From what I can tell, the British media doesn’t care if their criticisms of Netflix’s Harry & Meghan docuseries don’t make any sense. They’re mad that the series isn’t scandalous enough, all while being scandalized over every little thing. They’re mad that the series is trashing QEII’s life and legacy while also crowing about how it’s nowhere near as bad as they thought. They’re mad that Meghan and Harry are rich and living independently, while the “good royals” are welfare queens. It’s been a hectic week, what will all of the briefings from royal sources insisting that royal sources never brief. Thankfully, Katie Nicholl at Vanity Fair had a big update over there in Upside Down Opposite World: Prince William and Kate “refused to watch” the docuseries and they’re keeping calm and carrying on. Clearly, given the number of incandescent-with-rage leaks from William.

Prince William and Princess Kate refused to watch Harry & Meghan, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s docuseries, when it dropped on Netflix at 8 a.m. local time on Thursday morning and instead took their children to school. Aides say the couple will carry out business as usual with King Charles and Queen Consort Camilla also carrying out diary engagements and avoiding the eagerly awaited launch of the controversial document series.

One senior palace aide told Vanity Fair it was a case of “keep calm and carry on” and “business as usual” at the palace and despite reports that aides are braced to comment, no public announcements are expected from Buckingham Palace today.

“There has been a lot of hype but there is not going to be a comment at every twist and turn,” a royal source said. “It’s business as usual and keep calm and carry on.”

While aides will be watching the series closely, along with the royals’ lawyers, the palace are reluctant to comment on the show because they don’t want to feed what has become a media frenzy.

Netflix has yet to announce the ratings for its global screening of the first three episodes of the show for which Harry and Meghan were paid a blockbuster 100 million dollars.

Buckingham Palace has so far refused to comment on the series but there has been controversy over whether it was contacted for comment ahead of transmission. The show opened with a statement from Netflix saying that the palace declined to comment, however, the palace say that while they were contacted for comment, it was from a third party and that when they tried to verify the email with Archewell and Netflix they did not get a response.

“In the absence of this verification, we were unable to provide any response. The substance of the email we received also did not address the entire series,” a source said.

[From Vanity Fair]

A few things. One, William has been screeching down the phone “TELL THEM I’M KEEPING CALM AND CARRYING ON.” Two, why are we constantly being told that both William and Kate take their kids to school together? Is it because they live apart?? Three, why do they have to brief Kate’s hagiographer that they “refuse to watch it”? Four, it’s pissing me off that the reporting is that the Sussexes were “paid $100 million for the series.” Their Netflix contract is to produce and create content, their contract is more than just “here’s $100 million for one docuseries.”

And lastly, it’s so, so funny that we went from Buckingham Palace and Kensington Palace huffing and puffing about how Netflix lied about contacting them and within hours, BP and KP had to walk back their lies. Initially, they didn’t say sh-t about verifying an email (they are such dipsh-ts, my god) – they flat-out said they had not been contacted.

Photos courtesy of Cover Images, Backgrid, Buckingham Palace.