THE SPANISH PRINCESS (S1E6) “A Polite Kidnapping”: Family First

This week, we get a visit from a family member other than a Tudor, a certain son of a king keeps up his routine of stubbornness and obnoxiousness, and a number of people show that they truly have a backbone. Welcome back to 16^th Century England, let’s get into episode 6 of The Spanish Princess!

An Unhappy Reunion

A blissfully happy Catherine has been writing to her mother, asking for the rest of her dowry. The letters are delivered to the Alhambra, but not answered. When a letter finally arrives for Catherine it comes with a surprise: with her ship having suffered damage, the Queen of Castile is in England. It is actually Catherine’s elder sister, Joanna (Alba Galocha) who has arrived, who became Queen of Castile following the passing of their mother. Joanna has come with her husband,Philip of Habsburg (Philip Andrew), who happens to be the son of the Holy Roman Emperor Maximillian, who is hiding none other than the traitor the crown has been hunting, Edmund de la Pool. What luck! Margaret and Catherine see their golden opportunities fall right into their laps!

Catherine goes to greet her sister in their shared mourning but Joanna is in no mood to hear it. Joanna doesn’t hide her hatred towards Isabella, who she says put everyone and everything above her daughters. When Wolsey offers to have a mass in Isabella’s honor, Joanna tells him what he can do with it.

A banquet is prepared, but Harry spends a bit too much time trying to comfort Catherine. Henry and Harry continue their bickering, with Henry angrily informing his son that he must do what’s proper and vet the visitors. Philip seems to have a wandering eye, so Joanna watches him like a hawk, snapping when his attention shifts to a pretty face. Catherine realizes that she must play the same game as the others to get what she wants. If her father won’t cough up the rest of the coin for the dowry, her sister will have to.

Maggie asks her tenant for their rent, but feels guilty as they are struggling as well. As if being a new widow wasn’t stressful enough, the king’s clerks storm into Maggie Pole’s home. Claiming she is behind on her tax payments to the Crown, and ignoring Maggie’s pleas for more time, the house is stripped of any item of value.

Joanna is still behaving strangely, but she suggests that she and Catherine perform a Spanish dance. Harry is none too keen on his father’s behavior (continuing their spat from last week). When Joanna sees her husband being a little too attentive to a serving maid, she throws a glass of wine in his face.

The ransacking of Maggie Pole’s home leaves her virtually penniless. She writes to Henry, begging for mercy and assistance.

Lina finds Oviedo in the stable, removing the shoes from one of the horses (an important plot point here! Take note!). She responds in the affirmative that she will marry him (with help from Catherine’s dowry of three gold plates). Oviedo wishes to marry her when he can financially support her.

An Unhappy Queen

Catherine gets another chance to talk to her sister. When Joanna asks about her sister’s marriage to Arthur, Catherine does have lovely things to say about him. As for Joanna’s marriage, her husband routinely cheats on her and gaslights her when he is confronted, going so far as to not speaking to her and locking her in her room. Philip has also put a bug in Ferdinand of Aragon’s ear that he should rule instead of her. Ferdinand is also trying to strip Joanna of her birthright. Tormented by the treatment by her father and husband, Joanna tells her sister to never marry, as marriage is a trap. An angry Philip comes back and Catherine tries to stand up for her unhappy sister before her husband carts her off.

As Stafford has been ignoring her, Rosa is quite glad when she is to meet him in the palace gardens. She has gotten all gussied up, as she thinks she’s finally making some headway with her child’s father. Catherine comes in once Rosa leaves, feeling defeated over her current state and how she wasn’t able to bring up the dowry to Joanna. She doesn’t see her future anymore.

Maggie Pole’s present state is also grim, as her son informs her they do not even have eggs to eat. The clerks took their chickens.

Joanna wants to know why the simple repair on her ship is taking so long. Stafford states that there was additional damage. Margaret Beaufort chimes in that the carpenters will need at least a week to fix it (which is obviously a lie. Earlier in the episode, it was claimed that that repair would only take a day or two to mend). Joanna demands that if they can’t fix her boat quickly, they can sell her one of theirs. After all, they need the money. Catherine watches this exchange through the window; another opportunity to ask her sister for the dowry.

Rosa has gone missing. Lina and Oviedo find her crying in the gardens. Stafford did not show up for their meeting, which has left Rosa sadder than before. She pleads with Lina to find Stafford and learn why he has been avoiding her, which Lina agrees to.

Catherine finds Joanna in the palace’s large chapel and agrees that they are being controlled by men in their lives and that they must help each other, to which Joanna points out that her sister has been soiled and no longer has a dowry, so there is no viable marriage for her. Catherine feeds her sister her big lie, which Joanna doesn’t believe. Harry is different. All she needs to drive the wedding forward is that dowry to be paid. They can then join forces and be one another’s allies against the French, with all of them ruling as queens.

Joanna knows that her ship is fixed and that Philip is behind them being “stranded”. Joanna tells her sister that they don’t rule anything. Catherine points out that this is preposterous. If Philip were to try to take the crown from Joanna, wouldn’t he want to be in Spain?  Joanna throws out her own question to ponder. If she’s wrong, why do none of the horses have shoes?

After a disastrous meeting with Philip and the rest of the privy council for talks on returning the traitorous Edmund de la Pool,  Henry angrily walks out of the chamber into the vestibule, barking at his son as to why he was fawning over Catherine rather than helping to negotiate de la Pool’s surrender. He has had enough of Harry’s lip lately and lack of interest in the throne they are trying to preserve for him. Henry then threatens to name someone else as his successor. Harry fires back, warning Harry that there will come a time when they are not around to guide him. A prideful and stubborn Harry continues to test his father.

Stafford, as predicted, did not hold up his end of the bargain and abandoned Rosa. Rosa tragically miscarries, tearfully declaring that the baby could sense that they were unwanted.

Once Catherine comes to Harry’s aid and takes him to tend to his wound, Harry gets romantic. Joanna comes in and points out that her sister shouldn’t entertain a man alone if she desires to preserve her reputation as a maid. Henry shows his enmity toward Joanna. Joanna comes out with the truth as to why she acts the way she does. Isabella used to physically torture her, hanging her on a hook with weights tied to her feet. Joanna unleashes what she’s been holding back. Catherine doesn’t believe it, and accuses Joanna of being crazy. As Joanna continues to defame their mother, Catherine verbally retaliates, followed by a slap. Joanna sees her sister for what she is, their mother’s daughter. The final answer is given: Catherine won’t get any money from her.

A Silver Lining

Harry mentions the negotiation ploy and how the Tudors want to keep Joanna and Philip there until Edmund is handed over. Catherine perks up. Joanna has the upper hand, but Catherine plans to barter with her sister. Pay her dowry and she can help her escape. Catherine finally tells her sister that she knows what she said was true. She heard her sister’s screams and her mother’s rationalization for the cruelty. Joanna busts in on the latest meeting and tells Henry that she’s the one Maximillian has to keep happy. The deal? Henry must swear on a holy relic that no harm will come to Edmund if he’s returned to England.

Maggie receives a letter answering her pleas of mercy, as her children will starve without their help. She goes back to the palace, encountering Catherine. Both women briefly talk about their mutual sorrow. Maggie is expecting to meet with the king, but in reality, Margaret Beaufort was the one who wrote the letter. She will see that Maggie gets her help, if she were to declare that Catherine and Arthur consummated their marriage. Enraged at Beaufort’s ploy and at all of her machinations, she finally tells her off.

Finally, with the deal in place, Joanna is set to leave for Spain. Catherine asks her sister about the dowry. Joanna agrees that an alliance between Spain and England is necessary, but it will come from another marriage. With a last twist of the knife to her sister, her plan is revealed. Her son Charles is to be married to Mary Tudor. Thanks to Margaret Beaufort’s brilliant idea, she no longer needs Catherine.

Juana (referred to here as Joanna) of Castile was known colloquially as “Juana the Mad” and while sources state that she suffered from some type of mental illness, it is not definitive as to if she was and/or what she had. Therefore one could argue that in this storyline, Juana’s treatment by her parents and husband may have been a driving factor to her behavior. She didn’t “hang” from a hook and try to seduce Harry for no reason. She was also portrayed as feisty, brash, and quite ballsy, which goes against what women in the Middle Ages were perceived and expected to be.

Historically, the engagement between Mary Tudor and Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor is squashed and Mary goes on to marry Louis XII of France, followed by Charles Brandon. She will produce children with Brandon, and their granddaughter is none other than Jane Grey, who will go on to rule England for a little over a week. Juana will also pick up the crown of Aragon following Ferdinand’s death in 1516. Although she remained queen, her mental state resulted in her imprisonment until her own death in 1555.

A very sad and poignant scene was when the three ladies take Rosa’s fetus and tenderly sent the child to their final resting place in the moat. Now that Rosa and Stafford no longer have much of a connection, this could put the plot of Rosa marrying Willoughby into play, further cementing the character’s basis on Maria de Salinas. Somehow their perceived disgraceful, objectionable, reputation-tarnishing actions (him visiting brothels and her no longer a virgin and having gotten pregnant with an illegitimate child) makes this marriage mutually beneficial and strangely equal.

We are down to the final two episodes of this season!  Next week, Maggie Pole has reached her breaking point, while Catherine scrambles to figure out her next move. In their eyes, “All Is Lost”.

Will Stafford ever willingly face Rosa again? Is the return of Joanna inevitable? Let us know in the comments below!