'The Count of Monte Cristo' Recap: Episode 2

The Count of Monte Cristo airs Sundays at 9:00 pm on WTTW and is available to stream. Recap the previous and following episodes.
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Months into his unjust imprisonment in the formidable Chateau d’If on an island off Marseille, Edmond Dantès tries to convince a prison inspector to release him. Edmond is being accused of being a spy for Napoleon Bonaparte; since Napoleon has marched on Paris and become emperor again, as Edmond has heard from a guard, shouldn’t Edmond be considered a hero?

But the inspector laughs: Napoleon only lasted a hundred days before being defeated at Waterloo and sent into exile once again. The king has been restored.

Edmond tries another tactic: he is innocent. The deputy prosecutor Villefort said as much to him. 

It doesn’t work.

Edmond is one of only two prisoners in the dungeon. It takes ten years for him to meet the other one. The Abbé Faria has been imprisoned for his writings for 14 years, a long time in which to harness his learning in secret. He has acquired the means for a lamp, a sewing needle, and a chisel. He has spent seven years tunneling through the walls with the latter, but ended up in Edmond’s cell instead of outside, as he had planned. He hides the chunks of rock he excavates in his waste bucket, which is emptied regularly without inspection.

It has been days since Edmond has eaten when the Abbé arrives in his cell; he has given up hope and wants to die, and the prison governor is ready to let him. The Abbé asks Edmond to begin eating again, in order to regain strength to help them both escape by continuing the tunnel. Revitalized, Edmond agrees, and suggests digging towards the courtyard, where they can tie up the guards and escape. It’s a sheer drop to the water if they dig towards an outer wall.

And so Edmond and the Abbé continue the painstaking work of tunneling. The Abbé shares his widespread knowledge of everything from aristocratic manners to medicine to literature with Edmond during rest periods. If they’re ever overheard talking, the Abbé pretends he’s muttering to himself.

Out in the free world, Edmond’s father has died. And Edmond’s friends believe Edmond himself is dead. His employer Morrel visited the deputy prosecutor Villefort for information; Villefort lied and told Morrel that Edmond had hung himself in the Chateau d’If during his imprisonment. Edmond’s fiancée Mercédès has become a countess and left Marseille. Edmond’s rival Danglars, co-engineer of Edmond’s downfall, has also left Marseille to work for a bank in Madrid, still smarting that Morrel did not promote him to captain of the Pharaon even after Edmond was arrested.

Tunneling through thick stone walls in secret is dangerous work. Edmond nearly dies when the tunnel collapses on him, sealing him in without oxygen. Fortunately, the Abbé excavates him before he perishes. The Abbé also helps Edmond realize why he has been sent to the Chateau d’If. Villefort is not a champion of Edmond’s innocence, as Edmond thought, but rather his downfall. The Abbé recognizes the name of Noirtier – the man to whom Edmond was supposed to bring a treasonous letter – as a Bonapartist who dropped the “Villefort” from his name. The Abbé surmises – correctly – that the royalist prosecutor Villefort wanted to prevent damage to his own reputation and thus sent Edmond to prison for life, where he could never tell anyone. 

Edmond curses Villefort, praying that he lives long enough for Edmond to meet him again and enact revenge, even as the Abbé warns against vengeance. 

After five years of toil, Edmond and the Abbé are finally close enough to escape that they can hear the guards in the courtyard through the end of their tunnel. In ten days, in the dead of night, they can finally break through to freedom. 

But then the Abbé has a stroke. He tells Edmond he will have to escape on his own, something the younger prisoner refuses to do. The Abbé also shares a piece of parchment he found in his employer’s library before being imprisoned. It appeared blank, so he threw it into the fire – but then words written in invisible ink appeared. 

The parchment is a map to a treasure hidden on the island of Monte Cristo by a cardinal 300 years ago. The cardinal and his son were both killed by their rival, the pope; knowledge of the treasure was lost. The Abbé is convinced it is still there. He bequeaths the treasure to Edmond.

As Edmond tries to help the Abbé recover before their escape, the Abbé also urges Edmond to find and marry Mercédès, whose gift of a pocketwatch Edmond still has, a tether of hope to the free world. 

Before their escape, the Abbé dies. Edmond hears the guards check on him, the prison’s governor burning his foot to make sure he is not faking it. After the guards sew the Abbé’s body into a sack, they head off to dinner before disposing of his body.

Edmond rips the sack open and closes his friend’s eyes. He then hauls the Abbé to his own cell and puts him in his bed, cutting his own hair and placing it over the Abbé’s head so that the corpse appears to be Edmond sleeping. He then returns to the Abbé’s cell, closes up the tunnel, and sews himself into the sack.

The guards return and pick the sack up with a living Edmond inside. They tie a cannonball to his feet and toss him into the ocean. Edmond cuts himself free of the sack and cannonball and begins the long swim to shore.

Because he has forgotten to leave out his bowl to be retrieved for food, a guard goes into his cell and finds the Abbé’s body. Confused, he summons the governor. The governor eventually discovers the tunnel and realizes what has happened. He orders the cannons fired in alarm. But Edmond has already made it to shore.