'The Crown' Season 5 Series Review

In the final image of the Emmy award-winning fourth season of Netflix’s The Crown, we see the Royals taking a family photo together on Christmas Eve. All smiling, looking to put on a face for what they call “The System,” a code word used for the power and responsibility of the monarchy and the individual sitting atop of it. One face didn’t seem to fall in line with the others, Princess Diana. This disconnect, or rather divide, is at the forefront of the fifth season of the highly acclaimed series, as every relationship within this family is falling apart, with the Queen the only one left to assess the damage, and salvage the legacy she spent a lifetime building. This conflict serves well as with a new brilliant new cast of actors playing these figures we’ve come to understand, and more detailed, elegant screenplays written by showrunner Peter Morgan, The Crown continues to be the best show on television.

Covering the events of Queen Elizabeth II’s (Imelda Staunton) reign from 1991 to 1997, we start at a moment in time when the country is facing an internal decision following Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s time in office. The public opinion of the monarchy is at an all-time low, with the sense that the Queen is too old-fashioned for the modern ways in which the world is changing. The person leading the charge of these conversations is her son Prince Charles (Dominic West), who is silently building support for his role as future King while undermining the very seat his mother sits on currently. In doing this, his obsession for the crown becomes thunderous, but Charles has more problems than his mother to deal with. As we come to see, the main problem for Charles lies in the problems we last saw in season four once again boiling over into this season in the crumbling marriage he has with Diana (Elizabeth Debicki).

Sure the couple try early on to bring back the “old magic” from their honeymoon, a time when the country and the couple were the happiest, with endless possibilities. But it quickly dissolves, with the marriage at the biggest impasse yet, on a collision course for separation, leading to outright divorce. Debicki, who looks uncanny in her portrayal of the Princess of Wales, gives Diana the haunting layers of raw emotion, peeling back the glamor and finding comfort in the moments where this tragic young woman can find some inner peace by sharing her side of the events that led her to feel like a prisoner within her marriage. It is a marvelous performance that requires empathy and full attention, as we see Diana have to fight for what is hers, even if it means losing everything, including her sons. In a role she was destined to play, Debicki gives the best portrayal of Princess Diana in recent memory.

Her counterpart, Dominic West, is also one of the strongest aspects of this season, as much of the time is spent building up not only the division between Charles and Diana but the war of Britain’s future between himself and the Queen. Charles may be the voice for the future and be the beacon of light into the modern age as he says multiple times throughout the season, but his anger and arrogance continue to get in the way, and West’s portrayal of an older man searching for the affection and respect of everyone around him is magnificent and calculated. And as much as he doesn’t want to admit it, for as up to date as Charles may think of himself, he is still part of “the system” and, from what we know and history shows, will be for a long time, no matter how much he complains.

The rest of season five flies around our other main characters, with Prince Phillip (Jonathan Pryce) getting a chance to show his passion for adventure is still very much there as it was in the earlier seasons of the show. The same goes for Princess Margaret (Lesley Manville), whose episode involving an old love from her past (Timothy Dalton), proves that there is still tons of magic and material left to cover within these characters. Yet the running theme that they are presented with is the idea of time and what to do with it as they grow older and grey. For Phillip, it is hobbies and clubs with his friends, and for Margaret, it is love and passion for an afternoon cocktail. Nonetheless, when each start to look back on their time, not just on the events of the show, but what we don’t see, Pryce and Manville excel do to showing the miles on these humans that have been broken by the very system they hold dear yet sacrificed their happiness for.

In this, we find Elizabeth, whose own crossroads about the purpose of her legacy as the sovereign of England is questioned in almost every decision and line she makes throughout this season’s ten gloriously rich episodes. Staunton is terrific as the ruler trying to keep all the fractured pieces of her marriage, children, and country together, all the while arriving into the back half of her life. She is the system, and in knowing that, she reflects on the expectations she set for everyone, the requests she made, and has to answer for all of the previous season’s sins with absolute acceptance. In granting Margaret this fling, Phillip his questionable friendship, and the divorce of Charles and Diana, she is given peace to her family, even though she is conflicted and, ultimately, felt cold and isolated by these difficult decisions. By showing this, Staunton's performance and Morgan’s writing deliver as honest of a portrait of Queen Elizabeth as we’ve ever seen her.

Technically speaking, from the episode’s direction to production design to the costumes, recreating iconic looks of the Royale family, the show continues to be on top of its game. But if a compliment is to be shown on anything outside of the performances, it is yet again the writing of showrunner Peter Morgan, who weaves together a six-year time period so vital to the fabric of his show and history, it is astonishing for it to be told with these level of riveting engagement and entertainment. And even beyond his moments with the Royale family, he is able to get us to connect with new characters like Mohamed Al and Dodi Fayed (Salim Daw and Khalid Abdalla), whose importance to the future of this series is set up perfectly and sprinkled throughout the season so effortlessly. Moreover, Morgan is also able to flesh out Camilla Parker Bowles (Olivia Williams), a character underused in previous seasons but given vital and impactful moments throughout the closing chapters of season five to explain her side of the story during the divorce.

The Crown season five is not the damnation that many would want on the monarchy and not the takedown others think it is because of the recent passing of the Queen in real life. It is a season of reflection and acceptance in the face of real life obstacles one must face, regardless of stature in the world. In doing this, it continues to deliver riveting drama but its heart and mind are in the right place, being that it remains neutral on the subjects it is talking about and makes us the audience have to think whether they are good people or not. With this, its balance of fact and fiction remains fascinating and keeps up wanting more as the final episode of each season fades to black.

Grade: [A]