S05.E05: Episode Five

[Bcharmer]

There isn't an exact equivalent but, having a go (because I love cricket!):

 

Failing to get anywhere = "duck" (really failing to get anywhere = "lame duck")

First base = "off the mark"

Second base = "boundary"

Third base = "six"

Home run = "six, right out of the ground"

 

If he only kissed her, then I guess Robert wouldn't have a "sticky wicket," would he?

[Mrsjumbo]

Ok, I finally watched the episode & read through the comments. I agree with everyone on the basic ponts, also:

1. So happy Bunting is gone! There was a scary moment where I thought TOM was running after her to ask her to stay!

Favorite line- Tom says she'll be missed by the other teachers & Bunting says "I'm afraid they thought I was a bit of a nuisance". Even the other teachers hated Bunting!

Favorite expression- Tom's grimace when Bunting said she loved him.

2. Elizabeth McGovern in She's Having a Baby (1988) is married & a houseguest attempts to seduce her & she turns him down. (The difference was that this was her husband's friend.)

3. Cora is either very naive or likes to stick it to Robert in her own way. First by inviting Bunting to dine multiple times & then by continuing to hang out with Bricker; both situations anger Robert but she continues.

4. Mosley & Baxter are the downstairs couple replacing the popularity of Anna & Bates.

5. Let's say Tom decides to go to America. God knows he's been dragging his feet all season about leaving. Why doesn't Edith go too & take Marigold & stay with grandmama? She seems pretty liberal & the Crawleys can make up some sort of story to keep their reputations.

[PRgal]

Ok, I finally watched the episode & read through the comments. I agree with everyone on the basic ponts, also:

1. So happy Bunting is gone! There was a scary moment where I thought TOM was running after her to ask her to stay!

Favorite line- Tom says she'll be missed by the other teachers & Bunting says "I'm afraid they thought I was a bit of a nuisance". Even the other teachers hated Bunting!

 

 

 

If the OTHER teachers are Miss Bunting haters, imagine the kids...

[JudyObscure]

Mosley & Baxter are the downstairs couple replacing the popularity of Anna & Bates.

I just loved how he heard her story and decided she was, "The victim!"  Heh. I wouldn't go that far but I think it's adorable that he sees it that way.  Her affection for him is even more sweetly rose colored.   The man everyone else downstairs sees as a foolish, insecure person, deserving of ridicule, Baxter sees as a gentle, kind soul who would never ever try to control someone else.

[wlk68]

While the dinner scene in Simpson's (a classic London restaurant that was about 75 years old when Mary and Blake visit and is still in operation!) was somewhat pointless it was FUN. I love Mabel Lane Fox and I got such a kick of the politely icy war of words she had with Mary. Golly, what a dinner! I hope Mabel and Mary become frenemies along the lines of Violet and Isobel.

I'm also enjoying Moseley and Baxter's growing intimate friendship, and I'm in love with Lord Merton. Robert James-Collier is such a good actor that I'm about to scream if he is wasted in another episode, with Thomas confined to lurking around looking sick and pale, "sweating like a beast" and acting like a jerk to any and everyone who offers him kindness. His story could be sooo much better.

This! There have been countless occasions over the years where we've seen Thomas mellow and be less of a dick and I was thrilled to see his character grow a little. But then JF would have him regress right back to his snotty mustache twirling Snidely Whiplash persona. It's a constant dance of one step forward, two steps back and it's seriously annoying.

[RedHawk]

But then JF would have him regress right back to his snotty mustache twirling Snidely Whiplash persona.

 

I know! When he snarl-hissed at Baxter, "I know you know something!" in a previous episode it was almost laughable, except Robert J-C made it work somehow. Yet Thomas' scenes when he was becoming closer to Jimmy, taking a beating for him, etc. were beautiful and moving, so much better than the crap we're stuck with now. Again, it makes no sense that Thomas is stuck in this regressive personality. So many at Downton are kind to him, why can't he respond as most human beings would? 

[annzeepark914]

I just loved how he heard her story and decided she was, "The victim!"  Heh. I wouldn't go that far but I think it's adorable that he sees it that way.  

Yes...I wouldn't go that far as well because I thought her story was a bit too incredible (she went to prison for a man she loved...hunh!).  I could be wrong but there's just something about her that doesn't ring true IMO.  And now she has info' re: the Bates?  Unless JF is really jerking us around, I don't know how she'd have info' on them since they didn't acknowledge each other (as previous acquaintances) when she arrived at Downton Abbey.  I'm getting weary of the downstairs drama this season...it has become annoying & uninteresting to me.

[helenamonster]

Not sure if the previews for next week at the end of the episode count as spoilers, but just in case...

 

So in the preview for Episode 6, there was a quick cut of Thomas saying something like, "If you want to help me, here's what you can do." A couple more quick clips, and then Baxter with Mrs. Hughes in front of the detective, apparently with information about Anna and Bates. I think Baxter, and to a lesser extent Thomas, are starting to put something together regarding Anna/Bates and Green. Baxter noticed the weird looks between the three of them last season, and, if I remember correctly, she was on the periphery of the whole train ticket saga from the CS. I think she suspects that they might be involved in his death, but she doesn't know why. And Thomas has heard her speak about Anna/Bates in relation to Green and might be coming to a similar conclusion. If this is the case, perhaps he tells her that if she tells the detective that Anna and/or Bates had something to do with Green's death, he'll stop self-medicating. It would be an interesting conflict for Baxter...she knows Thomas better than Anna/Bates, but he's been nothing but horrible to her. She hasn't interacted too much with Anna/Bates, but I've gotten the sense that she wants to be on good terms with them, especially Anna. This is pure spec from a few minutes of previews, but that's what I think is gonna happen, at least until I see it for myself tomorrow night.

[Wordsworth]

Miss Bunting:  Glad she's gone.  She served her purpose to remind Branson of who he was.  But Robert's talk with him made him realize that he can appreciate both worlds. Like he told Sarah in the beginning, "I believe in people, not types".  Sarah Bunting was just as guilty as those aristocrats she hates of lumping groups of people together.  She never gave the Crawleys a chance.  She judged them before she knew Branson, judged them before she got to know him better and still judged them after he told her he loved them.  Even when he was giving her the brush-off, Bunting couldn't believe he didn't despise the family. I cheered when he told her that his wife and his daughter come from them, too.  When you insult his late wife's family, you aren't going to win points.  I disagree that she's being presented as evil because she hates the aristocracy, but because she chooses to hate. 

 

Edith:  Rosamund warned Edith in the beginning what would happened if she went through with the inane plan to involve the Drewes.  She gave her a list of items and nearly all of them have come true.  Edith told Mr. Drewe some story about a friend of hers, but he clearly understood the real problem and offered to keep his wife out of it.  That was his mistake.  This would have been much easier if he'd just given Margie Edith's story about a friend of hers.  At least then it would have been a plausible reason for continuing to come by the house.  To Margie's knowledge, this child was the daughter of a friend of Tim's.  The letter asking the family to take her is proof enough and why would you need adoption papers if the parents are dead, right? 

 

But because Tim decided to keep her out of the loop, she doesn't understand why this woman from the big house continues to come by constantly, setting her little daughter the lap, petting the child and acting very much like she's going to grab the child at any moment and run out the door.  Mrs. Drewe isn't being paranoid or over-reacting...I'm sure that's very much what Edith wants to do.  I'm betting Edith grabs that little girl the minute she's in the house.  She simpers about wanting to put her to bed and do other things for her.  She shows up telling them she has to see the child.  She acts like a desperate woman.   To Mrs. Drewe, there is no foster situation; no adoption arrangement with Edith; no indication that this child belongs to any other living person. 

 

So why shouldn't Margie be suspicous?  Why shouldn't she worry that Edith kidnapped Marigold?  She didn't know Tim was home when she found them out back (remember she told Edith she should have left as soon as Tim got home).  All she knew was that she came home, already unhappy at the amount of time clingy Edith is spending with the child, and didn't find them inside.  For a moment, she certainly did believe Edith capable of taking the girl.

 

That scene where Tim and Edith mangled the whole stupid "godmother" situation just made it worse.  It pits Margie against her husband, Marigold against her adoptive siblings and the Drewe family subject to constant random visits whenever Edith just has to see the child.

 

If she's not having an affair with Tim, the only other thing could be that she just wants to pet on the child until she gets another project. In Margie's eyes, the child is having her daily life interrupted by a dilettente that will get bored with her.   Rosamund's visit only cemented the problem for her.  Not only is Edith not staying away, but now she's bringing random visitors around.

 

The whole thing was mishandled from the beginning.  As a parent of a stepchild who was moved from place to place by a transient mother when he was young and who I strongly suspect has some form of R.A.D. because of it, I feel for poor Marigold.  In the real world, she will remember those people and, if not them, she will remember the feelings of being suddenly moved from the Drewe's cozy cottage to a large nursery where her "parents" and "siblings" are nowhere in sight, put under the care of a paid servant.

 

And as sorry as I feel for Edith whose choices and the dictates of society led her to this, poor Mrs. Drewe is being treated badly.  I don't envy her when the baby is yanked from her and for the other children who will certainly ask questions when their little sister is taken away.

 

Mr. Bricker: He was so adorable.  But so out of line.  Of course, Cora appreciated him and his flattery, especially while her husband was ignoring her and dismissing her opinions.  But nothing she did encouraged him to come into her bedroom uninvited to hit on her.  He did that himself. 

 

And the rest:  Please, God, please, just stop this whole Greene business.  Would Scotland Yard really care who might've pushed an unemployed servant in front of a bus on a busy street?  After two years??  Anna didn't kill him. Bates didn't kill him.  Just move on.  I love Bates & Anna.  They don't deserve all this.

 

Rose & Atticus:  How cute. 

 

The Russians:  No people group is entirely sympathetic or entirely evil.  I can loathe their anti-semitism while feeling sorry for them being thrown out of their homes, their country, separated from their families and being forced to eke out a living in foreign lands.

Edited February 23, 2015 by Wordsworth