Because it’s basically Dallas in costume - easy, fun, soap style nonsense. Pure escapism. It’s cheesy as hell, but I still love it.
I watch because…well, I love this stuff. I watched ‘Upstairs, Downstairs’ back in the day and ADORED every minute.
That series can be compared to a Chinese banquet. Now, DA is more like a particularly tasty take-out from the Chinese joint down the street. It’s similar, and pretty darned good (though it can’t compare to the glorious past).
I will be sad when it’s over, hopefully PBS/BBC will come up with something good in the near future…As for the series, I am wondering what will happen to Thomas. I don’t think he will be alive at the end, poor guy has had the world against him from the start.
I loved when she said something like: “Just one last self pitying comment.”
Then EVERY SUBSEQUENT statement of hers continued the self-pity. 
I’d wager pretty heavily that the series ends with an immaculate conception.
If the world is against him he’s got no one to blame but himself.
(Oh, and it’s Carson, not Carstairs)
It’s mediocrity is pretty much the main reason it’s so popular — and I say it as a fan myself. Compared to other MT period series, Downton is simplistic, sentimental, moralizing and, despite a large cast, pretty easy to follow. It provides a lot of emotional payoff for a relatively small investment of attention. And in addition to the aforementioned period costumes and settings, the dialogue is often very funny. Like a lot of viewers, I’ve spent enough time watching this show to stick with it 'til the end, even if a lot about it bugs me.
There may be some of this going on:
Shows you keep watching out of habit/loyalty/some unknown reason…
You mean a virgin birth. The virgin birth refers to the belief that the Blessed Virgin Mary got pregnant and gave birth to Jesus without ever having had sex. The immaculate conception refers to the Blessed Virgin Mary HERSELF being conceived and born to her parents Ann and Joachim without the “stain” of original sin. I’m not making this up.
There was an amusing Houston, Tx. half-hour talk show that came on after DA last Sunday, identical to ‘Talking Dead’, only about Downton Abbey. I forgot the name, it has the word ‘Manor’ in it. You could vote for things: “Survey says: most of you would book a room at the Carson & Hughes ‘Tender And Touching Weekend Getaway’ B&B.” 
I am glad Mr. Carson is going to get his Full and Complete Marriage. (I couldn’t help but wonder what the deal was with Mr. Hudson and Mrs. Bridges of Upstairs Downstairs. They had worked together for ages, were on a first name basis, but I cannot see those two in a Full and Complete Marriage.)
Nah - I just meant Bates would wash up first.
That possibility would be not just tragic, but promise Real Drama after the last episode. After a period of mourning, Lord Robert could take a new wife. A young new wife. Who would give him a son!
So Mary would never be mother of the Lord of the Manor…just the widow of the Heir Presumptive.
It’s because it brought into focus for Robert that she’s not a child anymore, that she’s capable of making tough, adult decisions and has exacting standards.
Excellent thought! Robert can marry Daisy. Edith can marry Mr. Mason. Thomas can marry Dickie Merton, and The Dowager Countess and Isobel Crawley can marry each other.
I’ve seen all of the final season, and the final, final (“Christmas”) episode, and I’ll advise you to lower your expectations.
‘Manor of Speaking’ is the after-show. Discussion of the previous show, and questions from the audience, plus polls.
I’d say the final DA season is off to a good start. The fox hunt was nice to look at. The Dowager Countess was in fine form. Good to finally have some closure on R. v. Bates. The dispute over the local hospital, and the financial pressures on Downton, have definite dramatic potential.
Yes, that was all good. My wife and I were coming up with delicate euphemisms for Mrs. Patmore to use: “When a husband and wife first are… um, intimate with one another…”
I think it was that he respected her strength in not yielding to blackmail. She even quoted the Duke of Wellington! From Wiki:
Wellington had a “vigorous sexual appetite” and many amorous liaisons during his marriage… In 1824 one liaison came back to haunt him, when Wellington received a letter from a publisher offering to refrain from issuing an edition of the rather racy memoirs of one of his mistresses, Harriette Wilson, in exchange for financial consideration. It is said that the Duke promptly returned the missive, after scrawling across it, “Publish and be damned”…
I doubt they’ll skip four years ahead in a single season, but anything’s possible.
I’d agree with that.
See the thread title, and please don’t make even veiled comments like this from now on. Thank you.
So here’s my problem with Downton Abbey. I’ve watched it since the beginning, and especially at the beginning, I liked it. But here’s what I want to see. I want to see Robert do something totally and utterly shitty. I want him to be a real bastard. Or at least, I want him to have the ability to. I think A.E. Larsen, who posts the blog “An Historian Goes to the Movies”, found the perfect example in the post, “Why I No Longer Watch Downton Abbey”, in which he talks about how, after Thomas’s homosexuality is revealed, he continues to have a job. As he puts it:
And it happens again in this last episode with the Marigold situation. Robert doesn’t throw his tenants off the land their family has been farming for a hundred years. He doesn’t have to. They volunteer to leave, even though this whole situation is Edith’s fault.
He makes the comment in the episode, when somebody asks him which side he takes on the hospital situation, something like, “I just can’t decide.”. And that’s the problem with the show. They never make him decide. He’s never forced to make hard decisions or face the consequences of his actions. Whenever he’s in a bad situation, he’s always saved by some Deus ex Machina. And it’s infuriating.
Downton is made by ITV, not the BBC. ITV was the UK’s first commercial channel back in the day, and has always been much more populist in its dramatic offerings than some of the higher brow stuff the Beeb does. Not that the BBC doesn’t stoop to lower stuff sometimes, or visa vera.
For some seriously good new period stuff from the BBC, look out for War & Peace, currently airing in the UK. It’s got a bigger budget than most films, truly epic stuff. It also features Lily James from Downton Abbey, along with Gillian Anderson:
I apologise; I wasn’t trying to spoil anything.
They do seem to be setting up a showdown between upstairs and downstairs. Even Mrs. Hughes made a snarky comment about Mary. I don’t sense any ill will on the Crawleys’ part…they are trying to be nice to a pair of incredibly valued employees. They just don’t understand how times, they are a’changing.
Captain Amazing, they did allude to Thomas’ homosexuality when he went for the job interview at the neighboring estate. The butler insinuated it was odd that Thomas wasn’t married (and he is a good looking man) and implied it was okay for butlers to be married now, as he was himself. But I do see your point…there seem to be no repercussions for the Abbey to employ an outed individual.
Edith and Marigold need to get to London already. The show is setting up situations and then quickly resolving them (Mary’s blackmail, Mr. Mason being evicted, sending off Marigold’s foster parents.)
I loved the embroidery Cora was working on when Daisy came to speak with her.
The medical procedure that Anna is going to get to keep the baby tucked away…does anyone have any insight into that? Does it actually work?
If I remember correctly, after Marigold was born, she was with Edith for a while nursing. Then, she was adopted to a couple in Switzerland for about a year or two, then finally she went to live with the Drewes for about 6 months, and now she’s spent the past year or two at the Abbey. Also, don’t the Drewes have 3 or 4 other children?
Mrs. Drewes attachment to Marigold seems disproportionate. (Complaining that no one was paying attention to her while she was similarly neglecting her other kids? That’s weird.)
Captain Amazing, they had similar problems with race and anti-semitism. Fellowes really wants people to like the Crawleys and the aristocracy, so he gives them anachronistically progressive viewpoints instead of really looking at the situation. It actually makes it much worse than if he hadn’t introduced the topics at all.