Meghan Markle and Prince Harry’s Never-Before-Seen Footage in Netflix’s Harry & Meghan

Netflix’s hotly-anticipated docuseries Harry & Meghan opens with a scene indicative of its extraordinary access. After a title card states that the British royal family chose not to comment on the project, part of a reported $100 million deal Prince Harry and wife Meghan Markle struck with Netflix six months after retiring as working royals, Harry appears in a self-taped cell-phone confessional. Huddled in the Windsor Suite of London’s Heathrow Airport in March 2020, the same month the couple moved to Los Angeles, Harry reveals, “We’ve just finished our two weeks, our final push, our last stint of royal engagements.”

Those engagements included a Commonwealth Day service at Westminster Abbey, where the couple made a somewhat tense appearance alongside Prince William and Kate Middleton amidst rumors of a sibling fallout and more behind-the-scenes drama. At the time, a friend of the couple told press that the sour trip back to London “has been a confirmation that they made the right choice in parting ways. There’s no warmth between the family members.” Reflects Harry in the Netflix tell-all, “It’s really hard to look back on it now and go, what on earth happened? Like, how did we end up here?”

The docuseries cuts to another self-taped cell-phone confessional, this one featuring a freshly-showered Meghan, wet hair wrapped in a towel, similarly flummoxed by the turn of events. “H. is in London, and I’m here,” she says, referencing her husband by his pet name. “I don’t know where to begin.” In another confessional, filmed while wearing a black bathrobe, Meghan says, “We keep talking about it because we know now it might not make sense, but one day it will make sense.” Meghan later explains why she and Harry agreed to this explosive docuseries during a more polished interview seemingly staged inside their Montecito mansion. “The past six years of my life, books are written about our story from people I don’t know. Doesn’t it make more sense to hear our story from us?” Opines Harry, “As a dad, I think consent is a really key piece to this. If you have children, it should be your consent as to what you share.”

Before the docuseries wades further into this exclusive, expansive (and expensive) access—a sea of Harry and Meghan’s never-before-shared stories about their courtship and family relations complete with text-message recreations, intimate photos, at-home videos, and criticism of the monarchy—Harry explains why he and his wife took it upon themselves to record themselves during this unprecedented transition period.

“A friend of ours actually suggested that we document ourselves through this period of time. With all of the misinformation out there, especially about us and the departure, it seemed like a really sensible idea,” says Harry, an explanation front-loaded in the six-part series to seemingly insulate the couple from criticisms they are selling out their family for cash. Meghan says that all of the sharing isn’t necessarily comfortable—“but when you feel like people haven’t gotten any sense of who you are for so long it’s really nice to just be able to have the opportunity to let people have a bit more of a glimpse into what happened and also who we are.”

The docuseries, from Oscar-nominated documentarian Liz Garbus (The Farm: Angola, USA and What Happened, Miss Simone?), includes a fantasia of exclusive Meghan-and-Harry footage. Among the juicier highlights from Harry and Meghan’s personal archives:
• Photos and audio from the couple’s engagement night, when Harry proposed on a blanket laden with white roses, electric candles, and Meghan’s beagle Guy. One photo shows Harry kneeling beside Guy, while a selfie shows Meghan and Harry smiling for the camera. There is also audio from a phone call Meghan excitedly made to her friend Jess, squealing, “It’s happening!”
• A grainy selfie from the couple’s second date and a series of photos from the couple’s five-day camping trip in Botswana, which was actually their third date. “We had to get to know each other before the rest of the media joined in,” says Harry, revealing that Meghan was “everything I’ve been looking for. She’s so comfortable, so relaxed in my company.”
• Screengrabs from their giddy FaceTime calls (in which it’s revealed that Harry was saved as “Haz” in Meghan’s phone) and never-before-seen text exchanges.
• Photo and video of Meghan and Harry’s eldest child Archie, adorably complaining about his dirty feet in one clip and reading along with Harry in another. In a different excerpt, Meghan holds one of the couple’s children as a baby and stands in front of a framed portrait of Princess Diana. “Who’s that?” Meghan asks as the baby reaches for the photo. “That’s your grandma Diana.”