‘Poldark’ Recap Season 5 Episode 2: The One Where Ross Makes a ‘Zine

Poldark Season 5, Episode 2 takes us to the charming cesspool that is 1801 London. I say charming because, man, that architecture! However as Ross Poldark (Aidan Turner), Demelza (Eleanor Tomlinson), and their friends soon learn, it is also a nest of snakes waiting to destroy them all.
As soon as Demelza arrives in London with children Jeremy and Clowance (still, that name!), she discovers that Ross is letting Ned Despard (Vincent Regan) and his lovely wife Kitty (Kerri McLean) stay in their cramped apartment. She also starts to discover that someone might be, I don’t know, spying on them. Ross has yet to tell Demelza that he’s become a spy, and when she finally brings it up later in the episode, Ross just apologizes for bringing her to the city.
However, the big revelation that hits Demelza in this episode is the overall concept of racism. Demelza is so charmed by Kitty Despard that it never occurs to her that she might be treated poorly by others on account of the color of her skin. However, when Ross decides they are all going to party at Vauxhall — “Tonight we promenade!” — it immediately becomes apparent that the upper crust of London are not ready for interracial romance. Demelza and Ross, and in turn, Caroline (Gabriella Wilde) and Dwight (Luke Norris), immediately realize that the aristocrats of London believe Kitty is Ned’s mistress. Not helping matters? Ned Despard is among enemies. You know, rich people. Hanson (Peter Sullivan), to be exact. The two men almost get into an altercation, but Ned holds back and leads Kitty home, to safety, away from the weasels.

However, the olds aren’t the only ones at Vauxhill. No, the youngs are, too. Hanson’s daughter Cecily (Lily Dodsworth-Evans) and Geoffrey Charles (Freddie Wise) are running around in masks like it’s Kenneth Branagh’s Much Ado About Nothing. In the heat of their flirtation, Cecily tells GC to introduce himself to her father and tell the old fogey off. In fact, she DARES him. GC’s all like, “VERY WELL,” because duh he’s Francis Poldark’s dumb-dumb son. Before GC can ruin everything, Uncle Ross steps in and saves the day. Believe it or not, but Ross Poldark is no longer a wild heathen with a short fuse. After five seasons he is finally a grown ass man. [sigh of relief]

But you know who is not so mature? Ned Despard. Every time Ross introduces Ned to someone who may be able to help his case, he freaks out.  Ned, it turns out, has a very short fuse. Like, the shortest we’ve ever seen on this show, and we once saw a man hug his wife to death for sleeping with hot Dr. Ennis. It comes out in a scene where Ross and Ned fence (you know, because this is Poldark and Aidan Turner’s got to something sexy). The scene shows how dangerous Ned is. He’s a better warrior than the famed Ross Poldark, but he’s paranoid, passionate, and overflowing with rage. If anything, it also gives us a glimpse at the man who molded Ross into the worst version of his younger self. I mean, woof, for bad father figures.

Elsewhere, Hanson is wooing the Warleggans and he brings up that part of his economic plan is SLAVE LABOR. George (Jack Farthing) can’t be bothered to be literally bothered by this because he is still hallucinating Elizabeth every now and then. His feeble grasp on reality is now so tenuous that Morwenna (Ellise Chappel) and Drake (Harry Richardson) discover that he’s told little, abandoned Valentine that he can find Elizabeth (Heida Reed) and bring her back. Even Uncle Meanface (Pip Torrens) has caught on that George is unwell. It’s not great.

While in London, Dwight gives an all-too-modern lecture on mental health as an illness. As he does so, we see the unwell George knights by none other than “Mad King” George. And then, a lawyer pipes up, and asks if a blow to the head can cause mental instability. When Dwight says yes, he’s immediately pressured into offering this defense on behalf of the guy (Andrew Gower) who tried to kill King George last week. Dwight succeeds in convincing the judge of this, making an enemy of the lawyers who wanted to execute the man. However, during this scene, when Dwight argues that real mental illness manifests more commonly as delusion, George’s uncle lets loose a truly delicious eye roll in his nephew’s direction.

This would all be fine for Ross, but he’s been working with Despard’s old secretary/treasurer/right hand dude Bannantine (Norman Bowman). They meet in secret, where Bannantine explains he can’t really exonerate Despard because spies. You know, the spies. The spies that are following them all around. The spies Ross is working for. The spies that will kill them if they step out of line? Nevertheless, Bannantine sends Ross a letter explaining that Despard isn’t a traitor, but basically a liberal, and the mean slave-owners in power (aka Hanson) ousted him as a ploy.

Ross gets a clever idea. Instead of taking the letter to the powers that be, he’s going to make a pamphlet out of it. You know pamphlets, right? They’re like Medium essays, but on paper. Ross only wants to send them to his inner MP circle, but the idiot left them with Demelza who is like, “Screw the soft launch. EVERYONE GETS AN AIR DROP OF THIS.” She, Kitty, and Caroline give them out like free samples at a BJs. Later, Ross’s spymaster explains that Enys’s little courtroom stunt have made Ross look like an enemy of the law, and Demelza’s actions have made Despard look like even more of a rebel because now loads of people are on his side and against the government’s. Ross seems to understand that stuff is dangerous, maybe most so for Ned and Bannantine.

Earlier, while Ross is handing out his own pamphlets, he runs into “Sir” George and pushes him on looking out for GC. When Ross invokes Elizabeth’s name, he’s able to push George to admit she is dead and George still blames them both for his wife’s demise. (So he’s not totally gone to mush.) But later, when Hanson and his uncle try to get him to sign a contract on the dotted line, George hears Elizabeth’s voice cautioning him against the deal. Soon he hallucinates her presence and it becomes clear that he needs some R&R home in Cornwall. His uncle tries to save face, but Hanson is undeterred.

Hanson is so undeterred that he is hanging out and plotting with a man with a mean-looking falcon. Falcon Man, as we’ll come to see, is the Cancer Man of Poldark. (I don’t blame the falcon for Falcon Man’s crimes, though. The Falcon is innocent.)

Ross returns home to the London flat to tell Demelza about his spymaster and how the spymaster wants them to save face by spying on Ned and Kitty. Since this is extremely icky, Ross decides it’s time to skip town and return to Cornwall. This fits in nicely with Demelza and Caroline’s plan to go home, and bring GC with them. (The idea is he can’t be close to Cecily.) However, Hanson wants to close the deal with George, so he, too, is going to Cornwall. Guess what? He’s bringing Cecily. Despard and Kitty are also coming to Cornwall. EVERYONE IS GOING TO BE IN CORNWALL.

And what’s been happening in Cornwall? Well, little Valentine is growing into an embittered, neglected child. Morwenna and Drake are considering boning. (Just considering!) And at Nampara, new maid Tess (Sofia Oxenham) is getting lofty ideas of seducing Ross. She even tries to see how Demelza’s dresses will look on her, but good old Garrick is on the case.

The episode ends with our heroes, their children, and their friends having fun on the beach. Meanwhile, there’s a corpse in the London water: Bannantine has been drowned, and it’s Falcon Man who seems to have done it.
Danger is afoot, my loves. Danger, and falcons.

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