The Girls FTW!

[therealsnape]

My goodness, what a fabulous episode for the Downton women. I nearly feel sorry for Robert. Nearly.


No, I do feel sorry for him, actually. Having Julian Fellowes going for you with a whacking big axe can't be a pleasant experience for an elderly man of conservative habits.

Especially not when for the past two seasons that damned fellow was all over you like a bad rash.

And now Robert's a conservative idiot who calls Catholics 'left-footers' (so thanks to Fellowes and the all-knowing internet I've learned something new today) and who makes the most abysmal fool of himself at the Girls' Luncheon.

But this episode had some glorious moments. For All the Girls - and that includes Mrs Patmore and Mrs Hughes, even though they didn't attend the Girly Luncheon. Allthough Mrs Patmore was present in salmon mousse and charlotte, of course. Ready for squee?

♥ Mrs Patmore helping Ethel. And such extraordinarily-beautiful eyes as that girl has. The most exquisite chocolat orbs I ever saw. (No, Kelly, don't shoot. In this case the point is about the colour of the iris. And they are so perfectly round that orb is the word. So just drop the red pen nice and quiet like. Move on, folks, move on. Nothing happening here.)

♥♥ Mrs Hughes, when told by Mosely that Mary Magdalene merely washed Christ's feet, saying, "I'll tell Ethel there's a treat in store for her then."

♥♥♥ Mrs Hughes and the way she looks at Ueber-Conservative Carson. Every inch of her says 'you silly man'. With such a lot of fondness underneath.

♥♥♥ Lady Violet asking whether she counts as 'one of the girls'.

♥♥ The collected Old and Not So Old Ladies telling Robert to put a sock in it at the luncheon party. And finally giving Edith some support. There's nothing like a good coven, Edith dear. Go for it.

♥♥ Lady Violet's refusal to leave as long as there's Charlotte Russe to be had.

And, last but not least,
♥♥♥♥ Mrs Patmore, for saying out loud what I've been thinking ever since last week (and before): "Everyone of you is in love with the wrong person."

Now for the week's squick:
We already had several hints that the times, they are a-changing. And since we have all these 'understanding the Downton Plotline' supportgroups on the flist, we really all managed to grasp that fact at some point or another. As I've said, covens, they are wonderful things.

So last week's moment with the lawyer, explaining to Matthew that the time in which these great houses could just totter on gently is past, was already too much of a good thing. Especially since Matthew (clever fellow that he is) seemed to have understood that all on his own.

Therefore, this week Daisy's father-in-law explaining the same point, and then Ivy telling Mrs Patmore (who can't be havin' with that, btw), and the lawyer chap telling again, and Matthew telling Mary ... well, it got just the tiniest bit repetitive IMHO. But three cheers for Daisy's father-in-law, encouraging a woman to run a business!

Also, I admire Isobel for plain speaking and calling a spade a spade. But must she call our prostitute a prostitute quite that often? And with such relish?

Comments

[vaysh11.livejournal.com]

♥♥ Lady Violet's refusal to leave as long as there's Charlotte Russe to be had.
That. Favourite line. :)

And I disagree about the explanations about times that are a-changing being repetitive. I actually thought is was very well done, how the same sense of new times coming was shown from different point-of-views and different classes.

I wish they would be that lucid about the Bates-pie-subplot, which is still a mystery to me.

[therealsnape.livejournal.com]

But the Bates / Pie subplot was explained.

Here's what happened:
The wife was poisoned from the pie she had for dinner. The police did not find the poison in any of the separate ingredients (flour or such); this shows that the poison was put in the actual pie as it stood in the house the day of her death. (Bates tells this when Anna informs him of Mrs Bartlett's testimonial).

The case against Bates is based on the idea that, since he visited her that afternoon, he put the poison in the pie. She then ate it and died.

Mrs Bartlett, however, has declared that she visited the wife in the late afternoon/early evening ("the gaslamp in the street shone into her house and made a sort of halo around her head" says Bartlett).

During this visit, the wife was actually cooking the pie ("she was scrubbing her hands to clean of the pastry. Scrubbing them till they bled, almost," according to Mrs Bartlett.)

However, Mr Bates had left the house by that time. He had already returned to Downton when his wife was seen cooking the pie that killed her.

As Anna put it so succinctly: The ex-Mrs Bates did kill herself. But in such a manner that Bates would be hanged for it.

[vaysh11.livejournal.com]

Ah, thank you so much. I had a general inkling that this is what they were getting up, but it's not as if I had got it from the show. (The prison guard mumbling may have something to do with that. ;))

I have still one question:
I get that Bates threatening his cell mate resulted in Mrs Bartlett making her truthful testament. But how did the cell mate know Mrs Bartlett? What is the connection?

And the former Mrs Bates committing suicide? So not believable. I am sure there must be another plot behind that.

[therealsnape.livejournal.com]

The only thing I can imagine is that the cell-mate and the guard are working together- they seem to be close. The Guard can overhear Bates's conversation with his lawyer (he was listening in pretty closely in this last episode) and he somehow must have heard Mrs Bartlett's address. But given the trouble Anna had in finding her, this does seem a bit of a plothole.

As to the suicide plot - well, it did seem a bit like those plotlines where a decent person wants to end a relationship and goes all 'oh, if only the other would feel that it's over, too'. In this case, the suicide did, at first, make everything right for Bates and Anna.

Also, I don't think Fellowes should venture into whodunnits yet.

[vaysh11.livejournal.com]

Also, I don't think Fellowes should venture into whodunnits yet.
A definite No that Fellowes doing mysteries. He should come visit one of my plotting workshops first. ;)

[tetleythesecond]

I add my own hearts to all yours! And I feel like you -- of course the changing times must be a big theme of this series, but speaking of the matter quite so bluntly all the time overdoes it IMO. Still, I've got to say that I like that we now hear Mr Mason on it -- and see that here is a farmer who is doing well for himself. I hope Daisy will take him up on his offer. And while everything goes very fast this season, I'm curious to see how class relations will rearrange themselves over the course of the rest of the show. I think it's very well done -- you keep having feelings where things might go, and then they often go into different (but also altogether plausible) directions after all. (I'm also thinking of the Thomas plot. I knew that O'Brien would swing back into friend mode. At least that's what I hope she's doing.)

I think that Isobel is beginning to open the valves to let out her own repression. (Doesn't she remind one of the women saying the c-word in Boys on the Side?) *g*

Also, did you see the preview to the next show, with Edith in the interview? Amelia Carlyle shall yet become a reality!

[therealsnape.livejournal.com]

I can't wait to see Auntie Amelia happen. It'll be a total delight.

I hope Daisy will take up the offer, as well. It would be an excellent career move for her.

I'm looking forward to the rest of the Thomas plot, too. Hope they don't do too much of the 'depraved feelings' thing. Even if there is some grounds to do so, given the period in which it is set. But let Carson and Robert be conservative together, and let the Girls be more modern!

[featherxquill.livejournal.com]

Do you think O'Brien is swinging back into friend mode? I don't. In the preview, telling Thomas that Alfred said that New Guy keeps talking about him? When New Guy has told O'Brien that he feels really uncomfortable about the way Thomas keeps touching him? I think she's setting him up for a fall, and I have all sorts of conflicting feels about it, because WTF WHY YOU GUYS ARE FRIENDS SERIOUSLY I THOUGHT YOU WERE BEYOND THAT O'BRIEN I THOUGHT YOU'D BECOME A BETTER PERSON WHO UNDERSTANDS THE COST OF RUINING PEOPLE'S LIVES.

I'm on Thomas's side in this. I love both of them, as complex and interesting morally dubious characters, but I don't know why this is happening. It seems so STUPID that they would just decide to destroy each other over basically nothing. Firstly, why Thomas decided to be a dick and undermine his relationship with the only ally he had below stairs, and now why O'Brien is retaliating in quite this way, when she's already been established as deeply regretting hurting the people she does actually care about. I can buy that she's worked out that he might like boys, but not that she would really want to see him lose his job/possibly go to prison or get hanged.

WHY YOU TWO SERIOUSLY PLEASE HUG AND GO BACK TO BEING BFFS. SERIOUSLY BATES IS BACK NOW GO BACK TO PLOTTING HIS DEMISE.

[cranky--crocus.livejournal.com]

This was my thinking, too.

My memory is shoddy--did it all start when O'Brien wanted to bring her nephew into the house, or before that?

[featherxquill.livejournal.com]

Yes, and she was hoping Thomas might help him, which he was disinclined to do because he had to work his way up the hard way and didn't see why he should give Albert a leg up (which, really, Thomas, ffs, you wouldn't even have come back to Downton during the war had O'Brien not engineered it, so come on). And then various sneaky and undermining things, and now she seems to be contemplating destroying his life? I just. NO YOU TWO SERIOUSLY HUG IT OUT.

[featherxquill.livejournal.com]

Basically a big fat YES to this whole post.

And although I think Carson was behaving like an arse in this episode, I am so pleased to see he and Mrs Hughes disagreeing like adults, and clearly still caring about each other deeply.

I do quite enjoy Isobel's bluntness, though. She's so good at puncturing the hypocrisy of these people, who will judge Ethel for what she's done while at the same time refraining from saying the word, as though by doing so they can pretend that prostitution does not exist or is too obscene to talk about/do anything about.

[therealsnape.livejournal.com]

Well, Carson is not really acting like an arse - he's not acting like Thomas did in series 1, kicking the cane from under a disabled man.

Carson does try to act in a good and honorable way for those he cares about. And I think Mrs Hughes acknowledges that and believes at the same time that his ideas are misguided and outdated - but he's still intrinsically a good man.

And I agree on your point of pretending prostitution doesn't exist as long as you don't mention the word. But Isobel has said it amazingly often, now. It's Fellowes saying it just a few times too many again.

[cranky--crocus.livejournal.com]

I am so pleased to see he and Mrs Hughes disagreeing like adults, and clearly still caring about each other deeply.
Yes yes yes to this! I loved seeing those interactions happen, and even the look Mrs Hughes threw him as she was leaving the room and closing the door. I wish we could see more of these mature 'agree to disagree' moments in television.

[cranky--crocus.livejournal.com]

Very much 'yes' to all of your hearts! I think at this point I've started zoning out of "the times they are a-changin'" moments for the most part, which I suppose for me does mean that I've heard a few too many of them. (Although as vaysh said, I suppose it is at least interesting to see them from different perspectives. I could do with a bit more "show instead of tell", though.)

[therealsnape.livejournal.com]

It was a great episode this time. Already look forward to next week, a-changing times or not.

[kellychambliss.livejournal.com]

My new motto -- "'Lie' is such an unmusical word."

I loved the Ladies Who Lunched, even if I did (sadly) think that it was fairly unrealistic. As (I think) Carson said, "Even the dowager?" I just don't see Violet finding Ethel's past quite so easy to accept. Of course, it could be that Violet was just unwilling to be ordered about by her son.

And while I understand that we are not always logical in our feelings, I'm not quite sure why learning that Sybil would probably have died regardless would so quickly change Cora's mind about Robert. The fact remains that Robert *did* refuse to listen to Dr. C, he *did* -- as Cora charged -- let himself be blinded by Harley Street status and knighthood and wealth. It doesn't really matter whether Dr. C was right or wrong: Robert's actions are still the same. So why would Cora change so quickly? (Unless she's been wanting to and just hadn't known how or been quite able to.) (The scene of her breakdown was quite well done.)

You're so right about Mrs Hughes and Carson -- behind-the-times though Carson may be, he's still trying to behave as an honorable man. "You silly man, but I love you anyway" sums up Mrs H's expression perfectly.

My favorite line is "I'll tell Ethel there's a treat in store for her."

[therealsnape.livejournal.com]

Oh, the "Lie is unmusical" comment, that too. Violet has so many great lines. Her description of a bad marriage, too. Unfortunately not able to see as much of each other as they'd like.

I think the way Robert burst in on that luncheon party was the silliest part - but I can see that Isobel didn't want to be ordered home as a naughty child, and also realised what such a deep insult to Isobel would mean for the family relations.

And I totally agree about Cora's sudden switch. Completely unconvincing. Might make a difference in the long run, knowing that Sybil would probably have died anyhow, but this?

I think I love the line about Ethel's treat best, too. I actually laughed out loud when she said it.

[tetleythesecond]

So why would Cora change so quickly?
My feelings exactly! Her rejection of him had been so sudden and harsh, and now a 180-degree change in two seconds? Of course she really needed that hug and that comfort, but didn't they have the twelve seconds to spare for her walking out, sorting out her feelings, and them maybe hugging tentatively in the evening?