Bridgerton Must Change Marina Thompson's Future To Avoid A Worse Crime

Marina Thompson's story is from the Bridgerton books, but in order to avoid an offensive stereotype, the Netflix series should fix her ending.

Bridgerton Must Change Marina Thompson's Future To Avoid A Worse Crime

Netflix’s Bridgerton series needs to rethink how Marina Thompson’s story ends and change her future to avoid a worse crime against the character. Bridgerton season 2 revealed that Marina Thompson (Ruby Barker) is now a mother to twins and married, somewhat unhappily, to Sir Phillip Crane (Chris Fulton). She was introduced in season 1 as a cousin who had come to stay with the Featheringtons during the social season. Marina doesn’t have nearly as big of a role in the books as she does in Netflix’s Bridgerton series. In Julia Quinn’s book To Sir Phillip, With Love, which focuses on Eloise Bridgerton and her love story, Marina is the deceased wife of Sir Phillip Crane and a distant cousin to the Bridgertons.

Marina has gone through quite a few negative events in her character arch on the Netflix series. The reason she was sent to live with the Featheringtons was partly so that she could be presented at court, but also because her father found out about her love affair with George Crane, which left her pregnant. After an ill-fated engagement to Colin Bridgerton, she then learns that George never abandoned her, but was instead killed in battle. This version of her story is already a deviation from the books. In Quinn’s original story, Marina was engaged to George, and when George died, she married his brother Phillip instead. Eloise is Phillip’s second wife after Marina dies of a fever eight years into their marriage. However, there’s no mention of an out-of-wedlock pregnancy or an engagement to Colin Bridgerton.

Marina deserves better character development and a better outcome to her story if Bridgerton wants to avoid turning her into an unfortunate stereotype. Bridgerton season 2 gives Eloise a new love interest in Theo Sharpe, which means that there is no real reason to kill Marina off just so that Eloise can play out the events of To Sir Phillip, With Love. Marina has already been given plot points that deviate from the books, and if Bridgerton intends to deviate from the books anyway, then the series should be mindful of what message it sends to have Marina’s story filled with tragedy. The current trajectory of her arc runs the risk of making her a tragic mulatto stereotype: generally, a mixed-race young woman who fails to fit in the Black or white world and dies tragically for trying to live above her station. It also runs the risk of making her story a sexist cautionary tale, suggesting that getting pregnant out of wedlock eventually leads to Marina Thompson’s downfall.

The artistic decision to not follow the books to the letter has served Bridgerton well. Diverse casting led to Regé-Jean Page as Simon Bassett and Simone Ashley as Kate Sharma. Likewise, creating Theo Sharpe to be a love interest for Eloise allows for a glimpse into Eloise’s world that otherwise might not have been a focus. That said, her budding romance with Theo Sharpe makes it clear that there’s no real reason for Marina to die. Narratively, Marina’s death would only take place to move Eloise’s love story forward.

It’s possible to argue that Marina’s apparent unhappiness in her marriage, though Phillip seems like a kind person, seems to foreshadow her impending death, clearing the way for Phillip to find happiness with Eloise Bridgerton. However, even that feels as if death is some kind of punishment for Marina, who in many ways does not fit the morality of the era and the apparent morality of the show. Likewise, Bridgerton has already set up a much more intriguing romance involving two people of different social classes with Eloise and Theo. Thus, a better direction for Bridgerton would be to develop a friendship between Marina and Eloise and to allow Marina the grace to discover happiness of her own, with or without Phillip.