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Monarch of the Glen | Meta: Why the S2 Archie/Katrina storyline is so frustrating to watch
It can be summed up in this gifset:
But why say it with pictures when you can say it with 5,000 words instead? :D
I keep coming back to the end of S2 for the wonderful angst onboard my ship, but it keeps making me crazy, because it doesn’t feel entirely fair. I like UST as much as the next person, and love the emotional complexity that exists between Archie and Lexie, but it’s the third leg of the triangle that is wholly frustrating to watch.
Don’t get me wrong – I don’t hate Katrina because she “gets in the way” of my ship. I actually don’t hate her at all. It’s just entirely too frustrating to watch her relationship with Archie, such as it is, play out over the second series because of her behavior. She keeps expecting Archie to be something he isn’t: forthright; grandly romantic; a mind reader, actually.
And when he doesn’t live up to her expectations, she gets all angry and upset without actually talking to him. That makes me crazy – the Big Misunderstanding that drags on way too fucking long is the bane of my existence as a romance writer.
Let’s break it down by episode, shall we?
Episode 1 – Justine is attempting to rule the roost at Glenbogle, but all she’s doing is isolating everyone. She is an outright bitch to anyone and everyone she feels is a threat to her relationship with Archie – not just Katrina and Lexie, but to Hector and Molly as well. Archie’s parents move out of the Big House in protest, which only serves to upset him even more. It all finally comes to a head after Justine and Lexie have a screaming match in the kitchen, with Lexie threatening to leave because of differences with “Mrs. Laird.” Due to the comedic subplot of this episode, Justine and Archie’s fallout and breakup is caught live on the webcams they’ve set up around the estate (that Hector and Duncan have moved into the house so Hector can keep an eye on things) and seen by everyone.
Katrina tells Archie that they’re “not just friends – you know it, I know it, and Justine knows it.” With the obvious implication that there is something romantic brewing between them, and that Justine is trying to push her away because of it (to which Justine freely admits later, during her breakup with Archie). After Justine leaves, Archie turns to Katrina for advice and support, which she offers freely. He tells her about his idea to hire another staff member, a Head Ranger, to help with the tourist business.
Episode 2 – Archie asks Katrina to come to the interviews for Head Ranger in order to help outvote his father and make sure they get someone decent into the position. She asks him over to her cottage and offers to make dinner for him, ostensibly so that they can discuss their battle plan for the interviews. Both of them know what’s really going on, though: it is a totally a date – or maybe a pseudo-date, testing the waters now that Justine’s out of the picture. Lexie warns Archie that Katrina’s cooking is atrocious, and this is borne out when he tries to compliment her cooking and she tells him flat-out that she knows she’s a terrible cook. She tells him to be straight with her, and they have some flirtatious banter. They have a moment, when she comes round to refill his wine glass, and as she’s leaning down to kiss him, he tells her to stop, because she’s also pouring the wine into his lap.
Yeah. Awkward.
So he goes in and cleans up, and when he returns, she apologizes, telling him that she knows it’s “too soon,” like she’s all angry that he isn’t ready to jump her right then and there. When he agrees, saying that it wouldn’t be fair to Justine or to her, she snaps back at him that she can take care of herself. They part company.
The next day is interview day, and among the candidates is a dashing outdoorsman named Fergal McClure, whom Katrina runs across while he’s skinny-dipping in one of the rivers on the estate. They hit it off right away, and when it’s time to interview, they begin flirting very obviously with each other. She, of course, lobbies to hire him, and Archie eventually agrees, even though he knows full well that he’s bringing in a romantic rival – they were that obvious during the interview.
Fergal immediately starts trying to woo Katrina once he’s told he has the position on the estate, and she is quite open to his advances. Understandably so, if she’s champing at the bit for a romance and Archie is still a wreck from his breakup with Justine.
Episode 3 – Archie turns to Katrina to help him land a grant from the Highland Council for the estate. They run into a major problem, however, in the form of Edith Rankin, the Council Chair. Rankin had been in love with Hector when they were younger, and took his return to Glenbogle after four years in the army with Molly on his arm as a personal affront, which she never forgave him for. She carries her grudge with a vengeance, denying Archie’s grant on principle alone – after Hector’s rejection, she’d vowed to never give the MacDonalds a dime.
Archie forces Katrina to stand up to Edith and the rest of the council, telling her that they are all cronies until someone breaks the deadlock and wrests the power away from Rankin. They manage to orchestrate a brilliant comeback and secure the grant for the estate. At the celebratory party at the Big House, Archie thanks Katrina profusely for her help, and tells her that he owes her everything, to which she demurs, saying lightly that she was only helping out “one of her constituents.” Archie asks her if that’s all he is to her, and she can’t respond, but she does avert her eyes. When he confronts her directly about her feelings for him (well, as directly as he can manage), she backs down and doesn’t respond.
Fergal interrupts them, giving Katrina her coat, and she tells Archie that Fergal is taking her out to dinner and then waits to see how he reacts – almost like she’s daring him to say something or make a scene. He doesn’t, though, and why should he? She’s made such a point of telling him how wonderful Fergal is, so he smiles at them and wishes them the best as they leave.
Episode 4 – Its Archie’s 30th birthday, and Hector is determined to marry him off, so he places an ad in a magazine advertising for a wife, without Archie’s knowledge. Archie, meanwhile, is coming to grips with the fact that he’s turning 30, and basically with where he is in life. When he finds out about Hector’s meddling – and the real reason for it, that Hector wants a grandchild to carry on the family line – he has an absolute comeapart. Meanwhile, an errant old tenant has smuggled onto the grounds, and stages a protest when he’s discovered, demanding that his cottage be given back to him.
Meanwhile, Fergal and Katrina are growing closer, and Katrina suggests that her schoolkids come test out the hiking trails on the estate that Fergal has been working on. Archie witnesses them having a moment together in the village, and he kinda casually asks Fergal about what’s going on with them. Fergal’s all enthusiastic, of course, and rather oblivious to Archie’s questions, but does reveal that he’s basically still wooing her.
Katrina’s bank made a mistake with her direct deposit for her rent, so she comes up to the house to give Archie a check. He apologizes for the “threatening letter” that’s sent out whenever the rents comes into arrears, and says that it goes out to all the tenants. Katrina takes issue with that, asking him if that’s what he thinks of her as, just a tenant. (Ugh. She’s called him just a constituent, so where does she have room to get all affronted when he basically says the same thing??)
She then proceeds to needle him about Fergal, talking about what a great guy he is, and how he really understands people – with the implication that Archie is the opposite. When Archie again posts a (semi)direct question, “…you included?” in response, she throws back that whatever is going on between her and Fergal is her business, not his.
When the tenant comes round and locks himself in the middle of a building that’s being restored, she gets up on her high horse about tenants’ rights – again, mostly to needle Archie. She knows he is very sensitive about being the laird, and wanting to do right by his estate and the community, so when Katrina basically joins the protest against him, it’s too much. They snipe at each other.
Katrina is annoyed that he’s not actually thrown out all of the lovely young ladies who’ve shown up to marry him, basically sight unseen. There’s one still hanging around named Tanya – and she was charged with keeping Archie occupied while Molly and Lexie set up his surprise birthday party on the beach. Katrina doesn’t know this, of course, but she gets all jealous and upset anyway. Apparently she can throw Fergal around and try to make Archie jealous, but he has no right to show any interest in another woman, after she basically keeps rejecting him to his face every time they meet? UGH.
Archie manages to sort out the tenant, which impresses everyone – even Katrina has to concede that he pulled it out of the hat again, managing to make everyone happy with his decision.
Tanya asks Archie point blank what the story is with him and Katrina, and teases him that he’s obviously nuts about her, given the passionate yet annoyed way he reacts to being asked about her.
When Katrina confronts Archie at his party about whether or not he’s actually considering an arranged marriage to Tanya, she’s appalled that he admits that he thinks Tanya is “all right.” She blusters a bit more, and he coolly reminds her that “what happens between me and Tanya is my business.” (Heh. I love that he has the audacity to throw her words back in her face – it also shows that he’s been paying attention and is getting very frustrated with her being so evasive about her feelings for him.)
Katrina goes off with Fergal as the party winds down, and they have a heavy petting session on the beach, while Archie continues to celebrate in private, with his family.
Episode 5 – Archie is attempting to set up a tableau in the house in order to win a grant from the Heritage Council to help with the tourist business. After Duncan’s snafu with the fireplace – in which he covers everything with soot – Archie seeks out Katrina for a bit of solace.
She’s upset with him (as usual), and complains that he never goes to see her unless he needs something. Gee, I wonder why? Could it be because she’s flaunting her blossoming romance with Fergal in his face, and denying that she has any sort of romantic feelings for him, even though their “relationship” was a major factor in his breakup with Justine?
She tells Archie that his tableau is a stupid idea and that nobody cares about how the other half lived in Victorian times, because nothing has changed. She dares him to set up a rustic tableau instead, a scene of the life of a Victorian peasant, and he takes her up on her challenge, even though he only has 36 hours to complete it before the Heritage Council is coming round to see it. They continue to bicker, rather heatedly in fact, albeit for two very different reasons: (1) Fergal has come around with a bouquet of flowers for Katrina, and (2) Archie feels like Katrina is withdrawing her support from him and his ideas of how to run the estate and generate some profit to counteract the debt they’re mired in. When Fergal asks what’s going on, Katrina snits that “the laird is just here on council business, but we’re done, right?” to which Archie replies (in a very disgusted voice) that they are very definitely done – meaning, of course, that he’s finished with attempting to meet her halfway and hold their friendship together, much less build anything more.
Everyone else senses trouble, of course. Archie and Golly go out in search of a croft to make over for the tableau, and Archie asks him if he thinks that Archie is a dinosaur and a feudal tyrant and stuck in the past, blah blah blah – the insults that Katrina tends to hurl at him when she’s trying to get to his weak spot about being the laird. She’s constantly going on and on about how they need to rid themselves of the ruling class, and it does get a bit annoying even when she’s not trying to wield it as a weapon to bash him over the head.
Golly guesses what it’s all about, and also guesses that Archie isn’t quite as done with Katrina as he thinks he is. He recognizes Archie’s growing jealousy over Katrina’s relationship with Fergal, but Archie insists that he’d love nothing better than for the two of them to get together and basically leave him alone. He even bets Golly that he can get them together by the end of the week. Golly agrees to the bet, assuring Archie that he’ll lose. He walks away from the croft, telling Archie that he doesn’t need a ghillie, he needs a shrink (ha!).
Archie ropes Fergal and Duncan into helping him with the project instead, and Fergal takes the opportunity to ask Archie to help him get Katrina. It’s just the opening Archie was looking for. He suggests that Fergal plant a tree in front of Katrina’s cottage – which he does, and is met with great success. Katrina comes round the next day to thank Fergal in person at the croft, and of course Archie is there to witness it all. He can’t hide his jealousy, but he does swallow it pretty well, and tells Katrina that he thinks Fergal is a great match for her and basically encourages them to continue with their romance.
Later that evening, Katrina visits the croft to apologize to Archie for blowing up at him. She tells him the story of the crumbling building, how it used to belong to Kilfetter, the village matchmaker, who died of a broken heart after setting up the girl he loved with another man. The whole scene and story is meant to reflect what is going on between Archie and Katrina, in that:
• They were childhood sweethearts who had a falling out
• Years later, the girl’s father commissioned Kilfetter to match her with a rich husband from Glasgow
• He agreed, because he thought the girl no longer loved him, and he wanted her to be happy no matter what
• The girl’s husband left her and she died penniless, but only after writing to Kilfetter and telling him that he’d broken her heart all those years ago by abandoning her
So, obviously, Archie is the reluctant matchmaker, pushing the girl he loves (Katrina) into a relationship with another man because of a misunderstanding about their feelings for each other, and putting them all at risk of ending up lonely, bitter, and broken-hearted.
This is what gets me: if she realizes what he’s doing in pushing her and Fergal together, why doesn’t she say something? Why does she keep trying to hint around and get him to say something? For all that she spouts feminist, modernist political positions, she’s awful damn content to be coy about being in love with him, and basically sustains the misery of the UST that resonates between them.
Fergal finally clues in to all of this, and confronts first Archie, and then Katrina about it. He accuses them of being lovers, and using him in some sort of weird charade/lover’s spat, and he doesn’t appreciate it. They both deny it, of course, and insist that they’ve only ever been friends, but each lets something slip that just taints the situation – Archie admits that he and Katrina spent the night together when their car broke down in the middle of nowhere (neglecting to mention the fact that they thought they were brother-and-sister at the time, and were on a quest to prove it – Episode 1x4), and Katrina spills the beans about the dinner and almost-kiss from Episode 2, but Fergal is basically done with them both.
Which upsets Katrina, because she’s just lost her boyfriend, and she believes it’s because Archie told him a pack of lies.
So let me get this straight…she’s angry that Fergal, the man she’s basically using to make Archie jealous, left her because of something Archie said to him?! And she has the audacity to complain to Fergal that she’s tired of people “not being honest” with each other, and “not saying what they feel”?! She, of all people, who brings the definition of reticent to an entirely new level?! ARGH!!
So the next day she arrives at the croft because she’s one of the two delegates from the Heritage Council coming to see the finished tableau. She snipes at Archie for driving Fergal away while the other delegate is inside, and basically snipes at him again while complimenting him on the tableau, telling him how “cunning” it is, and how it (meaning he) “had completely fooled her.”
Archie wins the grant, and Katrina delivers it to the house, giving the check to Molly and Hector so that she can avoid seeing Archie. She sees him anyway, and gives him a tortured look, and of course he goes after her, making it all the way outside and just in time to witness Fergal arriving, apologizing to Katrina, and making up with her right there in the front drive.
Turns out Golly was right, even though Archie was the one collecting the money on the bet:
This episode drives me absolutely nuts, because they are basically talking to each other in code the entire time. If they would just be plainspoken with each other, they could easily sort things out and save themselves a lot of misery. It’s obvious to one and all that they are (supposedly) crazy about each other – but no, Katrina seems content to play hard to get and then gets all angry when Archie doesn’t chase after her.
Episode 6 – Fergal and Katrina are officially an item, and the entire village knows that he’s been staying with her at her cottage, thanks to the gossipy postman. Archie is painfully aware that she has chosen Fergal instead of him, and makes an attempt to get on with his life, and with his plans for the estate.
Katrina receives notice that the Glenbogle community school is being closed down, which means she’s out of a job. She runs immediately to the Big House, summoning Hector because he sits on the school board. She tells Archie what happened, and he agrees to help her with her campaign to keep the school open. They all attend the meeting, and Archie realizes that he knows the guy from the Board of Education because they went to school together. He agrees to work on the BoE lackey while Katrina gets the word out about their campaign.
Fergal has disappeared, meanwhile, upsetting Katrina because she feels abandoned in her hour of need. (Oh really? Even though she has Archie behind her 100% with this effort?) When he resurfaces, he tells her that he’s been offered a job in New Zealand – and he asks her to go with him.
Meanwhile, Archie comes through and saves the community school, because he has some delicious dirt on the BoE guy. The school will stay open, but with only half the number of students, and only one teacher – meaning that either Katrina or her deputy, Maureen, will lose her job.
Katrina can’t decide whether to stay in Glenbogle, or whether to go with Fergal to New Zealand. She asks around for advice, and it’s Golly who tells her to talk to Archie before she makes up her mind for sure. She goes off in search of him, only to find him kissing Lexie in the kitchen, and she huffs away without a word, convinced that Archie has moved on, right into the willing arms of Lexie, which means that he no longer has feelings for her.
Which, of course, couldn’t be farther from the truth.
But she doesn’t actually TALK TO HIM, she literally just leaves and goes home and burns every picture of him that she can find (ugh, so melodramatic!) and decides that since Archie so obviously doesn’t want her, she’ll go with the man who does.
Fergal turns in his notice to Archie, who is surprised by the news of the NZ job; he’s downright shocked when Katrina announces that she’s going with Fergal to the other side of the world. He actually has to leave the room, because he didn’t see that one coming at all.
Katrina stops to talk with Lexie, telling her to “take care of Archie” for her (again, seriously?! You can’t even take care of him when he’s there for the taking!!), and Lexie tells her that the kiss wasn’t as damning as Katrina had assumed. Lexie admits that she’s interested in him, but acknowledges that he still has feelings for Katrina and that she wasn’t even going to go there, especially not to end up as his rebound.
Katrina is all shocked and wonders if she’s just made the worst decision of her life.
Episode 7 – Archie’s sister Lizzie arrives unexpectedly, and is due to have a baby at any moment. Lizzie and Katrina are friends (because of course), so when Lizzie learns that Katrina is planning to leave, she has to know what’s going on. Archie gives Fergal and Katrina a proper send off in the form of a big, formal dinner party at the Big House, and thanks them both for their work. He and Katrina actually manage to have a somber, drama-free farewell, even though they are both all haunted about it: Archie, because he thinks he’s lost her for good, and Katrina, because she knows she’s making a huge mistake but has way too much pride to admit it.
Lizzie confronts both Archie and Katrina about their feelings for each other, and upon learning that Archie is devastated that Katrina is leaving, but concedes that he’d already lost her, is determined to clear the air before Katrina can fly the coop the next day. She goes down to Katrina’s cottage as the latter is packing up and asks her, point blank, why she’s going. Katrina tells her it’s because Fergal loves her and shows that to her on a regular basis, whereas Archie doesn’t. She scoffs when Lizzie tells her that Archie is crazy about her, saying that “he’s had months to say something” to her about it, and to stop her from making pretty much every decision she’s made, but that he hasn’t.
I want to reach through the screen at this point and throttle Katrina. I just can’t with the way she’s behaving. She’s known Archie since they were kids, so she knows what he’s like. She watched him while he was with Justine, and she watched him break up with Justine live on the webcams in Episode 1.
Yet somehow, she expected him to be different with her? And she’s angry that he isn’t acting out of character, when she has given him no indication that she has romantic feelings for him, except when she’s sniping at him?! She outright denies it every time he asks her directly, so what is he supposed to think?
And she’s angry that he hasn’t stopped her from getting together with Fergal, or from leaving Glenbogle with him? WHY?! She knows that Archie always tries to do what he thinks is best for everyone except himself. If he thinks Katrina is in love with Fergal and happy with him (because what reason would he have to think otherwise?!), then of course he’s not going to stand in her way!
The gall of this woman, I swear. Maybe it’s stubbornness, maybe it’s pride, maybe it’s outright stupidity. Whatever it is, it’s frustrating as hell to watch unfold, and actually makes me angry. Katrina needs to take responsibility for her actions, all of them. She did it to herself. She pushed Archie away; she shouldn’t be surprised that he gave up his pursuit.
Lizzie will not be deterred, however, and conspires to bring them together one last time by making Katrina and Archie the godparents of her baby. She goes into labor in Katrina’s back garden, so Katrina rushes her back to the house, and they all have a moment after the baby is born. It’s a really great scene, actually, the culmination of all the relevant subplots. Katrina and Archie share a moment with the baby under Lizzie’s watchful eye, but even then, neither one of them say anything to the other.
Fergal arrives at the house to get Katrina and take her to the train.
Archie lets her go, and she goes.
Lizzie, Molly, and Hector have to practically push him into action, and he runs off after the taxi, intent on catching up with them at the train station and actually making the grand romantic gesture Katrina has been angling for all season long, to tell her that he loves her and wants her to stay.
He doesn’t catch them, of course, and comes back to the house looking even more miserable than ever. The next day, he goes down to Katrina’s cottage to retrieve the keys (since, technically, it is his property) and finds Fergal there. Fergal tells him that Katrina left him in Edinburgh, and that she’s nowhere to be found. He’s upset, of course, but realizes that Katrina’s feelings for him weren’t the same as his feelings for her. He tells Archie that, if she loves him, she’ll follow him to NZ.
Which is when it finally occurs to Archie that following her is what Katrina has been wanting him to do all along, though she never bothered to say it. Too bad it’s too late now…
Episode 8 – Archie is hosting a reunion of the Clan MacDonald and staging the Highland Games as he prepares to formally take over the lairdship and leadership of the clan from Hector. An American cousin swoops in and claims that he is the real laird, and suddenly Archie finds himself fighting for something he only reluctantly took on a year before.
In the meanwhile, Katrina has returned to the glen. Archie goes down to see her, albeit after receiving a somewhat deceptive word of advice from Lexie: she tells him that Katrina is fragile and needs her space, not to be immediately engulfed in another romance when she just left a different one in tatters.
Archie gives Katrina space during their meeting, and Katrina gets very upset about it. She thinks he’s arrived to make a grand romantic gesture (like what, confess his love for her? After all the grief she’s put him through?!), and she is very obviously waiting for it this time – but when it doesn’t come, she basically tells him to fuck off. She goes up to the Big House the next day to turn in her notice that she’s leaving the cottage.
That spurs him into action. He asks her to come round for a drink so they can discuss things, to which she readily agrees. He gets all caught up in the chieftain’s challenge, however, and completely forgets about Katrina and Lexie, who thinks that maybe their kiss in Episode 6 did mean something after all. Lexie is very catty to Katrina when she arrives, and she drives her away, making her think that maybe what Archie wanted to tell her was that he’d found someone else – someone more reliable – to spend his time with.
Lexie, of course, confronts Archie about her feelings for him the next morning in the infamous bathtub scene. When he tells her that he’s still hung up on Katrina, she handles the whole thing with a lot of dignity, and actually works to get them together. She fools Archie into confessing his feelings for Katrina over the loudspeaker at the clan gathering, and then literally pushes Katrina into his arms right after that.
Archie wins the chieftain’s challenge, assumes his role as leader of the Clan MacDonald, and finally gives Katrina the grand gesture she wants. He invites her up on stage in front of every member of his clan and finally kisses her for the very first time. She actually goads him afterwards, asking if that’s the best he can do, so of course he kisses her again and everyone cheers.
So, in the end, she actually gets what she wants without having to expend any risk of rejection herself. It rather makes me sick, and I say that as the Queen of Angsty Romance, which thrives on characters denying themselves their heart’s desire. I just can’t stand it when a character can’t actually take responsibility for their actions and/or choices, instead blaming everyone else for their misery, and who basically spend the entire time whining and complaining when the object of their affections is oblivious – or resentful – of them.
Give me Justine’s outright bitchiness any damn day of the week. At least then you know what you’re dealing with.
But why say it with pictures when you can say it with 5,000 words instead? :D
I keep coming back to the end of S2 for the wonderful angst onboard my ship, but it keeps making me crazy, because it doesn’t feel entirely fair. I like UST as much as the next person, and love the emotional complexity that exists between Archie and Lexie, but it’s the third leg of the triangle that is wholly frustrating to watch.
Don’t get me wrong – I don’t hate Katrina because she “gets in the way” of my ship. I actually don’t hate her at all. It’s just entirely too frustrating to watch her relationship with Archie, such as it is, play out over the second series because of her behavior. She keeps expecting Archie to be something he isn’t: forthright; grandly romantic; a mind reader, actually.
And when he doesn’t live up to her expectations, she gets all angry and upset without actually talking to him. That makes me crazy – the Big Misunderstanding that drags on way too fucking long is the bane of my existence as a romance writer.
Let’s break it down by episode, shall we?
Episode 1 – Justine is attempting to rule the roost at Glenbogle, but all she’s doing is isolating everyone. She is an outright bitch to anyone and everyone she feels is a threat to her relationship with Archie – not just Katrina and Lexie, but to Hector and Molly as well. Archie’s parents move out of the Big House in protest, which only serves to upset him even more. It all finally comes to a head after Justine and Lexie have a screaming match in the kitchen, with Lexie threatening to leave because of differences with “Mrs. Laird.” Due to the comedic subplot of this episode, Justine and Archie’s fallout and breakup is caught live on the webcams they’ve set up around the estate (that Hector and Duncan have moved into the house so Hector can keep an eye on things) and seen by everyone.
Katrina tells Archie that they’re “not just friends – you know it, I know it, and Justine knows it.” With the obvious implication that there is something romantic brewing between them, and that Justine is trying to push her away because of it (to which Justine freely admits later, during her breakup with Archie). After Justine leaves, Archie turns to Katrina for advice and support, which she offers freely. He tells her about his idea to hire another staff member, a Head Ranger, to help with the tourist business.
Episode 2 – Archie asks Katrina to come to the interviews for Head Ranger in order to help outvote his father and make sure they get someone decent into the position. She asks him over to her cottage and offers to make dinner for him, ostensibly so that they can discuss their battle plan for the interviews. Both of them know what’s really going on, though: it is a totally a date – or maybe a pseudo-date, testing the waters now that Justine’s out of the picture. Lexie warns Archie that Katrina’s cooking is atrocious, and this is borne out when he tries to compliment her cooking and she tells him flat-out that she knows she’s a terrible cook. She tells him to be straight with her, and they have some flirtatious banter. They have a moment, when she comes round to refill his wine glass, and as she’s leaning down to kiss him, he tells her to stop, because she’s also pouring the wine into his lap.
Yeah. Awkward.
So he goes in and cleans up, and when he returns, she apologizes, telling him that she knows it’s “too soon,” like she’s all angry that he isn’t ready to jump her right then and there. When he agrees, saying that it wouldn’t be fair to Justine or to her, she snaps back at him that she can take care of herself. They part company.
The next day is interview day, and among the candidates is a dashing outdoorsman named Fergal McClure, whom Katrina runs across while he’s skinny-dipping in one of the rivers on the estate. They hit it off right away, and when it’s time to interview, they begin flirting very obviously with each other. She, of course, lobbies to hire him, and Archie eventually agrees, even though he knows full well that he’s bringing in a romantic rival – they were that obvious during the interview.
Fergal immediately starts trying to woo Katrina once he’s told he has the position on the estate, and she is quite open to his advances. Understandably so, if she’s champing at the bit for a romance and Archie is still a wreck from his breakup with Justine.
Episode 3 – Archie turns to Katrina to help him land a grant from the Highland Council for the estate. They run into a major problem, however, in the form of Edith Rankin, the Council Chair. Rankin had been in love with Hector when they were younger, and took his return to Glenbogle after four years in the army with Molly on his arm as a personal affront, which she never forgave him for. She carries her grudge with a vengeance, denying Archie’s grant on principle alone – after Hector’s rejection, she’d vowed to never give the MacDonalds a dime.
Archie forces Katrina to stand up to Edith and the rest of the council, telling her that they are all cronies until someone breaks the deadlock and wrests the power away from Rankin. They manage to orchestrate a brilliant comeback and secure the grant for the estate. At the celebratory party at the Big House, Archie thanks Katrina profusely for her help, and tells her that he owes her everything, to which she demurs, saying lightly that she was only helping out “one of her constituents.” Archie asks her if that’s all he is to her, and she can’t respond, but she does avert her eyes. When he confronts her directly about her feelings for him (well, as directly as he can manage), she backs down and doesn’t respond.
Fergal interrupts them, giving Katrina her coat, and she tells Archie that Fergal is taking her out to dinner and then waits to see how he reacts – almost like she’s daring him to say something or make a scene. He doesn’t, though, and why should he? She’s made such a point of telling him how wonderful Fergal is, so he smiles at them and wishes them the best as they leave.
Episode 4 – Its Archie’s 30th birthday, and Hector is determined to marry him off, so he places an ad in a magazine advertising for a wife, without Archie’s knowledge. Archie, meanwhile, is coming to grips with the fact that he’s turning 30, and basically with where he is in life. When he finds out about Hector’s meddling – and the real reason for it, that Hector wants a grandchild to carry on the family line – he has an absolute comeapart. Meanwhile, an errant old tenant has smuggled onto the grounds, and stages a protest when he’s discovered, demanding that his cottage be given back to him.
Meanwhile, Fergal and Katrina are growing closer, and Katrina suggests that her schoolkids come test out the hiking trails on the estate that Fergal has been working on. Archie witnesses them having a moment together in the village, and he kinda casually asks Fergal about what’s going on with them. Fergal’s all enthusiastic, of course, and rather oblivious to Archie’s questions, but does reveal that he’s basically still wooing her.
Katrina’s bank made a mistake with her direct deposit for her rent, so she comes up to the house to give Archie a check. He apologizes for the “threatening letter” that’s sent out whenever the rents comes into arrears, and says that it goes out to all the tenants. Katrina takes issue with that, asking him if that’s what he thinks of her as, just a tenant. (Ugh. She’s called him just a constituent, so where does she have room to get all affronted when he basically says the same thing??)
She then proceeds to needle him about Fergal, talking about what a great guy he is, and how he really understands people – with the implication that Archie is the opposite. When Archie again posts a (semi)direct question, “…you included?” in response, she throws back that whatever is going on between her and Fergal is her business, not his.
When the tenant comes round and locks himself in the middle of a building that’s being restored, she gets up on her high horse about tenants’ rights – again, mostly to needle Archie. She knows he is very sensitive about being the laird, and wanting to do right by his estate and the community, so when Katrina basically joins the protest against him, it’s too much. They snipe at each other.
Katrina is annoyed that he’s not actually thrown out all of the lovely young ladies who’ve shown up to marry him, basically sight unseen. There’s one still hanging around named Tanya – and she was charged with keeping Archie occupied while Molly and Lexie set up his surprise birthday party on the beach. Katrina doesn’t know this, of course, but she gets all jealous and upset anyway. Apparently she can throw Fergal around and try to make Archie jealous, but he has no right to show any interest in another woman, after she basically keeps rejecting him to his face every time they meet? UGH.
Archie manages to sort out the tenant, which impresses everyone – even Katrina has to concede that he pulled it out of the hat again, managing to make everyone happy with his decision.
Tanya asks Archie point blank what the story is with him and Katrina, and teases him that he’s obviously nuts about her, given the passionate yet annoyed way he reacts to being asked about her.
When Katrina confronts Archie at his party about whether or not he’s actually considering an arranged marriage to Tanya, she’s appalled that he admits that he thinks Tanya is “all right.” She blusters a bit more, and he coolly reminds her that “what happens between me and Tanya is my business.” (Heh. I love that he has the audacity to throw her words back in her face – it also shows that he’s been paying attention and is getting very frustrated with her being so evasive about her feelings for him.)
Katrina goes off with Fergal as the party winds down, and they have a heavy petting session on the beach, while Archie continues to celebrate in private, with his family.
Episode 5 – Archie is attempting to set up a tableau in the house in order to win a grant from the Heritage Council to help with the tourist business. After Duncan’s snafu with the fireplace – in which he covers everything with soot – Archie seeks out Katrina for a bit of solace.
She’s upset with him (as usual), and complains that he never goes to see her unless he needs something. Gee, I wonder why? Could it be because she’s flaunting her blossoming romance with Fergal in his face, and denying that she has any sort of romantic feelings for him, even though their “relationship” was a major factor in his breakup with Justine?
She tells Archie that his tableau is a stupid idea and that nobody cares about how the other half lived in Victorian times, because nothing has changed. She dares him to set up a rustic tableau instead, a scene of the life of a Victorian peasant, and he takes her up on her challenge, even though he only has 36 hours to complete it before the Heritage Council is coming round to see it. They continue to bicker, rather heatedly in fact, albeit for two very different reasons: (1) Fergal has come around with a bouquet of flowers for Katrina, and (2) Archie feels like Katrina is withdrawing her support from him and his ideas of how to run the estate and generate some profit to counteract the debt they’re mired in. When Fergal asks what’s going on, Katrina snits that “the laird is just here on council business, but we’re done, right?” to which Archie replies (in a very disgusted voice) that they are very definitely done – meaning, of course, that he’s finished with attempting to meet her halfway and hold their friendship together, much less build anything more.
Everyone else senses trouble, of course. Archie and Golly go out in search of a croft to make over for the tableau, and Archie asks him if he thinks that Archie is a dinosaur and a feudal tyrant and stuck in the past, blah blah blah – the insults that Katrina tends to hurl at him when she’s trying to get to his weak spot about being the laird. She’s constantly going on and on about how they need to rid themselves of the ruling class, and it does get a bit annoying even when she’s not trying to wield it as a weapon to bash him over the head.
Golly guesses what it’s all about, and also guesses that Archie isn’t quite as done with Katrina as he thinks he is. He recognizes Archie’s growing jealousy over Katrina’s relationship with Fergal, but Archie insists that he’d love nothing better than for the two of them to get together and basically leave him alone. He even bets Golly that he can get them together by the end of the week. Golly agrees to the bet, assuring Archie that he’ll lose. He walks away from the croft, telling Archie that he doesn’t need a ghillie, he needs a shrink (ha!).
Archie ropes Fergal and Duncan into helping him with the project instead, and Fergal takes the opportunity to ask Archie to help him get Katrina. It’s just the opening Archie was looking for. He suggests that Fergal plant a tree in front of Katrina’s cottage – which he does, and is met with great success. Katrina comes round the next day to thank Fergal in person at the croft, and of course Archie is there to witness it all. He can’t hide his jealousy, but he does swallow it pretty well, and tells Katrina that he thinks Fergal is a great match for her and basically encourages them to continue with their romance.
Later that evening, Katrina visits the croft to apologize to Archie for blowing up at him. She tells him the story of the crumbling building, how it used to belong to Kilfetter, the village matchmaker, who died of a broken heart after setting up the girl he loved with another man. The whole scene and story is meant to reflect what is going on between Archie and Katrina, in that:
• They were childhood sweethearts who had a falling out
• Years later, the girl’s father commissioned Kilfetter to match her with a rich husband from Glasgow
• He agreed, because he thought the girl no longer loved him, and he wanted her to be happy no matter what
• The girl’s husband left her and she died penniless, but only after writing to Kilfetter and telling him that he’d broken her heart all those years ago by abandoning her
So, obviously, Archie is the reluctant matchmaker, pushing the girl he loves (Katrina) into a relationship with another man because of a misunderstanding about their feelings for each other, and putting them all at risk of ending up lonely, bitter, and broken-hearted.
This is what gets me: if she realizes what he’s doing in pushing her and Fergal together, why doesn’t she say something? Why does she keep trying to hint around and get him to say something? For all that she spouts feminist, modernist political positions, she’s awful damn content to be coy about being in love with him, and basically sustains the misery of the UST that resonates between them.
Fergal finally clues in to all of this, and confronts first Archie, and then Katrina about it. He accuses them of being lovers, and using him in some sort of weird charade/lover’s spat, and he doesn’t appreciate it. They both deny it, of course, and insist that they’ve only ever been friends, but each lets something slip that just taints the situation – Archie admits that he and Katrina spent the night together when their car broke down in the middle of nowhere (neglecting to mention the fact that they thought they were brother-and-sister at the time, and were on a quest to prove it – Episode 1x4), and Katrina spills the beans about the dinner and almost-kiss from Episode 2, but Fergal is basically done with them both.
Which upsets Katrina, because she’s just lost her boyfriend, and she believes it’s because Archie told him a pack of lies.
So let me get this straight…she’s angry that Fergal, the man she’s basically using to make Archie jealous, left her because of something Archie said to him?! And she has the audacity to complain to Fergal that she’s tired of people “not being honest” with each other, and “not saying what they feel”?! She, of all people, who brings the definition of reticent to an entirely new level?! ARGH!!
So the next day she arrives at the croft because she’s one of the two delegates from the Heritage Council coming to see the finished tableau. She snipes at Archie for driving Fergal away while the other delegate is inside, and basically snipes at him again while complimenting him on the tableau, telling him how “cunning” it is, and how it (meaning he) “had completely fooled her.”
Archie wins the grant, and Katrina delivers it to the house, giving the check to Molly and Hector so that she can avoid seeing Archie. She sees him anyway, and gives him a tortured look, and of course he goes after her, making it all the way outside and just in time to witness Fergal arriving, apologizing to Katrina, and making up with her right there in the front drive.
Turns out Golly was right, even though Archie was the one collecting the money on the bet:
This episode drives me absolutely nuts, because they are basically talking to each other in code the entire time. If they would just be plainspoken with each other, they could easily sort things out and save themselves a lot of misery. It’s obvious to one and all that they are (supposedly) crazy about each other – but no, Katrina seems content to play hard to get and then gets all angry when Archie doesn’t chase after her.
Episode 6 – Fergal and Katrina are officially an item, and the entire village knows that he’s been staying with her at her cottage, thanks to the gossipy postman. Archie is painfully aware that she has chosen Fergal instead of him, and makes an attempt to get on with his life, and with his plans for the estate.
Katrina receives notice that the Glenbogle community school is being closed down, which means she’s out of a job. She runs immediately to the Big House, summoning Hector because he sits on the school board. She tells Archie what happened, and he agrees to help her with her campaign to keep the school open. They all attend the meeting, and Archie realizes that he knows the guy from the Board of Education because they went to school together. He agrees to work on the BoE lackey while Katrina gets the word out about their campaign.
Fergal has disappeared, meanwhile, upsetting Katrina because she feels abandoned in her hour of need. (Oh really? Even though she has Archie behind her 100% with this effort?) When he resurfaces, he tells her that he’s been offered a job in New Zealand – and he asks her to go with him.
Meanwhile, Archie comes through and saves the community school, because he has some delicious dirt on the BoE guy. The school will stay open, but with only half the number of students, and only one teacher – meaning that either Katrina or her deputy, Maureen, will lose her job.
Katrina can’t decide whether to stay in Glenbogle, or whether to go with Fergal to New Zealand. She asks around for advice, and it’s Golly who tells her to talk to Archie before she makes up her mind for sure. She goes off in search of him, only to find him kissing Lexie in the kitchen, and she huffs away without a word, convinced that Archie has moved on, right into the willing arms of Lexie, which means that he no longer has feelings for her.
Which, of course, couldn’t be farther from the truth.
But she doesn’t actually TALK TO HIM, she literally just leaves and goes home and burns every picture of him that she can find (ugh, so melodramatic!) and decides that since Archie so obviously doesn’t want her, she’ll go with the man who does.
Fergal turns in his notice to Archie, who is surprised by the news of the NZ job; he’s downright shocked when Katrina announces that she’s going with Fergal to the other side of the world. He actually has to leave the room, because he didn’t see that one coming at all.
Katrina stops to talk with Lexie, telling her to “take care of Archie” for her (again, seriously?! You can’t even take care of him when he’s there for the taking!!), and Lexie tells her that the kiss wasn’t as damning as Katrina had assumed. Lexie admits that she’s interested in him, but acknowledges that he still has feelings for Katrina and that she wasn’t even going to go there, especially not to end up as his rebound.
Katrina is all shocked and wonders if she’s just made the worst decision of her life.
Episode 7 – Archie’s sister Lizzie arrives unexpectedly, and is due to have a baby at any moment. Lizzie and Katrina are friends (because of course), so when Lizzie learns that Katrina is planning to leave, she has to know what’s going on. Archie gives Fergal and Katrina a proper send off in the form of a big, formal dinner party at the Big House, and thanks them both for their work. He and Katrina actually manage to have a somber, drama-free farewell, even though they are both all haunted about it: Archie, because he thinks he’s lost her for good, and Katrina, because she knows she’s making a huge mistake but has way too much pride to admit it.
Lizzie confronts both Archie and Katrina about their feelings for each other, and upon learning that Archie is devastated that Katrina is leaving, but concedes that he’d already lost her, is determined to clear the air before Katrina can fly the coop the next day. She goes down to Katrina’s cottage as the latter is packing up and asks her, point blank, why she’s going. Katrina tells her it’s because Fergal loves her and shows that to her on a regular basis, whereas Archie doesn’t. She scoffs when Lizzie tells her that Archie is crazy about her, saying that “he’s had months to say something” to her about it, and to stop her from making pretty much every decision she’s made, but that he hasn’t.
I want to reach through the screen at this point and throttle Katrina. I just can’t with the way she’s behaving. She’s known Archie since they were kids, so she knows what he’s like. She watched him while he was with Justine, and she watched him break up with Justine live on the webcams in Episode 1.
Yet somehow, she expected him to be different with her? And she’s angry that he isn’t acting out of character, when she has given him no indication that she has romantic feelings for him, except when she’s sniping at him?! She outright denies it every time he asks her directly, so what is he supposed to think?
And she’s angry that he hasn’t stopped her from getting together with Fergal, or from leaving Glenbogle with him? WHY?! She knows that Archie always tries to do what he thinks is best for everyone except himself. If he thinks Katrina is in love with Fergal and happy with him (because what reason would he have to think otherwise?!), then of course he’s not going to stand in her way!
The gall of this woman, I swear. Maybe it’s stubbornness, maybe it’s pride, maybe it’s outright stupidity. Whatever it is, it’s frustrating as hell to watch unfold, and actually makes me angry. Katrina needs to take responsibility for her actions, all of them. She did it to herself. She pushed Archie away; she shouldn’t be surprised that he gave up his pursuit.
Lizzie will not be deterred, however, and conspires to bring them together one last time by making Katrina and Archie the godparents of her baby. She goes into labor in Katrina’s back garden, so Katrina rushes her back to the house, and they all have a moment after the baby is born. It’s a really great scene, actually, the culmination of all the relevant subplots. Katrina and Archie share a moment with the baby under Lizzie’s watchful eye, but even then, neither one of them say anything to the other.
Fergal arrives at the house to get Katrina and take her to the train.
Archie lets her go, and she goes.
Lizzie, Molly, and Hector have to practically push him into action, and he runs off after the taxi, intent on catching up with them at the train station and actually making the grand romantic gesture Katrina has been angling for all season long, to tell her that he loves her and wants her to stay.
He doesn’t catch them, of course, and comes back to the house looking even more miserable than ever. The next day, he goes down to Katrina’s cottage to retrieve the keys (since, technically, it is his property) and finds Fergal there. Fergal tells him that Katrina left him in Edinburgh, and that she’s nowhere to be found. He’s upset, of course, but realizes that Katrina’s feelings for him weren’t the same as his feelings for her. He tells Archie that, if she loves him, she’ll follow him to NZ.
Which is when it finally occurs to Archie that following her is what Katrina has been wanting him to do all along, though she never bothered to say it. Too bad it’s too late now…
Episode 8 – Archie is hosting a reunion of the Clan MacDonald and staging the Highland Games as he prepares to formally take over the lairdship and leadership of the clan from Hector. An American cousin swoops in and claims that he is the real laird, and suddenly Archie finds himself fighting for something he only reluctantly took on a year before.
In the meanwhile, Katrina has returned to the glen. Archie goes down to see her, albeit after receiving a somewhat deceptive word of advice from Lexie: she tells him that Katrina is fragile and needs her space, not to be immediately engulfed in another romance when she just left a different one in tatters.
Archie gives Katrina space during their meeting, and Katrina gets very upset about it. She thinks he’s arrived to make a grand romantic gesture (like what, confess his love for her? After all the grief she’s put him through?!), and she is very obviously waiting for it this time – but when it doesn’t come, she basically tells him to fuck off. She goes up to the Big House the next day to turn in her notice that she’s leaving the cottage.
That spurs him into action. He asks her to come round for a drink so they can discuss things, to which she readily agrees. He gets all caught up in the chieftain’s challenge, however, and completely forgets about Katrina and Lexie, who thinks that maybe their kiss in Episode 6 did mean something after all. Lexie is very catty to Katrina when she arrives, and she drives her away, making her think that maybe what Archie wanted to tell her was that he’d found someone else – someone more reliable – to spend his time with.
Lexie, of course, confronts Archie about her feelings for him the next morning in the infamous bathtub scene. When he tells her that he’s still hung up on Katrina, she handles the whole thing with a lot of dignity, and actually works to get them together. She fools Archie into confessing his feelings for Katrina over the loudspeaker at the clan gathering, and then literally pushes Katrina into his arms right after that.
Archie wins the chieftain’s challenge, assumes his role as leader of the Clan MacDonald, and finally gives Katrina the grand gesture she wants. He invites her up on stage in front of every member of his clan and finally kisses her for the very first time. She actually goads him afterwards, asking if that’s the best he can do, so of course he kisses her again and everyone cheers.
So, in the end, she actually gets what she wants without having to expend any risk of rejection herself. It rather makes me sick, and I say that as the Queen of Angsty Romance, which thrives on characters denying themselves their heart’s desire. I just can’t stand it when a character can’t actually take responsibility for their actions and/or choices, instead blaming everyone else for their misery, and who basically spend the entire time whining and complaining when the object of their affections is oblivious – or resentful – of them.
Give me Justine’s outright bitchiness any damn day of the week. At least then you know what you’re dealing with.
This is so interesting
(Anonymous) 2022-06-08 07:36 pm (UTC)(link)Watching again I think Justine cared and least was willing to fight! Katerina is presented as moral on the one hand but is actively pursuing someone else’s partner - Archie is also at best easily lead and at worse a womaniser! I genuinely feel sorry for Fergal and Lexie in this as they are caught in the cross fire. Archie kissing Lexie given the context of what she has told him and then acting like it is nothing also bothers me - he is her boss and in a position of power. I never thought of this before: It kind of makes both Archie and Katerina seem a bit immature and thoughtless - realise it’s for a tv programme and needs suspense - it gets a bit much!
I would love love to see an analysis of Archie and Lexie’s relationship if you ever fancy it.
Thanks for an interesting read. You have a gift
Re: This is so interesting
Archive and Lexie are my OTP for this show, and I was Team Lexie all the way, even way back when I watched the series when it was first run. Re-watching it again a couple of years ago just made me a bigger fan. She is fabulous, and I had a lot of Thoughts and Feelings about the way they forced her into a Cinderella mold in Series 3. I basically rewrote the highlights of S3 in Paper Hearts to add more kisses, because there certainly weren't enough kisses!!