There’s more than one reason why we should be glad Penelope didn’t marry Debling.
The Big Picture
-
Bridgerton
Season 3 creates a connection with
The Terror
Season 1 through Lord Debling’s interest in the Northwest Passage. - Lord Debling’s expedition plans mirror the doomed journey of the Franklin expedition, adding a dark twist to
Bridgerton
. - The horrors of the Arctic explored in
The Terror
season 1 align with the potential fate of Debling, foreshadowing a grim future for the character.
When we think about possible recommendations for Bridgerton fans who want to keep the buzz going after the end of a particularly steamy season, we usually go looking for romance shows or period dramas, perhaps both at the same time. Choices may vary from Pride and Prejudice to Downton Abbey to Shondaland’s own Still Star-Crossed. What most people won’t do is look at a teary-eyed Bridgerton fan sobbing because their favorite show has just wrapped its latest season and say, “Hey, you know what TV series would be perfect for you? American Horror Story.” Sure, interests may overlap, and there are indeed many Lady Whistledown (voiced by Julie Andrews) lovers out there who enjoy a good scare from time to time. Still, the connection between a Regency love story and a chilling horror tale isn’t obvious. That is, of course, until now. In its third season, Bridgerton has created a direct link between itself and one of the greatest, most aptly titled horror shows of the past few years: AMC’s The Terror.
A Reddit user was the first to point it out. The connection is built through a recently introduced character, Lord Alfred Debling (Sam Phillips), and one of his many interests: the Northwest Passage, connecting the North Atlantic and the North Pacific through the Arctic Circle. A doomed venture in the 19th century, in which the story of Bridgerton takes place, the search for this commercial route inspired author Dan Simmons to write The Terror in 2007, which in turn inspired David Kajganich to create the show of the same name in 2018. A second season, subtitled Infamy, followed in 2019, and there are talks of a third season, dubbed The Terror: Devil in Silver, set to come out in 2025. However, the only one that follows Simmons’ novel, a fictionalized account of what might have happened to one of the most infamous expeditions to the Northwest Passage, is Season 1.
Bridgerton
The eight close-knit siblings of the Bridgerton family look for love and happiness in London high society.
- Release Date
- December 25, 2020
- Creator
- Chris Van Dusen
- Cast
- Rege-Jean Page , Julie Andrews , Jonathan Bailey , Ruth Gemmell , Polly Walker , Golda Rosheuvel , Phoebe Dynevor , Simone Ashley , Luke Newton , Nicola Coughlan
- Main Genre
- Drama
- Seasons
- 3
- Studio
- Netflix
Who Is Lord Debling in ‘Bridgerton’ Season 3?
Now, to fully understand how Bridgerton connects to The Terror, one first has to understand Lord Debling. A wealthy, titled gentleman who takes an interest in Penelope Featherington (Nicola Coughlan), Debling is actually quite dreamy. Handsome, open-minded, understanding, and generally a nice chat, he’s deemed by the ton to be kind of weird due to his fascination with the environment and his insistence on a vegetarian diet. Still, these peculiarities are not enough to make him any less of a catch. Her heart still fixated on Colin Bridgerton (Luke Newton), Penelope falters a bit and nearly agrees to marry Debling when he asks her mother for her hand. In the end, though, Debling realizes that Penelope has feelings for another man and decides to break the whole thing off.
That is probably for the best, and not just for Penelope. You see, the problem with Debling is that he doesn’t really care that much about love. He doesn’t bring it to the table, and he’s not looking for a wife who is madly in love with him either. What he wants is a sensible union with a partner that has her own interests to fill up her life and that can keep his affairs in order as he travels around the world. As a matter of fact, he has a whole expedition planned that will keep him away from his budding family for a total of three years.
Said expedition, as Lord Debling tells Penelope in Episode 4, is not only to the North, but to the “fabled Northwest Passage.” Now, that is not a good omen. Let’s just say that if Lord Debling is planning on taking a trip to the Northwest Passage in 1824, the year in which Julia Quinn‘s Romancing Mister Bridgerton sets Colin and Penelope’s story, he’s most likely not coming back. Reddit users are also pointing out that the other lady Debling is seen courting in Bridgerton Season 3 is Cressida Cowper (Jessica Madsen), who is a widow in Quinn’s series of novels, which might be pointing to a tragic future for our dashing gentleman. From the looks of it, poor Penelope just narrowly escaped from becoming a very young widow.
The ‘Bridgerton’ Character You Didn’t Know Was Based on a Real Person
There’s more truth here than you may think.
What Is the Northwest Passage that Debling Is So Obsessed With?
But, wait, why are we being so pessimistic about Lord Debling’s trip? Why is everyone so certain that our guy is not coming back from this alive? Well, as you may have guessed by now, the “fabled Northwest Passage” is a very real route that explorers have spent centuries trying to cross. Consisting of a series of deep channels around what is now known as the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, the passage is surrounded by icebergs and other icy masses on both sides. Though the place has been the home of many indigenous populations, modern European ships have always had a hard time going through the region, and most sailors who traveled there were ill-prepared for the cold and the long periods of time they spent stuck.
The difficulties that came with finding this Northwest route sure went a long way when it came to making it famous among would-be explorers. According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, one of the men that helped popularize the passage in Europe’s imaginations, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, actually drowned trying to cross it in 1583. In the following centuries, many others would meet their fate in a similar way, drowning, starving, or freezing to death as they attempted to brave the low temperatures and the hard icy masses without paying any mind to the survival expertise of the locals. It was only in 1905 that the passage was crossed safely for the first time by an expedition led by Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen. The whole thing lasted a total of three years, from 1903 to 1906. Only in 1944 did someone manage to reach the other side of the Northwest Passage in a single season.
The Horrors of the Northwest Passage Were Covered in ‘The Terror’ Season 1
Before Amundsen, though, the most famous expedition to try to make its way to the Pacific through the Northwest Passage was the Franklin expedition. Now, how do you set sail on a ship called the HMS Terror and expect your journey to be anything less than terrifying is a mystery, but that is what John Franklin (Ciarán Hinds) and his men did back in 1845. In short, the Terror and the Erebus left England to be last seen by a whaler merely two months after the start of the trip. Following this event, no one knows exactly what happened, but starvation, scurvy, lead poisoning, botulism, and, well, cannibalism are suspected of having taken the lives of all of Franklin’s explorers.
In Dan Simmons’ novel and in the show that it inspired, there is also the presence of a mystical, bloodthirsty beast. The result is a series that is a treat both for those looking for some supernatural horror and for those that prefer a more historical approach. Though, to be fair, the supernatural doesn’t always feel like its necessary. Well written, beautifully directed, and incredibly acted, The Terror shines mostly for how it portrays the relationships between Franklin’s crew members. Jared Harris is particularly great as de facto protagonist Francis Crozier, but the entire cast is able to sell the madness, the panic, and the desperation taking over them as time passes with no sign of anything besides ice with extreme ease.
Desperate, panicked, and mad is exactly how the members of Franklin’s expedition must have felt during their time in the Arctic, doing God knows what to survive. It was only in the 1850s that the first traces of the expedition were found, and the first remains of the ships weren’t located until 2014. So, yeah, if Debling is really going on that Arctic expedition that he keeps blabbering about, his chances aren’t looking good. If we do the math, he only missed being aboard the Terror or the Erebus for about 20 years! Hey, if he comes back from his first trip, he still has time to catch them in the near future, right?
Bridgerton Season 3 Part 1 is available to stream on Netflix in the U.S.
This article was originally published on collider.com