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Sep. 28th, 2015 04:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chocolatepotThoughts on Downton, 6.01:
- Robert and Cora: what did they even do? I don't remember.
- Mary: GET OUT OF MOURNING. Oh my god. It's been years, and she's still in purples and black. I honestly don't understand where they're going with this clothing story, because it doesn't fit with the narrative the show likes about the changing times, and normally I'm complaining because Mary's clothing is too prescient, so what are they thinking? It's been four years since Matthew died. Why was six months (or was it a year? I thought six months) of full mourning considered worrying but three+ years of second mourning not?
- Edith: Good on Edith for making plans to gtfo, she really needs to, but I'm also getting tired of how she opens herself up to Mary's bitchiness. EDITH! You keep trying little barbs on her like you think you're going to get her one of these days, but every time she overreacts and blows you out of the water. It's like you pinch her, so she stabs you with a knife. The only way to win is to stop provoking her in the first place and at least get the advantage of looking martyred.
- Tom: Good on you for getting out.
- Isobel and Violet: It's a good try, it really is, but Fellowes has no idea what to do with Isobel. She's best when she's actively doing something, like nursing or her prostitution-rescue thing, not managing or arguing. She's at her worst when she's arguing because she's so complacent about it. Violet is still okay but she seems real frail and I can't tell if it's acting or Maggie Smith. :( She's okay, right?
- Elsie and Carson and Mrs. Patmore: C plot, but the best of the episode. I'm not shipping E/C for some reason, but they're not Mary drama so it's cool.
- Thomas: BEST. Also. If somebody asked me "which bit of the episode should I watch?" I would absolutely suggest the bit where he gives George a piggyback ride.
- Anna and Bates: Just ... no. Not anymore. Please. Bates gets actively less and less appealing every season - it's kind of weird. Like at first, the whole gentlemanly schtick was cute because they weren't together and he was so reticent about getting together but wanting to at the same time (cast-iron button for me). Then he went too far in trying to keep them apart, which is only okay if you completely embarrass yourself by hitting Harry Potter and running away like a child. In prison it got a little better, just because of the setting, but last season his attempted gentlemanlyness was awkward. When he does it now I just feel super uncomfortable. Plus, Anna has had a VERY busy time, does she really need to have miscarriage angst?
- Daisy: Oof, that was uncomfortable.
I had hoped that Fellowes was going to pull out all of the stops for the last season, but instead we got a rehash of the usual Downton bag of tricks look pretty set to have it for the rest of the series. Anna and Bates have an emotional drama that doesn't intersect with anyone else's plot. Isobel and Violet have a long-running fight that represents conservatism vs. progress. Mary suffers the repercussions of her (not actually that scandalous) love life.
I remember back when the show started, and for the first few seasons I really defended Fellowes against charges that he was infatuated with a rigid class system, the ideal of loyal retainers, and a mythical golden era. I still don't think he consciously is, but when you write episodes with plot points like "Violet defends independent business entities" and "the Crawleys are right that Daisy shouldn't speak up to defend her father-in-law" and "yet another grasping maidservant who doesn't know her place has ill designs on the family" it gets really hard, Julian. We're at like season three of Glee exasperation levels here.
Now, Daisy (Being Human)/Lizzie Siddall (Desperate Romantics) playing Merida on Once Upon a Time, that has potential.
Workers came today to put up my pictures and calendar (it's a 1910s Costumes Parisiens one that I wish had been up all year but I didn't remember I had it until recently) and fix my windows. They open and close smoothly now! And my walls aren't so bare! There's also a bulletin board, so I was able to take a bunch of papers off my table, which is nice.
Put up my AMA at AskHistorians. Oops. Forgot it was my day and they only reminded me like ten minutes ago. Now watching Philomena while I finish sewing down the piping on my bodice. (Hemmed and put waistband on the overskirt yesterday; didn't get much done today because of the workers.)
- Robert and Cora: what did they even do? I don't remember.
- Mary: GET OUT OF MOURNING. Oh my god. It's been years, and she's still in purples and black. I honestly don't understand where they're going with this clothing story, because it doesn't fit with the narrative the show likes about the changing times, and normally I'm complaining because Mary's clothing is too prescient, so what are they thinking? It's been four years since Matthew died. Why was six months (or was it a year? I thought six months) of full mourning considered worrying but three+ years of second mourning not?
- Edith: Good on Edith for making plans to gtfo, she really needs to, but I'm also getting tired of how she opens herself up to Mary's bitchiness. EDITH! You keep trying little barbs on her like you think you're going to get her one of these days, but every time she overreacts and blows you out of the water. It's like you pinch her, so she stabs you with a knife. The only way to win is to stop provoking her in the first place and at least get the advantage of looking martyred.
- Tom: Good on you for getting out.
- Isobel and Violet: It's a good try, it really is, but Fellowes has no idea what to do with Isobel. She's best when she's actively doing something, like nursing or her prostitution-rescue thing, not managing or arguing. She's at her worst when she's arguing because she's so complacent about it. Violet is still okay but she seems real frail and I can't tell if it's acting or Maggie Smith. :( She's okay, right?
- Elsie and Carson and Mrs. Patmore: C plot, but the best of the episode. I'm not shipping E/C for some reason, but they're not Mary drama so it's cool.
- Thomas: BEST. Also. If somebody asked me "which bit of the episode should I watch?" I would absolutely suggest the bit where he gives George a piggyback ride.
- Anna and Bates: Just ... no. Not anymore. Please. Bates gets actively less and less appealing every season - it's kind of weird. Like at first, the whole gentlemanly schtick was cute because they weren't together and he was so reticent about getting together but wanting to at the same time (cast-iron button for me). Then he went too far in trying to keep them apart, which is only okay if you completely embarrass yourself by hitting Harry Potter and running away like a child. In prison it got a little better, just because of the setting, but last season his attempted gentlemanlyness was awkward. When he does it now I just feel super uncomfortable. Plus, Anna has had a VERY busy time, does she really need to have miscarriage angst?
- Daisy: Oof, that was uncomfortable.
I had hoped that Fellowes was going to pull out all of the stops for the last season, but instead we got a rehash of the usual Downton bag of tricks look pretty set to have it for the rest of the series. Anna and Bates have an emotional drama that doesn't intersect with anyone else's plot. Isobel and Violet have a long-running fight that represents conservatism vs. progress. Mary suffers the repercussions of her (not actually that scandalous) love life.
I remember back when the show started, and for the first few seasons I really defended Fellowes against charges that he was infatuated with a rigid class system, the ideal of loyal retainers, and a mythical golden era. I still don't think he consciously is, but when you write episodes with plot points like "Violet defends independent business entities" and "the Crawleys are right that Daisy shouldn't speak up to defend her father-in-law" and "yet another grasping maidservant who doesn't know her place has ill designs on the family" it gets really hard, Julian. We're at like season three of Glee exasperation levels here.
Now, Daisy (Being Human)/Lizzie Siddall (Desperate Romantics) playing Merida on Once Upon a Time, that has potential.
Workers came today to put up my pictures and calendar (it's a 1910s Costumes Parisiens one that I wish had been up all year but I didn't remember I had it until recently) and fix my windows. They open and close smoothly now! And my walls aren't so bare! There's also a bulletin board, so I was able to take a bunch of papers off my table, which is nice.
Put up my AMA at AskHistorians. Oops. Forgot it was my day and they only reminded me like ten minutes ago. Now watching Philomena while I finish sewing down the piping on my bodice. (Hemmed and put waistband on the overskirt yesterday; didn't get much done today because of the workers.)
