Everyone in this is either an arsehole or a ninny. I had hopes for Isabella, and she is the best of the bunch, but she lost me entirely when she asked for forgiveness for the man who a) raped her (so he thought) and b) murdered her brother (so she thought). There's turning the other cheek and then there's being the biggest doormat in Vienna. I can only hope that ambiguous ending means she's ditching these foul people to go back to the convent, but, as I said, doormat. She's probably going to end up married to the Duke, with Fucking Angelo simpering at her over the dinner table while he tells her how doing his level best to ruin her life has made him a better man.

Angelo, let's face it, is only believable when he's being the puritanical, repressed, sadistic villain that he is. His pretend remorse (because I cannot take said remorse seriously given that it instantly appears at the very moment he's caught out by someone with the power to execute him for his actions) is deeply, deeply unconvincing. And as genuinely compelling as the fifth act was (despite all this bullshit, before this last act the play was risking single stardom) it doesn't make up for Shakespeare thinking people should be able to swallow that turn-on-a-dime tripe like his ridiculous characters do.