I agree.
What was the point of Robert’s trip to America? Nothing happened while he was gone that wouldn’t have happened if he’d stayed home.
And what was Edith’s plan? To have the baby and ask the tenant to raise it as his own? Is he even married?
Jack Ross came off as a wuss. If he had the sense not to marry Rose, he had the sense not to get involved with her in the first place.
Wait what? I thought that was a fantastic episode. The best episodes are the ones where they scheme and plan and nothing much happens (or, at the least, stuff happens at a very languid pace) - the worst ones are they when they decide to move things along and have things like Bates in prison (I’m guessing this time because of the crowd Bates gets away scot free).
Barrow’s absence at least allowed Mosely to cozy up to Baxter. (Sheesh, we only have one more episode to find out that the whole Barrow/Baxter thing is about!)
I agree that the subtlety is better than the soap operatic rushing about.
“Then you have told me, but I should like to hear it enunciated more clearly.”
I can’t help wondering if our dear band leader isn’t putting Mary off the scent to buy time for an elopement.
I sincerely hope poor Moseley isn’t about to be tied in a knot; but I don’t see how else this can end.
In addition to the Baxter-Moseley thing, it is also preparing us for the visit of the boorish American in-laws in the season finale.
I’m trying to decide if Bates killed Mr Green. (BTW, does everyone realize that last night’s episode was the season/series finale? Next week’s episode is the Christmas special.)
I thought Edith should go abroad with Rosamund and pretend to find Gregson and marry him, and then come back home and announce she’s pregnant. Rosamund is lined up declare that, yes, she witnessed the marriage — and then it would be easy enough to make up some story about babydaddy staying in Switzerland to … do something. And if he shows up for reals, surely he’d go along with the story since presumably he does want to marry her. Unless he’s hiding from her now! 
I liked Molesley manfully whacking the bell-thing, telling off Jimmy, offering his arm to Baxter and firmly carting her away. All she needed was a big stuffed animal to go with it.
If he did, he should have been thoughtful enough to give Anna a plausible reason for being away. He could have at least come back with a new pair of socks or a brochure from a lecture – something. Does he want Anna to think he killed Green?
She’ll never ask him but she’ll always suspect. If he came up with a good story, then Anna won’t have to think her husband is a murderer, or worry that someone saw him push Green and come forward later.
I think Bates didn’t kill Mr. Green, just because it’s way too obvious the other way. But either way it’s clearly either TV-plot-makes-it-obvious, or TV-plot-makes-it-TOO-obvious. Pretty irritating in any case.
And good lord do I not care AT ALL about Ivy and Daisy and Alfred and their drama. Glad it only takes up a few minutes each episode.
Someone pointed out that Daisy is more than five or ten years older than she was when she first came to Downton Abbey but she still behaves as a very young girl (with regard to her romantic attachments).
She’s been pretty sheltered in those 5 years or so. I wonder how many times total she’s even left the house in those years.
Well the first episode took place in April 1912 and this last episode was set sometime in the summer/early fall of 1922 so it’s been over ten years since we first met the inhabitants of Downton. (There is no way any of those characters look ten years older btw! The time jumps are really becoming problematic, especially with the next episode skipping forward a year to the summer of 1923!)
You could be right. He gave up too easily, and Rose didn’t seem all that upset – assuming she got his note but I’m not sure about the timing.
To give the actor who plays him time off for another project (The Monuments Men).
To have her baby and keep it nearby without the scriptwriters having to resort to any of the usual cover-ups:
a) “secret” marriage and near-immediate tragic widow-hood (except the baby-daddy is already married, and things could get awkward if he re-surfaces)
or
b) passing off the kid as her mother’s (Cora is mid-fifties by now, so little hope of pulling off that one)
or
c) going away for a while and returning with a souvenir “adopted” baby (possibly still in play for Season Five)
Really bothered about this in last night’s episode. Anna wasn’t the least bit bothered by having to see her rapist every day in close quarters, eat meals with him, or possibly run into him in an empty wing or something where he might attack her again. No - her only concern about having Green over all the time is that Bates might kill him. I do hope that he’s not accused - otherwise, we’re looking at another extended prison sequence.
The Rose storyline was facile and stupidly handled. And Edith’s plan to hand the baby to a neighbor (“he takes such good care of pigs… I’d bet he’d take great care of a baby!”) was flat out idiotic. I think that all three of those were good story ideas, theoretically, but they’d take a stronger, gutsier writer to make them into something good. Instead they’re all just bleh.
Some questions and comments: Anybody else suspect that Mary’s two suitors will turn out to be poofs (to use the vernacular of the day)? Most distressing that we’re going to have to see Shirley Maclaine again next week; she’s nowhere near the caliber of Maggie Smith in the role of cranky dowager. So is Olive Oyl actually going to Switzerland? And why is it that all the women in this series are shapeless sticks? Corsets? Breast binding? Director’s obsession with women who look like little boys? I am truly glad that the stupid subplot with Daisy, et al, is finished.
I’ll take Ladies Edith and Mary. You can have Mrs. Patmore.
Given (as noted earlier in the thread) that the Crawleys and their staff have lived a dozen years with no visible sign of aging–and may well go another dozen before the show ceases production–I think you may yet hope for such a moment.
(I’m expecting a Big Reveal in the very last episode: that the Creepy Crawleys are aliens/undead/Harrods-mannequins-come-to-life, the last being my favorite.)
Mrs. Patmore is a hottie.
When Tom Branson introduced the schoolteacher to the Crawleys, Carson’s expression seemed to be one of disapproval. Although I’d think they’d be happy if her married a local woman like that, since it means he might stay instead of moving to America.