This seemingly never-ending kerfuffle got me thinking...what's the role of a Royal Protection Officer? To protect the principal I presume.
It must be quite simple when the threats are assasins, snipers, lone loonies etc. But the threat to H is far more subtle, and the weaponry isn't in any armoury.
Just for the record, I believe H has been as complicit as M from the off, and the protection he's being afforded is, I suppose, for his position in the RF rather than the man himself.
Nonetheless, how does an RPO or the Met define and quantify the hazard and the risk of it happening, when both exist within the Harkles' own domestic environment?
Would they intervene if H was displaying behaviour they consider a danger to himself or others? Do they regard Archie as a separate principal to be protected or is he just collateral damage if/ when things kick off big-time? And what about the 'normal', everyday, fucked-up intimate terrorism (thanks Nigella) that I suspect is happening in Tyler Perry's gaff.
It's like that metaphor of boiling a frog - anyone in that environment for prolonged periods gets more and more 'tolerant' to the not-normalness until they're seriously and permanently psychologically damaged. I think that's where H is right now: he's fucked-up headwise but doesn't understand just how mad it's become. Even someone who was psychologically robust would be ground down after months of it 24/7. Only he's not, plus he's still in thrall to M and maybe still thinks if he could do enough to please her it would go back to the good times.
Back to the RPOs' role: so rather than a sudden, violent act, the harm to the principal might be imperceptible and insidious, until one day someone who's not seen H for months would be in no doubt that he's gone off his rocker.
M is one of those poisonous individuals who's mad and bad, but also clever / manipulative enough to pass for 'normal' when it suits her. Her self-regard is limitless and that'll be her downfall because she actually believes all the nonsense she puts about. But she'll be tripped up by her own actions.
I think Doria's the sanest and also the cleverest - in terms of self-preservation anyway - of the household. I doubt she's in thrall to M so she's not part of H and M's folie a deux. Doria's main concern is, I think, Doria, so she'll join forces with M if it's in her interests. If she comes out of this mess quids-in, great. But if not, she'll just go back to her life as it used to be. She's an opportunist.
Poor RPOs.