LadyintheLoop

Hasn't it occurred to Alicia that if she's not the Governor's wife she's not a "name" anymore? I hope that when she returns to the grand jury she walks right up to the line of perjury and then stumbles a bit. Then, when Peter gets a chance to make a deal and get her off the hook, he can decide that being The Good Spouse is for suckers.

Because he was a gentleman? Involving Mary in the reconciliation was a weak plot point and "You gave me my life back" was way over the top, but it was only right for Edith to make some acknowledgment of Mary's effort. After all, she'd expressed herself so very freely before.

Well, it was the least she could do. And it took some guts, considering how Bertie must have despised her. (Did she confess that she'd spent a lifetime undermining Edith, which might actually have changed his mind?) It was also in her own best interests. Just because Tom and her parents were happy about her marriage didn't mean that they'd forgiven, or forgotten, what she'd done. And Edith's announcement that she was going to take Marigold and move to London had to be the last nail in Mary's doghouse.

I was livid as the episode was winding down and we could see that Mary would marry and Edith would not, but that last luminous shot of Edith redeemed it all. It's better to see that she'll be all right with her child, her career and her hard-won self-respect. (And if Bertie does come round, that will make it all the sweeter.) He'd taken off his livery but he had on his shirt and underwear, though they were sopping wet. And I've heard of "wedding tackle" (though that really wouldn't apply) and "meat and two veg," but is "wedding vegetables" really a thing?

I think Edith was trying to get there in stages. First, when Bertie proposed, she implied that she and Marigold were a package deal; then in the corridor, I think she was winding up to tell him that she wasn't a virgin. If he'd accepted that, the last step would have been a lot easier. When Edith told Mary that she and Henry were right for each other, I hope she meant, "You're two shallow, creepy a-holes who need to marry so that you can make two people miserable instead of four." I'd love to see the CS play out that way (I know, fat chance).

Was it really so awful that one of the kids was tired of sharing a room with an opposite-sex sibling? I'd think Bow would have welcomed the chance to tell Ruby that one of the twins was taking over the guest room. (I doubt Monster-in-Law is crashing on the couch.) And shouldn't someone explain why Ruby is underfoot all the time? If Dre let her move in, that should be grounds for divorce. I did like smart and capable Zoey.

She isn't sure how much her father knows, though, and she wants to keep things tranquil for him. That's reason enough to hold her peace.

Because it's a sitcom trope (like Niles Crane, with his giant wardrobe, buying a cowhide belt). It would have been more realistic, though, if Dre had worn something a bit out of style and his assistant had called him on it.

I think it was about competing for an audience with Pope Benedict. Reminded me of Orrin Hatch on Murphy Brown: "I saw her push a nun once." Rowling is Joanne; Jo March was Josephine. They shared a nickname, not a name.

I'm not even sure how much the class system factors in. If Drewe really had brought home a friend's "orphaned" child, and if that child's unwed, working-class mother had shown up with a birth certificate, would that scene have played out any differently? The mother-child bond trumped everything else. Even Charlie's grandparents needed Ethel's permission to take him, and she was a prostitute.

Edith didn't ask it as a favor, though. Drewe had told her how his wife loved children and wanted a lot of them, and Edith told him that she had a "friend" who was willing to pay for her child's care; it sounded like a win-win. Drewe undoubtedly figured out the truth at once but he was free to refuse; he welcomed the opportunity to pay Robert back for his kindness. Drewe was a decent man and a loving husband, but he assumed that what the missus didn't know wouldn't hurt her. She told him at the big reveal that lying to her was as bad as taking a mistress, and she was right; he'd let her think it was safe to give her heart away. (OK, his intent wasn't as bad, but the result certainly was.)

But Marigold didn't react as if she'd found Mummy again at last; she just giggled at the nice lady who was cooing at her. I don't think she'd ever forgotten the woman who not only bore her, but nursed her for several months; IIRC, Mrs. Drewe's very first line in the series was something like "Wonderful how she's taken to you, m'lady." Illegitimacy disgraced the child as well as the parents. She was starting to realize that Edith's attachment to the child was wildly out of proportion to the "facts" -- it was crazy for an earl's daughter to be so smitten with a working-class orphan, so the problem had to be with Edith. Her own husband would never lie to her, would he? She had no choice because the Dowager and Rosamund were about to spirit her away to a "school" for little embarrassments. Whoever got to raise her, it wouldn't be the Drewes.

Edith's original story was that Marigold was a friend's child. Doubtless Drewe was right to realize that her story wouldn't fly, but at least Edith intended to keep both Drewes on the same page, and checking up on the child so that she could reassure her "friend" would have been less worrisome than falling in love with a random baby. The pigs were supposed to be Downton's salvation, right? Will Drewe's departure help bring the story to an end?

And superwoman Bow is gut-wrenchingly insecure. And Daphne keeps wrong-footing the other employees. (I think it's deliberate.)

I think this is more sinister than just being a liar; she deliberately wrong-foots people so that she can control them by making them doubt themselves. Time will tell. . . .

Looks like Alex got better during the day, since they only had to re-record part of his audio this time. Alex always has to comment when a champ comes in under $10,000 or so. He's going to be unbearable tomorrow. Surprised that it was a TS, but was I the only one who almost picked Carson McCullers?

"This title object 'falls' in the 1975 novel that kills off Hercule Poirot." Alex actually said, "Curtain, that's right!" Possibly imagining things, but I thought I heard a little break in the sound, as if there'd been some editing. Is it possible that Alex first correctly called it wrong, only to be overruled by a judge who hadn't heard the "s"?

I was yelling "Curtains! She said Curtains!" Did they decide that "this title object" (singular!) was distinct from the actual title? If Jenny had been ruled incorrect, either of the other contestants could have gotten it right and picked up the DD. This was a game where the winner was going to be the person who had the highest total going into FJ.

That's an interesting theory but I have a different one: Jackie was first and foremost an adrenaline junkie. That's what made her such a great fit for the ER, but it left her easily bored, unable to live without constant change and excitement. Two moments stand out: At the end of Season 2 (?), when Jackie has painted herself into a corner, she looks into a mirror and intones, "My name is Jackie, and I'm a drug addict" -- and then cackles, "Bite me!" During Season 6 Antoinette, while showing a co-op, complains that sobriety is effing boring. ​ As her sober self she's ordinary and as a recovering addict she's faintly pathetic, but as a high-functioning user she's awesome! Faster than a speeding drug test! Leaps tall administrators in a single bound! The lying and scheming and hairsbreadth escapes just confirmed to her how extraordinary she was; a steady, legal supply wouldn't have satisfied her. ​

It's a sad callback to the opening credits, where she smiles into the mirror in happy anticipation and opens her medicine cabinet. That said, she opened "only" one bag; numbing the pain of the moment was a higher priority than surviving the experience, but I still have trouble believing that she'd have knowingly ruined Fiona's big day. If she did . . . yikes! Apart from "final impenitence," wasn't "despair" also on the list?

No, that much was sincere. She tried to give him his personal effects when he left, but he wouldn't take them. That was part of her hallucination. When she lay on the floor, her stethoscope was under her neck. The show portrayed more than one kind of addiction. To me, the bracketing of "Make me good" and "You're good, Jackie" shows that she's dead. At this point the only good Jackie is a dead Jackie. I still think her OD was consistent with an accident. Heroin wasn't her drug of choice but between the hospital running out of meds, Eddie heading for jail and the pill mill being under investigation, she couldn't afford to be fussy about her next fix.

"Make me good." "You're good, Jackie!"

I got Miller's Crossing, Prizzi's Honor and Logan's Run. Dang, I'm old.

And they show her making the same hand-to-mouth gesture in the previews. And if she'd been helping herself to Eddie's stash, that might explain the loose pill on the floor. Because he's essential to the plot? Here's how I'd finish it: Dr. Prince enlists Jackie's help to end his life. Akalitis sees one last chance to protect patients who actually want to live, so she calls the police. They find that Eddie's had some kind of dirty dealings with an incapacitated Prince, so Jackie's act looks less like mercy than murder.

I think we're supposed to believe that Jackie loves Eddie so that we'll actually care when she throws him under the bus. Well, Kevin's heading for a financial crash and Jackie thinks she's given up dealing for good. Maybe it's going to be up to Jackie to pay for the college of Grace's choice.