Caution: This post contains SPOILERS from The Count of Monte Cristo.
It’s not easy to start off an adaptation of an iconic piece of fiction. The Count of Monte Cristo is one of the best revenge stories ever told, and it also has a mixture of romance and adventure thrown into it as well. This is a story of heartbreak, confusion, jealousy, and vengeance, and The Count of Monte Cristo series premiere makes all of that clear.
It wastes no time in getting into the details of the story, but it also doesn’t rush things. We pick up straight away with Edmund’s return to Marseilles, where he has already made enemies. The first is that of his love’s cousin, and the second is that of the man on the ship who believed he should be the man in charge after the captain’s death.
Sure, that man probably should have been, but there was something in Edmund that the captain saw. It’s a story as old as time, and many people don’t like to be overlooked for a job they believe is rightfully theirs. While we get to see that in Danglers, we also get to see that he realizes that maybe taking revenge in the way that he’s planning isn’t right.
Photographer: Paolo Modugno
It’s Hard Not to Feel for Edmund on The Count of Monte Cristo
Like in the novel, it’s hard not to feel for Edmund. He has no idea what is going on in his life. All this young man wants is to marry and enjoy his life ahead of him, but that can’t happen with so much going on behind the scenes.
We get to see everything that’s happening, but I think I would have preferred to have just seen it from Edmund’s point of view at first. Maybe later we could have learned who exactly accused him of being a spy and why.
We’re taken through the emotions with Edmund, and Sam Claflin does an excellent job of pulling each one from the depths of his soul. He captures the confusion and the relief as it looks like he’ll be let go. As everything else develops, there’s more confusion, fear, and despair. This is a man who is innocent, and he just doesn’t understand what’s happening.
He doesn’t even realize that he has enemies, because he’s so young and carefree.
A Lot of Build-Up in the First Episode
The story is only just getting started in this first episode, and this is something to point out. With 10 episodes, there is time to tell the entire novel, and we need this slower start to really feel for Edmund. He is the main character after all, and we will get his revenge story as the episodes come.
For some, this could feel too slow. However, it brings us depth and understanding.
While some adaptations could have opted to bring us Edmund in prison right away and then give us the backstory later, The Count of Monte Cristo has opted to tell the story in a linear fashion, and I appreciate that. It’s an older-school form of storytelling, and it works so well for this setting.
As I said, the only thing that I could have done with being kept hidden is who turned him in. Sure, we know it form the novel, but it would be fun to work through the puzzle pieces with Edmund, as he realizes why he is being imprisoned, the nature of the letter, and who his enemies are.
The ending of the episode left me intrigued, though. How do the people who once thought of him highly react? Will they believe that he is a spy, as the authorities tell them, or could they spend their time trying to prove his innocence and finding out the truth? It creates a need to watch more of the episodes — not that the production quality doesn’t already do that — and that’s a plus for the series.
The Count of Monte Cristo airs on Sundays at 10/9c on PBS.
