The mark of a great television show — a truly great one — is when it becomes difficult to remember a time before it even existed. Such is the case with Tony McNamara's The Great, which follows the "Almost Entirely Untrue Story" of Catherine the Great (Elle Fanning) and her tempestuous marriage to Peter III (Nicholas Hoult). Even as this series has had its ups and downs throughout its previous seasons to date, it has come to be known for a bevy of enjoyable traits: unabashed irreverence, absurd humor, and delicious crassness that clashes with its beautiful and impressive production and costume design. (Anyone even slightly familiar with McNamara's other historical drama on the big screen, The Favorite, knows what to anticipate from his writing in that regard.) While the upcoming third season (of which all episodes were provided for review) continues to lean into everything the show has built a reputation on — and then some — it also proves that The Great is capable of growing and maturing in new ways. Season 3 might be the series' darkest yet, but it's also the show reaching for more narrative depth to successful returns.
The story picks up largely in the aftermath of Season 2's ending, which saw Catherine — finally having reached her breaking point with Peter's continuing attempts to undermine her rule, not to mention having something of a hand in the death of her mother (Gillian Anderson) — entering her husband's chambers and proceeding to stab him in the back multiple times. Or did she? In the aftermath, it becomes clear that the unexpected target of Catherine's brewing fury had been none other than Peter's body double Pugachev (also Hoult), and though her husband's doppelganger stumbles off to live another day (but more on that later), there's now a big conundrum hanging over Catherine and Peter's marriage. How do you stick with someone you know actively tried to assassinate you?
Well, in typical The Great fashion, that answer lies in the form of some 18th-century marriage counseling, but for the most part, Peter seems... largely okay with the fact that his wife, up until recently, had murder on her mind. In fact, he steps even more into the role of stay-at-home dad this season, complete with toting their son Paul around in the historical version of a fur-lined baby bjorn. There are still points of contention, however, between the seemingly content couple, and in spite of Peter's insistence that he is fine with Catherine running the country, his tendencies to assert his own opinion at unwanted moments lead to echoing clashes between them.
Heavy is the head that wears the crown, and Catherine may be in store for the most difficult year of her reign yet. After rounding up all of Peter's most vocal supporters at the end of Season 2 — including a wayward Marial (Phoebe Fox), who continues to try and look out for number one most of all — the Empress now has a decision to make. Should she assert herself as a ruthless ruler by executing everyone at court who has been plotting against her, or is the answer a more diplomatic strategy?
The answer may not surprise you, but the dynamics that result from Catherine needing to regroup and reassess who her biggest allies truly are lead to some intriguing shifts in power over the course of the season. Namely, Georgina (Charity Wakefield), who famously has been one of Catherine's biggest detractors, seems to have developed a change of attitude during her time away from court, and now takes steps to angle herself as one of the Empress's closest advisors. It's a move that also puts her in close conflict with Marial, and some of the season's most humorous moments result from the two women physically battling each other in the background to see who can make it to Catherine's side first.
Georgina and Marial's conflict partly stems from their unique personal connection — Marial's affair with Grigor (Gwilym Lee) is still going strong, in spite of her being trapped in a marriage to her child cousin Maxim (Henry Meredith). However, Grigor couldn't be more distracted by the threats to his own deepest friendship that could shove him out of Peter's favor. Now that King Hugo (Freddie Fox) and Queen Agnes (Grace Molony) have arrived in court after fleeing a recent, more successful attempt to overthrow their reign in Sweden, Hugo has set his sights on becoming Peter's new BFF, much to Grigor's chagrin. While the season's tangled interpersonal relationships often succeed at being more compelling than the politics, what proves more interesting is how frequently the two spheres overlap — especially for Catherine, who finds her position both at court and across Russia as a whole more tenuous than ever before. The voices of dissent are becoming louder and louder, and those she could have once relied on to provide backup — like Orlo (Sacha Dhawan), are starting to pull their support. When an unexpected death rocks the court even further, it is a bombshell event that throws all of these characters into chaos, but it also makes the show better for how its cast goes through the emotional wringer and back again.
Chief among them is Fanning, who is somehow giving us more of herself than she ever has in the role before. In previous seasons, Catherine always maintained a certain level of optimism and forward-thinking despite the many forces conspiring against her — her own husband often among them. By Season 3, with tensions building within the palace and beyond, it's never been more obvious that the veneer of confidence and self-assuredness that she has carefully worked to construct around herself in public is starting to show its cracks, and the loss she sustains effectively shatters it even further. McNamara's skewering scripts lead Fanning's Catherine into some particularly heavy places — there's a moment when she bursts into tears, albeit with a mouthful of food, that captures the series at its simultaneously most hysterical and heartbreaking. Yet it's also proof that The Great, for all its black comedy and twisted sensibilities, is still capable of claiming new and exhilarating territory in its storytelling.
Fanning is far from the only cast member who is given the emotional runway to explore the intricacies of their character even further, and a lot of it happens in the wake of that devastating loss that sends Catherine's court into a tailspin. Aunt Elizabeth (Belinda Bromilow, who has always been one of my personal favorites on the show) continues to be her somewhat eccentric self, but with a sinister undercurrent throughout. Sure, she's initially barging into private bedchambers solely to see if she can catch Catherine and Peter in the act of conceiving another heir, but when the chips are down, she remains just as canny and ruthless at preserving the status quo no matter what manipulations are required. Hoult has double duty once again this season, embracing Peter's emotional complexities about being shoved into a subordinate position as well as the grimy coarseness of his body double, who somehow survived his multiple stab wounds at the end of Season 2. It's actually Pugachev who could prove the biggest threat to Catherine's reign, as his ability to impersonate Peter starts to extend in notoriety beyond the nobility. Who better to whip the serfs up into a frenzy than the man who bears a startling resemblance to the beloved former Emperor?
What ultimately makes The Great's latest season so, well... great is how it manages to feel like the natural next evolution for the series as a whole, with shake-ups that are bold and potentially thrilling for what lies ahead. There could be some growing pains with a possible fourth season, but what The Great has going for it is what it always has — staggeringly good performances, constantly evolving relationships, and characters who end up in wildly surprising places. At this point in the story, does it really matter whether The Great is occasionally true or not when what the show is willing to be the most excitingly revisionist about is itself?
Rating: A
The Great Season 3 premieres May 12, exclusively on Hulu.