Downton Abbey - A Last Look

Series 1 - The beginning

So, after a couple of years and a stack of DVDs, we've wrapped up the final Christmas special at the tail end of the final series of Downton Abbey, Britain's - and apparently America's - favourite cosy period melodrama of decent toffs and loyal domestics. As I mentioned a while back, we were rather taken with series 1, which followed the Granthams - headed by cuddly patriach Lord Robert and his indomitable mother Violet, she of the perpetual sneer and the silent 'bitch' - and their staff from the sinking of the Titanic to the beginning of World War I.

Series 2 - The one with the uniforms

Season 2 saw the Abbey at war, with first the local hospital and then the Abbey itself drafted in as a convalescent centre, bringing the toffs authority into conflict with the idealistic old Scottish doctor and Isobel Crawley stepping up and clashing with Lady Cora as administrator and Lady Sybil training as a nurse. Resident scumbags Barrow and O'Brien continue to scheme against decent straight man Bates. The melodrama quotient is ramped up, with Matthew Crawley becoming engaged to some random, then being crippled, then recovering, where poor William the footman dies after taking the worst of the shell which did for Matthew's back, but not before Mrs Pattmore the cook basically browbeats Daisy the kitchen maid into marrying him on his deathbed. Bates is arrested for murder and Matthew's lacklustre fiancee dies of convenient flu. Sibyl and chauffeur Branson conduct a shenanigan and marry, gaining an eleventh hour blessing from Lord Grantham, who has a poorly-conceived first base affair with a maid which had us groaning in outrage. Lady Edith continues her run of shocking romantic ill-fortune during a brief appearance by a man claiming to be the dead Patrick Crawley. Series 2 really has everything, including a Christmas special in which Matthew finally proposes to Mary and Bates goes down for life.

Series 3 - The Americans are coming!

Series 3 brings more staff, including an ex-prostitute (shock!) and another kitchen maid who turns out to be prettier than Daisy (horror!) as well as Cora's American relatives. Barrow gets a bit more sympathy, nursing a crush on the new footman and beginning to break with O'Brien. Tom and Sibyl return from Ireland after Tom is implicated in a revolutionary outrage. Edith is jilted at the altar (or was that in series 2?) and then lands a job as a columnist. Sibyl dies giving birth to a daughter, the first victim of the zero-sum curse (no child can be born in Downton without someone dying.) Anna fights for Bates' freedom and Dowager Countess Violet continues to be awesome. Violet's niece, Lady Rose MacClare comes to Downton and is a topping flapper-type gal.

This year's Christmas special has a holiday in the highlands courtesy of Rose's parents. Edith receives a proposal from her editor, a maid gets fired for getting fresh with newly widowed Tom, Thomas saves good looking footman Jimmy from a mugging and Mary gives birth to a baby boy. Matthew hurries to see his son and then dies in a car crash.

Series 4 - Daisy seems constantly to be shoved into the background of these line-ups

Season 4 sees Lady Rose getting a lot of plot, notably an affair with a black band leader which Mary aims to put a stop to because she doesn't think it fair of Rose to play on his affections largely to piss off her parents. Tom, now the family agent, and Mary, as Matthew's sole heir, work to persuade Lord Grantham of the need to modernise Downton, a theme begun in Season 3. O'Brien leaves and is replaced for a while by scheming Edna, the maid who hit on Tom in the Christmas special. With Bates out of prison and everything swimming for him and Anna, she is raped by a visiting valet during a performance by Dame Nelly Melba. To keep the theme, Edna date rapes Tom and gets a verbal pummeling from Mrs Hughes for her trouble. Edith's intended disappears in Germany seeking a divorce from his insane wife, leaving her pregnant.

This series is hella dark, man. In the Christmas special it turns out that Edith's fella was murdered by the SA and she initially gives up her daughter for adoption. Mr Bates is suspected of the murder of Anna's rapist and Mary burns a train ticket which will later prove to have been a potential alibi. On the upside, we get to know Mr Molesley this series, a quiet older servant with perpetual bad luck, who proved to be a breakout hit with us.

Series 5 - Now with 100% more creepy Midwich Cuckoo looking children

Series 5 is the one with the Russians. Tom courts a school teacher whose liberal views annoy Lord Grantham and aggravate the white Russian refugees taken in in the area. Lady Rose hooks up with a Jew (shock!) and Anna is accused of murdering her rapist (horror!) Barrow brings in a ringer by getting a Miss Baxter, whom he can blackmail, hired as Cora's new lady's maid, but she forms a connection with Mr Molesley which has us going 'aww' for the rest of the run. Mary is courted by several men and rejects them all, even the one she's had an affair with, while Edith brings her daughter to Downton to live with a tenant's family in a largely unnecessary sub-plot carefully engineered to bring her the maximum trauma. The Abbey gets a wireless and Violet has a bit of a thing with a Russian prince. Isis the dog dies, no doubt the belated victim of the zero-sum curse. Isobel finds an admirer in Lord Merton, but declines to marry him because it would antagonise his sons. Carson proposes to Mrs Hughes, which also adds a lot of 'aww' to our viewing.

Series 6 - I honestly expected the Abbey to explode

Mary is romanced by a racing driver and Edith by a land agent. Bates and Anna are finally off the hook, only for Mrs Patmore to be implicated in adultery at her B&B. Lady Mary takes Anna to her gynaecologist, Daisy's father in law gets a new tenancy despite Daisy's misguided outbursts, and Daisy gets her ologies with some help from Mr Molesely. Lord Grantham has a perforated ulcer (I was for a while certain he was going to die in the final scene of the series) while Violet clashes with everyone over a plan for the hospital which would reduce her influence in the community. Edith gets engaged to her land agent, who turns out to suddenly be a Marquis, only for Mary to reveal her relationship to baby Marigold and ruin things, provoking a clash between the sisters at last, and Tom pushes Mary to marry the driver despite a racetrack accident which spooks her badly. Barrow begins to regret his past actions as he finds himself isolated and desperate, culminating in attempted suicide.

The final Christmas special sees Mary engineering a reunion between Edith and Bertie Pelham, and ends with Edith's wedding, the birth of the Bates' first child, rapprochements between Daisy and footman and wannabe farmer Andy, Mrs Patmore and Mr Mason, Isobel and Lord Merton (who marry in part to spite his horrid daughter in law) and Barrow becoming butler when Carson is struck by the palsy and persuaded to retire while remaining as a guiding presence. After the last 6 seasons of cray-cray melodrama, it feels almost unbelievably cuddly; as if it were some hazy afterlife after the Abbey did explode.

So, that's Downton Abbey. A mere 52 episodes, but so much dramah! Some say it's reactionary, and certainly the Crawleys are impeccably lovely for a bunch of toffs, but it's not as bad as it's made out, also showing the impact of changing times, the decline of privilege and the erosion of social distinctions, with even Lady Mary, she of the cut-glass accent, surprisingly pleased when Tom and her husband open a used car dealership. Yeah, it's cosy and yeah it's a bit daft, but damnit it's a lot of fun too (the bleak season 4 notwithstanding.)