MY LADY JANE – A Review by John Strange
Amazon Prime’s original offerings ran to gamut from family-friendly to more mature fare. My Lady Jane is very much a mature audience offering. The word I keep coming back to is… bawdy. We are presented with things you don’t want your kids watching. Unless it’s time for “the talk” and maybe not even then.
The premise as put forth in the trailer is that the writers have done a “what if” with the life of Lady Jane Grey (Emily Bader), one of Henry VIII’s ill-fated wives. Instead of being married off to her cousin the king, she survives his reign and is married off to a different nobleman, Lord Guildford Dudley (Edward Bluemel).
Doesn’t sound all that exciting, does it? Okay, now add in that this England has normal folks and ones who can change into an animal. You know, magic.
Add in the normal back-stabbing politics that generally ran throughout the English court. And high-ranking individuals who tell the population that anyone that can shape-shift are evil and not worthy of living with the rest of the good godly folks.
This particular piece of illogic has shaped laws that create a dilemma for Jane. One of those laws is about to bite her in the backside. She has to save herself and then save the kingdom from those who want to take control by any means possible.
I saw the first two episodes at the screening. The humor is reminiscent, in a small way, of the show “Galavant” without the singing but with a lot of sex and sexual innuendos (as I said, not for the kiddos).
I enjoyed watching the episodes though I did feel a bit guilty about it. I suspect that the show will do very well on Prime and do very well for Prime’s viewer numbers. The quality of the show is good though the humor, at least in the first episodes was a bit heavy-handed, perhaps to firmly seat the era’s mores firmly in our minds. I give it a 4.5-star rating.
Directors: Jamie Babbit, Stefan Schwartz
Cast: Emily Bader, Edward Bluemel, Jordan Peters, Anna Chancellor, Dominic Cooper, Kate O’Flynn, Rob Brydon, Abbie Hern, Isabella Brownson, Robyn Betteridge, Henry Ashton, Máiréad Tyers, Michael Workeye, Joe Klocek, Brandon Grace, Will Keen
MPAA Rating: TV-MA
Selig Rating: 4.5 Stars
Runtime: 8 Episodes.
Release Date: 06/27/2024
Release Location: Amazon Prime
Language: English
Genre: TV Series – Adventure, Comedy, Drama
Trailer: MY LADY JANE Official Trailer
The Selig Rating Scale:
5 Stars – Excellent movie/show, well worth the time and price.
4 Stars – Good movie/show
3 Stars – OK movie/show
2 Stars – Well, there was nothing else…
1 Star – Total waste of time.
