In its first three seasons, Bridgerton, the dazzling Regency-era romance that many women immediately regretted watching with their mothers, made it very clear that it was not a social commentary.
Despite occasional dips into discussions of class through Eloise’s brief political arc, Mary Sharma leaving the nobility to marry a tradesman, or even Anthony’s forgotten mistress, Sienna, from the first season, Bridgerton has made it abundantly clear that they are not here to make a statement on class. The show is a romance. The focus is on the dazzling balls, splendid food, and extravagant costumes, not the numerous servants who dedicate hours to preparing them.
Until this most recent season, where class divides take center stage.
The season finally takes us below the glitz and glamor of Regency England and into the lives of the maids, footmen, governesses, and everyone in between who allow the nobility to keep up their illustrious lives. We delve beneath the stunning homes of London’s elite into the downstairs, where we see servants pressing the laundry, chefs whipping up whatever meal their employer might desire, and maids cleaning up after every spill.
This change in focus is evident from the very first minute of the new season. While the show opens with Bridgerton House, it does not focus on our titular family. Instead, we see their staff wiping the piano, fluffing the pillows, and carrying floral arrangements, the spotlight not cast on the Bridgertons anxiously awaiting the return of their youngest son, but on the staff that allows them to think of nothing else.
Not only are the staff brought to the foreground, but the show specifically highlights the class divide that has been off-screen for the past three seasons. One scene in particular shows a visit from the barber devolve into a joyful, shaving cream-filled brawl between the Bridgerton brothers.
The carefree and energetic scene soon cuts to a more solemn picture of a maid cleaning up the spill, intensely scrubbing the floors without yet having made a dent in the shaving cream-covered room.
This is not to say that Bridgerton is now going to transform into a revolutionary social drama. While they have attempted to tackle social issues in the past (namely, Queen Charlotte’s prequel’s controversial tackling of racism), that does not mean they have ever done it well.
The main focus of this season is not a revolution brewing in the servants’ quarters of London, but instead a whimsical Cinderella story centered around a maid named Sophie Baek, who happens to be the illegitimate daughter of nobility (as one of her fellow maids says, Sophie should get to go to the ball, as it “is her birthright”).
While Sophie might not be a typical maid (the Bridgertons are consistently surprised by her level of education and find it appropriate to comment on it), she does live in a very different world from the Bridgertons.Â
The stakes of this season feel higher. In Season 3, if Penelope had not married Colin, she still had the option of a suitor. If she hadn’t married at all, she would have been cast to the fringes of society, but she would have had more than enough money to support her for the rest of her days.
In Season 4, if Sophie does not have work, then her entire life is threatened. There are many times throughout the season where her love interest, Benedict, seems baffled by her decisions, seemingly not understanding that she needs wages, and therefore work, to survive. Her conflicts are truly life or death, as she has no fortune or family name to fall back on.Â
While the first part of the season could have benefited from Eloise returning to the political sphere (instead of committing herself to “life on the shelf” and meandering around balls and other society events without any purpose), the class-focused story is far more interesting than anything we saw out of Bridgerton in Season 3.
The characters have chemistry, they face a conflict with seemingly no easy resolution, and the background has finally expanded to show some of the working-class characters in the story, creating the most entertaining season since Kate and Anthony dazzled in season 2 (which also had elements of class differences, as Kate was not nobility herself).
In the past, Bridgerton has been at its best when they allow their main characters of the season to take the spotlight, without being dragged down too much by seemingly irrelevant side stories. This season spectacularly focuses on Sophie and Benedict, and by allowing class divides to permeate the story, Bridgerton introduces a layer of interest that we have not seen much of from the show.
This season does not abandon the fantasy of Bridgerton. It deepens it. Sophie and Benedict’s story is grounded in class, conflict, and consequences. The stakes are higher, the relationship is riskier, and the viewer is compelled to root for a happy ending that almost doesn’t seem possible (but it’s Bridgerton, so I’m sure they’ll figure it out in Part 2).