As to the Edith-Mary plotline, meh to the “resolution”. I was hoping for
[list=A][li]An incredible screaming match where Edith says “you incredible fucking bitch, you ruined my last chance at happiness” and a catfight with hair-pulling.[/li][li]Failing that, Edith revealing some information that would totally spoil Mary’s wedding and/or marriage, or at the least giving her a black eye on her wedding day. [/li][/list]Lots of the episode seemed forced, and going in opposite directions. Barrow’s suicide was true to type, but would have been better if he had actually died. Now he will get his position back, and not have to leave Downton, and that is sort of a forced happy ending.
Likewise with Edith and Mary - the part about how Mary can’t stand to think that Edith is happy when she is not was right on the mark, but Edith should have gone off to her magazine and sent a note saying “Best wishes on your marriage - now you won’t have to play the tragic widow unless this one dies in a car crash too”.
The part about Mrs. Patmore and her house of ill repute was funny, but slight. The giggling over it by the staff seemed like something they would do. And the family rallying 'round and showing support by having tea there was true to type - noblesse oblige and so on.
It is also forced that Mosley becomes a wonderful teacher and reaches the children. He is too meek to be a good teacher, and it is another resolution written that way just to close off the character.
Spratt the butler writing the gossip column was funny, but brought in too late in the series - it needed to be developed to be more than just a one-off gimmick so that Edith and her editor can say “Bananas”.
And I was sorry to see the Dowager giving advice to the love-lorn Mary that said in essence “You need love - follow your heart” and especially hugging Mary. Totally in opposition to everything the Dowager has been since the beginning of the series. She is all about duty to the family, and marrying well so that the house and the name can be maintained, and emotional restraint. She would never, in a million years, abandon that, and it just rang false for her to be suddenly warm and emotionally supportive.
Fellowes is just coming up with resolutions for characters as the end approaches. And I really hope the Marquis doesn’t come back and nobly reconcile with Edith - she is destined (artistically) to be a single mother running her magazine.
The last few episodes of the series should have been about the impending end of the Grantham family, and the inevitable doom of Downton Abbey. They are dinosaurs, and the asteroid is only a few years away. And they know it, and so does the writer, and so does the audience.
I assume Bates and Anna are done, as characters. It is too late in the series for one or the other to be accused of killing someone, and a miscarriage would be just another random tragedy for no other reason than that Bad Things Happen to Bates.
It is a difficult series to resolve, but “they lived happily ever after” isn’t an option for any of them - the Great Depression, and WWII is coming, and the end of the great houses. The best resolution for any of the characters is bittersweet, and that is very hard to write successfully without bathos.
Regards,
Shodan
And Denker or Thomas wouldn’t dream of suicide; they’d be like two vampires feeding off each other’s energy. 
