Downton Abbey, season 4, episode 1
Sep. 24th, 2013 08:03 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shallownessUgh, look at me, still invested in the characters. Mrs Hughes is the best, all interfering (my one quibble was that there were other men in the workhouse too. Perhaps she’ll let Isobel sort them out in the next few episodes), but also awesome: Mrs Pattmore (a friend, not a follower), Violet (I am your grandmother), Isobel (stronger than she thinks) and Anna (always young at heart).
Awesome for a bit – Edith, in going to visit Isobel and helping Violet out, but I spent the rest of the time going ‘no, Edith, no!’ even if you could tell why she was melting at Michael’s gesture. I seriously hope they bump into Strallan because AWKWARD x 100. Cora was awesome over the nanny business, which I thought was well-handled in a lot of ways. Thomas was being a snake in the grass, which Bates noticed, but he didn’t know what we knew, which was that she banned Isobel from seeing her grandson – granted, it might not have been a great time, but given the circumstances, just give over, woman. The anti-Sybbie campaign, which I think came from anti-Irish prejudice, was the limit. Cora wasn’t seen to explain that to anyone, autocratic, much? But she needed a moment of good judgment after the new lady’s maid business, and at least Mrs Hughes teased out the complications of her not being there for Isobel. Otherwise this paragraph would be about me ranting that Fellowes can't write all the complications that make up Cora.
I’d forgotten that there’d be so many ramifications to the death of Matthew – I was mainly thinking of Mary, the son and the estate – so I loved that Molesworth got so much time. I couldn’t see his father’s roses anywhere. I’d forgotten about O’Brien going, but it looks as though we’ll have a conniver in her place, anyway. What I will say is that Branson (adorable with Sybbie) is caring for Mary’s state a lot, isn’t he? Yes, it’s partly because he’s been there himself, Matthew was his bro and he doesn’t want Robert to blunder backward (‘Pompous’ got hurled at Lord Grantham quite a lot), but getting to think of her may get to be a habit...
Er, I may have been thinkiing that would happen before the show came back – I even started writing fic about it, but never got my scribbles into shape. I don’t know if I think it’s healthy or could last, because it is what they’ve been through that would mainly draw them together, but I think it would be interesting to watch, especially because Branson is tied to Downton in so many ways now, however awkward his situation is. (Please note, I thought there was a good case for Sybil/Matthew in series 1).
What else? Well, I’m sure that other posts will be written about how the episode showed off the upper classes moving from mourning to half-mourning in 1922, with Edith-in-London being the exception. (What she could get away with and what Ivy couldn't is duly noted.)
We had a lot of recurring motifs – the electic whisk being this year’s gadget to throw the old people off. I STILL think Daisy would be better off having left for the farm. There were new sets/locations. And the baby was named George, which I genuinely didn't know until last week, but that gave me cause for chortling. I am still in the Mary doesn’t deserve Carson camp. And after all the fuss with LAvinia's father's will, surely Matthew would have written one...
But mainly I am fangirling Mrs Hughes.
Awesome for a bit – Edith, in going to visit Isobel and helping Violet out, but I spent the rest of the time going ‘no, Edith, no!’ even if you could tell why she was melting at Michael’s gesture. I seriously hope they bump into Strallan because AWKWARD x 100. Cora was awesome over the nanny business, which I thought was well-handled in a lot of ways. Thomas was being a snake in the grass, which Bates noticed, but he didn’t know what we knew, which was that she banned Isobel from seeing her grandson – granted, it might not have been a great time, but given the circumstances, just give over, woman. The anti-Sybbie campaign, which I think came from anti-Irish prejudice, was the limit. Cora wasn’t seen to explain that to anyone, autocratic, much? But she needed a moment of good judgment after the new lady’s maid business, and at least Mrs Hughes teased out the complications of her not being there for Isobel. Otherwise this paragraph would be about me ranting that Fellowes can't write all the complications that make up Cora.
I’d forgotten that there’d be so many ramifications to the death of Matthew – I was mainly thinking of Mary, the son and the estate – so I loved that Molesworth got so much time. I couldn’t see his father’s roses anywhere. I’d forgotten about O’Brien going, but it looks as though we’ll have a conniver in her place, anyway. What I will say is that Branson (adorable with Sybbie) is caring for Mary’s state a lot, isn’t he? Yes, it’s partly because he’s been there himself, Matthew was his bro and he doesn’t want Robert to blunder backward (‘Pompous’ got hurled at Lord Grantham quite a lot), but getting to think of her may get to be a habit...
Er, I may have been thinkiing that would happen before the show came back – I even started writing fic about it, but never got my scribbles into shape. I don’t know if I think it’s healthy or could last, because it is what they’ve been through that would mainly draw them together, but I think it would be interesting to watch, especially because Branson is tied to Downton in so many ways now, however awkward his situation is. (Please note, I thought there was a good case for Sybil/Matthew in series 1).
What else? Well, I’m sure that other posts will be written about how the episode showed off the upper classes moving from mourning to half-mourning in 1922, with Edith-in-London being the exception. (What she could get away with and what Ivy couldn't is duly noted.)
We had a lot of recurring motifs – the electic whisk being this year’s gadget to throw the old people off. I STILL think Daisy would be better off having left for the farm. There were new sets/locations. And the baby was named George, which I genuinely didn't know until last week, but that gave me cause for chortling. I am still in the Mary doesn’t deserve Carson camp. And after all the fuss with LAvinia's father's will, surely Matthew would have written one...
But mainly I am fangirling Mrs Hughes.
