‘The Crown’ Season 5 Review: Queen Elizabeth II’s Death, Historical Sleights Of Hand, & Controversy Hobble Series’ Return

deadline.com:

SPOILER ALERT: This review contains details of the fifth season of The Crown, which debuts all 10-episodes on Netflix on November 9 “Don’t want to break any rules,” exclaims Imelda Staunton’s Queen Elizabeth II about halfway through the fifth and penultimate season of The Crown.

The latest incantation of the now deceased monarch in Peter Morgan’s Netflix drama uttered that, but when it comes to the rules, the latest run of The Crown has knocked down almost all the gilded guardrails this time round.

A result that tilts unsteadily between the gelastic and the grubby. For one thing, launching on November 9 on the streamer and veering close to the events of Morgan’s 2006 film The Queen, this season of The Crown comes just two months after the real-life Elizabeth passed away at the age of 96 and over 70-years on the throne on September 8.

Too soon in one sense, the series is also too late in another. Debuting just days after now King Charles III on Friday hosted a climate change meeting at Buckingham Place, the 1990s-set fifth season of The Crown is closer than ever to our own era yet already has the dusty texture of ancient history.