Bleak House (BBC miniseries 2005) in Spoilers

I watched Bleak House on Netflix while I was supposed to be studying for my neuro final because it was so damn good.

Main Cast: Esther: Anna Maxwell Martin

Ada: Carey Mulligan

Richard: Some dude

Mr. Jarndyce: NoLips

Lady Dedlock: Scully from the X-Files

Sir Dedlock: Eyebrows

Dr. Woodcourt: Cutiepie McJowls

Mr. Guppy: Frog Mouth

Mr. Tulkinghorn: Daddy Lannister

Captain George: Mutton Chops

Hortense: French Lady

Jo: Dirtface O'Streetrat

Mr. Smallwood: Yellow Teeth

So Bleak House is based on the Charles Dickens novel of the same name. You know it's a Dickensian story because there are roughly 2000 characters and they're all important. The main themes of the story are: secrets, death. The miniseries is in 8 1-hr parts on Netflix.

A little backdrop. We are in England, and it's post medieval times but pre-antibiotics. In London there is a case called Jarndyce vs. Jarndyce, over a will dispute, that has gone on for years and years, with nothing getting done. Why does nothing get done? It's because while in court, they don't do anything but waste time, not to mention that there are multiple wills. Ada and Richard are cousins, "The Wards in Jarndyce," so basically some Jarndyce relatives who are orphaned. They are adopted by John Jarndyce, owner of Bleak House, who is rich without waiting for his inheritance. Mr. Jarndyce also adopts Esther, our heroine, to be a companion for Ada (because it'd be improper for her to live alone with two unmarried men, no matter how seemingly related they are). Esther is brought to meet up with everybody by Mr. Guppy, who works for the Jarndyces' lawyer. Everyone becomes BFFs immediately.

Before they leave for Bleak House, they spend the night at the Jellyby house. Mrs. Jellyby has about 50 children, but she's obsessed with her charity in Africa. Caddy, the eldest daughter, goes into Esther's room and just puts her mom on blast, complaining about her horribly. She apparently will complain to anyone who will listen. But Esther is really nice, so they become friends.

Once at Bleak House, they all get settled, and Esther is given the housekeeping keys. I thought this was pretty insulting, but Esther was flattered with the amount of trust that she was shown, and besides she doesn't really do any cleaning, just supervises the workers. The wards meet Mr. Skimpole, Mr. Jarndyce's friend and houseguest. Mr. Skimpole can be best described as a walking, talking, giant piece of shit. On the first night there he is going to be arrested for debt and he asks Richard and Esther to give him some money to bail him out. They do, and Mr. Jarndyce pays them back. But from then on, Esther doesn't like Mr. Skimpole.

Meanwhile back in London, we see who lives in Mr. Krook's house. Mr. Krook is a fat drunk who has a beautiful cat named Lady Jane. He collects letters, but he can't read. Ms. Flite, an old maid who has a billion pet birds with stupid names lives there. She's out of her mind, but magically wise. She says her birds will be set free on The Day of Judgment. His other tenant is Mr. Nemo. Mr. Nemo works for Mr. Snagsby (who is basically FedexKinkos) by writing copies of official law documents. He's an opium addict, and we see him meeting some Chinese guy (they got the good shit) and giving some money to Jo, a street urchin.

Sir & Lady Dedlock live at Chesney Wold, and they have some land disputes with their neighbor Mr. Boythorn. But who cares. One day, Mr. Tulkinghorn, a lawyer, comes to meet with them about some stuff. He dropped a paper and the (much younger than her husband) Lady Dedlock recognizes the writing--it's Nemo's writing. She's asks Tulkinghorn, "Who copied this?" And he's like, "I don't know, but I can find out," and she's like, "Okay, whatever, you're sooo interested in it."

Tulkinghorn goes back to London to investigate the copier. He eventually figures out that Nemo did the copying, so he goes to Krook's house to meet him and finds him, dead. Krook comes up and goes through his stuff (because these people had no respect) and steals a bunch of his letters. Tulkinghorn calls in Dr. Woodcourt, who says that Nemo probably died from an overdose, but he thinks he was probably a great man earlier in his life. Tulkinghorn is like, "Yeah right." He asks some more people about Nemo, like Mr. Snagsby and Jo.

He shares his findings with the Dedlocks, and even though Lady Dedlock is freaking out on the inside, she says she doesn't care anymore. However, she soon dresses up like her maid Hortense and finds Jo. She pays Jo a lot of money to tell her about Nemo, where he lived and where he is buried. Back at the lady’s house, there is a new maid, Mary, whom the housekeeper Mrs. Rouncewell is training as a new Lady’s maid.

Mr. Jarndyce, Esther, Ada, and Richard all go to visit Mr. Boythorn. They go for a walk and get caught in the rain, and since the Boythorns and the Dedlocks basically have the same yard, they meet Lady Dedlock. In one of the most awkward deals ever, Lady Dedlock makes Mary her new maid and fires Hortense. Hortense cannot believe the bitch just did that. Meanwhile Ada and Clare just look on like “o.O.”

Meanwhile back at Bleak House there’s some romance going on. Mr. Guppy comes to visit Esther. At first she’s like, “Who?” but then she remembers he’s the guy who took her to the lawyers’ to meet everyone. He fell in love with her that day, so he asks her to marry him. Esther is justifiably bewildered and she very gently turns him down. But there’s more. Ada and Richard have fallen in love with each other. They ask Mr. Jarndyce permission to get engaged, but he says “Er… no, not right now. You should get a job first, Richard.” So Richard’s like, “FIIIIIIIIINE, I guess I’ll be a doctor or whatever.” He totally gets a nice set up to work under a prominent doctor in London, who is played by Harry Potter’s mean muggle uncle. Dr. Woodcourt is the doctor’s other protégé. They all go to have dinner with them, and Esther and Dr. Woodcourt get to talking and it’s obvious they have the hots for each other.

Richard trains to be a doctor for about five minutes and says “I think the law’s my boy now. I’m going to be a lawyer, that way I can work on our inheritance case!” Mr. Jarndyce says, “Ok, but you have to be sure. By the way, please don’t obsess over that stagnant case, it’ll ruin you just like it ruined my uncle.” But Richard just says, “Yeah yeah, I get it whatever.” Five minutes later, Richard decides he wants to be a soldier, so he enlists, and gets some training by Captain George, an old soldier.

The guy who was trying to arrest Skimpole earlier dies, and the wards go down to London to find his kids living alone. The eldest daughter Charley (who is about 11) is working by washing clothes to take care of them. Mr. Jarndyce “gives” the girl to Esther as a maid, and she reluctantly accepts. One day they are in London again, touring the ghettos, and they meet Jo, who is very sick. They figure he’s going to die there so they take him back to Bleak House so he will be better taken care of. But he runs away in the night and Esther ends up catching his sickness. Oh no she gets smallpox! Esther almost died, but Charley is her nurse and she recovers, but she still has lots of scars all over her face, but no one really cares, they’re just happy she’s still alive. Mr. Jarndyce soon proposes to her, and she agrees even though she was thinking of him as a father figure and she’s in love with Dr. Woodcourt, because she’s so grateful to him for taking her in.

Back to the Dedlocks. Lady Dedlock is approached by Mr. Guppy, who found out she was interested in Mr. Nemo and is going to work on trying to get his letters from Mr. Krook. He also tells Esther that he might be able to figure out who she is. Some other way, she finds out that Esther’s last name used to be Hawdon, and that she was brought up by a Ms. Barbary (or something). When they’re all visiting Mr. Boythorn again, they take another walk and run into the lady. Lady Dedlock tells Esther, “I’m your mother but you have to keep it a secret and we can’t ever meet again.” She thought Esther had died soon after she was born. Esther is her daughter out of wedlock, with her old sweetheart Captain James Hawdon.

Esther and Ada go into London for some reason. Along the way, Esther goes to visit Mr. Guppy. Remember, she got scarred up by her smallpox so as soon as she lifts her veil, he goes, “I DON’T WANT TO MARRY YOU ANYMORE!” Esther’s like, “I don’t care! I just came to tell you that I no longer need help with my origin story!”

Dr. Woodcourt is a really nice guy, but you can’t make money if none of your patients can pay you. So he joins the navy as a doctor. Esther and Ada go to some town where a boat is about to land and they stay in an inn. Later that night, the boat comes in and everyone is congratulating Dr. Woodcourt, because he was a hero and saved a lot of people. He and Esther have a nice awkward conversation that goes something like this. “Hi.” “Hi.” “I heard you’re a navy hero, that’s cool.” “Yeah but I’m still poor.” “Oh that’s all right.” “So… I’m glad you didn’t die from smallpox.” “Thanks.” Ada’s all like “oooh, you like himmmm.” Because of course she does.

Can we go back to Tulkinghorn the evil man? He was interested in Lady Dedlock’s reaction to the handwriting, so he does a bunch of investigating, talking to Jo, Mr. Snagsby, Captain George, etc. Tulkinghorn works with Mr. Smallweed, who owns some property and so he basically holds debts over everyone’s heads. He figures out that Nemo was really James Hawdon and who he was to the Lady. He goes to Chesney Wold and threatens her, “Now you have to do what I say or else your secret will get out and you’ll bring shame to everyone.” Mr. Krook dies (of spontaneous combustion) and since Mr. Smallweed owned his house he gets it and everything in it. He finds the letters. The girls go to visit Caddy, because she’s married and has a baby now, but they’re both sick. Her stupid father-in-law has called a quack to take care of her and the baby, and when Esther gets there he’s talking about how his snake oil will cure them. She kicks him out and calls Dr. Woodcourt. Dr. Woodcourt heals them both, making Esther’s ovaries explode. But, Dr. Woodcourt is still poor as shit, so he lets Mr. Jarndyce get him a job at a hospital in North England.

Someone kills Mr. Tulkinghorn. There are two main suspects. The first is Captain George, who went to see him last night (with a gun!). He had a motive because he gave up his friend James Hawdon’s letters so Tulkinghorn would cancel his debt, and then Tulkinghorn went ahead and did not do that at all. Also, Tulkinghorn’s caused a couple people to die, and Cpt. George is a nice guy who doesn't take to kindly to that sort of thing. The other is Lady Dedlock, who also “went for a walk” that night. We know her motive, it’s that Tulkinghorn knows her secret, but no one else does. The maid Hortense, who was also used by Tulkinghorn, pins the murder on Lady Dedlock because she’s still salty about being fired, but they figure out she did it.

Richard visits and the girls thinks he’s looking a bit skinny. He has also hired a new lawyer, who was recommended by Mr. Skimpole so you know he’s no good. He can’t afford to pay both the lawyer and for his uniform in the army, so he drops out of the army and goes to live in a studio apartment in London. Mr. Skimpole and the lawyer are just stringing him along, because nothing’s going on in the Jarndyce case, and even though Richard’s getting sick, he still goes to the court every day, where nothing happens. By the way, Richard coughed about 3 episodes ago, so you knew he was going to die. Later on, we find out that Ada and Richard got married in secret, and Ada starts living with him in his little flat, and soon they’re expecting a child. Esther is kind of sad that Ada didn't tell her, but Ada goes, “Well this is payback, because you didn't tell me that you were engaged to Mr. Jarndyce, and you didn't tell me that Lady Dedlock was your mother,” or something like that.

Mr. Smallweed still has the letters, despite efforts by Mr. Guppy to buy them. Guppy tells Lady Dedlock that he couldn’t get them and that Mr. Smallweed has them. The Lady rushes to tell the butler not to let anyone named Mr. Smallweed in, but she’s too late, because he’s already there trying to get Sir Dedlock to buy the letters. Now that her secret’s out, Lady Dedlock runs away. She eventually ends up going to the graveyard where Nemo was buried, and dies in the rain there. Everyone is sad, especially Esther and Sir Dedlock.

To wrap up, a bunch of things happen at once. Mr. Smallweed goes back to Krook’s house to go through all the letters, and he finds a Jarndyce Will. The constable comes in right when he finds it, so he tries to hide it but the constable sees and goes, “What’ve you got there?” And Smallweed goes, “Nothing! None of your business! It’s mine!” And the policeman just says, “Hand it over,” and Smallweed goes, “Nuh-uh!” and the policeman goes, “Give it!” When he sees that it’s Jarndyce’s will, he takes it to the court. In court that day, they all decide that that was the latest valid will, and that Ada and Richard are entitled to get the inheritance. Everyone is happy for about two minutes, but then the judge declares that all the Jarndyce money has been used up in the gabillion-year-long case’s court fees, so there’s no money left. Richard passes out. They get him back to the flat, and he’s like, “Oh well, at least it’s over. Now we can get on with our lives!” And he promptly dies. It’s the Day of Judgment, so Ms. Flite releases all her birds. I have to believe they all died too, because how long have they been in captivity relying on her for food? They don’t know how to get worms and stuff. Our bird was lost for four days and we found her but she was so hungry at the doctor’s office.

Mr. Guppy meets Esther again and since her smallpox scars are pretty much all cleared up, he asks her to marry him again. He’s such a prize, but Esther turns him down. Neither Mr. Guppy nor his mother can believe it. Dr. Woodcourt also asks Esther to marry him, now that he has a job in the North Country, but she has to turn him down because she’s engaged to Mr. Jarndyce. Nooo!!! But then, Mr. Jarndyce takes Esther and Ada up to Yorkshire, and he shows her a small house that is also called “Bleak House.” He tells Esther, “Ok, you’re going to live here, because this is Dr. Woodcourt’s house and I know you guys want to get married.” Esther is shocked and she protests, “But I already said I’d marry you! I don’t want to leave you all alone—“ And Mr. Jarndyce confesses that he adopted Esther with the express purpose of marrying her. Which is creepy, but it’s not as bad as in “The Tale of Genji” so there’s something.

At the end, Esther and Woodcourt get married, and everyone is having a fine time. Esther sees Mr. Skimpole at the wedding and is about to throw her out, but Woodcourt is like, “Relax” and they kiss and dance and everyone is happy, except for the ones who are dead.