User reviews

Lucy Worsley takes an interesting look into the infamous Blood Mary, notable for being Britain's first female monarch, but better known as Bloody Mary, a tyrannical ruler and puritan, responsible for the deaths of many protestants.

Unlike other episodes, I go into this one having studied this era quite extensively, so it was intriguing to hear Lucy's thoughts on the subject.

Is it bad that I have to say I disagree with such a well respected historian such as Lucy, but there it is, the idea that Mary was simply misunderstood and vilified by the press of the time, that's a stretch.

You can't have it both ways, Mary can't be a head strong, intelligent, business minded leader, and be forced into taking action under duress of her Spanish husband, it doesn't quite work as an argument.

There is so much evidence to suggest that Mary became incredibly tyrannical in her later years, when she knew her throne was under threat, life became unbearable for many, and I'd have to question the number of deaths, but again, who am I to question.

To claim that Edward caused more deaths than Mary, he was a child, who was simply a manoeuvred by a group of men with large ambitions, Mary was a strong willed adult, motivated by her religion.

Lucy makes this a little too much about Mary's sex, and whilst it did play a part, I've always thought it was more about her religion, and relationship with her father, she must have felt so bitter towards her father, who literally changed the shape of the country to marry Anne Boleyn.

Of course there's some lovely detail here, the fact that Mary's coronation was not in a Catholic church, and there are some incredible references, Lucy certainly went digging.

It's good that we all have different points of view, this one didn't quite work for me.

5/10.