The massacre of St. Bartholomew’s Day is a historical fact that The Serpent Queen could not escape and kept tapping its feet until finally delivering us a powerful, well-tied, acted, and bloody episode. Red Wedding? Ha! The Lannisters had to go back to Catherine de Medici’s school!

Samantha Morton is gigantic in the role that no one else could do what she did in these two seasons. The emotion of love eternally denied (whether from her husband or her children), the cunning Italian apparently even tried to do the right thing, but in response she was betrayed, humiliated, and (if it had been possible), discarded. One would think that at this point she would no longer be underestimated, but no one learns the lesson, not even Rahima, who fell in love with Catherine’s half-brother and chose to run away with him to America. Not during the Queen’s watch, she won’t.

The second season “lost” the humor of the first, saving the ironies for an iconic appearance by Minnie Driver as Elizabeth I. Otherwise, there was drama and plotting on all sides, with Catherine de Medici seemingly losing every battle.

In fact, no one has ever proven the Queen Mother’s participation in one of the most tragic and bloody events in all of history, but it is safe to assume that it probably had her approval. In fact, the main objective of the massacre was to eliminate the Huguenot Protestant leaders who were present in Paris for the wedding of Henry of Navarre and Margot, but the broader motivation included both political and religious factors. As The Serpent Queen shows from the beginning, France was deeply divided between Catholics and Protestants, and Catholic leaders feared the growing influence of the Huguenots.

The series takes several liberties to spice things up, but it maintains the factual coherence that Catherine had great influence over King Charles IX and believed that eliminating the Huguenot leaders could consolidate Catholic power and stabilize the kingdom. After all, she had already tried everything and was losing badly.

As we know Catherine’s life was extremely difficult and above all she was a survivor, neither time nor the Crown have tamed her ability to recalibrate her plans and change her strategy in mid-flight. She “knows” that her children will die, she knows that a snake is among her closest ones, so if the future of the Valois is compromised, she will live in the present in command of everything.

The Serpent Queen kept true details: Margot’s animosity towards her mother, the incestuous relationship between her brothers, the competition between them, and the political machinations. Somehow the narrative was not kind to the homosexuals Guise and Anjou, turning them into cold-blooded killers under the guise of fear of being exposed and not accepted. Their lovers are killed, their mothers and brothers humiliate them, and they practically become monsters. Nobody beats Catherine, however.

Throughout the series, this could be the conclusion of the series – whose third season has not yet been announced – and if so, it ended well. Catherine defeats ALL her enemies in one fell swoop. She manages to force Margot into marriage with Henry, she uses Anjou so that he can get revenge and do her dirty work for her, she leaves the Guises’ name linked to the massacre and puts an end to the Protestants. She kills the brother who left her for Elizabeth I, her lover, Montmercy, who protected Edith, and so on. One by one, they fell without mercy.

So, if this really is the end of The Serpent Queen, it is worth mentioning its quality. Its first cousin, The Great, has been increasingly committed to the absurd while maintaining high-quality dialogue, performances, and production. Here, however, sarcasm has never left the narrative, keeping us hooked, delighted, and surprised. Everything is absolutely impeccable: the soundtrack, which kept the songs of women closing the episodes; the award-winning costumes, but even more so, the masterful participation of the entire cast.

And remembering that our antagonist and protagonist has always spoken directly to us, it is worth remembering that she warned us that she would make us see what she did and why she did it, inviting us to ask ourselves if we would do it differently. My answer is no, we wouldn’t. Maybe we would be even more cruel? There is no immunity to the poison of wit and The Serpent Queen is a feast for it. If she doesn’t return, she will be missed.

Edited: Sadly, it was confirmed in October 2024 that the series was canceled.

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