I fall somewhere between you and your girlfriend on this issue … I think he does act out of concern for Mary … but mostly out of insecurity. And I have a lot of sympathy for his insecurity, one of the main themes of the show is that his is a dying world (okay, now I’m making this sound like Dune, but you know what I mean) and he doesn’t see any other path … he’s not even capable of it, and was never given any tools for how to cope with it.
Could someone give me a refresher on how Mary can inherit shares of Downton from Matthew? In theory, could she will them to anyone she wanted, or MUST they go to George after her? I thought it was entailed to a male heir, so I am not clear on how she can inherit as a widow but would have been unable to inherit as a daughter.
Typical Downton… lush sets, good acting, and a mixed bag of storylines ranging from actually interesting and insightful to who-could-possibly-care.
Love triangle among the maids? Don’t care
Carson forgiving his old dancing buddy (who, let’s not forget, BLACKMAILED him a while ago)? Don’t care
Edna? Don’t remember her at all, even upon being reminded
Thomas causing more trouble? Have the people at Downton MET him? If I lived there and he ever told me ANTYHING about ANYONE that was not obviously and immediately factually verifiable I would always instantly assume he was lying
Rose pushing the boundaries of what’s acceptable for a young gentlewoman? Somewhat interesting
Lord Grantham not knowing how to deal with Mary’s grief? Somewhat interesting
Edith’s boyfriend considering becoming German just so he can get a divorce? Somewhat interesting, if only because it’s such an utterly oddball idea
We need a solicitor to check in here and 'splain it to us 'murricans. (And non-landed/titled folk.)
I can’t believe Edith’s boyfriend is willing to become a GERMAN CITIZEN? After the war they’ve just fought? I do not trust him one single bit. She is such a sap. (I love her nose, however. I hope she never gets it fixed.)
I agree. I’m a fan of Stevens and I’ve never heard him say anything that could be construed as “snooty.” He’s always been grateful that the show launched his career and simply wanted to do other things. And based on the dreadful writing last season I can’t blame him.
There doesn’t seem to be a similar backlash against Jessica Brown Findlay, who played Sibyl. Maybe that’s because her death wasn’t thrown in like an afterthought at the end of a Christmas special.
The way that the Earl is treating Mary demonstrates a VERY Victorian view of women and their “limitations.” These were people who thought a woman’s uterus would shrivel up if she pursued higher education.
Things had changed quite a bit for women by the 1920s, in terms of allowable behavior, acceptable roles, respect for their intellects, and general independence. Think of Edith saying that a woman eating in a restaurant, especially alone with a man, would have been unthinkable 10 years earlier. I’m not saying that things were peachy or anything, but the idea that a woman needed to be wrapped in cotton and protected from the world until she had a nervous breakdown (which was evidence that she needed to be protected) was simply passé. I forget who told her to "take an interest in something, but the idea that she not only could, but should have interests of her own was pretty modern.
So, I think that concern for Mary was indeed a strong motivator for the Earl, but his ideas on how to help her aligned very nicely with his desire for control of the estate. He had little reason to want to break out of his old ways of thinking, because forcing his will on this issue was, as far as he was concerned, a win-win.
I’m with you. Didn’t he say that Portugal and some other places had the same type of laws. Why not someplace else?
Then again, I can see why a guy like that might be attracted to Germany in spite of everything. It WAS a pretty happening place in the 1920s, especially for a guy who has “literary friends.” Art, design, literature, theater, architecture, design, modernism, expressionism, the Bauhaus…you get the idea. In 1922 they had no idea that the depression and Hitler were on the way.
Branson may have been dumb not because he lacked native intelligence but because he hadn’t really had a chance to develop in that regard. Exposure to more sophisticated/intellectual people and a job where he has to actually think instead of just drive places might be helping him reach his potential. Also, he’s more secure in his position so he is probably more confident in expressing himself.
Huh, it never occurred to me that he had underlying motives other than being in love with Edith, but I can see how it’s possible. Hmmm.
And I can see how the writers picked Germany – it’s still European, in a way that Portugal wouldn’t be, if that makes sense … educated English might speak German or at least have studied it in school, for example, but I doubt many people were speaking Portuguese. One of the reasons the war was so tragic is because so many British people (of Edith’s class) had significant experiences with travel or study in Germany, or had German friends and business associates. My impression is that while anti-German sentiment ran high during the war (for obvious reasons), that post-Versailles feeling was more specifically anti-Kaiser and/or anti-German military, and not quite so much leveled at the average German businessman or professor. I think plenty of people would still look askance at the boyfriend for taking up German citizenship, but not quite at the level of if a person today were to go join the Taliban or something.
Germany was still considered highly educated and cultured, and as Green Bean mentioned, was really about to rise on the cutting edge of the arts, music, and theater. Looking ahead, if Downton continues for more seasons, you can easily project the boyfriend and Edith into the fairly significant numbers of British who happened to be living and working in Germany during the time of Hitler’s rise to power. And besides, it’s not as if the plot could get crazier than the real life Mitford stories.
I think Lord Fellowes saw Parade’s End–maybe he even read the book(s). Anyway, he learned about the author, Ford Madox Ford. Who was born Ford Hermann Hueffer; his father was a music critic from Germany. Ford’s marriage was unhappy & he moved in with Violet Hunt, who wanted to marry.
So Ford went to Germany, hoping he could use his ancestry to establish legal residency & get a divorce. As we know, adultery was the only ground for divorce in Britain & Mrs Ford (or Mrs Hueffer) had refused to divorce him–although he gave her ample reason. Eventually Violet & he returned to England, telling everybody they had married legally. Violet called herself Mrs Hueffer & was sued by The Real Mrs Hueffer–which caused a giant scandal. There had been no divorce & no legal marriage.
Then the War began; Hueffer served & suffered serious shellshock–even though he was old enough to have avoided service. In 1919 he changed his name to Ford Madox Ford. It was a bit late for the anti-German hysteria, but he probably wanted to sever ties with both “Mrs Hueffers.” He’d already found another woman. (He led an interesting life & wrote some excellent things.)
Really, I think this is why Fellowes picked Germany…
I had no idea who Edna was until this thread. I thought she was the widowed housemaid who Lord Grantham kissed back in season two, even though the wrong people seemed concerned about her being rehired for that to be the case. Even now I only vaguely remember her. It would have been nice if they’d been a little more explicit about why she’d been fired. This show must have had half a dozen former housemaids by now, and I think Edna was only in one previous episode.
As for Thomas’s scheme to have Anna take the fall for Edna, a big part of it may just be that Anna was one of the few people they could safely and plausibly accuse of having damaged one of Lady Grantham’s gowns. To say that Lady Edith or Cousin Oliver borrowed it without asking or that Mrs. Hughes accidentally damaged it while she was filling in as lady’s maid would be likely to backfire, and any of the other servants would have needed to go out of their way for no obvious reason. But as a lady’s maid herself Anna would have had the opportunity, and as Thomas said there are several plausible motives ranging from jealousy to a well-intentioned but clumsy attempt to help out.
As for Thomas’s long-term plans, he may also feel it would be both amusing and potentially advantageous to make sure that the two lady’s maids dislike each other.
Awww. That’s sweet. I love a romantic. Seriously. I really do.
Attractive?? She’s a troublemaking loose cannon and a complete spoiled brat. She needs to die.
Anyone remember the new Upstairs Downstairs– the one set during WWII? There was a character similar to her, a party girl who wouldn’t be controlled by anyone. She got involved with a Nazi and was in way over her head. I wish a similar fate for Rose.
Did anyone else find the interactions between Mary and Carstairs a little inappropriate? I remember the scene last season where they sort of reminisced about how they were when Mary was a child, but I doubt that Carstairs would have allowed himself to respond to her emotionally now that she is grown up.
And the subplot about how he had to reconcile with his old music hall partner, who was blackmailing him, and the back story about the love triangle was forced. And I got the feeling when the other guy told Carstairs about how his lost love confessed that Carstairs was the better man was made up. I would rather have seen Carstairs accept an apology for trying to blackmail him and leave it at that.
I was surprised to see O’Brien leave. Did she just quit the show, like the actor who played Matthew?
Still it was a promising beginning. Lots of possibilities for plotting and surprises and scheming. Mary and her father will get into lots of conflicts, and Tom the agent will side with Mary and the Earl will resent him again. And delicious scandals when Lady Rose gets into inappropriate relations with the commoners, gets pregnant, and there will be another mesalliance of a marriage for the aristocracy to be scandalized about.
And the more Maggie Smith, the merrier! She needs to scheme more!
And I liked the sudden twist where the nanny, who was being set up as an innocent being bullied by Thomas, and then was revealed as being neglectful towards one of the babies in her charge and a bad person. I would have liked to see Lady Grantham go even more Mama Bear about her grandchild and have her thrown out instantly, without a night’s grace. Or horsewhipped.
If they were going to bring back a housemaid who had been getting involved with a member of the household, better it should have been the one who Lord Grantham kissed. Think of the sexual dynamics. More interesting than Edna, because so much more is at stake.
Still and all - I love this show. What is it about this soap opera that has me addicted when daytime ones leave me cold and retching?