TV Review: Victoria

It beat BBC’s Poldark in the Sunday evening viewing ratings battle and lived up to last week’s standard. Victoria is proving itself to be the next Downton Abbey with all of its steam, passion and politics.

This week the 19-year-old monarch, portrayed effortlessly by Jenna Coleman, comes to terms with her role as Queen and her role as a woman in the world. Revealing a statue in memory of her father, Victoria faces an uprising from a rebel group before her very eyes and is escorted away from the danger at the request of Lord Melbourne (Rufus Sewell).

Much to the audience’s delight, the relationship between the Queen and her Prime Minister seemingly blossoms and the love they both have for one another is evident. Perhaps the greatest beauty of the drama is that it is true: Queen Victoria herself gushed about her “dear Lord M.” in her diaries and writer and creator Daisy Goodwin deserves enormous praise for that. Hence why it was so gripping when Coleman’s character confessed her love for the man forty years her senior in an emotional scene displaying the romantic restrictions a monarch faces.

However, things do change – and pretty quickly at that. The end of episode three sees Victoria meet her cousin Albert (Tom Hughes) and fall in love with him almost immediately. After previously declaring to remain a virgin Queen like Elizabeth I, her current inspiration, we know that this phase of her life won’t last long.

Next week’s episode of Victoria will certainly be interesting as we see our favourite royal heroine embark on a new chapter of her life.