Much as I like to keep an array of Georgette Heyers and Catherine Cooksons on my shelves for succour at times of mental hardship, so too I like to keep a romantical televisual endeavour or two tucked away on my watchlist. There have been many depredations upon both media in the godforsaken year of 2020. I have read everything from Regency Ponce to A Bathful of Clinkers, and watched everything Amy Sherman-Palladino ever breathed upon and Outlander twice, even though him in the kilt does nothing for me sexually at all. That’s the extremis 2020 has us in.
Bookwise, I am now staring down the barrel of Barbara Cartland and things were looking almost equally as bleak on the watchlist. But then, like a knight on a white charger, came the discovery of Virgin River, and the release of its second season on Netflix.
I mainlined most of the first series during the Priti Patel bullying saga, and used the remainder to distract myself from Boris Johnson’s rendering of collated international scientific fact and expert recommendation as “’Tis the season to be jolly careful”. The premise is unashamedly simple. Mel Monroe (Alexandra Breckenridge), a warm-hearted and unthreateningly beautiful nurse practitioner and midwife, leaves her job in LA for one in the sleepy, close-knit town of Virgin River. She is burdened by a Secret Sorrow.
Despite this, her lovely hair and loving nature, plus her ability to look after the babies people birth, abandon and stumble upon with such astonishing frequency that the name Virgin River starts to take on a faintly mocking air by episode six, soon she becomes a beloved part of the community. She even eventually wins over the irascible doctor (Tim Matheson) of the sleepy, close-knit town of Virgin River, who at first resented her arrival. His ex-wife, the gossipy but loving and warmhearted Mayor Hope McCrea, hired her without his knowledge, you see, because she knew he needed help even though he couldn’t admit it. And she wasn’t about to let the sleepy-knit, close townspeople of Virgin River suffer from one man’s stubbornness (overlaying a secretly lovehearted and warm nature), no sirree, Bob! Hope is played by Annette O’Toole, who after a decade spent keeping everything shipshape as Martha Kent in 10 seasons of Smallville is your go-to woman for such a role, and it looks like she is enjoying herself hugely.
Romantical possibilities (!) are offered by barman Jack (Martin Henderson), a former marine haunted by the things he has seen and done in Iraq, but upon whom the healing powers of the town are gradually working. But! He – or at least a part of him, not his heart – is involved with Charmaine. He confesses his love for Mel but before he and his part can fully disentangle themselves from Charmaine, she falls pregnant. I do hope Mel, the only nurse practitioner-midwife in town doesn’t find herself having to set her feelings aside and care for her as conscientiously as she would any other patient, in series two.
Intrigue (!) is supplied by energetic and entrepreneurial fellow newcomer Paige (Lexa Doig) who runs the bakery truck (this is a thing in Virgin River; other sleepy, close-knit towns may vary), never talks about her past, and has a driving licence in another name. Jack’s best friend and fellow former marine Preacher (Colin Lawrence) keeps a warmly loving eye on her, though, and I sometimes wonder if he won’t prove to be somehow the exact antithesis of whatever it is she is running from.
No spoilers re Mel’s Secret Sorrow or Paige’s mystery, because a) I promise you, you have already guessed absolutely accurately, and b) I do recommend that you enjoy it for yourselves.
As for season two: well, my darlings, it’s … more, absolutely, of the same! Mel DOES have to set her feelings aside and care for her as conscientiously as she would any other patient! Paige and Preacher’s relationship develops, as does Hope and Doc’s (the latter as comic relief). There are more minor medical crises! And everything remains charming, good hearted, solidly made, stolidly paced and altogether restorative to one’s fractured mind and splintered spirit in these wretched times. An Oxycontin addict occasionally intrudes, but nothing in Virgin River ever goes really violently or irredeemably wrong. I even have faith that despite Mel’s fear of loving a man again, and Jack’s marine-guilt, they will find their way to happiness together. These are not rushing rapids. It’s Dawson’s Creek for broken grownups. Follow the winding Virgin River to the sea of comfort that awaits.
