So I have finished season 5 of Netflix’s The Crown, and while I have many thoughts (like why did Diana call Dr. Khan a frog????), one thing that I wish we explored more was Diana’s most iconic moments—particularly that of the “Revenge Dress.” The series went through quite a lot of Princess Diana and Prince Charles’ last years of marriage in the span of the ten episodes, and with it came moments that were iconic to many ’90s babes, like Diana’s dress.
When the world learned of Charles’ affair, Diana showed up at a dinner at Serpentine Gallery in Kensington Gardens in a black dress that the public dubbed her “Revenge Dress,” and it was so important to her story with Charles that in the cursed musical Diana, it had its own song. (Do not get me started on this musical.) Point being, the dress was a big deal.
This season had a lot of fashionable moments that I remembered from growing up, which star Elizabeth Debicki talked about to Tudum before the series came out. “Princess Diana herself was so profoundly cool and groundbreaking with fashion,” Debicki said. “She was really transgressive. She really made choices that other people weren’t making.”
Like many of Diana’s moments, the show made sure to include each bit we knew of her life that has made headlines, but because there were so many hits back to back to back, when we finally did get to see the Revenge Dress, it was so quick that I felt like I needed more of it—which is how I felt about a lot of this season. There was so much happening that they almost rushed the iconic parts. We saw her pull up to the dinner and that’s about it—which is, essentially, what we actually got from Diana, but with a show like The Crown, I just wish we got to explore more of her fictionalized thoughts.
That’s the beauty of this series. All of this is fictionalized based on the real events, so we get to explore our ideas of the royal family in a different light. With the Revenge Dress stuff, we just got a brief look at something we already had. And sure, the buildup around the dress was different, and they did a similar take when it came to Diana’s interview with the BBC, given that we barely saw the actual interview and, instead, got more of the aftermath, but this is, for me, the first time watching this show where I felt a bit let down because this is the stuff about the royal family that I knew.
I didn’t need some grand scene about Diana picking the dress or her thought process, but maybe just a bit more time spent with this iconic look that has stayed as part of Diana’s story even almost 30 years later would have been nice.
(featured image: Netflix)
