Watching My Lady Jane: Episode 4 recap

In which our heroine entertains, discovers smut, and survives multiple assassination attempts. Presumably.

Photo: Jonathan Prime/Prime Video

My Queen Jane

Jane and Guildford arrive at the palace (at night, of course) and Seymour comes out to hand her the crown. I can’t believe Guildford couldn’t be bothered to button up his doublet for this very important occasion. Jesus, Guildford, pull yourself together!

Jane, who spent the whole journey looking like she was going to burst into tears, takes the crown and puts it on her head while Lemony Narrator smarms that he’s sure things will work out just fine.

The title card now switches from My Lady Jane to My Queen Jane. Heh.

Jane heads to the throne room, where the council, Mary, Elizabeth, and Jane’s family are all waiting. Jane tries to tell her sisters that everything’s the same, but Frances interrupts and says that’s not the case at all. Jane is queen now, so they’ll need to show her respect and deference. She then curtsies to her daughter, a moment so shocking Jane responds to it by fainting dead away. Guildford manages to catch her, so at least he’s found a use.

This is not my beautiful house

Jane wakes in Edward’s bed, wearing Edward’s robe, with Charles and a bunch of servants looming over her. She immediately feels sick and wonders aloud why Edward would do this. Charles, who seems very sweet, says that Edward always thought a great deal of Jane. He goes on to say he wishes he’d been with Edward at the end, to give him comfort.

Jane asks him if it’s true Edward threw himself out of a window, in his delirium. Charles tells her that he heard Edward was being poisoned by Dudley, which apparently is news to Jane. Seriously? Nobody told her that her father-in-law was in prison for killing Edward? Neither she nor Guildford wondered where his father was when they arrived?

Charles tells her that he heard Edward was being poisoned by Dudley, which apparently is news to Jane

Charles also drops the odd fact that Edward wanted to be alone in the cold, unpleasant north turret with his poison-riddled body, which Jane finds ridiculous. Charles admits he does too.

She takes herself to the north turret to poke around and looks out the window Edward allegedly fell out of.

And then Guildford comes and draws her away from said window, possibly fearing a repeat defenestration. They gently ask if the other’s all right, and both respond the same: ‘eh, you know.’ Lemony Narrator tells us this is as close as the English get to admitting emotional turmoil. Hee!

Guildford’s been to see his father and is sure he’s innocent. The man’s a conniving bastard, but no murderer. They agree that Edward’s murderer and the person who tried to kill them are one in the same. Yeah, probably. I mean, how many royal killers are likely to be running around this place anyway?

Guildford has to go, as it’s almost dawn. Jane admits she wishes he could stay and he sweetly teases her for being vulnerable for once. She teases him for being sensitive for once, and they veeeery nearly kiss, but then she tells him they can’t do ‘this.’ Jane: yes you can. You really can. You can have your hotcake and eat it too.

Jane, you can have your hotcake and eat it too

Or, how about this: you’re queen. You’re in charge. This is the first episode where nobody's told you you're powerless or someone else's property, because you're really neither of those things now. You don’t really need this divorce, you’ve got as much power and independence as you ever will. You’re obviously hot for your husband, why do you want to get rid of him?

Anyway, he warns her that she needs to be careful, as the palace isn’t safe. Yeah, I guess this new, very public status for both of them is going to make it super hard to hide the fact that Guildford’s an Ethian, which makes Dudley’s push to name Jane Edward’s heir seem pretty stupid, in hindsight.

Queen Mum

Frances, of course, is waaay excited to have her daughter as queen. She’s ordering people around, making demands like a pop star with insane contract riders, and settling into her magnificent new rooms.

She and Charles talk excitedly about all the preparations for the coronation and its attendant parties, but Jane’s more interested in why her younger sister’s wearing a wedding ring. Margaret breaks the news about Katherine being married off to Leicester, which shocks and horrifies Jane, but it’s fine, because he died anyway.

Jane switches over to talking about meeting with the privy council about Dudley. Frances tells her to forget about him, because Dudleys are always traitors. They do seem to have had quite a few members executed for treason, I’ll give her that.

While Jane gets dressed, Frances gives her advice on how important it is for her to be calm and take advice from Margaret of Anjou. Margaret of Anjou was a badass, so it’s not the worst idea. Basically, it boils down to: You’re the queen; act like it.

You lying snake

Mary is wroth that she’s not the first woman on the throne. She stomps around, wearing one of Henry VIII’s old jackets, scolding Seymour and saying she’ll just have to take care of this herself. She demands the key to Seymour’s zoo.

There, she visits one of the cells and offers its inhabitant freedom if it does something for her. She tells it to get into a large book-shaped box she’s holding.

Back at the palace, she threatens Petunia with a knife to get Elizabeth to do her bidding: bring that book-shaped box to Jane’s room and leave it there. Don’t look inside it.

Mary is wroth that she’s not the first woman on the throne

Elizabeth duly takes the box to Jane’s room. Jane asks her to stay and have a chat, since they haven’t had any time together since Jane arrived at the palace.

They pour wine and reminisce about Edward, and Jane asks if he and Seymour were close. While Jane talks, Elizabeth notices a snake poking its head out of the box. Jane thinks she’s getting upset because of all the Edward talk, and Elizabeth takes the lifeline and says yes, she misses him, as she puts a heavy pile of books on top of the box. But, she adds, she’s glad he chose Jane.

The next day, she releases the snake, with Petunia by her side. The snake transforms into a man, who runs away (got his freedom after all). Then Petunia takes her human form and thanks Elizabeth for not letting Mary carve her up. Elizabeth asks her to share everything she knows about Edward’s death.

Later, when Mary goes to Elizabeth and demands to know why Jane’s not dead of acute snakebite, Elizabeth lies that the snake was dead. Mary knows she’s lying and tells Seymour to fetch more of their favourite poison.

Jane Marple

Jane summons Dudley to answer for himself, pointing out that the poison was found on him. Dudley argues that he’d never risk stretching out a nice velvet doublet by sticking a box in the pocket. Seymour breaks in and points out that Dudley had a motive to murder Edward, since it put his daughter-in-law (and, presumably, future grandkids) on the throne. Motive = murder.

Seymour also scares up a witness: a cook who claims to have seen Dudley put the poison in the king’s food.

Dudley and Seymour start slapping each other, while Jane rolls her eyes and tells Charles she wants to talk to this cook.

It takes her all of ten seconds to poke a swiss cheese’s worth of holes in the cook’s claims. Once Jane rips her story apart, the cook transforms into a rabbit and is quickly spitted by a Kingsland guard.

Seymour swiftly pivots to saying that Dudley was apparently innocent and the cook was the poisoner all along. He applauds Jane’s efforts. She glares at him, then swirls off. 

King Guildford?

Guildford’s groom brings him to his new stable at sunset (where’s he been spending the day?) and Seymour overhears him calling the horse ‘my lord’. The groom covers and tries to hustle Guildford back out of there, but Seymour grabs his lead rope and brings him further into the stable, demanding to know why Guildford’s dismissed all the grooms from these stables and why his clothes are there (along with a bed). The groom lies that the family has their own grooms, and the clothes are his, but Seymour concludes that Jane’s kicked Guildford out and he’s now… sleeping with the horses, for some reason. Like there aren’t extra bedrooms in the palace, or that Guildford wouldn’t have a room of his own there anyway.

The groom’s all, ‘You got us! Why don’t we leave now? Please?’ Because Guildford’s going to turn back into his human form any second now. Seymour stops at the door and goes back for his sword, while horse Guildford snorts in anxiety. Seymour sneers at him for a bit, then strolls on out, disappearing just as Guildford changes back, gasping and freaked the hell out.

Seymour concludes that Jane’s kicked Guildford out

Guildford goes to collect Jane for dinner or something, and she fills him in on the whole situation with the cook. Guildford takes her into a nearby room and tells her that this situation is untenable now. He needs that cure and asks if their deal still stands. She says it does, but right now she has other things to see to.

He accuses her of giving up and she says she’s never given up on a thing in her life. (Except for running away, I guess. And her herbalism book, which she could have restarted after her mother destroyed it, but she didn’t. Anyway…) He tells her to prove it, and she decides to do so by attacking his face with her lips.

They make out hardcore for a bit, then he stops and apologises, saying he knows she doesn’t want this. Well, she kissed him, so I’d argue she does, in fact, want this, but Jane agrees and he leaves.

He returns to the stables, where his newly released father finds him packing. Guildford says he plans to head to Florence, still in hope of a cure. Dudley sits his son down and tells him he needs to get Jane to name him king. As king, Guildford would have protection and the power to try and find a cure.

Guildford accuses his father of marrying him to Jane purely to grab power, not to find Guildford a cure. Dudley says he’s spent many years breaking the law and taking on considerable risk to protect Guildford and now it’s time for Guildford to return the favour and redeem the family name. (Does it need redeeming? Isn’t Dudley a high-ranking councillor?)

Thursday murder supper club

Jane has a nightmare about Seymour chasing her through a hedge maze. Then she has a secondary nightmare of those two assassins from the woods smothering and stabbing her in her bed. She realises the Kingsland guards need to go.

The KGs are controlled by Seymour, so she goes to his study and, finding him not there, pokes around, looking for some information. Seymour returns and she demands a list of the guards. He fetches it from a locked chest, and she notices an ominous black folder in there. When he goes to hand over the list, he ‘accidentally’ drops it in the fire. Then he tucks the key to the chest into a small box.

Jane watches him do so, then invites him to a supper party that night.

While Jane entertains her guests at the dinner party (and banter-flirts with Guildford), her sisters go to Seymour’s study to get that black folder. The key isn’t in the little box, so Margaret picks the lock with a hairpin. Of course this kid can pick locks.

The dinner party’s predictably tense. Mary’s pretending to congratulate Jane while slipping poison into her wine; Seymour’s trying to get Guildford to go hunting with him the following morning. Guildford says he intends to sleep in and Seymour suggests he’s going to be up to no good, prompting Jane to defend her husband and to say that his reputation is wildly exaggerated. Aww.

Seymour asks Guildford just what the hell he does all day, and Jane offers up a distraction by asking about the recently deceased cook, wondering why she should want to kill Edward. Seymour says it’s because ‘beasts’ hate Verities, of course, and how about a toast, everyone? Jane picks up the glass of wine she doesn’t know is poisoned while Seymour turns his toast into a promise to root out any more Ethians at court.

Everyone goes to uncomfortably drink, but just before they do, Frances jumps up to give a toast to… herself. Of course she does. Jane rolls her eyes and reaches for her glass, but before she can pick it up, a fed-up Stan, sitting next to her, grabs it instead. Before he can drink it, Frances snatches it away, because she wants him in good form for later.

She raises a poisoned glass to herself, and Seymour gives Mary the most obvious desperate look in the history of desperate looks and clinks glasses with Frances so hard he spills her poisoned wine all over the table. He loudly apologises, as the Grey sisters pass by the room, waving the folder Jane wanted, and Guildford sees all this and winks at his wife.

Say anything

Later, Stan plants himself underneath Frances’s window to serenade her with Knights in White Satin. Ahahahahahaha! She storms outside and tells him to shut up. She’s not interested in any grand gestures of chivalry, and she’s definitely not interested in the marriage proposal he offers. She tells him he’s not husband material, because if he were, she and Dudley would have had him marry Jane, not Guildford.

At this point, Stan very nearly spills Guildford’s secret, and he says enough that Frances gets serious and tells Stan he has to tell her everything right now.

Dirty Enigma

As Guildford and Jane start going through the papers in the folder, he tells her she doesn’t have to defend him, because he really doesn’t care what people say about him. Well, maybe you should, Guildford, because did it occur to you that having a husband who’s allegedly out sleeping around and getting drunk might be really humiliating for Jane?

The folder’s full of coded letters. Guildford recognises the code and just happens to have a cipher wheel for it. He learned it from his father, apparently. Handy! But it’s also nice of them to give him a win, and something to do other than look pretty.

They decode the messages, but instead of evidence proving Seymour’s guilt, they discover they’re all very dirty letters from Mary. Ha! They’re as entertained by this as I am. But then Guildford reads one that references Florence and Widowmaker, and Jane realises it’s about the poison (Florentine Widowmaker). They realise Mary and Seymour killed Edward together.

Jane’s ready to go to Dudley and the council about this, but Guildford points out that it’s nearly daybreak, so he can’t go. He urges her to be careful.

The Hampton Court Strangler

Mary and Seymour post-coitally discuss the fact that something is off with Guildford. Seymour mentions that the grooms from the west stables have been dismissed, which Mary agrees is odd. She goes to find out what’s going on, leaving Seymour tied to the bed with an itchy ear.

In the garden, she comes upon Jane coming back from the stables. Jane panics and tells Mary she can’t go to the stables. She also accuses her of killing Edward and then, very stupidly, holds up the coded letter that proves it.

 So much for Jane's fighting abilities. Not so tough without your dagger, are you?

Mary screams and hurls herself at Jane. They tussle and Mary gets the letter and eats it. So much for Jane's fighting abilities. Not so tough without your dagger, are you?

Mary then strangles Jane, telling her to abdicate or die. Jane fights back, getting feebler and feebler until she’s still.

Mary gets off her and walks off, leaving Jane lying on the grass.

Let’s do the twist!

A cloaked figure approaches the stable as Guildford transforms into his horse form. The camera pans up to reveal… Frances. Of course.

And then we get a second reveal! Edward’s alive!