Attention, young ladies and eligible bachelors of the world: dust off your dancing skills and pay a visit to the modiste, for a new season of Bridgerton has just arrived at Netflix. Based on the series of novels of the same name by Julia Quinn, the hit show’s second season follows not just one, but two Bridgerton siblings as they make their way through the many balls and promenades of Regency London’s high society. But will Eloise (Claudia Jessie) and Lord Anthony (Jonathan Bailey) succeed in their season goals — respectively, to keep away from all potential suitors and to win over the diamond of the season? And what does Lady Whistledown (voiced by Julie Andrews) have to say about these matters?
“Capital R Rake” begins with all members of the Bridgerton family, Daphne (Phoebe Dynevor) included, waiting impatiently outside Eloise’s room as she dresses up to come out before Queen Charlotte (Golda Rosheuvel). Much more passionate about her intellectual pursuits than about finding herself a husband, the second Bridgerton daughter couldn’t be more relieved when her introduction to the court is interrupted by the arrival of the newest edition of Lady Whistledown’s Society Papers. After a long period of silence, even the Queen must stop everything to find out what the mysterious gossip writer has to say. And, for Lady Whistledown, there’s only one thing that matters: finding out who Her Majesty will single out as the diamond of the season.
As Eloise gleefully runs out of the Queen’s reception, there’s still one thing she doesn’t know: that her good friend Penelope Featherington (Nicola Coughlan) is the one hiding behind the Whistledown alias. While Eloise forges a full dance card with fake names like Lord Byron to keep potential suitors at a bay, Penelope uses her status as a wallflower to eavesdrop on conversations between ladies and servants alike, gathering juicy information to feed her secret project — a task that becomes harder and harder now that she has Eloise following her around, begging for company during the balls.
Still, Penelope persists, mainly because playing Lady Whistledown is the only good thing she has going on at the moment. With Colin Bridgerton (Luke Newton) traveling across Europe, there’s no one to make her heart beat faster, and things at the Featherington residence are less than ideal. After the death of Lord Featherington (Ben Miller) at the end of Season 1, Lady Portia (Polly Walker) and her daughters face financial difficulties as they await the arrival of the new lord, who is said to be a cruel and cheap old man who exiled his own son to the Americas. With nothing but uncertainty ahead of them, Lady Portia goes through the silverware looking for things to sell, and Philipa (Harriet Cains) fears for the status of her upcoming marriage to Mr. Finch (Lorn Macdonald) without any kind of dowry for her own family to offer.
The true protagonists of the season aren’t Eloise and the Featheringtons, however, but Anthony and Kate Sharma (Simone Ashley). Following the end of his affair with Siena (Sabrina Bartlett) in Season 1, the Viscount Bridgerton has decided to take a wife — except his list of demands can be very… well, demanding. A capital-R Rake, as Lady Whistledown so deftly puts it, Anthony isn’t interested in any of the young ladies of London. In a montage that shows him going from dates with aspiring brides to brothels to his office, we see him turn down woman after woman for a myriad of silly reasons. He even walks out on a girl fluent in French and Latin because she doesn’t speak Greek as well!
Things begin to change for Lord Anthony when he sees a young woman running through the country on horseback. He follows her, intrigued by her horse-riding skills, and manages to engage her in a somewhat contentious conversation. Sadly for him, the lady leaves without telling him her name. The audience, however, soon finds out who this mystery woman is: the stepdaughter of Lady Mary Sharma (Shelley Conn), a noblewoman who was the diamond of her season but threw it all away and fled to India with a common clerk. Alongside her stepmother, Kate has moved to London to arrange a suitable marriage not for herself, but for her younger sister, Edwina (Charithra Chandran). The trio enjoys the hospitality of Lady Danbury (Adjoa Andoh), who has lent them private chambers at Mayfair and is highly invested in aiding Edwina with finding a husband. She’s also on the lookout for someone that might interest Kate, an old maid of 26. Alas, the older Sharma girl is less than receptive to Lady Danbury’s intrusions in her love life.
Besides engaging in her usual matchmaking, Lady Danbury is also hosting the first ball of the season, as she does every year. During the event, she introduces Lady Sharma and her daughters to Queen Charlotte, but Her Majesty still holds a grudge against Mary for her sudden departure all those years ago. As a matter of fact, Lady Sharma's scandalous elopement is still the talk of the party, with ladies gathering to share their impressions on the new family's arrival while Lady Whistledown has yet to present them with something juicier. Only one thing can put an end to all this unsavory gossip: Lady Bridgerton (Ruth Gemmell) announcing loud and clear that her son, the viscount, is looking for a wife. Ambitious mamas and their daughters quickly swarm around Anthony as he and his mother enter the ballroom, shifting the attention away from the Sharmas (at least for now).
When he finally gets a breather, Anthony runs outside, where he finds a group of fellow titled men who thank him for drawing all the attention from the young ladies and their mothers. Much like the viscount, the three young men aren’t partial to the young ladies of society. They ask Anthony why he doesn’t just find any woman to "wed, bed, and bred," and he responds with his long list of things he considers indispensable in a wife and the future mother of his children. Unbeknownst to the men, Kate has been eavesdropping on their entire conversation. After Anthony’s friends leave, she tries to walk away without being noticed, but no such luck. Noticing the look of disgust on her face, Anthony asks Kate if she takes issue with his requirements for a wife. She responds by saying that her issue resides with any man who treats women as chattels and breeding stock before deftly insulting Anthony's horsemanship abilities and then running inside to get her sister and leave the ball.
While Kate is getting to know Lord Anthony's ugliest side, Edwina has been catching the eye of many suitors at Lady Danbury’s ball. However, there is a catch regarding the young girl’s marriage that she herself isn’t privy to. Upon receiving a letter from the Sheffields, Lady Mary’s parents, Lady Danbury confronts Kate about the Sharmas' real reason for coming to London. Since Mr. Sharma’s death, the family has been going through a tough time, but Lady Mary and Kate have always done everything in their power to keep Edwina ignorant of their difficulties. But as the young girl grew up, the need for a dowry in order to marry her began to weigh on the Sharmas’ heads, and they had to go to the Sheffields for money. They oh-so-kindly agreed to cover Edwina’s dowry, but with one condition: that she marries a nobleman. After revealing this truth to Lady Danbury, Kate asks her not to tell Edwina. She fears that her sister will marry the first nobleman she finds in order to get her family out of their predicament, and she wants Edwina to have a chance at true love.
On the heels of Lady Danbury, it’s time for Queen Charlotte to host her own ball. Feeling pressured by Lady Whistledown to name the season’s diamond, Her Majesty personally greets all the young ladies, including Eloise (whom she had already befriended in secret in Season 1) and Edwina. During the ball, Eloise once more has to sneak past the men trying to fill up her dance card and runs outside with Penelope. She vents about feeling judged solely by her looks instead of her mind and her interests. Penelope, in turn, confesses that there are certain benefits to being a wallflower, such as listening in on everyone’s conversations. For a second, it looks as though Eloise will uncover her friend’s secret, but, thankfully for Penelope, her mind goes in another direction.
Meanwhile, in the ballroom, Anthony takes out Edwina to dance, and Lady Danbury uses her wiles to convince the Queen to give the Sharmas a chance. While the viscount is charmed by his chat with the youngest Sharma, Lady Danbury recalls a conversation from early on in the episode in which Queen Charlotte said she wanted to shake things up this season. By the end of the ball, Her Majesty proclaims Edwina the new diamond, and Anthony is intent on marrying her. But Kate isn’t having it: as soon as she sees her sister dancing with Lord Bridgerton, she pulls her aside for a little chat.
Back at the Featherington residence, Lady Portia and her girls arrive from the Queen’s ball to find a pile of stuff in the middle of their entrance hall. It seems the new Lord Featherington has arrived, and he’s not as bad as rumors made him out to be. Or, rather, the man the rumors spoke of is now dead, and it’s his son that has come from the Americas to take over the Featherington estate. Instead of being old and cruel, Jack (Rupert Young) is young, dashing, and has already settled the matter of Philipa’s dowry. Apart from Lady Portia's annoyance with being kicked out of the master bedroom, it looks like lady luck is finally smiling upon the Featheringtons.
With the weight of poverty off her back, Penelope decides to use her powers to make some change, motivated by her earlier conversation with Eloise. "Capital R Rake" ends with the women of London reading a very peculiar issue of Lady Whistledown's Society Papers that questions the diamond tradition and posits that women should be valued for more than just their looks and frivolous skills. Eloise, of course, is ecstatic, but Queen Charlotte? Not so much. Unknowingly, Penelope has just made things for the current diamond of the season an awful lot harder.