Admittedly, it's Full of Gibberish, Over-the-Top Hospitality and Self-Help Jargon. Yet I Truly Love Meghan's Festive Episode.
No matter the time of year, it's constantly open season for commentary on the Duchess of Sussex's televisual offering, With Love, Meghan. Commentators, both professional and armchair, have rarely been so united as when enthusiastically shredding the series' earlier episodes to pieces. The prevailing view seemed to be a more egregious regal scandal had hardly ever taken place than the notorious pretzel-bagging incident.
Now, like a merry renegade master, she has returned once again with a "Christmas Special" (or a holiday episode). Yet now, it's different. The familiar ingredients audiences anticipate – meaningless jargon salads, intense hospitality – persist, but set of a yuletide episode, it all clicks into place. The elements have slid together; it's a flawless festive blizzard.
At this stage, Meghan resembles the oddball family member at the typical holiday get-together – providing unsolicited, unnecessary advice, and supplying the occasional strange exclamation. ("I love spinach!" … "A tradition has to have a beginning." … "A tree is part of my memory and love of the holiday season.") She's an interesting figure, but her presence is familiar and oddly reassuring. And she seems happy enough; she's inflicting a bit of damage.
She knows her each tiny facial movement, utterance and gaze will be analyzed and scrutinized, but manages to seem carefree and remarkably at ease.
It could be this is the initial instance in history where that clichéd phrase – "Ignore them, they're just jealous" – could actually be true. Because, let's face it, everything in Meghan's Holiday Celebration is charming. Admittedly, it's all painfully excessive, nonsense and flamboyant – but isn't that exactly what Yuletide is all about? And the talk she's talking might be ridiculous, but the walk she's walking seems authentically impeccably styled.
Whatever she sets her mind to, she accomplishes with flair. Her cooking looks delicious, the wreath she makes is gorgeous, her gifts are practically too exquisite to tear into. Not a single thing is average or ugly – including the way she ties her kitchen garment is stylish and elegant. She doesn't toss a meal in the oven, it "goes for a spin", and she creases wrapping paper like an origami guru. She also seems to be completely savoring herself from start to finish. How could any skeptical viewer not be convinced, bursting with seasonal cheer and left with a powerful yearning for crafted festive snaps or a vegetable display where broccoli is organized in the likeness of a Christmas ring?
Meghan used to pretend for a living, obviously, but nonetheless, after the level of attention she has endured since she started dating Prince Harry, a theoretical combination of Meryl Streep and Judi Dench would struggle to act this genuinely. Her decision to alter or even soften her persona, even though it being so persistently, globally mocked, is oddly heartening. In our volatile world, here is something we can depend on: Meghan will be like this, whatever happens. We will consistently know where we are with her.
If you're still not buying her brand, a point that will surely come as a comfort: you are not obligated to. We don't have the draft in this country, and were it to return, it would be unlikely to include streaming With Love, Meghan: Holiday Celebration. If, on the other hand, you decide to tune in and are consumed by longing about her flawless Christmas, there is hope either. Be you a royal or a everyday person, hardly any child truly appreciates the time and energy their mother does in December. So you can take heart by envisioning Archie and Lilibet's faces when they unfold a beautifully scripted letter that says, 'I love you because you are brave,' from a DIY festive calendar, in place of a sweet treat.
