Warning: Reviews of The Crown season 6 will contain spoilers.

How did Kate Middleton and Prince William become entangled? I can only speak for myself, as someone who tuned out much of the royal family tabloid fodder of the early 2000s, so it’s been a bit of a curious mystery. What Alma Mater posits is that, as with many machinations throughout the course of the show, their meeting was never really something left up to chance.

We see through an opening flashback when a young Kate (Ella Bright) and her mother Carole (Eve Best) incidentally run into Diana and William outside some kind of fundraiser, and Kate is quickly smitten. Of course, she treats it more as a harmless school-girl crush, but her mother sees it as a kind of destiny she has to work towards. The intervening years show her mother dutifully following William’s move from Eaton to his college decision. It’s all very Shakespearean, as the earlier part of season six was, though less explicit.

It’s not revealed until the final moments of Alma Mater that adult Kate’s (Meg Bellamy) life was almost pre-ordained by her mother, as she plotted out Kate’s post-high school life to correspond with William, even planning their global excursions to coincide together. But their early interactions play more like they’re kind of star-crossed lovers, destined to end up together, but always at different stages of romantic availability as they navigate the messy social obstacles of college. At least the episode gives us the gift of Honor Swinton Byrne hamming it up as Lola, a brash, jealous, and heavily made-up fling of William’s.

Bellamy makes a fine enough introduction as Kate, though she’s painted as a kind of blank canvas, with a frustrating lack of interiority. She’s more seen as an object of affection for William. Whether the events of Alma Mater are factually accurate or not, including the paparazzi’s gross obsession with William’s dating life, they’re still not terribly interesting. McVey continues to make William an interesting character, and he has noticeable chemistry with Bellamy, so there is potential in this storyline. But the knowledge that they do, in fact, remain together today kind of dissipates the dramatic tension.

The material with Harry comes almost out of nowhere near the end of the episode, but it reminded me of another recurring theme that’s sprung up throughout the course of the show. That is, the younger sibling, the second best with no official obligations, as they rebel and find their own path. It happened with Margaret early on, and again with Anne (two sightings so far this season!) around the middle portion of The Crown’s run. Harry’s personal struggles have perhaps been more scandalous, if only because of the age we live in, so it will be interesting to see the show explore this aspect and how it’s evolved since the days of Margaret’s youth.

Indeed, the changing media landscape will make for an intriguing backdrop for the remaining episodes as history has a chance to repeat itself, as we see another royal relationship blossom against a more frenzied, tabloid-driven world. The wheels are already in motion for another pseudo-arranged relationship between William and Kate, in the vein of Charles and Diana. By the end of Alma Mater, Carole has already not-so-subtly pushed Kate out of a seemingly solid relationship and into the arms of William. Turns out the misguided intentions of our parents isn’t just something that applies to royalty.