Since 2017, Netflix has constructed a Christmas rom-com cinematic universe, which now includes more than a dozen films, but its twin anchors are a pair of royal-themed trilogies set in the present day.
Conjuring up the raw materials the plots demand — monarchies and picturesque snowy villages — has forced Netflix to invent two European countries: Aldovia (where a New York journalist meets her “Christmas Prince”) and Belgravia (where Vanessa Hudgens’ baker character agrees to a “Princess Switch” with her royal doppelganger).
Neither of these is meant to be more than a stage set for the female fantasy of putting on a pretty dress and dancing with a prince in a cozy Christmas castle. But as a male history nerd whose wife forced him to watch these terrible movies, my mind immediately went to a very different place.
Behind all that cocoa-sipping…
