'The Count of Monte Cristo' Recap: Episode 1

The Count of Monte Cristo airs Sundays at 9:00 pm on WTTW and is available to stream. Recap the following episode.
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“I was robbed of 15 years of my life. The only woman I ever loved was taken from me in that time. And now I want revenge.” So says Edmond Dantès in a confessional to a priest. How he will find vengeance is a story for later episodes. For now, we must learn how he was wronged.

The trouble started during a journey to Constantinople undertaken by the ship the Pharaon. As the ship neared the end of its voyage at Marseille, its captain Leclère neared death. In the midst of a storm, Leclère made Edmond the new captain from his deathbed, despite the objections of the cargomaster Danglars. Leclère then confidentially entrusted Edmond with a letter to be delivered to someone in Paris. 

When the Pharaon makes it back safely to Marseille, its owner Morrel accepts the late Leclère’s promotion of Edmond to captain. After all, Edmond has worked for Morrel since he was a child, and this was Danglars’ first voyage for him. 

Edmond rushes off to his fiancée Mercédès, who thought him dead since the Pharaon arrived home a month late. We must marry before you leave again, she tells Edmond. 

Her cousin Fernand, a lieutenant now that he has returned from the military academy, would rather they didn’t. He believes it is his destiny to marry Mercédès, especially since they are both Catalan. He and Danglars commiserate over their shared enemy of Edmond, and Danglars shares that he overheard Leclère giving a letter to Edmond. Perhaps Danglars and Fernand can use this against him.

Leclère was in the navy and knew Napoleon Bonaparte, who has been exiled to Elba. Leclère added a stop at Elba to the Pharaon’s voyage. So Danglars suspects the letter is from Napoleon, and Bonapartists are now considered treasonous. 

Danglars and Fernand pen a letter to the local prosecutor warning that Edmond is carrying a letter on behalf of the exiled emperor. But the innkeeper Caderousse overhears them scheming and objects. Danglars crumples the letter, throws it towards the fire, and leaves. Fernand retrieves it, ignoring Caderousse’s admonition not to do anything stupid. 

The deputy prosecutor is the ambitious Gérard de Villefort, who has followed the changing politics and dropped his father’s name because of his father’s sympathies for Napoleon. Villefort is also marrying Renée, the daughter of well-connected monarchists – anti-Bonapartists. So when he receives the anonymous letter denouncing Edmond, he sends an inspector to bring him in for questioning.

Edmond is celebrating his engagement to Mercédès in a party sponsored by Morrel, who also gifts the couple a purse with a handsome sum of money. Edmond hands it to his father for safekeeping. 

Fernand dances with Mercédès and urges her a last time to marry him instead of Edmond, listing his prospects as a military officer. She abandons him, disgusted. Danglars finds him and asks what he did with the letter – Caderousse told Danglars that Fernand retrieved it. Fernand explains that it has made its way to Villefort.

Edmond tells Mercédès that he has to deliver Leclère’s letter to Paris and suggests that she join him, as a honeymoon. She gives him a pocket watch that reminds her of her father. They are to be married the next day.

But then the inspector and his men appear and arrest Edmond, who insists that there must be a mistake that will be cleared up. Morrel and Mercédès follow him to the prosecutor and anxiously wait outside. Fernand and Danglars intercept Caderousse, who has realized what has happened, and threaten him with death if he ever reveals what he knows. 

Villefort questions Edmond. Someone is intent on getting you in trouble, he warns. Edmond admits that Leclère visited Napoleon but Edmond did not join him; he hands over the letter, which he has not opened. Villefort reads it and says it could have caused great harm to the king. But Edmond is innocent; Villefort lets him go. 

As Edmond is leaving, Villefort asks him to whom he was to deliver the letter. Edmond tells him: Noirtier. It is Villefort’s own father, whose name he has dropped. Villefort burns the letter and gives the inspector escorting Edmond new orders.

Villefort knows that if it were revealed that his father were scheming to overthrow the king with Napoleon, as the letter suggests, his own career would be over. So he destroys the evidence and silences Edmond by sending him to the notorious prison Chateau d’If on an island off Marseille. 

Morrel has left Mercédès to speak to the police commissioner, so she is the only one there when Edmond emerges from the prosecutor’s office, thinking he is being sent back to the engagement party as a free man. She follows the carriage, surprised to see it turn towards the port, then watches as Edmond is put on a boat and rowed away – to where, the inspector will not tell her.

Villefort acquires a letter of introduction from his future father-in-law and sets off for Paris. He meets his father and tells him about the letter found on Edmond; his father denounces Villefort for his ambition and says that Napoleon has already left Elba and is marching north towards Paris, gathering an army along the way.

While Edmond is admitted without a trial to the Chateau d’If as a spy for Napoleon, his friends on the mainland try to determine what has happened. The inspector tells Morrel he doesn’t know about any boat, despite what Mercédès saw. Fernand speaks to his commanding officer on Mercédès’ behalf and tells her that Edmond has been charged with treason and taken to the Chateau d’If. No one ever returns from there alive.