Gunpowder episode 2 review: ‘But screw your courage to the sticking-place’
Gunpowder puts a lot of pieces together in its second episode, but that doesn’t mean it escapes some issues with pacing and timing.
(The quote in the headline is from Macbeth, Act 1, Scene 7: “But screw your courage to the sticking-place, / And we’ll not fail.”)
One of the first lines in the second episode of Gunpowder is this, directly from Kit Harington’s Robert Catesby: “My purpose is to kill the King of England.” It doesn’t really get him anywhere, because he’s in Spain, but at least he’s trying.
In particular, the scene where Robert witnesses how Spain treats its own religious minorities lets Harington show a man struggling for anything resembling coherence as he sees people burned at the stake. It’s a good exercise in acting for him.
So it’s off to Brussels in Flanders for Robert, hoping to find someone who will actually help him, like, say, Guy Fawkes, wreathed entirely in shadow. Look, that symbolism is maybe a little strong, Gunpowder. Ditto with our being told that Fawkes is really good at things that particularly benefit the plan.
Granted, having someone good at these kinds of things becomes suddenly necessary when King James might have the opportunity to continue his own religious persecution and get his treaty with Spain (which has a Catholic monarch, as the show likes to emphasize to make sure we get the politics at play here. That I can’t fault, though). Nothing is ever quite so simple, though, and when the actual negotiations open, it doesn’t go well for him.
However, the scene in which all of Robert’s fellow conspirators get to introduce themselves reads as a reminder that we don’t know these people’s names, although the intention seems to be to show how devoted they are to each other and this pact (with the exception of Fawkes, noticeably).
At least Liv Tyler and Mark Gatiss get to play off of each other — with Gatiss still keeping his head tilted — within the first 10 minutes. In fact, Tyler’s Anne Vaux gets to call his Robert Cecil out, and the facial expressions, though minute, are fascinating. It’s two actors we know so well from other projects, playing off each other, clearly on opposite sides. She gets to reassure Father Garnet, her voice alternately forceful and weak as she pleads with him to keep on keeping on. Lastly, she also calls out her own cousin, reinforcing that yes, I like Anne.
In fact, most of this episode doesn’t particularly go well for Cecil, who has to scramble to keep the Spanish treaty and managing his spies to keep the king happy (and get the king what he wants, which means he keeps his job). At least he gets to talk about his own father, picking up the ongoing subplot in which Robert Catesby is also not the greatest of dads.
Since we know Harington best as Jon Snow, it’s hard to see him play a father to a son here, but the acting itself is fine, and quite emotional at points. There’s even a touch of dramatic irony as Robert rides off, with his son running after him, since viewers familiar with the history know it will not end well for Robert.
Ultimately, what’s most difficult to fathom about this episode is Gunpowder‘s sense of time. Characters move from place to place quickly and talk a lot in all mostly similar-looking locations (at least the little location subtitles help). The series opens in 1603, but we seem to be much closer to 1605, when the actual plot occurred.
As for the torture scene that happens towards the end of the episode, they’re still not as bad as the first episode’s executions, at least until bones start snapping. Additionally, at least Robert pulls off a prison break … a really poorly planned one, but a prison break … for a captured priest. In fact, the show almost seems like it’s going for a full-tilt cliffhanger. Kudos for not doing it, frankly, but it’s not like our conspirators are in the greatest place as they flee either.
Next: 25 of TV's messiest meltdowns
Gunpowder concludes tomorrow night on HBO. What did you think of this episode?