The Crown -- Jewel?

The Crown has run for four seasons so far on Netflix, telling the story of the British royal family from the ascendancy of Queen Elizabeth II to (so far) the 1980s. Throughout its run, it's been loved by audiences, praised by critics, and showered with awards. There was never really a point in the show's existence that it wasn't on my radar. But I only took to watching it in the past few months, and only recently caught up with it completely. My take: it's a very good show... but it's also flawed at its core, and I'm not sure I like it.

When I focus on the good, I can't imagine I'll point out anything that others haven't highlighted before. The production value is beyond incredible. It looks super-expensive to make, better than many movies. I'd imagine the show must have an enormous audience for Netflix to continue to justify new seasons. (But then, who knows how their accounting works.)

Of course, as much budget as they put on screen in the form of sets and costumes, they put toward an exceptional cast full of A-list actors, both award-worthy and award-winning. And even though time marches on, leading to characters going and coming, and (famously) others being recast, the heavy hitters they get for The Crown only get heavier. Everything you've heard about how good Claire Foy, or John Lithgow, or Olivia Colman, or Tobias Menzies, or Helena Bonham Carter, or Josh O'Connor, or Emma Corrin, or Gillian Anderson are on this show? It's all true, and still often sold short.

But the show can also be incredibly slow-paced at times, incredibly repetitive from one season to the next, and frankly rather dull in between the handful of real showpiece episodes that make you sit up and take notice. The Crown is incredibly uneven, and I think this is unavoidably baked into its subject matter. The Crown makes me think that the problem is trying to build an ongoing television series around real-life people and real-life events.

You don't need to watch many episodes of The Crown to learn (if you didn't already know it from reality) that the royal family are, generally and collectively, not good people. Of course, it's far from required that "good people" be the focus of a television series; there are many examples of widely praised (and rightly so) shows centered on criminals, screw-ups, and outright villains. But... those shows almost always include some likeable supporting characters. Or episodes in which the unlikeable main character softens somewhat, doing one nice thing (even if for the "wrong reason"). When writers control the narrative, it's easier to walk the tightrope of making you like people who make decisions you want to watch through your tensed fingers.

By the same token, you can make a movie about real people by carefully curating what parts of their real life you want to feature. To create a narrative arc for the protagonist, you find one episode from their life in which they traveled a meaningful "character arc" that changed them in one way or another. Clear away the unneeded parts, and you're on your way to a three-act structure.

The problem with The Crown is that it ultimately cannot stray away from the decades-long history of its characters: namely, to continually repeat the same mistakes, whinge about the same complaints, and never, ever grow or change in any meaningful way. Every season of The Crown features the episode where Philip complains about being overlooked, the episode where Margaret complains about being underappreciated, the episode where Elizabeth bristles at the sort of restrictions she never hesitates to impose on everyone else. And it's no coincidence that the actors of The Crown have won so many awards for their performances; besides them actually being good in their roles, these "very special" episodes seem coldly calculated as awards bait.

In order to provide any character arcs at all, The Crown generally must look to its "temporary" characters -- often its Prime Ministers, who generally leave office different than when they came in. But even that isn't always the case. It's just as likely that a new character comes on the show just when you've come to hate all the old characters, sticks around long enough for you to start hating them too, and then gives way to new characters you'll also eventually come to hate.

Basically, I'm very glad I don't have any more episodes of The Crown to watch right now, because I had grown weary of the formula. But I won't pretend that I won't be starting season 5 the moment they drop it all at once on Netflix some time in 2022. Maybe by then, I'll have a better sense of why I find a show I'd probably grade a B- overall so compulsively watchable. Is the acting that big a selling point? Are the one or two grade A episodes each season what makes it? Someday, maybe I'll figure it out.