I’m so excited about The gilded age Season 4, which I just can’t stop talking about it since the Season 3 final that I’m still not over. Big changes are on the horizon of Bertha (Carrie Coon) with George (Morgan Spector), who potentially leaves her for good, while Gladys (Taissa Farmiga) is pregnant after getting married to the Duke of Buckingham.
So far, we have been focused on what the recent past means for Bertha’s future. After George’s short dance with death, he admits he no longer knows if he is in love with his wife who is dramatically leaving before she has a chance to gather her thoughts. Together with Gladys’ pregnancy, she has essentially brought her dream, old money life without a soul in the world to share if with.
But what if the ongoing old money versus new money -fight is the wrong thing to focus on? Two separate rivals are on the field to support the fire between Bertha and the life she wants, but I think it is life that it accidentally can land that needs the most attention (spoiler: it involves feminism).
Carrie Coon believes Bertha could have a ‘feminist awakening’ in the gilded age season 4 and I agree
In a speech with the deadline, COON explained: “One of the things that happens as Bertha and Gladys come together at the end of the season is [Bertha]’S will have to reflect back on what she has done, even if it is successful, it is not without complication. It was not free of cost.
“The kind of beginning feminist awakening would be a really interesting persecution for her, whether or not marriage lasts. […] I think she’s not far down this exploration to understand exactly what happened. We catch her in the middle of trying to treat that moment. “
Inadvertently, I think she has hit the nail upside down here. Previous seasons of the HBO Max show have proud not to be similar to the last, and seeing Bertha sliding into full sister suffragette -mode would be such a sharp subtle way to create change and personal redemption.
In terms of time, we are also in order. Women’s voting rights in the United States took hold at the end of the 19th and early 20th century with the demand for such a collected interest as early as the 1840s. The first official movements came together in 1869 and we are only a few years out of there.
With the magic at TV, The gilded age Season 4 could easily return with a time jump, or maybe Bertha hills himself in the grassroots beginning of women’s voting rights to get away from his own problems.
Personally, I think the narrative switch would not only make us, but those around her more empathetic to the life she really lives (yes, everyone except Christine Baranskis Agnes). Bertha has never been perfect, but she is not a door mat either, and that makes her a perfect Emmeline Pankhurst type. Take the man down and also take down the patriarchy.
I think that Bertha will go the way of Winnifred Banks in Mary Poppins? No. But Season 4 will have to move with Times after the Season 3 final almost sewn up every existing narrative thread, and what better way to do it than with a place of forward-thinking progress?
