The Crown

If the writing on The Crown Season 6 Part 1 falls a bit short where it counts the most, the cast at least delivers the goods. Imelda Staunton is still the most ineffectual Queen Elizabeth II the show’s produced, but she’s no longer in the spotlight, so it’s fine. Instead, The Crown Season 6 Part 1 belongs to Princess Diana and Elizabeth Debicki.

They aren’t awful — if nothing else, Elizabeth Debicki‘s take on Diana is so excellent it’s a pleasure to see her get such a full, and tall, spotlight — but the third and fourth episodes especially represented my least favorite stretch of The Crown to date.

It's not a misfire, it's just not an overwhelming success either. But what it has given us is an emotionally tender goodbye to Debicki's Diana – and her performance is for the ages.

Interesting choices are almost completely absent in the first part of season six, with the exception of two different photographers serving as a framing device for episode two (not coincidentally the standout). In the brief moments that attention isn’t on Diana, we’re rehashing the same old stuff.

In hindsight, the previous installment may have been even more of a herald for where the series would end up by its finale. Although there's still the last half of Season 6 left to weigh in on, it's more than safe to declare that The Crown has lost much of what initially made it shine.

Blame it on the subject matter, or perhaps merely the difference between more recent events and decades-old ones, but The Crown has saved the worst for last, following its disjointed fifth season with a sixth that feels more tabloid-y and less stately.

Granted, with only half the season to work with, Season Six of “The Crown” is more assured than the season prior, if only by fits and starts. It helps that this first stretch holds a singular focus on Diana in her last days.

The Crown limits Elizabeth Debicki to a carefully outlined, inoffensive portrait. As they pass the children between each other, she and Dominic West invest a rueful, grown-up sadness into a failed relationship, but separately they tend to fall into predictable choices.

There was perhaps no way to gracefully cover this part of the story, not even in the earlier days when Morgan was able to view the whole complicated picture from 30,000 feet up. But now that he’s emotionally embedded himself so deeply into this world, it feels like an impossible task, and one where The Crown, like its queen, is not entirely sure how to address.

Yes, the audience knows it’s coming, but with each ominous reference and blatant tease, it becomes harder and harder to believe her final days were anything like this. Forgetting verisimilitude, it also makes for vapid drama. “The Crown” is so preoccupied with one of the Royal family’s most infamous tragedies, it does little to develop anyone else.

The Crown, similarly, has taught the world what it meant to be British, in the 20th century. But it has also run out of road – run out of history to retread – and, on its last legs, has less to say than ever, about what it means to be British now.

It’s hard to escape the suspicion that the writer has real contempt for this family. The sixth series is at its best when it moves away from the royals themselves.