Rivals, Season 2 Feature Scores
Explore all 49 feature scores for Rivals, Season 2, organized into pros and cons.
Scores by Feature
Summary
49 reviewed features-
Very positive 4.5-5.024 (49%)
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Positive 3.5-4.416 (33%)
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Neutral 2.5-3.49 (18%)
Pros
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The comedy ranges from sharp dialogue to full physical farce, with many critics highlighting the season’s relentless laughs and eccentric English silliness.
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The ensemble is widely praised for committing fully to the show’s heightened tone while keeping its characters human. One sharply negative take found some performances embarrassed by the material.
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The leads bring swagger, menace, vulnerability, romance, and comic warmth to an intentionally exaggerated world. David Tennant and Alex Hassell receive especially strong praise.
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Lavish estates, pastel pools, polo fields, television studios, and tactile period details create an immersive, affluent 1980s world.
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Enthusiasm for more episodes is very high, with several critics eager for the second half and a future season.
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Rupert, Monica, Maud, Taggie, Sarah, and several supporting women receive richer, more mature arcs. The season is strongest when it lets the glamorous surface give way to vulnerability and consequence.
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Large comic set pieces, interlocking secrets, and multiple revelations are handled with impressive control, particularly in the dinner-party episode.
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Most critics find the season irresistibly funny, glamorous, and addictive. A small minority sees the same excess as vapid, exhausting, or empty.
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The expanded ensemble is a major strength, with Claire Rushbrook, Emily Atack, Lisa McGrillis, Bella Maclean, and others turning quieter roles into memorable highlights.
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Beneath the glossy debauchery, the season explores class, power, sexism, hidden sexuality, loyalty, consequences, and the fragility of love.
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The season drew overwhelmingly enthusiastic notices, including several maximum-score reactions and claims that it improves on the first season.
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The strongest romantic pairings feel unexpectedly tender and emotionally charged, especially Lizzie and Freddie and the scenes between Rupert and Taggie.
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The dialogue is consistently witty, cheeky, and packed with knowingly outrageous period jokes.
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Big hair, crushed velvet, bright florals, and deliberately tacky fashion make the 1980s setting vivid, funny, and instantly recognizable.
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The adaptation preserves Jilly Cooper’s wit, sensuality, class satire, and larger-than-life characters while making thoughtful modernizing changes.
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The season is widely regarded as a confident, richer continuation that adds darker consequences and more complex relationships. A few critics find it looser or less substantial.
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Carefully chosen 1980s songs reinforce the period, sharpen jokes, and heighten romance and conflict.
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Rutshire feels expansive and lived-in, with interlocking homes, companies, political circles, and social hierarchies that support the sprawling ensemble.
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As a glossy bonkbuster and heightened prime-time soap, the season delivers sex, scandal, comedy, romance, and melodrama with confidence.
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The writing successfully juggles comedy, melodrama, romance, satire, and character depth. Occasional overcrowding and rushed subplots are the main weaknesses.
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This is exuberant grown-up escapism for viewers who enjoy glamorous soap, broad comedy, and unapologetic excess.
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The tangled romances and escalating feuds are highly compulsive. The fragmented release schedule makes the season less satisfying to consume week by week.
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The corporate feud, affairs, betrayals, and emotional fallout create rich soapy drama without abandoning the show’s playful tone.
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Reversals, betrayals, scandals, and romantic shifts remain juicy and frequently jaw-dropping.
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The 1987 election, class hierarchy, workplace sexism, and Thatcher-era prejudice add context and sharper stakes, though the satire can remain soft.
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The playful operatic vocal score gives the show a distinctive comic voice that comments on the onscreen excess.
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Greater vulnerability and consequence give the season more heart, especially in its romances and family conflicts. Monica’s death lands as anger and disappointment rather than satisfying tragedy.
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The hyper-saturated palette, sweeping countryside, playful camerawork, and extravagant interiors create a bold look, though some flourishes can be too much.
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The show gives women and marginalized characters more space while engaging with period sexism and homophobia. Monica’s death is a major exception, criticized as a dated queer-character trope.
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The best set pieces, especially the crowded dinner-party farce, are staged with precise comic timing and escalating visual chaos.
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Rutshire expands beyond the central feud, adding new histories, families, social layers, and links to other Cooper stories.
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Rupert’s public destruction shows how scandal, broadcasting, and political image can be weaponized to dismantle a person’s career and relationships.
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Its unusual blend of 1980s broadcasting politics, country-house soap, sexual farce, and social commentary gives the series a distinctive identity.
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The expanded episode order gives the story more room to deepen characters and broaden Rutshire beyond the first season.
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The show is knowingly cartoonish and occasionally implausible, but most critics see that unreality as part of its charm rather than a flaw.
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Inventive camera movement and bold compositions add energy and emotional emphasis. A few flourishes are so obvious that they feel heavy-handed.
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Season 2 resumes the established feuds, romances, and Rutshire tone smoothly, making the expanded story feel like a confident continuation.
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Hints from the wider Rutshire Chronicles suggest an appealing path toward a broader Jilly Cooper television universe.
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The scripts balance sharp dialogue, eccentric jokes, emotional turns, and complicated ensemble plotting with considerable skill.
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Escalating revenge, political scandal, and unresolved relationships keep the season tense and leave viewers eager for the remaining episodes.
Cons
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The many affairs, business loyalties, family histories, and new characters can be difficult to track. The central Tony-Rupert-Cameron conflict remains clear enough to anchor the chaos.
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Story momentum is generally strong, but the hybrid weekly and split-season release pattern is repeatedly criticized as confusing and frustrating.
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Most characters retain recognizable flaws while gaining depth, though Taggie’s repeated pining can feel tiresome and overly static.
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Hayley Atwell fits Helen well, but her American accent is inconsistent and occasionally slips.
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The season creates strong anticipation and memorable shocks, but Monica’s episode-six ending is criticized as harmful and dramatically unjustified.
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The central rivalry moves well, but some secondary relationships are rushed or denied enough screen time.
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Most scenes move briskly, but one ambitious dinner-party sequence interrupts its own rhythm with distracting asides.
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The season generally deepens its moral stakes by making selfish choices carry consequences. Monica’s abrupt death, however, is criticized for cutting off her agency rather than completing her arc.
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The abundant sex and nudity are central to the show’s comic identity and are often embraced as part of the fun. Some critics find the excess tiring, while others miss the first season’s freer erotic energy.