Downton Abbey

Ugh, what a jerk Larry was. I hope that doesn’t scuttle Isobel’s and Lord Merton’s marriage plans, but it probably will, judging from how she seemed to take the pompous nastiness.

Yeah, she is very adamant about not wanting the last years of her life being hated by her son in laws.

Stop standing in the way of love dudes!

Also, one of the best moments of the show ever happens during the x-mas special. Get ready to get misty.

We are currently in season 3, saw the very first episode last night. I have to say, that was a bloody brilliant episode. After being slightly bored by season 2, this one was very well crafted. Mary’s american grandmother was everything I thought she would be, and I was rather anxious the whole way through, for what was going to happen to stop the wedding. Nice episode and I hope the rest of the show lives up to this one.

The only thing that needs to go away is the whole Bates thing.

One of the things I love about Downton Abbey is it doesn’t overstay its welcome. It does its 8-9 hours and then is gone for a year. I am all for shorter series. I miss them when the finally episode shows, but that only makes me eager to tune in the following year. I love a show like Supernatural, but I think 22 episodes means we get a lot of mediocre, forgettable stuff.

Yeah, I usually binge supernatural with a friend I visit like 3-4 times a year. Those are “filler” episodes. Could definitely do without them.

Cheeky.

OK, how in the heck is Anna Bates supposed to have used all 95 lb. of her weight to push a 150-160 lb. Green into the path of a passing truck?

I am pretty sure they (like Lord Grantham suggests) that they don’t have any real evidence, but they are just shaking her down to get at who they really think did it, Big Pappa Bates.

Well, that was certainly tied up in a nice little bow, wasn’t it. :-)

My mum loves this show (she has a thing for the time period of repressed working class people cleaning the toff’s shoes kind of thing (and Jane Austin everything!)), but i just bounce right of it. I always feel uncomfortable for people like Butlers, and even if filthy rich (yay lottery) i would never have any, or cooks or any of those kind of trappings…it is just so last century and a symbol of how wealth is rarely used for actual good (and all the issues around the evils of wealth in general).

Now that is not a comment on the actual show i know, but the setting just puts me right off, i can’t see past the repressive societal issues, and all that brings into question. I’d rather they all were involved in a workers co-operative or something :)

Very cozy. Someday I’d like to be able to go and rent Hogwarts for a shooting party.

The Dowager Countess gets all the good lines, as usual. “I shall never again receive an immoral proposition from a man. Was I so wrong to savor it?”

Mary pointing Mr. Barrow at her enemies is awesome; hope to see more of that in the future. Also, “Michelle Dockery” anagrams to “Dorckey Hellmice,” which is outstanding.

It was a charming finale for the season. I love this soap opera and hope it continues for years, though if it winds up in the next season or two, so be it.

Julian Fellowes says he doesn’t want it to beyond 1930, but it would make sense for it to go to post-WW2 when England’s socialism kicked in and destroyed most of the remaining great houses. I would like to see that portrayed in history even if most of the elderly characters would be replaced by younger actors.

Anyway, fun season and I hope we have at least a few more to come.

I did feel bad for Isobel and Dickie Merton. Too bad his sons were total asshats.

I dunno. The next few years will be dramatic (the 1926 General Strike, the Wall Street crash), but the 30s are just gloomy and forbidding. I can see why Fellowes would think to draw a line under it with end of the Roaring 20s. Hopefully the Earl won’t have invested everything with some Wall Street shoe shine boy.

And yeah, what’s with Dickie failing to lay down the law with his revolting offspring? Maybe someone will sic Thomas on them.

I think the show ends after next year. Maggie Smith has said she will leave after next year, and I remember reading that BBC actor contracts go only three years so they would have to resign everybody again to go 7+. Seems like that makes it set up for them to make next year the finale.

Yes, I could see it ending next season, but it’s such a success it’s not hard to imagine it going on a few more years. We watch much more PBS than we did before we started watching Downton.

Season 6 will be the last.

Executive producer Gareth Neame says they’re contemplating a film spin-off, but no mention of whether Julian Fellowes would be involved. Fellowes is apparently doing a new show set in Gilded Age NYC, which could be fun, though I’m not sure the antics of the American aristocracy has the same appeal.

Fellowes has mentioned a few times that he wanted to do a prequel that shows the meeting and courtship of Robert and Cora; I wonder if that’s what they’re talking about?

I could see the 6th season’s Christmas special, which would be the series finale episode, showing a 90+ year old George telling his grandchildren about the history of Downton and using that as a vehicle to tell the life stories of all the characters. “Tell us a story about Mr Carson grandpa!”

I’ll be sad to see it go. I was hoping they’d run up to WWII. With good makeup they could have aged the characters, though the grandmother would need to die unless they want to pretend she lives to be 100 or something.

I would like to see a feature film. That would be fun.

The final season has begun airing in the U.S.

Please, no spoilers from those who aren’t watching it on Masterpiece.

After watching that first episode, especially the ending part with Hughes and Carson, it is getting dusty up in here, and we haven’t even started getting near the end of the season.