The Gilded Age Season 3 Review

The United States, 1882. The nineteenth century is drawing to a close, but the past is not so willing to step aside. This is the story of two very different families living in houses across the street from one another. Under the roof of the wealthy widow Agnes van Rhijn live her overly kind-hearted sister Ada, her melancholic son Oscar, and her dreamy niece Marian. And in the neighboring mansion stands the Russell family estate, ruled by financial magnate George together with the calculating and ambitious Bertha. They care for their promising son Larry and their daughter Gladys, who really ought to be married off soon (preferably to some kind of king). Mrs. Russell desperately wants to win a place in high society, but the aristocracy has no desire to welcome self-made nouveau riche upstarts into their ranks.

But history moves forward regardless, and now the balance of power has changed. Agnes, having fallen from grace, is no longer the main authority in her own home; Aunt Ada expresses her grief in rather peculiar ways; and young Marian is afraid to begin a new relationship after the failure of her previous one. Oscar suffers from the consequences of his reckless actions (on top of the secret he has shamefully hidden his entire life) — and things are not going too smoothly next door either: George Russell intends to reshape the American landscape and build a railroad connecting the country’s three largest states, but the miners on the purchased lands are not prepared to surrender without a fight. Meanwhile, Bertha’s latest scheme surprises even her husband: the enterprising wife wants to marry her daughter off to an impoverished English duke, though the girl’s heart clearly belongs to someone else entirely.

So what on earth are they supposed to do now?

A continuation of an excellent series that not only hasn’t lost its grip, but seems to have become even better in the details. “The Gilded Age” is for those who find “Bridgerton” too frivolous and anachronistic, for those who miss realistic late nineteenth-century settings, and simply for anyone longing for the spirit of “old television” wrapped in modern packaging.

There are no bright colors here, no carefully choreographed dances to orchestral Sabrina Carpenter covers, no gigantic sets or cinematic scale. Even the special effects are occasionally so conditional they nearly undermine the dramatic tension. But none of that matters. By its third season, “The Gilded Age” has firmly established itself as a solid and captivating historical drama whose continuation you’ll eagerly await.

As before, the story focuses on the characters and their development. The stiff-necked Agnes tries to rein in her pride; the simple-hearted Ada learns once again how to live alone (while also becoming head of the household); friends from different backgrounds, Marian and Peggy, prepare to open their hearts to men after traumatic past experiences. Bertha Russell once again builds intricate schemes to help her husband gain influence and to elevate herself into the eyes of society as a noble lady, but the calculations driven by her concern begin to fail and only push away those she is trying to protect.

Perhaps this season is not as spectacular as the previous ones, and there are almost no cameo appearances from historical figures on the scale of Oscar Wilde or Thomas Edison (unless you count Mrs. Astor, Ward McAllister, and the editor of Fortune, who were all real people). But it’s worth remembering that even the fictional main characters were not invented from scratch by the writers: Bertha Russell, for example, is based on Alva Vanderbilt, the wife of railroad magnate Vanderbilt, who was also rejected by high society; her husband George is a blend of Alva’s husband and Jay Gould, the corporate tycoon who fought stubborn labor unions even more ruthlessly than Russell does in the series. And their daughter Gladys… let’s just say the real story was EVEN sadder than the one shown here.

So “The Gilded Age” is far from being just a fantasy about bygone days twenty years before the Great War and the other horrors of the twentieth century. It is a true television novel, drawing on real history not merely for its setting, but for the authenticity of its portrait of an era when people were only beginning to think about things now familiar to us, such as women’s suffrage or equality regardless of skin color. A fictional story inspired by the lives of real people during a fascinating period that became the precursor to our own.

It is a portrait of late nineteenth-century America, where the old collided with the new, where the “new rich” were ready to compete with hereditary aristocracy, where a simple footman could suddenly become wealthy, and a trusting broker could lose everything. A land of opportunity, a time of upheaval, an age of transformation.

Rating: 8/10, very достойно. An old-fashioned thing made according to the standards of modern драматургия: beautiful, engaging, and fast-paced.

A one-hundred-percent recommendation — even your mom will like it.

P.S. The new season has already been written and is almost finished filming; its premiere was announced just the other day — we’re expecting it at the end of 2026. So very soon we’ll once again return to the tiny New York of the late nineteenth century and see for ourselves exactly how the battle between past and future unfolds in a time when everything was changing far too quickly. Surprisingly modern conflict, wouldn’t you say?