sistermagpie

No reason to suppose any of those private conversations were true. The ring was real, I know. I hope it didn't look like that! But we don't know anything more than that, I don't think. There was always a rumor she was pregnant as well. OMG, what a hideous ring. And even here they set it up as if she just pointed a the first thing she saw and said it was pretty. Then Dodi wound up looking pathetic again by dragging her to Paris and trying to buy it himself, turning it into a romantic gesture that could only fail. Gotta say, that doesn't really work for me, because while Diana did learn how to use the press to her advantage, she did that after they descended on her in the first place. She never needed to whip them up into a frenzy on purpose. That was the first narrative, but it was quickly proven the paps couldn't be totally blamed. The driver was drunk and driving too fast. (And if she'd been wearing a seatbelt she'd also have lived.) I was impressed at the way they showed Dodi in this episode, the way he proved every single second that he could never have married this woman. He was completely out of his league, always trying to do something and causing trouble he didn't know what to do with. He was completely unprepared to deal with Diana in any situation other than locked in a private space, and this whole ep kept finding ways to show him failing at every situation. Even when he wasn't making bad decisions, he kept getting upset and obviously melting down and obviously should have been letting Diana control things instead. He was like a little kid on a Make-a-Wish date with Diana who insisted on trying to pretend he was in charge. Obviously we don't know what happened in the car, but it's hard for me to imagine Diana being one to suggest trying to outrun the photographers. But I can believe Dodi the notice, to whom this is all new, telling the drive to speed up. His father, too, as portrayed here is as inept as Dodi, for all his claims of being the impressive one. He was like a loser junior high friend claiming to be a great pick up artist giving advice to his shy but actually more in touch with reality friend.

Not that I know the laws, but I'll bet her lying about her background might work in his favor. Yes, I was squealing while fanning myself. So daring! I thought of that too. It would be a good way to get them together slowly, to have them both burnt by their first infatuation. Personally, I just wouldn't be optimistic because it seems like he's just overwhelmed with this being his first rather than really being that compatible with her. And Bertha was on point at that dinner. I was impressed by her witty conversation. She also made it easy for him to stay with her, assuring him she'd take care of the Wintertons etc., and that they'd be relieved. Re: Turner's name, Fellowes does seem to picking names from some Big Book of Comically Ugly Names for Women a lot of the time. With Bertha it seems like she almost took it as another challenge-she wasn't named to be a romance heroine, but she made herself one. The one name I find distracting is Peggy. Not because it's anachronistic, since it's not, but her character is similar enough in type to Peggy Olson on Mad Men that it always makes me think of her.

I thought it was a great line and imagined the guy laughing heartily at it. He would know she was joking while at the same time, she did kinda step on a metaphorical landline that exploded and changed her life then. Yeah, Diana's been through enough to not be too surprised that somebody took a picture of her when she thought she was in a secluded spot outdoors. Wasn't the guy's boat in the water too? Bond villain is exactly what this guy is at this point. And Dodi's pathetic.

He's become a favorite of mine. Watching him enjoying the conversation at the bee dinner made it all the better. This just seems like a silly set up for a gold digger. He's a minister and has been one for years, never having married, even when he was a younger, hotter reverend? He's a pretty bad con man if that's his game. And now he thinks he's struck gold with the spinster sister of a wealthy widow? Without doing any due diligence about her actual fortune? I know Ada's former boyfriend thought she was rich, but wasn't that because he remembered her family before her brother lost everything? I know the proposal seemed fast, but it's the kind of courtship you see in old books all the time. He's a middle aged man who took care of his mother for years and he genuinely does seem to have things in common with Ada. It would make a much better story, imo, if they're just two lonely people whose obstacle is another more selfish lonely person. Also, it seems like if he was a con man he wouldn't seem so exactly like Ada herself. That is, he'd be charming and flattering, not shy and gushing at the same time. Sure a good con man might match himself to his target, but this guy's been really open about just liking Ada a lot without putting her in any bad situations (looking at you, Mr. Raikes).

Sure, Kim's a known addict and Kyle at this point isn't, but they're still both presenting themselves as the big victim and whose problems aren't self-imposed, and Kim was plenty good at manipulating her version of it as well. She never did it the way Kyle does, but that would be self-defeating for her. Kim's thing is that she's special and supported the family all by herself (as she tells it) and it's left her too vulnerable, innocently impractical and fragile to be counted on for anything. Kyle wasn't special, so made a role for herself being competent and practical and managing things like her mother's helper, and whenever people get annoyed at her (for good reason) she wails about how she's always trying to help everyone. Kyle expects nobody to notice that a lot of her helping gives her a way of feeling superior (and that she loves getting a chance to publicly pick up after Kim) and Kim expects everybody to see her irresponsibilty as a byproduct of her quirky fragility. Both of them cry victim the most when they're being seflish, imo. Seems like of the two, Kyle's less successful at getting people to buy her martyr act.

I guess this might come down to what Fellowes things on the show, though. If we're being sloppy, most people today think of OW as gay, and they specifically had him comment on Oscar and John Adams, so we'll see if he was trying to do that with his OW or not, I guess.

I was the opposite on this one. I really didn't like Richard. That is, I didn't hate him and Monica together or hate him--I was basically fine with it when they were together, but more and more since then, I didn't buy him as presented. The idea that he's a divorced friend of her parents with kids older than her, yet somehow none of these things--age, generation, ex-wife, kids--were ever a problem ever. Hard to believe he is even friends with her parents. And he's allegedly been stuck with one woman he doesn't love for decades and seems to always be dating tons of women when he's not with Monica, but he really wants to jump into another long relationship that seems like it would be a lot like the one he left (sans kids). It was completely perfect until he announced the reason they'd break up. He just seemed like a fictional contruct where they came up with this messy situation and then wanted it to be romantic so they sort of sliced away all the messy bits, leaving a sliver and casting Tom Selleck. So whenever he showed up again I got more suspicious. Like he says his marriage was over for years and they stayed together for the kids and I thought...did your wife know that? When he ran into Monica and Chandler while with yet another woman and decided he wanted her back, that seemed like the kind of guy he already came across to me. So he worked as the unbelievably debonaire True Love of Monica's that Chandler felt he couldn't measure up to, but I didn't root for them as a couple themselves.

TBF, so does Kim, just in a different way.

Not at all! The thing with Erika I was surprised Sutton didn't say, was Erika didn't just embarrass Sutton, she insulted the dancer. "Hey, she says your show is shit so I'm telling her to apologize!" is hardly a nice thing to say to your friend.

This has been Bill's one side for a while.

I appreciate that they put in the two fours to explain how she came up with an 8!

On George bringing the union rep to his house, I can see two reasons he might have done it, strategically. First, it's private, so it the guy gets on board there's no witnesses to see them getting friendly. Second, he may have felt like all that wealth would be intimidating. It shows his power and resources.

I don't think this is what Fellowes is going for, because he loves his rich folks, but it made me wonder if Turner and George were twins here. He's got everything he wants, but can't help but screw over his workers because nobody can win but him, and that's going to cause him more headaches. Just like Turner can't just take her own winnings and let Bertha exist. Just as the workers haven't done anything to him--they've helped him, in fact, just as Bertha was good to Turner here--they have to be assholes and start a war. Not that Bertha isn't like this too, but she's not crushing people just to crush them--she's putting her opera thing above getting revenge on Turner in this ep.

Moving up is bad too. The Russel's have moved up and Old Money was not amused. Turner's in a different position since she's married into old money, but Agnes is constantly checking out the histories of everybody when it comes to marriage. Hard to think that somebody being Mrs. Russel's former maid wouldn't have everybody laughing. Her trust seemed right on target to me. She believed that he didn't sleep with Turner, but was angry at what he did do. I think it's the type of thing you can't understand until you've experienced it. Peggy wants to go there because she believes in what she's doing and thinks she'll write the story well, and she's right, but a person who's been treated as human all their life might think they know the score--until they're there. Agreed. So far the only servant scenes that seem very real is the German Maid and the guy from Brooklyn, because she's hilarious goggling at Turner. But nobody has the natural authority of a Carson or the housekeeper at Downton. Maybe that's part of it, that the younger members of the staff just don't seem to have any natural respect for others in the staff, because they don't have the same cultural history.

And his bragging that "only" 20 people died building the Brooklyn Bridge. Weird flex! That doesn't seem like a good way to court Agnes, privately asking his sister to go out with him. I think he does like her, though whether it's really romantic on his part we'll see. He's got to have some reason why he hasn't married all this time--it would have been expected of him. If he wanted a rich wife he could have had one by now. A little late to start that career, it seems! Exactly. Why walk right into the place everybody knows you're the maid? Sure, Bertha may have reasons to keep quiet, but you're not protecting yourself very well. Basically everyone knows already--Oscar too, and he's not a servant or a Russell. The two servants from the two houses were already laughing about it, so it's well known in two houses already. Yes, not only is she revealing herself as a former maid to a big part of the world she's trying to move in as Old Money, she's making up new rumors about herself sleeping with the last guy she worked for. Is her new old husband so far gone she's willing to play with any fire that comes her way and assume it would never come back on her? Because now she's bringing men into it too. The only reason Bertha's much covering for her is because she needs her Old Money husband, right? So she's in a pretty precarious position.

I thought they made that pretty clear. If you know the name Oscar Wilde at all, then you're not expecting something taking place in Russia that's obviously a tragedy, so having the person saying he's witty in person, followed by him making jokes at the party...I thought it was setting up just that idea. Except for the fact that it seemed like people already knew who he was, but why would they when it was his first play? Or were they just saying his name so we could hear it and it was awkwardly written? Or was he already known as a writer before that? I have read some of his fairy tales, but it doesn't seem like that would get people talking the way they seemed to be in the episode.

Oscar Wilde's plays are definitely not known to be boring--which is probably why this one's rarely done. It was the first one of his performed, according to Wikipedia, and closed after a week. No surprise. Most of plays, at least the ones I've seen, aren't tragedies, though. It seems like that's what they were hinting at. Basically people saying, "Wow, the play's terrible but he's hilarious in person..." Iow, he'll be a hit when he starts writing plays that are more like himself. I can understand why Bertha's mad a George, certainly, but if I were her I'd at least look forward to telling Turner how embarassing it must have been for her to get naked and then get thrown out of bed. The Colyer girl seems to have inherited her family's heartlessness. Turns out the guy didn't do anything wrong except be a loser. Which is a perfectly good reason to divorce him, I guess, but the way they're treating him makes me want them to get found out. I am so rooting for Ada and the minister. I find his Boston accent endearing--no idea if it's well-done or not, but it's not aggressive or distracting, but still a nice character note. As soon as they brought out the soup I knew this was no soup, it was chowdah! I wonder why he hasn't married. Seems like he was trying to make some sort of point with that story about the painting. But I suppose he also doesn't have much money?

Given what I've seen of George, I think he'd tell Bertha. This is not a guy that submits to blackmail, particularly of something he didn't do. It's not like people wouldn't believe him publicly if he told them what really happened, given that Turner quickly slept with/married the next rich guy she worked near.

Heh. It's funny to read this now when I was just having a slice in a pizza parlor I go to a lot and I looked up and realize there was a picture of customer Paul Rudd on the wall with the owner. He can show up anywhere!

TBF, I didn't get the impression they meant nobody could remain married, just that in order to have a show they'd need to have conflict, and so their lives would need to be back in dissaray with reasons for them to go back to a dynamic more like the ones they had before they were married. Which I still disagree needs divorces, but I assumed that's what they meant. That the ending of the show was meant to be stable and they'd have to shake things up for drama. Mike and Phoebe always made a lot of sense to me. She's with a guy who's stable and easygoing who supports and loves all her weirdness. She doesn't need some guy who's competitive with her on that score or has the same vibe as her. Also, he quit a job as a lawyer to play the piano, so he shares her fudamental values too. Surprised me too!

Yes, it really was an amazing example of creating a situation with a lot of emotional complications and then ignoring them in favor of a soap opera twist with a mustache twirling villain that just puts the whole thing to rest without it really affecting Peggy or showing her character. She's just angry at her father or not. Other than that she's still mourning a baby she never knew that died. Her husband doesn't seem important either way.

Agreed. George's point was that he knew that Gladys didn't love Oscar, and he seemed to know that Oscar wasn't in love with Gladys either. He was right on the money when he said he believed that Oscar genuinely didn't want Gladys to be unhappy in the marriage--that's not love. But that doesn't mean he knows Oscar is gay. He could be saying the same thing to him without that specific meaning. Oscar could be a straight man who didn't love Gladys (and wasn't loved in return) too. That might have been more of an issue of Gladys loved him back but since she didn't love Oscar either, he knew there would be no personal heartbreak like that on either side.

Ah! I see, yes--you meant the point of the scene. I agree, then. George was well aware that their money was part of the deal for Oscar, but also knows it would be for anybody. George's issue wasn't financial at all, but personal. He didn't even think Oscar was that bad of a choice--he said he believed that Oscar liked Gladys and wanted her to be basically happy with their arrangment.

I admit I'm confused what the point is then? Oscar likes Gladys because he wants money and she has a lot of money--and her other attributes make her a good candidate to get the money from her. When it looked like her family might be ruined, he dropped her, because her money is the main reason he's marrying her. So what makes the term fortune hunter distract from the main point? Just that them both considering money and status in marriage would be expected?

So much this. It's one decision that always disappoints me any time the rerun is on. The original way it happened was so perfect and more importantly sweet in the way the rest of the relationship was. Re: writers wanting to break people up, I always remember something I read about Six Feet Under how whenever they were brainstorming what would happen in a season somebody would suggest David and Keith breaking up because it was just easy conflict--and it was always rejected, thank goodness. It's weird b/c on one hand it is easy conflct, but otoh it's like they don't think about what a betrayal it would really be and how it would change everything. With R&R it made sense because they threw in the "break" thing and, more importantly, their relationship problems were always adolescent and there from the very beginning. But you don't take a couple based in respect and genuine friendship and think cheating can be wacky.