‘The New Pope’ Gets Meta and Opens a John Malkovich–Shaped Pandora’s Box

Posted On Feb 27, 2020 By admin With Comments Off

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HBO/ Ringer explain

John Brannox impels his first address as the leader of the church, but not before doing some mind-bending name dropping

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The New Pope is here–and as the designation would imply, there’s a new pope in town. Don’t worry, Jude Law’s Pius XIII can still lay claim to the title of People’s Sexiest Pontiff Alive, but a challenger to the papacy has emerged in the form of John Malkovich. Every week, we’ll douse ourselves in holy ocean, dive into Paolo Sorrentino’s unholy life, and come out with scripture( blogs ). Our wander are ongoing with the third largest episode.

Verse I. WHAT’S IN THE BOX?

For a series announced The New Pope, marketed predominantly through the alluringimage of pope John Malkovich flanked by pope Jude Law, it’s sure taking a long time for us to see Malkovich’s Sir John Brannox as, you know, the actual pope. With Pius XIII still comatose, we’ve previously gone through one pontiff–rest in ability, Woke Pope–and by the start of the third incident, Brannox is still of two minds about accepting the papacy. Brannox’s life, wracked by the inexplicable deaths among his twin brother Adam, has left him more than a little mopey and disappointment. There’s too the inquisitive topic of his parents’ decades-long contempt for their alone living son, which has me feeling that there’s more to Adam’s death than the line has let on.( Either that or I’m precisely preconditioned to find John Malkovich terrifying in any character, and I means that as a kudo .)

While flirting with the notion of turn pope, Brannox tells the head of his family’s estate that he’d take only one of the family hounds with him to Rome, along with the “box.” We still don’t know what’s inside it, exclusively that Brannox needs it to sleep at night–and it’s worth noting that Brannox’s butler had a rather horrified face on his face when he heard that the box would participate him in the Vatican. The tease of the box’s materials is continued when we nearly check Brannox open it; the next time this happens, I cry the finest internet sleuths will be on the contingency.

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All screenshots via HBO

To channel Brad Pitt for a moment, I need to know: WHAT’S IN THE BOX? I would say there’s a 99 percentage chance it does not contain the separated head of Goop magnate Gwyneth Paltrow, but virtually anything else is on the table. A reminder of his dead brother? A vape pen? Melatonin gummies infused with CBD oil? Napoleon’s shriveled penis? I will not rest until we get some answers.

Poem II. Into the Malko-verse

I can understand why Brannox is taking so long to decide whether he wants to become pope. Sure, the Vatican appears dope, but he’s basically already in a goddamn castling. He’s living the Succession life, right down to the family baggage that always seems to come with exorbitant wealth. So yeah, Brannox doesn’t get along with his parents, but his neighbourhood is so big that he can repeatedly avoid them because they live in another wing (# anointed ).

Also, there’s the small matter of becoming the leader of one of the world’s biggest beliefs while it’s in the midst of several legitimate crises–including the cover-up of gender corruption gossips and the continued idolatry of hot, young, comatose Pius XIII. It’s a lot to put one across a chap described multiple times as a fragile case of “porcelain.” And, like, would you want to leave this sick dwelling theater?

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Brannox screens Easy Rider for Sofia, the Vatican’s director of sell, once fixing him a fascinating comparison from our Young Pope.( It’s a quintessential hippie cinema, and given all the acrimony Pius XIII had for his hippie parents who vacated him, he is more likely to consider watching Easy Rider heresy on the different levels of denied access to a Cherry Coke Zero .) Brannox tells Sofia that his favorite celebrities are Dennis Hopper, Jack Nicholson, Sean Penn, Sharon Stone, and Marilyn Manson, because they all “seem free.” He wants to meet them–and, given that Stone and Manson are set to make appearances on the serial, we know his devotions will be replied to.

But then Sofia drops-off a line so explosive it blackened my eyebrows: “You prompt me of my favorite performer, John Malkovich, ” she tells him.

Wait, what ?! “He doesn’t do much for me, ” Brannox greetings. OK, stand up, we need to consider the implications of this. Somewhere in the Young/ New Pope Universe, John Malkovich exists and, yielded Brannox’s stature as a socialite with a goddamn knighthood, probably knows this man is his doppelganger. Have they ever assemble? Is it possible that Brannox’s twin brother, Adam, faked his death so he could change his mention to “John Malkovich” and haunt his lifelong dream of becoming an actor? Does this want Jude Law is also an actor in this world-wide with a outlandish resemblance to a comatose pontiff? Is Paolo Sorrentino aware that this winky, throwaway joke was totally break-dance my intelligence?

If that wasn’t fairly of a real-world clusterfuck, this bout throws in a feed laugh where Meghan Markle is a close personal friend who is constantly announcing Brannox for fashion advice. “Wear the yellow-bellied Dior, because it toy up the contrast with your colour, ” he exasperatedly tells her. “They want to be influencers, ” he says to Sofia, “yet they have no idea of emblazon or combination.”( Earlier in the incident, Brannox announces Meghan a “nuisance.”) I “ve no idea” why Meghan Markle is catching handwritings in The New Pope, but it contributes a hilarious and unintentionally meta dimension to the series when Brannox honestly ponders what she’ll do without his constant advice when he eventually decides to go to Rome and accept the papacy. Turns out, Meghan losing one of her besties to the Vatican caused her and Prince Harry to renounce their sovereign claims. This is canon, right?

Verse III. This Pope … Fucks?

A common segregation between the memes encircling The Young Pope and the show itself concerned the pope’s[ clears throat] libido. If your alone Young Pope learning came from the sinfully intelligent corners of the internet, you’d expect Pius XIII was an edgy pope who didn’t play by the rules and, because he was like Jude Law, might shrug off any notions of celibacy to get his holy freak on. I’m certainly not kidding when I say that several friends, upon learning that I was obsessed with The Young Pope, asked a question some variant of So, does this pope fuck?

Pius XIII was certainly an extreme pontiff, really not in accordance with procedures the memes would guide you to believe. What was extreme about Pius XIII wasn’t that he was the first pope to “OK, boomer” the conclave and listen to Billie Eilish, but that he was a revolutionary conservative with outdated deems on abortion and homosexuality who threatened to send the church backward. Even more juggling: Despite wielding remarkable good looks and unironically showing he might be more handsome than Jesus, this pope never seemed to be led by lures of the flesh.

All due respect to John Malkovich, but when he was revealed to be the lead in The New Pope, I presupposed his pope would also resist carnal passions in favor of wailing at subordinates and questioning the decor of the Sistine Chapel. But Brannox, although it is not explicitly engaging in any sexual activities in this episode, gamely flirts with Sofia in his personal theater and practically shares a tender embrace with Cardinal Gutierrez( much to the dismay of the onlooking Cardinal Assente ):

Brannox may also be a sexually fluid pontiff–another fascinating implication that will surely provoke the church as much as the show’s raving nuns. It remains to be determined whether Brannox will actually act on any of these exhorts, or if he’s simply a flirting.( He jokes that he’s caught they didn’t require any nudes for his papal photo shoot .) Still, if you’re going to place speculations on a pope getting laid in this universe, don’t hold out hope for Jude Law–no matter how bare his beachwear might be.

Verse IV. A Papacy of Tenderness

Midway through the bout, it’s finally time to formally reveal Brannox as the next pope. But before the cardinals can get to another referendum, we must bid one final adieu to the short-lived reign of Woke Pope. Now, I don’t know much about what goes on inside the walls of the Vatican, but I didn’t expect Francis II’s funeral service basically being a cardinal tap his forehead with a decorative gavel and to be, “You awake, dude? ”

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Is this an actual thing that happens with deceased popes? If Francis II had jolted up like the Undertaker I’d have clenched my rosary pellets so hard they’d have erupted from their chain.

Anyway, since the New/ Young Pope Extended Universe has already centered itself on several elected popes, we understand Brannox–who now goes by Pope John Paul III–deliver his speech to the masses and his address to the cardinals within about 15 minutes of screen day. John Paul III’s edict is influenced by his upbringing and his riotous liaison with his parents: He craves the church to “protect fragility” and steer away from fanaticism. “Passion is the everlasting opponent of humility, ” he tells the cardinals. “Christian humility, which is frugal, is just and is necessary.” In lieu of “concrete love, ” John Paul III craves the church to embrace “abstract tenderness.”

It was Pius XIII’s initial activist attitude–though he got better and more accepting as The Young Pope departed along–that alienated the church from many of its admirers. On the surface, John Paul III’s empathetic word of tenderness is not simply feels tolerable, but it’s something that should have a more universal appeal by virtue of its level-headed intent.( At least, for the Catholics who aren’t part of the brand-new, cult-like following of comatose Pius XIII .)

But all the reasons John Paul III seems so pleasantly well-adjusted to the early throes of the papacy are why I’m worried that it’s exclusively a matter of time before things become horribly amiss. The New Pope wouldn’t be particularly compelling if John Malkovich were a peerless, drama-free pope who steered the church into a new age of affluence. Shit is inevitably going to hit the fan–whether it’s because Pius XIII will eventually wake up from his lethargy, the self-described fragility of John Paul III will begin him to unravel, or some combination of the two. Unfortunately, I reckon it’s exclusively a matter of time before the Vatican becomes an unstable institution–again.

Verse V. Smash the Holy Patriarchy

If there’s one thing The Young Pope was never great at, it was adding features to its female personas–all of whom behaved principally in the service of men like Pius XIII and Cardinal Voiello. And while The New Pope has lost Diane Keaton’s Sister Mary–arguably the most interesting female person from its precede; certainly the best baller–the streak offers a more forceful look at how the church enables lovers in positions of superpower to take advantage of women who just have a voice.

First, there were the cloistered nuns–the same ones who we participate rave during the show’s opening recognitions–being denied an outlay of 200 euros to fly one of their sisters to see her mom before she dies from place 4 cancer. The nuns are stonewalled because the Vatican is undergoing a “financial crisis”–meanwhile one of the cardinals recently purchased a Bentley–and this trip-up would be an extraneous expense. It’s this type of attitude that Francis II engaged in vain to destroy.

Then there’s Esther, who’s separated from her husband and struggling to support her son, Pius. She befriends a widowed serviceman named Fabiano, who produces a bizarre resemblance to Philip Jennings disguised as “Clark” on The Americans.

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After they become romantically involved, and Esther tells him about her monetary strifes, Fabiano suggests that she … prostitutes herself for a prosperous female he knows, because her son has some facial abnormalities and is still a virgin.( Instead of prostitution, he calls it an “act of Christian charity.”) Esther is understandably insulted, but knows she’s in desperate need of money–and when she consults her neighbourhood clergyman about developments in the situation, he considers the opportunity another “miracle” on the level of Pius XIII praying away her infertility. Yikes. As Esther agrees to the arrangement before balking when the mutilated male ways her heart, Pius XIII are simply removed a sobbing from his hospital bunked.

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The B-plots with the nuns as well as Esther prepared me reconsider the raving nuns from the opening approvals( specially since they’re apparently the same cloistered nuns ). I didn’t leant much contemplated behind the dancing beyond “lol, this is fun and peculiar! ” but maybe it’s supposed to represent the characters’ internal disarray, the push and pull between religion and abandon. What else would erode someone’s faith more than watching cardinals expend in wildly irresponsible actions after the strange deaths among a pontiff who inspected to eradicate the Vatican’s wealth? If the seeing of a nun coming tatted up is any indication, these women might be on the brink of rebellion.

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The Vatican might be about to implode, and with a “piece of porcelain” as the brand-new pontiff, it might not be long before John Paul III begins to shatter.

Disclosure: HBO is an initial investor in The Ringer.