Tony Gets Shafted in the ‘Rivals’ Season 2 Premiere
A spoonful of sugar isn’t enough for the dose of medicine Tony has to eat as 'Rivals' returns.
Tony Baddingham is alive and kicking; long live Lord Baddingham. Rivals returns for Season 2, like a diseased sheep crashing headlong into a gate, picking up mere moments after the Season 1 cliffhanger. Baddingham lies on the floor in a pool of his own blood, having been brained by a TV award by Cameron after he slapped her. As Uncensored girls Beattie and Sarah get us caught up on Tony’s condition on the evening broadcast, we’re treated to the minutes after Cameron made a run for it, as Tony is found in his office by Joyce and Ginger just as he revives, while Cameron arrives to find Rupert just as he’s walking away from his tender goodbye with Taggie.
Lord Baddingham is AWOL (at least for now) at the Corinium offices, as is Cameron, which leaves Freddie and Declan’s Venturer project free to pursue the idea of putting live polo on broadcast with the upcoming Rutshire Cup final. We are treated to a pool party at Freddie and Val’s, with some very fit polo players for Taggie and Caitlin to ogle, though it’s Tony’s brother, Bas, who’s really caught Taggie’s eye. It helps that everyone is talking about Rupert’s past sexploits, his one-night-stands turned four-night-stands, as the assumed reason for his absence, reminding her she’s just another notch in the bedpost.
The party breaks up when the polo players (and Patrick) get drunk enough to start skinny dipping, despite (or perhaps due to) Val having a complete meltdown over it. By then, Taggie’s hit sad-drunk and confesses to her siblings about Rupert kissing her before he disappeared, refusing to believe Basil’s cutting remarks that he’s elsewhere bedding another.
Foolish girl; Bas has the right of it, of course, as the scene moves to Rupert’s remote estate in Devon, where the emotionally stunted manchild and Cameron are currently going at it. He’s been hiding her here, keeping her occupied while the dust settles, because he promised to keep her safe. As for Tony, he arrives home with a giant bandage around his head, his family tightly huddled around him as he slowly makes his way inside. He claims he doesn’t remember anything (and with a TBI, that could very well be true). But Monica knows her husband too well; of course, he remembers everything, and he’s already got Ginger on the case.
The best part about Rivals is that it is willing to go full big budget with an extended sequence where Evil Tony, in a helicopter, chases Rupert as he rides along the cliffs on his motorbike. It’s a stunning sequence worthy of a James Bond film (RIP James Bond), genuinely dangerous as Tony drives Rupert far enough away from the estate to give himself time to collect Cameron before he can make it back up the hill.
But for my money, the heart of the series is Declan and Maud, the married couple who actually love each other. Their “Are ye dancin’?” scene in the high-end salon, as Sade (played by Brooke Combe) sings in the background, is the heartfelt emulsifier that holds this frothy confection together. Until, of course, they’re screaming at each other again, which happens just as soon as the endorphins wear off. Maud throws him out of her hotel room naked as the day he was born (save for a well-placed box of Kellogg’s Crunchy Nut Cornflakes).
Speaking of Tony and his dramatic helicopter entrance, it turns out he’s not taking Cameron far; just to the Corinium offices, where he gives her an offer she can’t refuse: a custom-fitted black and red Chanel right off the runway with matching shoes. Accept it, return to her place in the hierarchy, and give him the win over Rupert by staying with the company. It probably isn’t proper to cheer her acceptance, but damn does she look good.
Joyce and Ginger are a touch uncomfortable when Tony tells everyone his accident was falling down the stairs, and declares Cameron’s conspicuous absence while he was gone was her “studying the opposition.” (Well, that’s one way to describe it.) That evening, Charles, still in double agent mode, has to break it to Rupert that Cameron seems to be willingly back on Corinium. He does not mention the shout-out Tony gave him for holding down the fort in her absence in favor of the more important revelation that Corinium will now also be filming the Rutshire Cup final at the Hampshire Estate in an attempt to cockblock Venturer.
I appreciate that the series has James Vereker run down the rules of polo for the Americans in the audience, if for no other reason than it gives Sarah reasons to correct him in utter disgust. However, her crabbiness is definitely due to hormones, as she proceeds to vomit all over him in the middle of taping. Beattie, of course, confirms she’s pregnant, even if none of the men around them have figured it out. Unfortunately, Tony’s big surprise at the end of the match was supposed to be Sarah parachuting out of a small airplane. There’s just no way she can, as nauseous as she is, forcing her to confess her condition to him and Deirdre. Tony would prefer that she get rid of it and says as much, casually threatening her job. However, his tune changes when she informs him it’s his, from their little knockabout in Season 1. Oops.
The polo game is, as Caitlin rightly observes, really just an excuse to watch hot men be shirtless on horses, so of course, the opposing team (the Jones Jets) is comprised of the Venturer boys – Bas, Rupert, Freddie, Henry, etc. – as underdogs against the champion Remington Steelers. The Jones Jets win (natch!) with Rupert scoring the goal of the game. That’s not the only way Rupert scores, either. The moment she gets Tony on tape declaring his injury was an accident, all his own fault, Cameron calls cut, walks over with a smile, thanks him for clearing her name and avoiding scandal for his family, and then marches across the field to Rupert and plants one on his mouth.
Of course, this all happens just in time for the parachute jump, now being performed by poor Deirdre. At first, it seems like one thing has gone Tony’s way, as the parachute opens with the Corinium logo, much to Declan’s irritation. But then Deirdre is blown right into a tree, whereupon the parachute gives way, dropping her several stories to the ground, screaming. The footage that airs later on TV turns out to be Venturer’s, including poor Deirdre’s fall, as the announcer guffaws, gleefully calling it “the footage Tony Baddingham doesn’t want you to see.” It is an absolute humiliation, and Monica is not here for it. When Tony arrives home, she gives him what for, promising that, as his wife, she has the power to humiliate him far more than any mistress ever could.
Rupert is now back with Cameron for the whole world to see, leaving Taggie heartbroken as she tries to cope while helping her mother host the afterparty. Lizzie wasn’t wrong about her needing to find someone less complicated to love (even if Lizzie isn’t exactly following her own advice with Freddie). At least Taggie can say she held her head high as she told Rupert to take his apologies and get out of her kitchen. Even if sending him home with Cameron means that they’re both there to discover Tony has broken into the house to threaten them before marching off into the night.
Dangly Bits & Bobs
- Seb and Dommie Carlile are actually characters from Jilly Cooper’s Polo, a nice glimpse of the extended Rivals universe Disney+ has hinted it’s aiming to create.
- The Gerald-Charles-Muffy threesome totally makes up for Archie losing both partners from last season. Did he not expect siblings to talk? Also, I am here for all Archie-and-Caitlin mess.
- Why are the guys from Four Men Went to Mow in costume at the Corinium meeting?
- I would totally watch Master Dog. I am glad it’s coming back.
- Mike Maples: “I’ve never been so poor or so happy.” Poor man.
- Funniest Moment goes to Val, claiming her son made it into Eton on the back of his exam results, and the uproarious laughter that follows.
- Best Outfit goes to Cameron for her red-and-white revenge suit at the Polo game.
Rivals Season 2 Episodes 1 through 3 are streaming on Disney+ and Hulu. Episodes from Season 2, Part 1 will continue weekly on Fridays through mid-June 2026. Part 2 will premiere in the latter half of 2026. Season 1 is available to stream on Hulu and Disney+.
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