The Royals
E! | Release Date: March 15, 2015
CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
48
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 21 Critic Reviews
Positive:
6
Mixed:
8
Negative:
7
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
83
Boston HeraldMark A. PerigardMar 12, 2015
Season 1 Review: The Royals wouldn’t be watchable at all except for Queen Helena, played to the hilt by Elizabeth Hurley. Read full review
80
The WrapDiane GordonMar 13, 2015
Season 1 Review: With The Royals, E! has a juicy soap opera that’s addictive, naughty and just the right amount of silly. Read full review
70
The Daily BeastKevin FallonMar 13, 2015
Season 1 Review: Once you commit yourself to the trashy abandon of The Royals, the one critique of the show might be that the abandon isn’t reckless or campy enough. Read full review
67
Entertainment WeeklyClark CollisNov 9, 2015
Season 2 Review: Elizabeth Hurley and Joan Collins seem to be having fun, and there is a thrill to be gleaned from a show so at ease with its daftness. [13 Nov 2015, p.57]
67
Entertainment WeeklyJeff JensenMar 6, 2015
Season 1 Review: If anything, you'll wish The Royals were trashier. [13 Mar 2015, p.67]
63
New York PostRobert RorkeMar 10, 2015
Season 1 Review: The Royals wants to shock but can’t, since the world it describes is something we know all too well from tabloid headlines about the real British royals. These characters are bored by their own jaded lives--and so are we. Read full review
60
VarietyBrian LowryNov 11, 2015
Season 2 Review: The Royals doesn’t ascend very high on the rung of cable dramas. But to its credit, the show isn’t entirely predictable, and even at its most ridiculous, it’s almost never boring. Read full review
60
Pittsburgh Post-GazetteRob OwenMar 13, 2015
Season 1 Review: The Royals is pretty much the entertainingly trashy prime-time soap you’d expect. Read full review
60
New York Daily NewsDavid HinckleyMar 12, 2015
Season 1 Review: The Royals doesn’t pretend to be much more than good fun, and it delivers that. Read full review
50
Philadelphia Daily NewsEllen GrayMar 13, 2015
Season 1 Review: A silly but potentially addictive soap. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleDavid WiegandMar 12, 2015
Season 1 Review: The Royals is entertaining but disappointingly toothless. Read full review
42
NewsdayVerne GayMar 12, 2015
Season 1 Review: The trash meter soars when [Elizabeth Hurley's] on-screen, then sags when she's off. And there's just too much sag here. Read full review
40
Boston GlobeMatthew GilbertMar 12, 2015
Season 1 Review: The Royals might have been more promising if it had been a little more ebullient and a lot more outrageous. There’s something too ordinary about it. We want to be bloody gobsmacked, mate. Read full review
40
The New York TimesAlessandra StanleyMar 12, 2015
Season 1 Review: It should be a hoot, but it actually gets old, and dull, very quickly. Read full review
30
Los Angeles TimesMary McNamaraMar 16, 2015
Season 1 Review: Camp requires courage, and The Royals has none. Read full review
30
The Hollywood ReporterAmy AmatangeloMar 13, 2015
Season 1 Review: The hourlong drama often plays like an extended MTV music video interspersed with dialogue. Read full review
30
New York Magazine (Vulture)Margaret LyonsMar 13, 2015
Season 1 Review: Royals is absent any thrill, any of that ticklish delight that makes shows like this pop. Read full review
30
TimeJames PoniewozikMar 13, 2015
Season 1 Review: A wan, chintzy soap that can’t compete with reality–either Britain’s or E!’s. Read full review
30
Wall Street JournalNancy DeWolf SmithMar 12, 2015
Season 1 Review: The Royals is a trashy soap opera that’s not bad enough to be funny and is best when it wallows in melodrama. Read full review
30
VarietyBrian LowryMar 11, 2015
Season 1 Review: Mostly, though, the fluctuations in tone are jarring, from wacky and screwball to earnest and warmhearted at the drop of a tiara. And while subsequent episodes keep spinning out new conflicts and crises, there’s going to have to be some generous grading on a curve to make this qualify as the guilty pleasure it’s clearly intended to become. Read full review
25
Newark Star-LedgerVicki HymanMar 16, 2015
Season 1 Review: While The Royals swings wildly from satire to sentimentality, from romance to raunch, and from camp to, well, crap, and only in the latter does it find its footing. Read full review
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