Netflix’s 2025 romantic animated film, The Rose of Versailles, is an interesting union of the East and the West, in which the tale of Marie Antoinette, first the dauphine and then the Queen of France, and her fictional friends are presented in the visual and narrative style of an anime musical. An adaptation of the famous 1972 manga of the same name by Riyoko Ikeda, the film follows a young Marie Antoinette’s arrival at Versailles and her eventual friendship with three characters somehow linked with the French royalty. Overall, The Rose of Versailles is quite an entertaining film to watch, although it clearly struggles to put up with the extensive content of the manga, which was initially published over 14 volumes, and also the anime series that was made from it, which contained around 50 episodes.
Spoiler Alert
What is the Netflix anime film about?
The Rose of Versailles begins in 1770, with a young girl’s first entry in France, not as any normal traveler, but as the new dauphine, or crown princess, of the country. The young girl, Marie Antoinette, has been brought to these new lands as part of a diplomatic deal between her mother, Empress Maria Theresa of Austria, and the King of France, Louis XV, in an effort to strengthen the ties between the countries amidst turmoil in Europe. She is to become the next queen of the country when the right time arrives, but young Marie is not bothered about any of this. She does not even understand what the responsibilities of her new position are and is instead fascinated by the beauty of one of the soldiers of the Royal Guard who is riding beside her carriage. She is informed that the soldier with striking features and an impressive personality, Oscar Francois de Jarjayes, is actually a woman.
In the next few months, Marie and Oscar strike up a strong friendship after the latter is tasked with the safekeeping of the dauphine. Marie learns about the life of Oscar, the youngest daughter of the noble Jarjayes family, who had been raised by her father like a man. General Francois Augustin Regnier de Jarjayes, the commander of the Royal Guards, wanted his youngest daughter to succeed him as the next commander and had therefore thrust upon her the strict military life of a man, and Oscar was made to train to be a Royal Guard from her very childhood. But as she grew older, Oscar did embrace her identity as a woman, despite having always been dressed and treated like a man. Therefore, at present, all the nobles and subjects of the French royal court know Oscar’s real identity as a woman, while she continues to serve in the Royal Guards, unlike other noblewomen.
This friendship between the two women takes the strongest shape when Oscar vouches to protect Marie from danger at all costs but then also allows the dauphine to explore certain situations that she is otherwise kept away from. One such situation is a masquerade ball being held in the city, where Marie and her friends sneak in, while Oscar accompanies them for vigilance and protection. This is where young Marie meets Hans Axel von Fersen and experiences a certain flutter of butterflies in her stomach for the first time in her life. Over the next few years, the lives of Marie, Axel, and Oscar intertwine, eventually getting Andre Grandier, a commoner friend and admirer of Oscar, also involved. The Rose of Versailles explores the different lives of these characters over the changing and tumultuous times of France.
Who informs King Louis XVI about his wife’s infidelity?
When King Louis XV passes away from smallpox, his grandson, Louis XVI, finally ascends to the throne, and with this, Marie Antoinette becomes the Queen of France. But something that she repeatedly mentions in The Rose of Versailles is the lack of a serious romantic bond between herself and her husband. Marie had grown up learning that one feels a certain sensation, almost a buzz, in their mind and body when they meet someone they fall in love with, and so she was confused as to why she did not feel anything like this upon meeting Louis XVI for the first time.
In some instances, the film does touch upon the fact that Marie, and in fact many other women during times of royalty, was pushed into a certain position and role of responsibility without her realizing so. She was so young when the marriage took place that Marie innocently wondered why she did not feel any attraction for her young husband and therefore questioned herself why the marriage was taking place. Marie and Louis are both about twenty when they ascend to the throne as the leaders of the country, and so their innocence continues to exist, which later becomes problematic as well.
But since the anime is focused more, almost entirely, on the subject of romantic love, Marie’s relationship with Hans Axel von Fersen takes center stage. A Swedish aristocrat visiting the French court for diplomatic purposes meets Marie, and there is an instant attraction between them. Although they keep it to themselves for a few years, Marie is unable to suppress her emotions, especially after realizing that she is genuinely in love with Axel, even after all these years. Therefore, she gives in to her feelings, which is beautifully presented in the film, with a burst of colors, and she starts an affair with Axel when he returns to France in search of a wife for himself.
Although Oscar had warned Marie against having an extramarital affair with Axel for many years, for she knew that this would lead to scandal in society, she could no longer control the decisions of her dear friend. As expected, people in the court started talking about Marie and Axel’s illicit affair, and there were rumors being spread about them as well. Only some time later, King Louis XVI is seen receiving a letter that warns him about the affair that his wife has been having behind his back, but we never get to know who had sent this letter. There can be no doubt that the man who wrote the letter wanted to harm Marie’s reputation and wished to see her punished by her husband, along with informing the king about what was going on behind his back.
Interestingly, by this time, the French monarchy had started to face some significant challenges following their decision to get involved in the American struggle for independence in order to hurt their common enemy, the British. As a result, their homeland started to go through economic hardships, and the common people were made to bear the brunt of it. An anti-imperial sentiment was already on the rise among citizens, and the letter sent to the king can have some link with this developing phenomenon. Any of the political leaders who would eventually lay the foundations of the French Revolution could have sent the letter to Louis in an effort to emotionally weaken him and cause unrest in the monarch’s inner chambers. It is also possible that a noble from his own court might have sent the letter with the same intention, since some of the nobles also wanted to capitalize on the mounting pressure on the king.
However, like with every other matter, The Rose of Versailles is interested in looking at this situation only through the lens of the romantic genre, and so we see Louis XVI reacting to it only in this aspect. But there is a twist in the kind of reaction he has, for he admits that he could always feel the absence of true romantic love between himself and Marie. He goes on to state that he will never stop Marie from secretly pursuing any relationship in which she would feel loved and a sense of fulfillment, and this is seemingly when Marie realizes the extent of Louis’ kindness and also love for her. Her relationship with Axel does not ultimately continue, and he too decides to remain a bachelor out of respect for his love for Marie. Whoever had sent the scandalous letter to the king does not succeed in his plan of creating a rift between him and the queen, but the times get only more difficult and dangerous for the monarchy.
What can be the reasons behind Oscar switching sides?
In the second half of The Rose of Versailles, Oscar Francois de Jarjayes decides to transfer from the Royal Guards and join the French Guards, the army that is responsible for the safekeeping of the country, and not just the royal family. She eventually leads her unit to battle against the Royal Guards when the French Revolution begins and supports the demands of the common people to bring down the monarchy and establish a republic. The primary reason behind Oscar’s change of opinion is obviously her witnessing of the tragic hardships that the common people were forced to bear while the monarchs still enjoyed extravagant lives of excess.
During an altercation on the streets, she also meets a leader of the revolution, Bernard Chatelet, who gives her a pamphlet that encourages her to read further literature on the subject. It is to be noted here that both Chatelet and Oscar are fictional characters who did not exist during the times of the French Revolution. Seeing the suffering of the common people genuinely touches Oscar’s heart, and she gradually starts to understand their anger against the rulers. When she decides to take the stance of fighting against the Royal Army, she mostly wants to bring an end to the unjust power and influence of the dukes and ministers, and she is arguably more bitter against them than the king and the queen.
There is a certain personal connection to this hatred that she develops against the ruling class as well, for the altercation on the streets was supposed to be against one of the dukes, but it ends up hurting Oscar and her dear friend and lover, Andre Grandier. The duke goes as far as deciding to kill a young child for stealing some food, and when Oscar sees it, he steps in to prevent such a cruel act; the duke flees the scene, allowing the angry mob to hurt Andre, which instantly makes him blind in one eye. After this incident, Oscar makes her intentions clear, and she becomes a crucial part of the revolution against the monarchy, and her resentment is stemmed from the tragic injury of her beloved. However, there can be one more personal reason behind Oscar’s change of opinion, which the anime film does not mention but very faintly hints at. Oscar had actually felt a strong romantic attraction towards Hans Axel von Fersen, but she could never express it because of Marie’s love for the man. There was practically nothing that would have stopped the romance between Oscar and Axel, but she did not indulge these emotions out of utmost respect for Marie and the position she held as the Queen of France. She did let loose on one occasion when she attended the royal ball dressed as a noblewoman and impressed everyone, including Axel, with her exquisite beauty. It was also on this night that both she and Axel had realized that they could not pursue their love.
But protecting Marie with all her physical and mental efforts had not ultimately worked out in favor of Oscar, for her own beloved had been ultimately struck down and literally blinded because of the cruelty of the monarchy that Marie and Louis stood for. If we are to think of such possibilities, then it can be imagined that Oscar herself had sent the letter to King Louis XVI about his wife’s infidelity, posing as a nobleman, for she might have started seeing Marie as her competition. Based on the narrative in the film, Marie and Oscar seemingly do not remain in touch towards the later years, and this distance and detachment might have made Oscar question her earlier servitude towards the young Daphne turned queen. Thus, this personal resentment might have also made her change sides in the end and ultimately lose her life in battle.
Does Marie Realize Her Partial Blindness By The End?
One of the biggest letdowns in The Rose of Versailles is that it completely drops Marie Antoinette in the last section, and we do not get to see her towards the end of her life. When the first sparks of the revolution are already visible on the streets, Oscar asks Marie to be more cautious of her flashy lifestyle, fearing that the common people will turn against her first, both because she is a woman and also because she is not French by birth. But Marie refuses to see anything wrong with the extravagant lives of her friends, and she is seen dismissing Oscar’s fears a couple of times. This suggests that the blindness towards the helpless subjects of France who were having to deal with the extreme shortage and poverty that Marie Antoinette is historically known to have had had already started developing in the young woman by this time.
Nonetheless, it would have been interesting to watch Marie witness the changing times and probably change her own ways, either out of respect for the masses or simply out of fear. But the romantic musical anime remains distant from any serious conversations even till the end, and so we simply do not see the character once its focus shifts to Oscar and her romance with Andre. It is unlikely that Marie Antoinette, in The Rose of Versailles, realizes her partial blindness in the end, but it also has to do with how she was still very innocent and unaware of the difficulties of life and how her royal upbringing and then marriage to the dauphin had made it impossible for her to learn about the real world. Thus, Marie probably remained unaware of life outside the royal palace, completely blinded by her own life of excess and luxury, until she met her end at the hands of the angry revolutionaries.
The Rose of Versailles ends with a post-credits scene, in which a garden full of blooming roses is shown, with the narrator mentioning the previously mentioned metaphor between the characters and blooming roses. The flowers in the end resemble each of the four characters, who were of noble character and had tremendous valor and pride, making the film a celebration of their lives. Once again choosing to stay away from the complex societal layers of the French Revolution, The Rose of Versailles confirms its stance of being a tale of love and the associated griefs because of love till its very end.
