![](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/d8a91b62d446b21fb693d97861f4a97969-forsytes-ep2.rsquare.w400.jpg\")
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The Forsytes<\/a><\/p>\n Episode 2<\/p>\n \n Season 1<\/p>\n Episode 2\n <\/p>\n \n Editor\u2019s Rating<\/p>\n 4 stars<\/p>\n ****\n <\/p>\n \n Photo: Sean Gleason\/Mammoth Screen\/Masterpiece\n <\/p>\n I know some of you have already watched this series in full (it premiered last fall in the U.K.), and some of you have watched a previous adaptation, and some of you have \u2014 this can\u2019t be right \u2014 read the book? So please know that unless I come into a show with prior information, I try to remain spoiler-free so I can toss narrative guesses into the ether willy-nilly. I have picked up from others that Soames is an antihero, but I am going to champion his likely-doomed relationship anyway. Maybe it will all work out this time! People love drastically changing classics.<\/p>\n We left off with Frances learning that Dressmaker Louisa\u2019s children are Jolyon\u2019s from their Venetian dalliance ten years ago. She returns home, and Louisa hyperventilates because, wow, things sure are coming to a head all of a sudden. Frances decides to put this on pause, though, because the family is going to the opera tonight (a very alive and valid art form! Check out your local opera company!), and Frances has invited the Carterets to their box. The Forsyte parents want to match up June with Boy Carteret and Soames with Girl Carteret. Unfortunately for them, June has this whole New Woman schtick she\u2019s trying, and Soames is obsessed with Irene the Ballerina, not that his family is at all aware.<\/p>\n While Bill from True Blood (Jolyon\u2019s dad) has made the announcement that Jolyon will succeed him soon, Bill is still in charge at the brokerage. This is good, because Jolyon isn\u2019t even wearing a tie to the office and looks like a dockworker. Get outta here, Jolyon! And wash that product out of your hair; it\u2019s like 1885, for God\u2019s sake. Instead of working, he flashes back to his man-bun life with Louisa in Venice. He doesn\u2019t have a literal man bun in the flashback, but spiritually, he has one. Jol just wants to be an artist on the continent with his soulmate, the former lady\u2019s maid. Honestly, he should do that. Soames and his dad gripe about relation over merit being archaic, and it is! Jolyon shouldn\u2019t have this job. He is a limp noodle held upright from sheer force of will by his wife and father.<\/p>\n Speaking of his wife, I hope you love bitches who get shit done, because I am Team Frances in all of this. She is handling things amazingly. I mean, I guess she could encourage Jolyon\u2019s art more? But her realizing the importance of that would require couples therapy, and I\u2019m relatively certain that didn\u2019t exist at this time. Frances immediately knew something was up between Jolyon and Louisa. FRANCES visited her as soon as she could, solely to gather information. She delicately reminds Jolyon that he is an adult with responsibilities. She visits Louisa again to figure out what her game is, and then, when she finds out that Jolyon knows about the children, Frances immediately has a forthright and calm conversation with him about it. I love her. But I also hope she has a dramatic breakdown later, because that\u2019s what soap operas are about. Jolyon doesn\u2019t deserve her.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Soames perambulates a park with Irene, examining works of art in progress. Again, I do not care what doom awaits, I am a melting goober about Soft Soames. He\u2019s so into everything Irene says, and Irene just stands there looking like a tiny fawn. Later, they ride in a boat around the lake, and then he arranges a picnic by the water. When they discuss her dancing, he compares it to his talent for numbers, and how they both have to learn a technique and practice it. Then Soames makes it clear he\u2019s not laying claim to any form of artistry! Look at this man trying to find points of connection while also admiring her work and lifting it above his. I can\u2019t. If you\u2019re new to my work, I am very gay, but my wife did hear me say \u201cAW\u201d multiple times while I watched this week\u2019s episode, always about Soames. Soames is the best but also probably the worst. Irene tells him she hopes to go to Paris very soon.<\/p>\n You might say, \u201cWait, does Irene give one single shit about Soames?\u201d Great, yes, we should definitely think about that. But that\u2019s a bummer, so for now, let\u2019s turn to the opera. They\u2019re seeing La Traviata, which is one of my and many people\u2019s all-time favorites, mostly because it is SO GOOD. If you\u2019ve seen Moulin Rouge, you know the plot. The Carterets and Forsytes are sharing a box as planned. Frances shoves June at Boy Carteret. June interrogates him about Frankenstein, and mentions the creature being forced to do another\u2019s bidding. What? That\u2019s not it, June. Stop making Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley\u2019s book about your eighteen-year-old angst when it\u2019s about her nineteen-year-old angst. June runs away from Boy and literally runs into another young man. His name is maybe Philip Bassoon? That can\u2019t be right. He gives her a pamphlet on the Fabian Society<\/a> (British socialists) and runs off. Guess we\u2019ll be seeing that young man of indeterminate name again sometime.<\/p>\n For now, we get to watch \u201cAddio del passato\u201d from Traviata! Fun fact: at my small Christian high school graduation, we could pick a song to play over our senior photo, but it had to either mention God or be orchestral. So I picked the part of \u201cAddio\u201d where she basically says, \u201cGod, forgive this fallen woman.\u201d And my high school said \u201cSounds great, go for it.\u201d What I wanted to do was this<\/a>, but comic songs rarely bring up God, so here we are. The recording they use for this performance is by a mezzo-soprano, which is fun and different, as usually the heroine is a soprano. \u201cIs that fun?\u201d you ask. Yes!<\/p>\n Nothing else gets accomplished at the opera other than some wonderful world-building. Girl Carteret tells Soames she adores Traviata, which is not a hot take, and Soames ignores her because she is not a waifish ballerina with doe eyes. Try harder next time, Girl Carteret!<\/p>\n Jol flashes back to his time in Venice when Louisa talks about their difference in stations, and he replies, \u201cAnd no gentleman ever married a lady\u2019s maid?\u201d Not really, Jolyon! Only in <\/a>Pamela<\/a>, and everyone hates that book. He decides to go to Louisa\u2019s shop, which she is very unhappy about. She makes him leave, but then he comes back later and sees the kids. So now Jolyon knows he has two kids with Louisa and everyone\u2019s plans are fucked. Jolyon\u2019s dad and Frances have some clandestine meeting in the gazebo, as befits my late Victorian soap opera, and she updates him on all this and how it could imperil Jolyon\u2019s position at the brokerage. Frances trusts in Louisa\u2019s discretion, but she didn\u2019t count on Jolyon being a Pushy Polly who keeps seeing someone who doesn\u2019t want to see them.<\/p>\n When Jol returns home, he and Frances immediately discuss the situation. Again, what great communication. What an example. If this were The Gilded Age, one would storm off for like three episodes in a row. Frances is concerned that Jolyon having \u201cillegitimate\u201d children could be used against him, and she just wants to ignore it and move on. Jolyon doesn\u2019t want to deny the children\u2019s existence, which Frances does not want to hear, and she makes him promise not to tell anyone for now. \u201cIt would be catastrophic for you as chairman, for us as a family, for me as your wife.\u201d Yeah, Jolyon! June overhears all of this and is mad at Jolyon.<\/p>\n Okay, back to Irene\u2019s feelings for Soames: she doesn\u2019t have any. Or rather, she is very \u201cThank you for being such an excellent friend to me\u201d and Soames, whose timeline has moved up because of her imminent move to Paris, declares his intense ardor for her. \u201cYou are my heart\u2019s desire. I cannot imagine a life without you.\u201d I\u2019M SORRY BUT I LOVE IT. Irene is baffled by this declaration, though. Soames, sensing potential rejection, offers that they can be engaged on a trial basis, and if she hates it, he\u2019ll release her from it. Irene smiles at him and he looks so happy.<\/p>\n We end with June going to tell Jol\u2019s aunt what\u2019s what, Frances seeing Jol\u2019s paintings brought out again, and Soames smoking a cigar with a very satisfied look on his face. I love this show so much.<\/p>\n Sign Up for the Vulture Newsletter<\/p>\n Entertainment news, for the pop-culture obsessed.<\/p>\n Vox Media, LLC Terms and Privacy Notice<\/p>\n