Entertainment

King Simon Dies On 'The Royals,' Who Killed Him?

by Keertana Sastry

Excuse me as I continue to recuperate guys, because The Royals Season 1 finale has completely blown my mind. Forget Game of Thrones and the Mad Men series finale for a second (just for a second! I love those shows, too!), The Royals just packed literal fighting, scheming, lying, backstabbing, corruption, love, a surprise pregnancy, a horrible death, and about 10,000 cliffhangers all into one episode. How is that even possible? First things first the worst news: King Simon finally succumbed to his wounds and passed away, which means Cyrus is now King. But here's the thing: Liam and Eleanor could still be Simon's children. And to top it all off, we still don't have a confirmed answer as to who killed King Simon, though the evidence does seem to point to Cyrus. Even Liam thinks so as he literally beat his uncle to a bloody pulp before being forced to stop thanks to his father's death.

So did Cyrus do it? Or could it be someone else entirely? Let's start by dissecting what we do know about Cyrus' plans to get the throne. We know he bribed the royal doctor to not test Liam and Eleanor's blood against King Simon's and yet still declare they weren't his children (then Cyrus threatens him & makes him leave the country). We know that Cyrus has always been jealous of his brother as evidenced by his many lines of dialogue suggesting this as well as the time he almost shot his brother in the back of the head while hunting. Cyrus' own mother doesn't trust him (and knows about his jealousy of King Simon). And finally we know that Cyrus doesn't mind giving the order to kill people as he had Queen Helena's lover Alistair killed. We also now know that Prudence is pregnant with Cyrus' baby but that's beside the point. So all signs seem to point to Cyrus right?

There could be another figure at play: Lucius, Queen Helena's personal assistant. Lucius is the one who carries out now-King Cyrus' order to have Alistair killed, at least he brings two hired gunmen with him to do the job he would never do with his bare hands. What's more he keeps the whole thing a secret from Queen Helena, a woman I could have sworn he cared more for than anyone else in the world. Plus, he has spied on people regularly like he did when Liam was telling Eleanor his plan to abolish the monarchy if he were to be king. And he has no respect for most people aside from, it seems, Queen Helena and now-King Cyrus.

The biggest piece of evidence that Lucius could at least be capable of killing King Simon is from the finale alone. Left by himself at the King's bedside, Lucius takes a look at Robert and says "Abolition is a coward's move" and looks as though he's about to strangle him as Tom Pryce (Ophelia's father & palace head of security) comes in to give Lucius the message that he's needed by the Queen. So even if he wasn't involved in the initial stabbing of King Simon (I still think if Cyrus didn't have this done, then a potentially complicated corruption storyline involving Domino could be the culprit), then maybe he did something to Simon while he was in a coma that caused him to die. There's something sinister about Lucius, and I intend to find out what it is. Season 2 returns in November according to the season finale's end credits. November can't come soon enough.

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