I know that you’re probably tired of people bringing up what Pen did to Marina but it’s not the kind of thing that can be overlooked. In S3, the writers try to paint Pen as some sort of feminist because she refuses to give up Whistledown but that’s ridiculous. Lady Whistledown was built off of exploiting the secrets of others and tearing down the women of the Ton. Pen talks a lot about being dismissed and ignored but that doesn’t make it ok for her to do what she did. That’s school shooter logic. Besides, Pen didn’t just target people who were nasty to her. She wrote about Daphne, Simon and she made fun of the king’s mental illness. The writers push the fact that Pen is a published female author without really adknowledging that a lot of Pen’s writing is misogynistic. How can outing your single,pregnant cousin who is desperate to find a husband so she doesn’t end up on the street ever be justified? That scandal isn’t going to disappear and Marina’s children will probably be ostracized because of it. She wanted to hold onto Whistledown so bad but it’s like even if she stops writing as Whistledown, that doesn’t mean she has to stop writing altogether.

I think the reason why a lot of people like Penelope is because she’s played by Nicola Coughlan and Nicola is so charming and lovely. Actually, writing wise, I think it was a terrible idea to make Pen Lady Whistledown. I know it’s canon in the books but it just muddies everything. In S1, Whistledown was like this God like figure that watched over everyone and knew all their secrets. So taking the weight of all of Lady Whistledown’s actions and putting them on the shoulders of one character is just too much. When you think about all of the things Pen wrote and the lives she ruined, it doesn’t make sense for the Ton to forgive her even if the Queen pardoned her. Cressida says that the society they live in forces women to turn against each other. In that case ,there isn’t much difference between Cressida and Pen.

Edit: I’m not trying to make the Penelope girlies mad. It’s just my interpretation that the writers tried to make Pen being LW a feminist issue about a woman who finds her voice (a voice she used to say some very nasty things) to take the heat off Pen for some of her very questionable decisions.