Summary
Lord Seadown assumes the villain mantle very capably in The Buccaneers Season 2, Episode 6, leading to a powerfully morbid climax and, on balance, the best outing of the season thus far.
Blimey, James Seadown is awful, isn’t he? This won’t be news to long-time viewers of The Buccaneers, but now we’re over halfway through Season 2, he has indisputably emerged as the real villain of the piece. Nowhere is this more evident than in Episode 6, “Every Single Piece of My Heart”, a genuinely tense and committedly dour installment that builds to the tragic death of a major character — and just when it seemed like the finish line was in sight.
The smartest play here is sidelining Nan. I know, I know, she’s ostensibly the protagonist, but this is really an ensemble, and it works better when the spotlight is shared around. And besides, we get to see Nan sulking every week — an hour’s break won’t hurt. Outside of a small, albeit key scene with Guy in which they both endeavour to commit to one another, Nan and even Theo get very little to do here. And it’s just as well.
But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. Things begin in Italy, where Guy spots Lord Seadown at the market and hurriedly tells Jinny, only to be confronted with the news that not only was she well-aware of his presence but has been seduced by his apologetic routine and wants to return to England with him. I was initially annoyed by this, as Seadown’s so blatantly terrible that Jinny even toying with the idea of believing him undermines her character. But it doesn’t take. As soon as she entertains the notion of not going home with her husband and feels the sudden grip of terror once again, she immediately resolves to leave. However, their hurried packing is interrupted by a sinister revelation — Freddie is gone.
With Seadown having snatched Freddie, Guy and Jinny return to England to enlist the help of Nan, the other buccaneers, and some key figures in high society. The plan is simple enough, but difficult for Jinny to accept given it’s basically a waiting game. Nan and Theo can help get Jinny’s story and perspective into the press, but she’s still technically a fugitive. Until a bill is passed giving women some semblance of say over the lives of their own children, her hands are tied.
Through Hector — who, it turns out, Lizzy didn’t marry last week, and boy is he salty about it — Nan plans to attend the opera as a guest of honour in order to schmooze the Home Secretary, which would be a fine enough plan if it weren’t for the fact that Lord Seadown is a couple of steps ahead. With the complicity of his mother, he’s hiding out at his Aunt Emily’s house, and while Jinny is opening herself up to the press, James and Lady Brightlingsea are concocting a plan of their own.
Imogen Waterhouse in The Buccaneers Season 2 | Image via Apple TV+
When James is spotted at the opera in The Buccaneers Season 2, Episode 6, it seems like a brazen move, but one unsurprising of such a narcissist, especially one trying to convince the world that he’s totally innocent of any wrongdoing. Lady Brightlingsea takes the opportunity to wind Jinny up to the point that she rushes to the opera to confront James about Freddie’s location, at which point he gives a dramatic performance acting like he’s being assaulted. To be fair, he kind of is, but he very much deserves it. It’s all a ploy to get Jinny arrested and released into James’s “care”, so that he can take over her “treatment”, which involves locking her in her bedroom and torturing her with all-too-brief glimpses of Freddie.
Luckily, Lady Brightlingsea develops a conscience over her complicity in this and tells Dick where James is hiding out. He and Honoria head to Aunt Emily’s sprawling manse with a loose plan to keep James distracted until Jinny and Freddie can be spirited away. And it half works. Honoria is able to get Freddie out of the building and abscond in a carriage with him, but James suddenly gets wise to it and all Hell breaks loose.
While James and Dick are tussling, Jinny shouts for help from upstairs. Disgusted, Dick socks his brother in the mouth and breaks her free, but their escape is interrupted by James pulling a gun. They wrestle again, and Jinny is able to flee, but for what seems like dramatic effect, James turns the gun on himself. The camera cuts away, we hear a gunshot, and the assumption is that James has committed suicide. But not quite. He has, in fact, shot his own brother dead.
With James in a sort of regretful trance, Jinny is able to escape and walk all the way back home, where she has to break the news to Conchita and Honoria that Dick is dead. Music plays over this scene, but it’s powerfully effective — perhaps more so than it would have been otherwise — with the dialogue drowned out. It’s a terribly morbid note to end on, especially after the mild jubilation of Freddie’s rescue. It makes The Buccaneers Season 2, Episode 6 easily the season’s best thus far, and it’s hard to imagine how the show is going to be able to rekindle any of its old fun-loving sensibilities in the remaining episodes.
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