get a little bit better after seven episodes, just a little. I know many people in England don't believe that Richard III killed the princes in the tower, but the writers go out of their way to place the blame with either Margaret Beaufort or Anne Neville. The whole thing reeks of a Richard III apology.
You can be critical of other series like "The Tudors" for their lack of historical accuracy, but at least that was an entertaining show. "The White Queen" makes "The (flawed) Tudors" look like a masterpiece. Whatever happened to James Frain? He was great playing Thomas Cromwell but makes Richard Neville (Warwick the Kingmaker) look like a pussycat. His death-scene is preposterous. It looks like the exam of a flunked drama-student in acting school. This brings me to the battle-scenes. We hardly get to see any, do we? And the ones that are shown seem to be skirmishes of about eight men getting involved in badly choreographed sword fighting. If they don't have the budget to show a proper battle, why even bother making a series set in one of the most violent periods in British history? The series ends with the battle of Bosworth FIELD, which happened in a august. What we get to see is a skirmish in a Flemish forest in the snow. Ridiculous.
If you thought Frain was bad check out Amanda Hale! Her portrayal of Margaret Beaufort is hysterical. I wished one of her spineless husbands would smack her in the face every time she starts whining about her son's destiny. And David Oakes is even worse as George of Clarence than as Juan Borgia. That about says it all.
I could go on and on about the anachronisms. At a certain point they didn't even bother to take off the iron bars that are put in castles for the tourists. The whole scenery feels wrong, too. Not for a moment you feel like you're in the middle ages. The landscapes and buildings of Flanders and England are just too different. But even a proper setting and less anachronisms wouldn't have saved the series. How much good would it do when the script is that empty and the acting is that bad? How could they have made such an interesting period in British history so boring? What a wasted chance!
You can be critical of other series like "The Tudors" for their lack of historical accuracy, but at least that was an entertaining show. "The White Queen" makes "The (flawed) Tudors" look like a masterpiece. Whatever happened to James Frain? He was great playing Thomas Cromwell but makes Richard Neville (Warwick the Kingmaker) look like a pussycat. His death-scene is preposterous. It looks like the exam of a flunked drama-student in acting school. This brings me to the battle-scenes. We hardly get to see any, do we? And the ones that are shown seem to be skirmishes of about eight men getting involved in badly choreographed sword fighting. If they don't have the budget to show a proper battle, why even bother making a series set in one of the most violent periods in British history? The series ends with the battle of Bosworth FIELD, which happened in a august. What we get to see is a skirmish in a Flemish forest in the snow. Ridiculous.
If you thought Frain was bad check out Amanda Hale! Her portrayal of Margaret Beaufort is hysterical. I wished one of her spineless husbands would smack her in the face every time she starts whining about her son's destiny. And David Oakes is even worse as George of Clarence than as Juan Borgia. That about says it all.
I could go on and on about the anachronisms. At a certain point they didn't even bother to take off the iron bars that are put in castles for the tourists. The whole scenery feels wrong, too. Not for a moment you feel like you're in the middle ages. The landscapes and buildings of Flanders and England are just too different. But even a proper setting and less anachronisms wouldn't have saved the series. How much good would it do when the script is that empty and the acting is that bad? How could they have made such an interesting period in British history so boring? What a wasted chance!