Badger

Mr. Swire knew about the fact that Matthew was in love with Mary and not Lavinia because Lavinia told him. He says that in the letter or at least he says he knows what transpired between them. That's why he tells him not to worry that he is putting him in the will under false pretenses. The thing is, I don't think Lavinia realized she was going to die that day. All indications were that she was going to make a full recovery and the letter was probably meant to tell her father that she was going to call off the engagement but that she bore no ill will towards Matthew and that she thought it was for the best. I think for Mary it was all about loyalty to the family. The family is in trouble, you have the means to make the trouble go away, so why aren't you helping? I disagree that Matthew was the better person. When he first came, he was an elitist snob who treated the servants or at least Molesley with contempt. But he came around and although I imagine if he had lived he would have really streamlined the staff, he no longer thought of them as stupid and useless. In some ways, he was like Sarah Bunting but unlike her, he was able to see past his initial prejudices. Robert's biggest fault is that he is way overprotective of the women in his family and even in some ways of the women in his employ. Remember after the Pamuk incident he told Carson to make sure the footmen (especially Thomas) didn't get too indelicate (paraphrasing) because it might bother the female staff. But as Branson said, he was a very good employer and cared very much for the people who worked for him either in service or as tenant farmers. After all, he did pay off Farmer Drew's debt.

I disagree that last season was the worst. I thought it was a very good season although I was disappointed my favorite character (Thomas) had no real storyline and I thought most of the epiodes were rather meh. Oddly enough, as a whole, it all worked for me though. It was never going to win an Emmy though because right now it's not the kind of show the Emmys tends to award. In order to be nominated for an Emmy, either your show or you have to put yourself up for a potential nomination. I'm not sure that Phyllis Logan ever had that happen for her.

I haven't actually watched it yet but I DVR'ed "Breathless" which is being shown as part of "Masterpiece Mystery" and Zoe Boyle who played Lavinia Swire is in it. Also Catherine Steadman who will be on "Downton Abbey" this season. Both Hugh Bonneville and Penelope Wilton were in "Iris." Hugh played Jim Broadbent's character as a young man and Penelope Wilton was a reporter.

Edna is in the ITV docudrama about World War I: The Great War: The People's Story. She plays Dorothy Lawrence who disguised herself as a man because she wanted to be a war correspondent and she thought if she was at the front lines as a soldier she would get stories. Both Mr. Molesley and Mr. Spratt (The Dowager's butler) are in the BBC series "The Crimson Field." I think it's scheduled to play in the US, but I'm not sure when or what network although it will probably be either PBS or BBCAmerica.

I think Edith sabotaged her chances with Sir Anthony just as much as anyone else. I'm not sure if this scene aired in the UK, but she tells him not long before the wedding that she wants to make taking care of him "her life's work." Now remember before that, she always acted as if his injury didn't matter to her although obviously it bothered him and it bothered the Crawleys. It's like as soon as he realized that Edith expected to spend their marriage being his nurse, he couldn't go through with it.

It reminded me of Mary in Series 1. She was the Irish girl who had a baby that was taken away from her and she ended up kidnapping another woman's baby some months later.

What if they had ended the Series 3 Christmas special with Mary and Matthew and their son together at the hospital? Then in the Series 4 opener, maybe they could have had say Anna make references to how Matthew had been killed in a car crash literally just hours after the birth of their baby. Like maybe Bates would ask her how Mary was doing and then she could say, "Not very well, But can you blame her with her husband dead in a car crash on his way home after Master George's birth?" Or maybe Robert and Cora could have that conversation.

From Spartacus: Vengeance, Agron and Nasir's first kiss. Lucy telling Ricky she's going to have a baby on I Love Lucy.

There really isn't anything "21st century" about Carson and his attitude towards Thomas's sexuality. The idea that people could be born with all sorts of traits -negative and positive - was not unknown at the time I thought the attitude of Bates had to do with what I call "the British sense of fair play." Bates did not like Thomas but the idea that he could lose his job and not get a reference for something he couldn't help probably struck him as unfair. Remember by the standards of the day,Jimmy was being "a big girl's blouse" about it. Also, everything that was done was about Thomas leaving with a good reference so he could get a job somewhere else. If he had known that Thomas would end up staying and getting a promotion, he may not have worked as hard in helping him.

I've been watching the Mary Martin and Cathy Rigby versions of "Peter Pan" on YouTube. All of Hook's songs are based on dances so I can see them incorporating Walken's tap into the show.

"Down by the Old Mill Stream" is the number Ricky, Lucy, Fred and Ethel did at the rodeo show with bells. I believe "Old Folks at Home" was the counterpoint to "Humoresque."

My take on the Mr. Green mystery is that Bates is going to learn that he died and realizes that to some people, he's a suspect. So he's going to try to figure out what happened. I think Anna will initially believe he killed Green but will ultimately end up trying to help Bates.

Her father was a doctor and so was her late husband. I think she said she trained as a nurse during the Boer War or something.

I think in the original "Outsourced" movie, Todd was only supposed to be in India long enough to train his successor as manager.

Does anyone remember "Outsourced?" It was on NBC around 2010-2011 for one season. It was about a young American man who is a manager for a call center for an American novelties company who discovers the call center has been outsourced to Mumbai, India so he has to move there if he wants to keep his job. The show had an incredibly likable cast but it got a lot of criticism for being about outsourcing and also for supposedly being un-PC.

FTR, it's Betty Hutton, not Betty Grable, who starred in "Annie Get Your Gun" with Howard Keel. It's very politically incorrect now, but one of my favorite musicals is "Flower Drum Song." It has one of the most beautiful and haunting songs ever about unrequited love: "Love, Look Away."

I'm sure "Downton Abbey" fans recognized Crawley family solicitor Mr. Murray in the episode.

Jack Cassidy played Ted Baxter's brother in one episode. Jeff Conaway played a figure skater who Lou's former girlfriend Charlene brought to a party.

This guy wasn't a big star and probably no one under the age of 50 would even know who he is, but Jacques Bergerac died on June 15. He's probably best known for playing Eva Gabor's ice skating teacher in Gigi. He also made appearances on various American sitcoms and dramas in the 1950's/1960's. http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/jacques-bergerac-dead-french-actor-ginger-rogers-715030

The gladiators do get paid if they win although not always in "coin."

The very first movie I ever saw Brando in (and it was actually his movie debut) was "The Men" which was about paraplegic Korean War veterans. Jack Webb was also in it. It was about their rehabilitation in the hospital and Brando's relationship with his family and girlfriend.

But that's the thing about being soulmates; it's not about physical types. If someone is your soulmate, you're going to find each other whether or not that person is your physical ideal or not. All the women Grayson dated after Deb died were thin and pretty like her, but none of them were his soulmate so the relationships never lasted. I thought the ending was very sweet. The show started off with Deb and Grayson together and it ended up with Deb and Grayson together only this time they were Jane and Ian.

It's a series finale.

I looked him up online and he also played "Joe Hardy" in the TV production of "Damn Yankees" which I actually remember watching! There's a story online that last year while playing Eugene O'Neill onstage he collapsed but apparently it was just dehydration. So he's still working as of last year.

I'm still waiting for an ice dancing team to do an exhibition piece using "The Twizzle" since there's now a move by that name. Jerry Lanning also did an episode of "The Lucy Show" and "The Donna Reed Show" along with his mother who was a nightclub singer. His brothers were also in "The Donna Reed Show" with them. And actually, the career transition that his "Dick Van Dyke Show" character made was pretty typical for the times. A young singer would start out making records that appealed mostly to teens and then would transition over to supper clubs, movies and/or theater. Incidentally, for "Law and Order: SVU" fans, Jerry Lanning starred in an early episode as a prominent conservative whose gay son is murdered.