Line #13 Series/Will


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4	''Will'' is an American drama television series about the life of young Creator/WilliamShakespeare in the late 16th century London theatre scene. It was created by Creator/BazLuhrmann's frequent collaborator Creator/CraigPearce and premiered on Creator/{{TNT}} in July, 2017.
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6	It features actor Creator/LaurieDavidson (in his first major role) as Shakespeare, Creator/JamieCampbellBower as his friend and rival Creator/ChristopherMarlowe and Creator/ColmMeaney as theatre owner James Burbage.
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10	!!This series contains examples of:
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12	* AlwaysSomeoneBetter: Admiration and envy color Will and Kit Marlowe's interactions -- each playwright (seemingly) has something the other desires.
13	* AnOfferYouCantRefuse: Topcliffe makes one to [[spoiler:Will: either he helps Topcliffe write an anti-Catholic play to combat Father Southwell, or Will's family becomes a target.]]
14	* ArrangedMarriage: Alice's parents try to set her up with [[HopelessSuitor Keenan]], the theatre's beer provider.
15	* AsYouKnow: During the show's first torture scene, Topcliffe and his captive make sure to remind themselves about England's Catholic vs. Protestant issue, just in case they'd forgotten.
16	* BeingGoodSucks: Will tries to be a good playwright, a good husband, a good father, a good Catholic, a good friend, and a good lover--all at once. It usually ends very badly for everyone involved.
17	* BelligerentSexualTension: Will and Kit have a... complicated relationship.
18	* BetaCouple: Richard and Molly, though they haven't officially gotten together yet.
19	* BigBad: Topcliffe.
20	* BittersweetEnding: [[spoiler:Topcliffe is disgraced and the theater is back in business, but Alice flees the country with Southwell--effectively [[ShipSinking ending]] her romance with Will.]]
21	* BuryYourGays: [[spoiler:Emerson]] is a classic example of this, due to having initially "debauched" his lover [[spoiler:Kit]] before dying.
22	* CerebusSyndrome: Compare the tone of episode 10 to episode 1.
23	* CodeName: "Mr. Cotton" for Father Southwell, which is historically accurate to boot.
24	* ColdBloodedTorture: Richard Topcliffe, Queen Elizabeth's primary investigator and torturer is not a nice man.
25	* {{Confessional}}: Will confesses [[spoiler:his affair with Alice]] to his cousin Father Southwell--naturally, Southwell proceeds to hold this information over Will's head for the rest of the series.
26	* ConvertingForLove: Inverted in a pretty interesting way-- [[spoiler:Alice converts to Catholicism only after Will spurns her and leaves her heartbroken.]]
27	* CreatorBreakdown: [[spoiler:Kit Marlowe]] goes through an epic one. He eventually [[CreatorRecovery recovers]].
28	* CreepyChild: Invoked in the scene where Presto [[spoiler:burns down Burbage's theater.]]
29	* CruelAndUnusualDeath: The writers seem very fond of the whole "hung then disemboweled while still alive" thing. All in the name of historical accuracy, of course.
30	* CruelToBeKind: [[spoiler:Alice's mother]] asks Will to be this in regards of his relationship with [[spoiler:her daughter]]. He complies to a devastating effect.
31	* CueTheRain: Things are not going too well for Will in episode 3 -- as a bonus he also runs into Kit in what could be called an interesting subversion of RomanticRain.
32	* DarkIsEvil: Heavily invoked with Topcliffe and his evil lair. Interestingly contrasted with the "brightness" that the show tends to associate with Catholicism.
33	* DeathByIrony: [[spoiler:Baxter, who spends the first episode sneeringly trying to one-up Will as a playwright, dies because Kit considers him to be the "lesser of two poets."]]
34	* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything?: On the official TNT's Will Podcast, the writers explained that they were trying to draw parallels between the historical Catholic/Protestant conflicts shown in the series and present-day religious extremism and unrest. Funnily enough, that's exactly what actual Shakespeare history plays tried to do in their day.
35	* DoubleAgent: Kit works as a spy for Walsingham -- when he feels like it. Sometimes he feels like doing the opposite, or playing for both teams at once.
36	* EasilyForgiven: Will lets Presto stay with him and vows to help [[spoiler:avenge his sister's death]] despite the fact that Presto has [[spoiler:actively tried to get Will killed and burned down his theater.]]
37	* EasyEvangelism: Father Southwell manages to convert [[spoiler:Alice]] to Catholicism rather easily considering the fact that English Catholics were illegal at the time and given traitors' deaths.[[spoiler:It especially applies since Alice had previously criticized Will quite sharply for getting involved in the movement.]]
38	* EvenEvilHasLovedOnes: Topcliffe's family is brought in for this very purpose.
39	* ExactWords: Topcliffe never tortured [[spoiler:Baxter]], oh no--he did but set him against a wall, that's all. Bonus points for the fact that this line is something that real-life Richard Topcliffe actually said.
40	* {{Foil}}:
41	** Kit for Will
42	** [[BettyAndVeronica Anne for Alice]]
43	** [[TheFundamentalist Southwell]] for [[CrisisOfFaith Will]]
44	* {{Foreshadowing}}:
45	** The players at The Theatre have weekly bets on the amount of [[ThePlague plague]] victims that week. [[spoiler:It's less fun once one of them is among the numbers.]]
46	** Kit, [[spoiler:in a fit of self-destructive despair]], starts a bar brawl...
47	* GetTheeToANunnery: Played with a lot. For obvious reasons.
48	* GoodNightSweetPrince: Will often uses this line on his son, Hamnet. Made heartbreaking if you've ever read a biography of Shakespeare...
49	* HarmlessLadyDisguise: Presto utilizes this technique often. Eventually it comes round to bite him in the arse.
50	* HellSeeker: Kit Marlowe, in the most literal way possible.
51	* HigherUnderstandingThroughDrugs: Kit takes Will to an [[spoiler:occult ritual]] to try to achieve this effect, hoping it will inspire him or allow him to glimpse hell. It goes about as well as you would expect.
52	* HistoricalDomainCharacter: Majority of the cast of characters, including cameos from Sir Walter Raleigh, Sir Francis Bacon and Dr. John Dee.
53	* HistoricalVillainUpgrade: In real life, [[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Southwell_(Jesuit) Robert Southwell]] was a Jesuit poet who was eventually captured by Topcliffe, tortured, imprisoned for years, and martyred without betraying his fellow missionaries. All that's really known about his connection to Shakespeare is a letter in which he criticizes the poetry of a "W.S." for not being focused enough on God. In the series, Southwell is a manipulative, cowardly, selfish hypocrite who not only treats his cousin Will cruelly when he refuses to [[spoiler:risk his and his family's lives by getting involved in the Catholic underground movement,]] but also [[spoiler:regularly lets people die for him with little effort to prevent it and even sacrifices Alice to save himself when their safe house is raided by Topcliffe.]] Oh yeah--and the real Southwell is also a canonized saint.
54	* HoistByHisOwnPetard: In the finale, [[spoiler:Topcliffe invites his superiors to watch Will's commissioned play and proudly proclaims the main character to be based on himself. The only issue: the play in question is {{Theatre/Richard III}}, and the officials are horrified by Will's depraved portrayal of the man, even going so far as to cancel Topcliffe's upcoming promotion.]]
55	* HomoeroticSubtext: There's some major BelligerentSexualTension going on between Will and Kit Marlowe.
56	* IDidntMeanToTurnYouOn: After some goading from Kit (channelling his inner [[Theatre/DoctorFaustus Mephistopheles]]) slightly drunk Will grabs him by the shirt and throws him on the table, getting right in his face. Kit, being Kit, ''loves'' this while Will appears to have something of a [[AmbiguouslyBi sexuality]] [[StupidSexyFlanders crisis]].
57	* IDontWantToRuinOurFriendship: Richard's reason for not pursuing a relationship with Molly.
58	* IllegalReligion: A major plot point.
59	* IncompatibleOrientation: Richard believes this to be the case when his attempts at wooing Emilia fall flat. There are some implications that he might be onto something.
60	* ItWillNeverCatchOn: "Who would want a play by William Shakespeare?"
61	* KickTheDog: Topcliffe's snide exchange with Presto in episode 1 after he [[spoiler:turns in Will as a Catholic]]--the guy is a high-ranking official of the queen and could certainly have afforded to pay Presto as a reward, but instead just equivocates his way out of it.
62	* LadykillerInLove: How Richard's feelings for Molly are presented.
63	* LeavingYouToFindMyself: [[spoiler:Alice during the last few minutes of the finale.]]
64	* LoveObstructingParents: The Burbages, for understandable reasons.
65	* MakingLoveInAllTheWrongPlaces: [[spoiler:Will and Alice]] have ''loud'' sex in Hell, a.k.a. the space under the stage. While her mother is showing her would-be suitor around in the theatre.
66	* ManipulativeBastard: For such an earnest guy, Will can be this just as much as Kit is, managing to succesfully play both [[spoiler:Topcliffe]] and Kit himself during the course of the series.
67	* MrFanservice/[[ShamelessFanserviceGirl Shameless Fanservice Guy]]: Kit appears in the buff in more than one episode. Other characters generally fail to [[PleasePutSomeClothesOn ask him to put some clothes on]], even when his nudity might be considered inappropriate for the situation.
68	* TheMuse: [[spoiler:Alice for Will, Emerson for Kit.]]
69	* NiceJobBreakingItHero: [[spoiler:Will breaks Alice's heart at her mother's request, thinking that it would prevent her from throwing her life away for their affair. It actually drives her right into Father Southwell's dangerous cause and leads her to convert to Catholicism, eventually getting captured and tortured by Topcliffe. Then, she decides to leave her family and the theater to flee the country with Father Southwell. Definitely not the effect that Will or Mrs. Burbage had in mind.]]
70	* ObfuscatingStupidity: Will pretends to be too simple to write a Southwell-bashing play for Topcliffe.
71	* OneTrueLove: Will considers [[spoiler:Alice]] to be this to him.
72	* ParentalSubstitute: [[spoiler:Will to Presto]] during the last few episodes.
73	* PosthumousCharacter: Will's martyred uncle, who spends his time as a ghost berating his nephew for his various misdeeds and lapsed Catholicism. It's unclear whether the ghost is real or just Will's hallucination.
74	* PurelyAestheticEra: Mixes 1970s glam rock/punk music and aesthetics with the Elizabethan era in similar manner as ''Film/AKnightsTale''.
75	* RevengeBeforeReason: Presto declares that he will [[spoiler:kill Topcliffe after he murders his sister]], despite the fact that it would probably get himself killed. Will talks him out of it, and then proceeds to [[spoiler:do the [[{{Hypocrite}} exact same thing]] when he finds out that Alice was tortured. Luckily she convinces him to stick with his plan to discredit Topcliffe instead.]]
76	* ShoutOutToShakespeare: Obviously.
77	* ShowWithinAShow: Pretty hard to avoid in a series about a famous playwright. Most notably used in the finale.
78	* ShownTheirWork: Despite some (often very deliberate) anachronisms, the show is very well researched, often delving into lesser known facts or theories about the period and the life of its titular character.
79	* SpookySeance: Episode 4 contains a hell-raising variation of this, as entertainment for the School of Night. It's not quite [[ArtisticLicenseHistory historically accurate]], as the real John Dee would be horrified by such a base display of magic and the real Edward Kelley, in addition to never being a part of the School of Night, was in Prague at the time the show is set, but it's a delightfully disturbing sequence.
80	* StalkerWithACrush: Kit certainly comes across as this at times.
81	* StarCrossedLovers
82	* SweetPollyOliver: Alice often dresses as a boy for safety and convenience, possibly inspiring some of Will's female characters.
83	* TheFundamentalist: Topcliffe, without a doubt. The show hints that he may be HidingBehindReligion as well in order to justify his sadistic love of torture.
84	** Father Southwell is an example of a somewhat milder version of this trope.
85	* TraumaCongaLine: Essentially what the last five episodes are--and it applies to almost every major character. Will, Alice, Presto, Kit, Richard... Apparently 16th century London was a bit of a mess.
86	* VeryLooselyBasedOnATrueStory: The show could be said to be doing the same thing to Shakespeare's life as he himself did to many historical characters that predated him.
87	* WellIntentionedExtremist: Robert Southwell.
88	* WritersBlockMontage: Kit has considerable trouble inspiring ''Theatre/DoctorFaustus'' out of himself.
89	* YouAreWorthHell: [[spoiler:Kit to his lover, who he calls "my king".]]

Context Series / Will