Might not be a popular take but I really enjoyed Carson's relationship with Mrs Hughes before they were married. Their roles and pressures mirrored so well and they were good support systems for each other- but it was nice seeing it all in a platonic way. Two heads of the servants going "Ugh you will not BELIEVE the mess i had to deal with today"

Prime Video lured me into watching this 2013 documentary "Lord Montagu" by describing it as 'a real life Downton Abbey'.

Lord Montagu's life sounds like a spinoff, Downton Abbey: The Next Generation. Like Downton Abbey and the real Highclere Castle, Lord Montagu inherits Beaulieu Palace House with enormous taxes and maintenance costs. Lord Montagu strives to keep the estate intact and generate income -- basically turning a comparatively modest country house into a tourist attraction.

I wasn't familiar with Montagu, so it was interesting to hear about his interesting life and personality. I couldn't help but think of him as basically Lord Grantham's grandson.

...wasn't that an unusual way of obtaining a servant from their current employer?

I would think that Guy, being wealthy & high-end in his own right, would have asked Lady Mary in a forthright manner, instead of allowing Thomas to handle his own transference of employment without any input [from Guy].

Is it just me or does anybody else love Charles Blake and wish we'd seen more of him. Also I think he was a much better match for Lady Mary than Henry Talbot whom I never seen the point of to be perfectly honest.

After reminding people he was the chauffer, I think Tom spends most of seasons 4-6 talking about the repair shop. Where is it supposed to go? Will it make money? What will it repair? How do they fix things without it for most of a decade?

Not so much for how it played out, but for the potential it had to be really interesting?

Bad acting and accent aside, I am curious as to how this might have been addressed if Patrick Gordon could have actually been Patrick Crawley. If his story held up and he could produce some apparent evidence of his identity, what would the procedure be for proving or disproving it?

There's no fingerprint or DNA evidence of course. But I've read in some Regency-era novels that if there was a contender to the legitimate heir to a title, the contender has to petition Parliament, submit their evidence/proof, and then whatever committee is involved with these situations reviews all of the evidence and makes a ruling on the validity of the claim.

I would have enjoyed seeing some version of this played out, with of course the final ruling being that Matthew is indeed the legitimate heir and Fake Patrick the fraud.

His story was bogus from the start and I never thought he was the real Patrick, but it might have been nice to see a little more in-depth attention to this, as opposed to the many Bates/murder storylines we had to sit through.

Anyway, you're all strangers to me now.

I always assumed this show was for women, like "Poldark" or "Outlander" you know, with the overtly romantic stuff. but damn, i just binged 2 seasons in 5 days and im hooked.

My thoughts so far, Mary and Mr Crawley (im blanking on his first name) are a bit irritating to be honest, the servant characters are definitly my favourite, The Butler reminds me of my old boss when i use to work in a Cathedral. And Thomas is growing on me a bit, even though he was a collosal c*** in the first season. he doesnt seem quite as nasty in the 2nd season.

Emma is a sweetheart, Mr Bates is alright but a bit meh and virtuous. Daisy and Patmore are good, and even Miss O'Brian is starting to turn into a bit of a softy and im here for it

The cast overall are amazing. Maggie Smith kills it as usual

I think he does really bring out the best in her and that is a big part of why he is good for her and the right person for her.

I'm rewatching the series of course and it really stood out to me that at the time Carlisle tries to bribe Anna into reporting on Mary's activities that he would have hit the absolute jackpot if he had encountered Barrow for anything underhanded instead. Yet the main plot has Carlisle only going up against the most principled and honorable characters in Downton.

It suddenly seemed unbelievable that Carlisle wouldn't have a better gauge on reading types of people and which ones can be bought or approached. Or maybe this simply showed that he was so powermad that he believed everyone could be bought and had a price.

It also seemed unbelievable that scheming Barrow who was so desperate for a position and who was volunteering to be footman at the time wouldn't have latched onto Carlisle.

Anyways still, I think there is a whole alternate reality or spin off where Barrow becomes Carlisle's butler and just absolutely thrives in his spymaster to the spymaster domain that I would have been terrified for the Crawleys for, but likely would have been satisfying to see them rip through London society. There's only one shot of them together and it's Barrow holding open the door for Carlisle to leave to library.

What do you all think?

Just to start this by saying: I know the show isn’t perfect, I know it has its flaws and I also know the show very well, so this isn’t my first time. I watched live from S3 onwards and have seen the entire show at least 5 times over the years in total.

But this is my 6th or so rewatch it total (seeing as it’s on Netflix in the UK right now) and I noticed something that I just can’t unsee and it might be one of my biggest pet peeves in a while.

In the latter half of the show (S3 onwards) it feels as though the show almost… tries to pad out its runtime by repeating the same conversations over and over again. I feel as though it doesn’t happen in the earlier seasons as much but here are two examples I’ve noticed.

After Sybil’s death, knowing what to do with Tom’s character was obviously a struggle and I can understand it must have been a challenge. But apart from Miss Bunting’s storyline, I feel as though the only time we see Tom on screen (after he becomes the agent) is to have various versions of this conversation:

Some character: it must be hard to straddle two worlds

Tom: it’s very hard

Some character: you’ve done so well though, managing to navigate these two worlds

Tom: it’s not been easy

Some character: but you mustn’t feel as though your journey has been in vain

Tom: I suppose so

I feel as though various versions of this exact conversation happen countless times over s3-5 and it’s just… kind of boring to be honest.

Another example, though much less severe, is the episode I rewatched last night in S5when Mary and Charles kiss to finally get Tony off Mary’s back. And while it’s only contained to this one episode mostly, idk how many times I heard this conversation:

Mary: why don’t Tony and Lane Fox get together

Charles: well if you’d stop yanking his chain, he might marry her

Mary: [ambiguous eyebrow lift]

It’s only disappointing because these episodes really are quite long. And while they do have a lot of characters to deal with and I’m not saying it’s easy, I can’t fathom why professional writers would waste precious screen time by recycling the exact same dialogue but in different flavours. I don’t mind similar storylines appearing throughout the show, but when the only time a character shows up on screen (like Tom) to just repeat the same points over and over, it feels like that time could be better spent elsewhere.

“The sentiment of the greeting is not reflected in the text” LMAAAOOOOOOOO

kind of a nowhere question but there's a few scenes were Cora is bathing while O'Brien is in the same room, so I wonder if the dynamics with Bates/Robert is the same

Most notably the phone call with shrimpy to find contacts at leeds general hospital, and the luncheon with ethel when she didnt want to waste a good pudding.

The sub often mentions how we'd love a prequel series focused on Violet's youth. Or a series about Cora and Robert's courtship (I've heard that's what the Gilded Age was originally intended to be). Or a series focused on the "babies" of Downton (Sybil, George, Marigold, etc.) in their twenties.

But if you could have a limited series (let's say 6-8 episodes) focused on a side-character who appears in Downton, who would it be??

It can't be any central cast member, so nobody from the Crawley/Levinson family or a blood relation, or anyone from downstairs. The tone would be same as Downton, so drama with some comedy, but not too dark or gritty.

My vote goes to Laura Edmunds, Edith's editor. I think it would be fun to see her life as a working woman in a male-dominated field. OR Mabel (but only if she ends up realizing that she can do better than Tony, or maybe they do get married, but they're not by the end 😏).

Branson't letter to Sybil

Season 3 Episode 3, when the general comes to visit the hospital with Mathew.
Branson volunteers to act as a footman to "keep up the honor of Downton", but in reality wants to pour the disgusting cow poo + sour milk + oil + ink soup over the general.

What I don't find believable is that after finding the letter, Carson doesn't do anything about it. We get the agreement between Carson and Mrs. Hughes that "it wouldn't help" to report him, plus the scandal, etc. But I would imagine that apart from the attack attempt, there was also the issue with the letter to Lady Sybil.

At this point he had confessed his love to Sybil and was basically harassing her, convincing that she loved him. So I image the letter would be somewhat inappropriate in the level of familiarity. Why would the chauffeur address Lady Sybil in that way? That seems like something Carson would most definitely report at least to Robert.

I wish I would’ve just paused it and took a picture.

I am pretty sure I was watching it, in one of the middle seasons I think, and Cora was in her room talking to someone getting ready for dinner or after dinner. She had on a green dress…not dark or bright green…but a kind of seafoam, green grey, sage green…it was really gorgeous and I want to look at the color again because I want to maybe buy something in a similar color.

I google Cora green dress and it only shows me pics of Edith in a strapless green dress…but I swear it was Cora!

I don’t know what episode it was and I just finished watching it all and don’t want to go through it all episode by episode. Does anyone know what I’m talking about? Am I delusional??

Everyone else did, including Matthew. But as far as I remember (this was quite a few seasons ago) Tom never did. I remember the scene where someone gave him the 'chicken' feather to indicate they thought he was a coward. Is it because he is Irish? Could they not be drafted by the British? Sorry if this is obvious but I don't know much about UK history.

I enjoy finding good things about characters. Tony is not a favorite of mine, but I noticed on this rewatch that he is always extremely kind to Tom. Tony is never snobbish towards him and treats him like an equal. I think Tony should really have left Mary alone and he has no business hiring valets. However, I appreciate that when Mary told him he needed to be fired, he agreed. Probably he was a bad lover, though.

So, I've asked a similar question about the nanny who was mistreating Sybbie before, but I'm honestly still confused. I get that she thinks that Sybbie isn't as good as George because he's the kid of two of the English aristocrat, while Sybbie is half working class Irish. But the thing I don't get is how she seems to look down on her from her own perspective. By that classist way of viewing things, isn't Sybbie still better than the nanny, being half aristocrat? Or is it like Spratt not wanting to serve the doctor tea? Because even though a doctor is higher up in society than a butler (or is that true?) he doesn't want to serve anyone he doesn't perceive as being in the total upper echelons? So is it that the nanny looks down on Sybbie because she thinks she should only be taking care of the best? Or is it not really about class and more about ethnicity, because Sybbie is half Irish and the nanny is fully English?

I'm just confused, honestly.

I have heard fans say she is a bully which i completely disagree with. She is flawed but I don't see her as a bully in any way. She is complex, she can be very kind and for sure she has her walls up but she she has many good moments. I find her a real and authentic character

So after what seems like a crazy long time I’ve finally committed to watching Downton Abbey. I’ve only watched Season 1 so far and the only spoilers I’m aware of (I think) is that Dan Stevens leaves after Season 4. I figured I’d post my initial reactions to Season 1. 

1. I HATE Thomas and O’Brien. I don’t think there’s much more to be said than that. 
2. I love Bates and Anna. I hope it works out for them 
3. Carson’s great. My boyfriend said he looks like the blue eagle muppet and now I can’t get it out of my head. 
4. I love the family. I kind of imagined Maggie Smith’s character to be worse? In the stubborn way I mean, but she’s been pretty good so far. I like her budding relationship with Cora. 
5. My preference for the sisters is Sybil, Mary and then Edith. Mary and Edith are just so terrible to each other! I keep thinking one of them has gone too far (like with the Turkish embassy) and that will be that, and then the other goes and blows it right out of the water (Edith’s upcoming engagement). Edith kind of started out more mean initially so that’s probably why I prefer Mary, but then again no wonder how she turned out with a sister like her. Thank god for Sybil. 
6. Slightly confused by Mary’s indecision with Matthew. I thought she was withholding saying yes until she told him about Pamuk but then she seemingly hasn’t done that but was more indecisive because of the pregnancy? Felt slightly clumsy to me but maybe that’ll be explained in Season 2. 
7. I love her and Matthew’s romance by the way. 
8. Also I have to say I HATED the whole Pamuk thing. It didn’t come across very romantic to me since she kept inferring he was her lover. He kind of forced himself onto her. Maybe it’s just bad  writing from 2010 but ew. 

The characters are honestly so well written, I love how everyone’s personalities are fleshed out, the different dynamics between the classes. The social aspect feels very real, the gossip, the bullying, the different splitting off in large groups, the fact that good characters can come across as harsh or blunt, but mean characters can be charming. It’s just the best part for me. Can’t wait for Season 2! 

!As we know, the last installment of the series takes place in 1928, which is 5 years before the Nazis' rise to power in Germany, 11 years before the start of WWII, and 12 years before the start of the Blitz. Would Downton Abbey be close to the bombings, or be directly bombed, or not suffer much effects?!<

She has to be such a miserable human being to do that to her daughter.

It's miracle that Rose is so kind and sweet. With so much love and kindness.

I am glad Rose moves away.

Wretched woman. Bonus Atticus mom is truly wonderful.