Dowton Abbey S2 - this week's episode
Feb. 1st, 2012 10:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkatIs it just me or is Dowton Abbey not as good this season as last? The story threads feel more labored and contrived somehow..filled with manipulative war story cliches...
*Matthew comes home, the last male of heir of Dowton Abbey, paralyzed and of course he can't have sex or kids, so he sends his weak fiancee away. A fiancee that we've rarely seen and seems to do nothing but cry about how she can't live without him. Meanwhile the woman who he spurned, because she initially turned him down, is nursing him, sticking by his side in almost martyr fashion. Becoming quite the nurse - a complete role reversal from last season. I feel like I've fallen into a 1930s/1940s movie...or 1950s for that matter, starring Greer Garson and Rod Taylor in the leads. Or maybe Bette Davis and Henry Fonda. It's all so melodramatic and teary. Yet I find my eyes dry.
Oh and in true soap fashion - the woman he spurned, Lady Mary, is to be wed to Sir Richard Carlyse a wicked newspaper man who holds her reputation over her head. (Last season she slept with a Turkish Prince...who died in the act of trying to make love to her. Bates, Anna, and her mother helped her move his body back to his rooms. It was all rather hilarious. But Edith, being snippy, decided to spout off her mouth ...and as result the scandal landed in the lap of Bates' nasty wife, who in turn sold the info to Sir Richard. Mary smartly got there first, and revealed the information to Sir Richard. I keep waiting for someone to off the evil wife...but I guess we aren't watching Godsford Park.)
*The servant...William...melodramatically dies, after trying to save Matthew...but first he must marry his one true love Daisy. (Too bad she doesn't feel the same way. I felt sort of sorry for Daisy...who gets roped into the whole mess out of guilt.) He insists so that she will get his pension and war fund as his widow. The parish minister bulks at performing the marriage because he believes Daisy is trying to cheat the system. (He's wrong but right at the same time. Daisy doesn't want to do it, everyone else wants her to.) It's all rather touching, but I find it to be a bit contrived. I knew William was a dead from the outset. I just kept waiting for him to get killed.
That's really all that happened. Was rather bored. I know, it's sad. But it reminded me a lot of those 1980s War miniseries...the Winds of War, and War and Remeberance, or Pearl Harbor.
All of which I found to be rather...difficult to connect to. I'd say I'm not a fan of War movies, but that's not quite it. I think it's the heightened melodrama...just feels off somehow?
Also the show is getting preachy on the class consciousness. The Brits are bit more into this than the Americans are in their dramas...mostly because it's an older country and classism is bit more complicated over there. It's complicated in the States too, but it's based less on "aristocracy and birth right" and more on well "money". Sir Richard Carlysle's speech to Mary underlines the difference. In the US - we have old money (people who had it since the 1700s) and new money,
but that's about it. Or inherited wealth. And here? Inherited Wealth is well, frowned upon. We make fun of the trust fund baby. While self-made has a legitmacy to it. But money/wealth equaling power? That's true in both countries. Just the aristocracy, which doesn't always have any money, is in a whole class by itself. We don't really have that in the US. And I think it's the one of the major cultural difference that stands out and is why British costume dramas are so fascinating to Americans...we can't quite wrap our heads around the whole aristocrat bit.
*Matthew comes home, the last male of heir of Dowton Abbey, paralyzed and of course he can't have sex or kids, so he sends his weak fiancee away. A fiancee that we've rarely seen and seems to do nothing but cry about how she can't live without him. Meanwhile the woman who he spurned, because she initially turned him down, is nursing him, sticking by his side in almost martyr fashion. Becoming quite the nurse - a complete role reversal from last season. I feel like I've fallen into a 1930s/1940s movie...or 1950s for that matter, starring Greer Garson and Rod Taylor in the leads. Or maybe Bette Davis and Henry Fonda. It's all so melodramatic and teary. Yet I find my eyes dry.
Oh and in true soap fashion - the woman he spurned, Lady Mary, is to be wed to Sir Richard Carlyse a wicked newspaper man who holds her reputation over her head. (Last season she slept with a Turkish Prince...who died in the act of trying to make love to her. Bates, Anna, and her mother helped her move his body back to his rooms. It was all rather hilarious. But Edith, being snippy, decided to spout off her mouth ...and as result the scandal landed in the lap of Bates' nasty wife, who in turn sold the info to Sir Richard. Mary smartly got there first, and revealed the information to Sir Richard. I keep waiting for someone to off the evil wife...but I guess we aren't watching Godsford Park.)
*The servant...William...melodramatically dies, after trying to save Matthew...but first he must marry his one true love Daisy. (Too bad she doesn't feel the same way. I felt sort of sorry for Daisy...who gets roped into the whole mess out of guilt.) He insists so that she will get his pension and war fund as his widow. The parish minister bulks at performing the marriage because he believes Daisy is trying to cheat the system. (He's wrong but right at the same time. Daisy doesn't want to do it, everyone else wants her to.) It's all rather touching, but I find it to be a bit contrived. I knew William was a dead from the outset. I just kept waiting for him to get killed.
That's really all that happened. Was rather bored. I know, it's sad. But it reminded me a lot of those 1980s War miniseries...the Winds of War, and War and Remeberance, or Pearl Harbor.
All of which I found to be rather...difficult to connect to. I'd say I'm not a fan of War movies, but that's not quite it. I think it's the heightened melodrama...just feels off somehow?
Also the show is getting preachy on the class consciousness. The Brits are bit more into this than the Americans are in their dramas...mostly because it's an older country and classism is bit more complicated over there. It's complicated in the States too, but it's based less on "aristocracy and birth right" and more on well "money". Sir Richard Carlysle's speech to Mary underlines the difference. In the US - we have old money (people who had it since the 1700s) and new money,
but that's about it. Or inherited wealth. And here? Inherited Wealth is well, frowned upon. We make fun of the trust fund baby. While self-made has a legitmacy to it. But money/wealth equaling power? That's true in both countries. Just the aristocracy, which doesn't always have any money, is in a whole class by itself. We don't really have that in the US. And I think it's the one of the major cultural difference that stands out and is why British costume dramas are so fascinating to Americans...we can't quite wrap our heads around the whole aristocrat bit.
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no subject
Date: 2012-02-02 07:14 am (UTC)I am susceptible to the melodrama of war, and this war was particularly melodramatic. So having the tragedy of it all around, unrelenting even as people find their joys, doesn't seem off to me.
I've watched "Hugo" and "Midnight in Paris" recently, both of which touch on the cultural, artistic, and human fallout of The Great War, so seeing it happen in "Downton" just fits in with all the other things. Plus, every time the Dowager Countess opens her mouth, there's something quotable tumbling out!
no subject
Date: 2012-02-02 08:32 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-03 01:46 am (UTC)But I think this season is a bit sluggish and over-the-top in the melodrama, last season was better paced, wittier, and more enjoyable - but I also prefer parlour farce to War Time melodrama...which may be the problem.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-02 01:58 pm (UTC)I don't remember Bates helping them with the body of the Turkish guy?
I keep telling my husband, "They are going to have to kill her," regarding Mrs. Bates. Bates and Anna are actually my favorite couple, but I don't know that I can take much more of the melodrama.
Also, am I the only one that thinks the chauffeur might be a bit off balance?
Although, I admit, just listening to Maggie Smith spout sometimes makes it all worthwhile.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-03 01:42 am (UTC)No, not the only one. I've been wondering the same thing myself. Sybil, I keep thinking, please don't run off with him - big mistake. He's crazy.
I don't remember Bates helping them with the body of the Turkish guy?
It's partly how he and Anna got together.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-02 02:58 pm (UTC)Well I've thought that from the beginning. And that sort of story is probably a lot less comforting for young folks like you. ;o)
It's not fair to say that Matthew "spurned" Mary. She did reject him once and then he said "enough" when she refused to give him a timely answer to his second try. He didn't actually know what her answer might have been till he told her to forget it. "Spurned" is if she declared her love, then he said, "No thanks."
The William+Daisy plot was just strange. What was the point of it? William got what he wanted, to be able to say he really had a girlfriend. Daisy got left with a very odd, if poignant memory. "Yes, I've been married and I'm a widow. But no, I didn't want to marry him and I have no idea what it's like to be married." If we forget William ever existed in the story, does it matter? I think it could have led to a better plot if he'd recovered.
Oh yes, I wanted to point out that Earl Grantham is as necessary as a figurehead in Downton Abbey as Andrew is in Ringer, and his character is just as useless and almost as clueless.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-03 01:39 am (UTC)William+Diasy didn't really go anywhere. I was admittedly relieved he died because I was not looking forward to them getting married and Daisy feeling trapped. This feels less grating and preachy somehow. But also weird. William's story feels like it was there to further Daisy, the evil footman/officer plot, and Maggie Smith's plot. (I can't remember anyone's names at the moment.)
Also true about Earl Grantham...he really doesn't have much to do. Yet, his role is still better acted and written than Ringer. (Admittedly not hard.)
no subject
Date: 2012-02-02 07:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-03 01:33 am (UTC)And I'm guessing the WWII shakeup is basically the house becoming a hospital ward and Matt being paralyzed. But it's not quite enough.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-02 08:02 pm (UTC)The Christmas special, otoh, I loved to pieces! :)
no subject
Date: 2012-02-03 01:23 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-02-03 01:34 am (UTC)They produced it with the BBC. So co-own the rights.
no subject
Date: 2012-02-03 02:33 am (UTC)There's a new series of 'Upstairs, Downstairs' due to be aired on the BBC soon, though. Let's hope it's better than the first series was! :)
no subject
Date: 2012-02-03 02:19 am (UTC)