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"I think Sarah deserves praise for what she has done for Mary Tudor. She has transformed the image of Mary from a disgusting old religous fanatic into a beautiful young woman who suffered horribly throughout her life. Yet still found it in her heart to love the daughter of her enemy and her baby brother who has taken her place as heir. Sarah and the writers should be appluaded. Now whenever I think of Mary I dont see that woman from Elizabeth(1998). There is very little mentions of Mary's future religous beliefs. You see how horrible her life was and why she seemed so irrational when it came to Catholicism and Phillip when she became queen. "

People keep saying how Jonathan Rhys Meyers deserves an award for his acting abilities on the Tudors, when i find Sarah Bolger is far more deserving of that honour! I couldn't see myself watching Season 4 if someone else was to take the role, because thanks to Sarah one of histories most villified monarchs is finally being seen as the Princess she was, rather than the Queen she became! I recently purchased Linda Porter's book on Mary Tudor, and am enjoying it immensely, she uses a very interesting quote to describe Mary, an woman who loved well, but not wisely, and it is so accurate!

No offense to the actress who played Mary in Elizabeth (1998), and the woman really did frighten me, i actually had nightmares consisting of her. But i always thought, and don't attack me for this, that her exterior represented the acts that were commited during Mary's reign, the ugliness of the Marian Persecutions...

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"I don't know what you've read, but young Mary certainly wasn't all that "weaker-willed' than her mother--she had just as much mettle and pride and determination, which I thought Sarah pulled off beautifully. I agree though that there have been far too few portrayals of Mary in her youth, which is why I have been so excited to see her included on the show as both a child and a teen--usually no one ever shows her going to live in Eliz's household, etc, which is a shame.

Of course it'd be even more perfect if they could cast someone with the right hair color, but since pretty much EVERYONE (from Catherine to Henry to Elizabeth) has the wrong hair color on the show, it's not too much of a surprise....:p In any case, well done Bolger! I can't wait to see more of you next season...."

If you look again at my sentence I was describing Alison Frazer's Mary and not making a sweeping generalization of the historical Mary Tudor. In Frazer's portrayl Mary is shown as weeker willed than Katherine of Aragon in that it showcases Mary's submission to her father's demands, which her mother had NEVER done and preferred to die in exile than submit. The episode even shows a saddened Mary praying to God and her mother for forgiveness and regretting she could not have held out longer.
This is historically accuarate, Mary did submit to her father in a letter which can be read on this webpage: http://englishhistory.net/tudor/primary1.html . When I said "weeker willed" it wasn't by any means meant as a put-down of Mary. If anything I've always thought the submission showed a very human side of Mary. The letter was written a month after Anne Boleyn's execution, and although Mary would be regretful of ever acknowleging herself as a bastard, Mary probably reasoned that with her mother's adversary gone and a new, Catholic Queen consort, she was surely hopefull that her life would improve in exchange for her submission. In regards to her submission Mary didn't have the same courage as her mother, who is still remembered as the Queen who defied one of the most powerful absolutist monarchs ever till the very end of her life.

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