Roseanna

Respectable women didn't have hair down except in bed. Anna had her hair down only in her wedding night.

Why first step? If Daisy moves to the farm, she stays there - until checked out by George who wants modernize agriculture after WW2. However, yours is a nice explanation based on the character and could be true, if Fellowes were keen to build consistent characters. But he wasn't. He was most interested in plots. Most of all, in finale he wanted to make everybody happy and obviously it meant that almost all except Thomas had to have at least romantic interest. The result was like eating too much chocolate.

Matthew left all his fortune without any reservations and conditions solely to Mary, and nothing to his unborn child. Matthew's inheritance from Lavinia's father had been invested in the estate. That means that Mary will be in charge of Downton so long she wants. Even when George will inherit the title after his grandfather's death, he must share power in the estate with his mother. Mary isn't Lady Crawley as she isn't married to Lord Crawley (who would be her unborn brother) but Lady Mary Crawley, both because she is a daughter of an Earl and because Matthew's surname was Crawley but he wasn't titled.

I just watched the episode anew and noticed an implausibility of Violet's story about her and Prince Kuragin's romance. She told that they had danced and skate together and when they decided to elope, they were going to his yacht that was waiting in the harbor. Now, they could skate only in the winter, obviously on the river Neva, but in the winter the Gulf of Finland would have been frozen and they couldn't have sailed with the yacht. Although there were icebreakers (the island fortress before St Peterburg, Kronstadt, had one from 1864), they weren't for yachts. If there is any "truth" in this story, Violet and Prince Kuragin would decided to take a train.

That would be OK in the Middle Ages, but DA describes 1920ies and, while Daisy loves Mr Mason, why would a modern woman (her new hairstyle!) want to live with "extended family" instead of creating a life of her own? That Tom chose to live with his in-laws, was quite strange too.

Daisy was quite pretty with her new hairdo - and the first time she looked an adult woman (she was supposed to be a teenager in 1912 when the show began and she has looked just the same during the whole series, over a decade). What I can't understand is why this modern-looking woman decided to move to the farm. After all, Mr Mason is only a tenant and we have seen that the position of tenants is dependent on the landlord (Drewes and Mr Mason in his former place). Daisy was a trained cook who was earlier offered a job in America, so she would probably have got a good job also in London (or maybe as the head cook in Brancaster). On the other hand she worked hard to get education and visiting London she mourned how much she had missed in the kitchen, so she could have gone in Gwen's footsteps and train for some other profession. Both options could have been better than the one JF made her chose.

I think that you miss the crux of the matter. Aristocracy (especially men but also married women who had provided a heir an spare) could do as they pleased provided that they did it in private. That was possible in the week end parties which gave ample opportunities - one had only to be in one's own bed before the servants woke (as Edith told Gregson). But in public there should be no scandal. So it was OK to the Prince of Wales and even to the King to have a married woman as his mistress. His earlier mistresses, like Mrs Dudley ward, understood wholly that they never could become Queen, nor wished it. However, with Mrs Simpson Edward began to behave against the rules by showing his relationship in public during the Mediterranian cruises which made headlines in American newspapers and thus damaged the British reputation abroad. As far as I have know, the Establishment was firmly against the match while the lower classes were more understanding. The Church of England would never have crowned a divorcee as a Queen. The government would have resigned and the opposition had promised not to form a new government. The Dominions were against even the morganatic marriage.

In the church Henry asked Mary if she and Edith were now best friends and Mary reproached him to be too soft in the head and explained that they were sisters which reminds me of saying that "you can choose your friends but not your relatives". I hate Fellowes writing a line to Edith that Mary "gave back her life". Edith had a *life* as an independent woman with her magazine and her daughter. And even if Mary arranged the meeting in the Ritz, it was Bertie and Edith who decided to forgive past mistakes to each other and marry. Also it was ridiculous from Tom to thank Laura from "saving Edith". It wasn't Laura who suggested that Edith would sink her sorrows in work but Edith decided it herself. And it was Edith who earlier gave work to Laura as an editor.

Even if Mrs Pelham hated Bertie marrying Edith because of her love child, her only chance was to persuade him in private not to do it. After she didn't succeed, there was never a real danger that she would have publicly resented the match, and even less that she should have revealed her secret for then she would have shamed also her son which she wouldn't never do but on the contrary pretend to be happy with the match and if there later were a scandal, she would have defended her family. That she rose and cut short his speech *twice*, was quite impossible for she undermined *his* authority and she wouldn't do that in public, however she treated him in private.

The second part of CS was shown here tonight. It seems that JF wanted to make everybody happy in love, although Thomas only got a job as a butler. I must agree with Mrs Hughes about the British upper class wedding. It looked like a coctail party. And no wedding waltz! In many of our movies it's the most emotional moment in the wedding and on of the most popular movies a new waltz was composed which became quite popular in real weddings.

We have seen that O'Brien regretted at once but it was too late. And she tried to confess when Cora was ill but she was delirous. I think just on the contrary: it would be utterly selfish from O'Brien to confess in order to get redemption to herself but at the same time cause great distress to Cora.

No. Its one of the things that show that Mary isn't interested in Edith at all. Originally only Rosamund and Violet knew. They had to tell Cora when Edith "disappeared" after taking Marigold from the Drewes. When Edith came back, Anna saw Mr Drewes and Marigold in the train and figured it out and told Mrs Hughes who told her keep silent. Robert figured it out in the end S5 as well as Tom in CS before leaving to America.

By protecting Barrow from prosecution Robert was also protected the reputation of Downton. However, Robert took rather lightly Barrow's action. It's not at all same if one tries to kiss somebody than if one comes another's bed uninvited. But then, JF handled also the Pamuk affair rather oddly. All in all, it was curious Robert made Barrow an under butler after all that had happened, solely because of Isis although he seems to love the dog more than his family. I guess it was only JF's trick in order to get Barrow to stay in DA. His schemes are needed in the *show*.

You are right. F.ex. lady Diana Cooper née Manners was officially a daughter of Duke of Rutland and his wofe but his real father was Henry Cust. Lady Diana was born in 1892, so the reality in the Victorian age seems to have been different than the facade - at least for aristocracy. Remember Anna Karenina and Vronsky: so long you had a secret affair (which everybody knew), it was okay. But if you left your husband and cohabited openly, you were left outside by the high society. When one thinks about, it's rather odd that the show totally lacks the aristocratic concept of marriage. Marriages are based on love (even that of Robert and Cora turned so), and there is no adultery.

No, she hasn't. Mary married an heir of the title and estate, Matthew, and luckily bore his heir before he died. Luckily, too, he had made a testament and left her fortune which he had inherited from his former fiancee's father (without Swire money, the Crawleys must have left Downton Abbey). All the big decisions about modernization of agriculture were already done by Matthew and Tom before Mary began to manage the estate.

Bates didn't fight in WW1 but (with Lord Grantham) in some earlier war (Boer war?).

To whom Thomas has ever been loyal? Who started runmours about Pamuk (they circulated long before Edith's unfamous letter)?

Why would Anna who has always been loyal to Mary and covered her secrets (including Pamuk) suddenly begin reveal them? If she ever told anybody, Thomas is the least likely person she would choose.

I agree with you: this isn't a documentary and the story is written to 21st century audience. As is all else in CS. The question is why many object this story but not others although in them the characters don't behave as they should in the period as the audience would dislike them if they do so. The best example is of course Edith and Bertie's story where happy end wouldn't be possible in the period. But nobody is protesting although it's purely fairy tale.

That's not the same thing at all. Mary's tryst would only be a nine day's wonder. If Edith acknowledged her illegitimate daughter, it would't just go away. Most of all it would damage *Marigold* who would be called ugly names. The attitudes began to change only in the late 60ies. Of course it would have better for Edith to move to London even if she had continued to present Marigold as her ward, but as the show happens in Downton, she had to stay there.

Actually I think it shows quite opposite. A bad novels, movies or series are so one-dimensional that they can have one interpretation. I also believe that in this case different interpretations may be basically due to different values of the audience. To me, the most important matter in life is to development. A person rarely develops if she has security and (so called) happiness. Often it's misfortunes that *forces* her to develop.

Actually Rose wasn't rich as her father lost his fortune. But undoubtedly she was a upper class girl who had nothing to do but have "scandalous" romances (which never become even seemingly dangerous, unlike the Paumuk affair) and finally to get married. I found all that rather boring. In CS Robert said to Lord Sinderby that Rose would love him if he only let her, obviously meaning that she had a warm heart. But actually that wasn't shown f.ex. in the famous hair style scene where Rose was most of all concerned that her meeting with Atticus' parents wasn't delayed by Edith's grief over Gregson. Of course she hadn't even met Gregson, unlike Edith's family. So I regard Rose a pretty girl who liked to have fun and who was usually nice towards others. But what kind of character she had in crisis, we were never shown, unlike that of Mary, Edith, Sybil, Matthew, Tom and Bertie.

Or Matthew could have married her during the war and she could have died after giving birth to a son. It would have been fun to see Mary as a step-mother - could she have been good to a boy who had been a heir, not her own son? But if we remember Carlisle's words (Lavinia had said to him seeing Matthew and Mary again in some corner that if only Matthew admitted the truth), Lavinia knew full well that Matthew loved Mary and she could have ended the engagement herself. Of course it would have been too easy as there wouldn't have been Matthew's guilty feelings. A love story must have outer and inner obstacles that frustrate the audience several times.

The problem is that while Matthew could say it because he had seen the soft side of Mary, Henry hadn't seen it. But he said it after the birth of their son. I don't believe he would have overlooked Mary's action towards Edith. Although Henry wasn't present, he must have at least a suspicion that Mary had caused Edith and Bertie to split, and if he really doesn't mind unless Mary act wrongly towards himself, he is quite shallow. So I guess it was JF's way to insist again in his own vision of Mary - unless he wanted to show how generous Edith was hoping that Henry would keep his ideal image of Mary.

I don't think that ageing or even death in such is tragic. Tragedy demands something extraordinary (f.ex. a man who is otherwise good makes a mistake that has fateful consequences like Oedipus). But I see your main point and I agree with it. JF should have had courage to let Violet, Robert or Carson to die in S6. Now DA was like a war movie where no important character whom we care for dies. The result is lack of depth. Besides Matthew, it was just Carson towards whom Mary felt genuine feelings.