Wordy Old Men on Downton Abbey: Season Five, Episode Three

[This week's delay was the direct result of Comcast blowing goats and the abysmal internet connectivity at OMD's parents' home. Wordy Ginters took the reins this week, thankfully, and the delay, while painful, should not repeat itself this season.]

Lady Mary works on her post-coital glow, Spratt drops a dime on her sex filled romp in Liverpool to the Dowager, Bates looks to get measured for pinstripes, again, Edith wears out her welcome with the Drewes, Baxter gets an ultimatum, Thomas is lying about something, Cora considers the art consultation business, Bunting shits in the punch bowl, Daisy does her maths.

Wordy Ginters: I've never been to England, but I imagine it doesn't get more romantic than Liverpool. Did you see the abs on Gillingham? I'm guessing those abs aren't historically correct. Regardless of his marbled midsection and impossibly full-bodied hair, he's already coming on a little needy, with the creepy "I notice everything you do" shtick and the unannounced arrival at the Russian Tea Party. I don't blame Mary for having second thoughts, but the self-absorbed "who will she end up with?" cliffhanger BS left me cold the first time around, as will its redux.

Screw these dinks.

Old Man Duggan: One of the worst days of my life had Liverpool as its lowlight. Travel nightmare on the day they arrested the terrorists in London who had been planning hijackings leading to heading deaf, dumb, and blind to Liverpool in the hopes of catching a ferry to Dublin to be able to eventually catch our flight from Ireland back to the States. Screw Liverpool and all its 'pudlians who couldn't tell me where the goddamn ferry line was.

As for good ol' Gill's abs, put your goddamn shirt on, you're making me randy with your abs and your lats, Tony Hunkingham. The Ham's got a 21st Century bod in the Roaring 20s. Good on him. You'd think with that package he'd be a little less desperate for the cavalier and anemic Mary Crowley. I'm not looking forward to getting to suffer through Lady Mary's hemming and hawing betwixt two suitors who frankly lack the charisma and draw of Matthew.

WG: I don't know what was more humorous: the idea that Carson could be wheedled into allowing a soldier shot for cowardice to have his name on the Downton War Memorial, or how PUT OUT he was when Thomas asked to use the demon telephone?

OMD: The incredulity in his eyes at Thomas possibly needing to use that infernal contraption when writing a letter would surely have done the glacially paced trick was a look of which only Jim Carter may be capable. His look upon having his office door shut behind him was priceless.

Just Falking around

WG: I thoroughly enjoyed the Dowager's stone cold lady balls when she effortlessly deflated Spratt's potentially embarrassing news with an extemporaneous cover story. It's those grace under pressure moments that make her coming undone at memories of Prince Kuragin more meaningful. The only thing that seems to rattle her is naughty sexy dirty blood sugar sex magik. And hey, I just watched Maggie Smith as a younger women in Neil Simon's barely watchable Murder by Death a few weeks ago, she was a total dish. Speaking of movies, isn't the dude who plays Prince Kuragin the same guy who rented Cruise his costume in Eyes Wide Shut? Those scenes at the costume shop were fantastically creepy.

OMD: Yes, Rade Serbedzija, who was also in Snatch. As for the young Miss Smith, I've seen none of her earlier work, much to my own chagrin. There's not a good reason for not having seen The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie. The old dame was quick on the draw with the fabricated reason for Mary's having been seen red-assed and sexually exhausted on the curb in Liverpool with her illicit lover. Spratt's inability to spew out his gossip in a way other than stilted was tiresome. Is he supposed to be affecting a Liverpudlian accent?

WG: I always dig it when Fellowes takes the production off Downton and films in London or other locales. Bricker humping Cora's leg up and down the museum corridors and the twilight sidewalks of London was visually striking. Despite the hash, rehashing, and re-purposing of many plot threads, the visuals have always been top notch on Downton Abbey.

OMD: The show is definitely at its best when mixing up the locations and showing that they're not just beneficiaries of preying on a flagging real-life manor. I simply cannot divorce Richard E. Grant from his role in Hudson Hawk. It makes it really hard to watch his neutered faux courtship of the married Cora Crowley. Grant was born in Mbabane, Swaziland.

WG: Spotted dick reference? Fellowes throwing a bone to the millions of middle school Downton devotees. The tragedy is that it's a damn fine dessert.

OMD: Good old Jules. Never above dipping his pen in the gutter inkwell and dropping a cheeky lewd reference.

WG: Sympathy butters no parsnips.

OMD: Nor is it reserved solely for the holy. But Carson could stop being a dick and just put dear cowardly Archie's name on the memorial.

WG: As much as I'm not looking forward to the Battle Royale among Lady Mary's suitors, I'm even more not looking forward to the idea that Bates is going to end up back on the hook. It's like peeling off a scab. I know you have a hard-on for shot framing, did you notice as he walked forlornly down the hallway after speaking with Anna about their predicament towards episode's end that he was tightly framed in by woodwork and windows with lattices and such? I get the jailhouse blues just remembering on it.

OMD: If Bates ends up back in the clink, that may be the nail in the show's coffin. Good catch on the filmic representation of Bates's looming imprisonment.

WG: What jumped out at you?

OMD: Cora's fitting with Molyneux was with Edward Molyneux, whose last name was apparently pronounced much more similarly to Rance Mulliniks, not in the fashion that Cora employed while namedropping her hoity-toity French pronunciation. Despite blindness in one eye on account of a war wound, he ran the go-to fashion salon in Paris and later Monte Carlo, Cannes, and London for the upper crust women who wanted to look unpredictably fashionable, at least according to the internet and historian Caroline Milbank.

WG: Thank your for conjuring visions of Rance Mulliniks and fine French fashion in the same paragraph. Have they ever been in such proximity before? Doubtful.

OMD: I like that free will as applicable to the boudoir escapades of the rich, famous, and gentrified is nonexistent in the eyes of the Dowager Countess. No, Mary, you were seduced. There is no other explanation. Of course Violet doesn't know that her granddaughter is the possessor of a mercilessly bloodthirsty anus, a fact that would certainly color her beliefs on aristocractic sexual determinism.

WG: For being relatively pragmatic, the old old old fashioned views on sex from the Dowager are a tad surprising. The only way to know about the fatal anus is to cross the rubicon. To experience it is to perish. Gillingham used up 8 of his 9 lives and half a spit curl surviving that weekend. Little known fact: locking pliers, AKA "vice grips," were invented in 1924. This is obviously related to Mary's anus, I just don't know how to connect the dots properly.

OMD: You are definitely onto something here. Is Tony Gillingham the man to invent them? Guessing so.

Mrs. Drewe's freak out was dumb. Of course Edith got the old heave-ho. It didn't take long for the helicoptering fairy godmother to get the heave-ho.

WG: Speaking of fashion, I kind of dig Mr. Drewe's threads. The man knows his vests. What he doesn't have is any idea how to execute a plan to get Edith reunited with her daughter. Whatever "plan" he had going, which was essentially visit us into submission, gives half-baked a bad name.

OMD: Every girl's crazy 'bout a sharp-dressed man. Hell, I'm crazy about him. But mastermind schemer? That's not Mr. Drewe.

I really loved Tom and Mary's fireside confidante scene. "Are we talking about your so-called sketching trip? Because I never believed in that for a moment." It was nice that the two of them could speak freely with one another. Perhaps Branson's lower breeding makes for easier to cut to the chase rather than dance around whilst employing tedious high society conversational conventions that endlessly skirt saying what is actually happening.

WG: If history has taught us anything, it's that Irish firebrands know all about fucking.

OMD: That cannot be argued. It is historical fact.

How is it that dipshit Miss Bunting can never bite her tongue and always ends up offending company? Let these Russian dopes mourn their dear dead Tsar without bringing up the policies of the forcibly and violently dethroned.

WG: Fellowes portrays Bunting like a hysterically right-wing over-the-top version of Hillary Clinton.\

OMD: I was driven by her residence just yesterday.

Baxter's bad influence was Mr. Coyle. I wonder what this says about Brendan Coyle's relationship with Julian Fellowes. I'm assuming this is a tongue-in-cheek nod to back-scenes shenanigans. Brendan Coyle, ever the bad influence on set, mucking up the works with his pranks and smoking of cigarettes.

WG: Excellent catch. No doubt a reference to the seductive ornery manliness of the powerhouse behind Bates.

Wordy Old Men on Downton Abbey: Series Three, Episode Seven [Christmas Special - "A Journey to the Highlands"]

This is the Christmas Special following the third season. If it were formally included in the series run, this is the ninth episode if you watched as they aired or are following along on DVD or Blu-ray. Of course, we're all seeing it seven weeks later, and many have not been so fortunate as to avoid the spoilers thanks to PBS's decision to delay airing the program stateside. As it is here at Inconsiderate Prick, Wordy Ginters and Josh "Old Man" Duggan will be your guides.

Old Man Duggan: So we jump ahead a full year. Despite the fact that this Third Series didn't advance through time quite as freely as the prior two did, we find ourselves in the ninth month of 1921, a full nine years later than where things kicked off. It seems a shame that Fellowes didn't expedite the Bates absolution a bit, especially given how much it all dragged, but maybe he'll advance things a little more rapidly this next series.

Wordy Ginters: I hope so. I assume we'll get to the ending in a minute. Despite that sour note from my vantage point, the last few episodes have salvaged the season, in large part because several monotonous plot threads were unstuck and set free, which clears space for new possibilities.

OMD: The new blonde maid checking out Branson as he passed by looked suspicious from the get-go. Moving right on past the fact that her head was shaped like an alien's head, it was clear to me that she was up to no good. Edna. Every British Edna is really a man, right? I think I learned that in school.

WG: Fellowes left his poker face in his kit bag. Too many telegraphed punches. Some of these last episode of the season moves would have detonated a bigger payoff with more set-up. You knew Mr. Edna wanted in Branson's trousers from jump street.

Chev vs. Bates: The Movie We All Want To See

OMD: Every once in a while, Bates will be doing something and the look on Brendan Coyle's face will seem so severe and dour as to make me wonder whether or not he is raging on the inside. Obviously it would appear as though that is not the case, as it does not appear to make sense when looking at Bates's nature, but when he was walking out of the kitchen after detailing how his Lordship loves going to Duneagle, that scowl that I project onto him appeared and I couldn't help but think to myself how he would make a great villainous mastermind to play foil to John McClane, John Rambo, or Chev Chelios.

WG: Coyle is one of the few members of the Downton crew I'd be drawn to see in another project. Crank 3: Port of Call Ripon.

OMD: Oh, no standard opening credits sequence this week, that means we have to wait an extra week (45 in total) before we see Isis's ass again to rev us up for new Downton Abbey. Do you think they're paying Branson to dog-sit while they're away?

WG: I was hoping we'd see Branson mincing about in one of Lady Cora's gowns, locking up Isis in a shed, or using Edith's toothbrush. Something with a little character. Some flair. Some reality. I know I'd have one of those beautiful gowns on before the last suitcase was loaded. I bet they are silky smooth.

OMD: No doubt.

Mary's pregnant. Color Colour me shocked.

WG: Too obvious, right? Perhaps this is the downside of the "one year later" gambit. When you drop theoretically big plot twists out of the sky, they ring off-key. Fellowes has been building pregnancy drama for the bulk of the season. To defuse that tension by planting a baby boy in Mary's womb in the last episode cheapened it somehow. It gave the whole thing a patina of cheese. Smoked Gouda.

OMD: More so than anything else, this episode made me yearn to go back to Scotland. Both my siblings studied outside of Edinburgh for a semester, my brother returned for a semester to work with the study abroad program, and my parents and sister were each married on the Isle of Mull. If I could move anywhere in the world, weather be damned, I do believe it'd be Scotland. For those curious, the scenes at "Duneagle" were filmed at Inveraray Castle outside of Inveraray in the county of Argyll, and sits near Loch Lyne. It's haunted by the ghost of a harpist who'd been hanged after peeping at a lady of the house. The chief of Clan Campbell, the Duke of Argyll, resides there. It's also a stone's throw from Oban which sets off a Pavlovian response in my salivary glands.

WG: Absolutely beautiful. One of my favorite scenes from Trainspotting is when they take a momentary break from the drugging grind and hike out into nature. One of the characters talks about how foolish it is that they run down Scotland and spend their days blissed out on heroin when the beautiful countryside is literally outside every window. Gorgeous country. Impressive Scottish street cred you've accumulated there. I've got a sister-in-law who works in a small village between Edinburgh and Glasgow. The best thing about her infrequent visits back to the states are the countryside photos she brings with her.

OMD: The condition to all that would be, of course, that I'd want to be as far as possible from Shrimpy and his family. The marital strife and incessant bickering would be much more than I'd care to immerse myself into, no matter the cost. Susan is positively insufferable. Every moment she was on screen was a moment in which I wanted to have someone, anyone stomp on my testes, and not in a pleasurable way. I feel bad for Shrimpy being stuck in a marriage as discordant as theirs. When he says, "We don't like each other," I understand completely. I can't fucking stand Susan.

WG: Jesus, she sucked. I thought Fellowes was paying homage to Single White Female with Susan and Cora, and the dueling haircuts. I was waiting for Susan to sneak into Lord Grantham's room and give him a blackmail beej.

OMD: If he can't summon an erection, does it still count?

If I wouldn't want to be around that familial conflict, then I really want nothing to do with the nonsense going on downstairs at Duneagle. Holy shit, those Scots are serious.

WG: Carson's counterpart was terrifying.

OMD: Every time they showed him, I shat myself.

When Isobel and Branson supped, I instantaneously cringed at the inevitability of Branson and Edna getting briefly entangled, as the transvestite alien spied a possible way to jump class strata. No me gusta. When she asked if Branson was ashamed of himself or what he was, I wanted to cut out her tongue. Do not fuck with Branson, Edna. You won't like what it gets you. Of course, her ham-handed button-pushing was instantly identified by the ever empathetic Mrs. Hughes, and the fiendish Edna was sent packing. It sure as shit looks to me that toying with Branson's emotions gets your ass fired if Mrs. Hughes picks up on it.

WG: I was disappointed he played the rube. Look, we all know Branson has had a rough couple of years. A fucking whirlwind. Can't be disputed. But where is the street tough revolutionary who fire bombed the swells mansion back in Dublin? That cat is long gone. He went from The Clash to The Alarm far too quickly.

OMD: Waking every morning to the 'pipes would be abrasive. I like the bagpipes as much as the next guy, but holy hell are they loud.

WG: I enjoyed the look on the Dowager's face immensely. Reminded me of the impromptu disgust she displayed when Shirley McClain was singing to her way back when. Does anyone register the unspoken "are you shitting me?" better than the Dowager?

Tufton, ca. 1980

OMD: Doesn't it seem like Mrs. Patmore's sleezy courtier had to have been transported forward in time from the 1920s? There's no way that guy is actually alive right now, is there? He could pass for Sloth's brother. How the hell is it that Patmore's back was turned every time he skeezed on a lady.

WG: He was a combo of Mel Sharples from The Brady Bunch and Schneider from One Day at a Time. A sweaty charmer.

OMD: Servants at the county fair. The family at the Gillies' Ball. This would appear to be the party down episode. If only Party Down were catering both of the functions [he looks longingly off into the distance]. I'd like to see how many R.D.D.s and R.D.D.s those Scottish servants would register on Ron Donald's watch. Also, I don't often agree with Carson, but when he said that "[he] would sooner chew broken glass" I laughed, but most of that comes from my similar disposition when it comes to spending time with the people. Do you think the merry-go-round was the same one used at the end of Strangers on a Train? I bet it was. It's still crazy to think that Hitchcock actually had that old man crawling under that contraption, hazarding death. Jimmy/James is quite the hustler, eh? No wonder Thomas fell hard for him. I'm glad Thomas and Jimmy made amends, if only just a bit. If you told me that I'd say anything nice about Thomas a year ago, I'd have punched you in the teeth.



WG: Exactly. Despite the fumbled footwork on some ends, Fellowes still comes through by making the unsympathetic sympathetic. I thought that merry-go-round came straight from the set of The Crush.

OMD: Fucking Lady Rose. The instant she returned to the screen there was one thing that I was certain of: she's replacing Sybil. Fuck me. The "mommy won't let me tart it up in the city" woe is me bullshit is not endearing her to me at all. Furthermore, I just don't see how Fellowes will be able to make her interesting. Surprise me, Julian. Please.

WG: Would it be possible to link her romantically with Branson? How about Carson? How about Edith?

OMD: My hope is that Carson finds love, even if it's not with Mrs. Hughes.

Clarkson and Isobel? What the fuck is going on here? Are we watching some weird, between war game show called Coupling Up? Are the hosts Ivor Novello and Lillian Gish? Clarkson gets himself a bit of the old liquid courage, musters up the gumption to ask her to think on marrying him, only to have her seemingly misunderstand what he was getting at while telling him she was afraid of change/remarriage.

WG: Did she know what was going on? I think she was completely daft. She's too busy working on the social safety net to be concerned about a crazy little thing like love.

OMD: I think she was completely oblivious.

Edith and Gregson. He loves her, obviously, but it wouldn't be an Edith love interest without an impassable hurdle. Of all of her prospective beaus, I actually like Gregson the most, but mostly because Strallan was disturbingly old. I'll never forget how Strallan had Branson's back after he was dosed, though. I love you, Sir Anthony.

WG: It will be interesting to see who Fellowes degrades more next season, Bates or Edith. With relatively bright skies shining over Bates and Anna, they would appear to be doomed. I can only assume that Gregson will be killed in a car accident.

OMD: Yeah, the family Bates is fucked.

So I happened across a headline on the front page of IMDb on what couldn't have been later than December 27th talking about what was next for Downton Abbey without Dan Stevens. I was fucking livid. This is the second time in three years that I've had a character's death spoiled in a fucking headline within a day or two of the episode airing. Have some fucking class, internet. Basically, I spent the entire episode waiting for the shoe to drop. Does he do something stupid to wrong Mary or does he just die? When does he die? How does he die? The whole fucking episode I just sat there guessing. Hunting accident? Shoe-horned affair? Hit by a stray shot as Susan attempts to kill Shrimpy? Death by food allergy while eating exotic food Scottish fare in the highlands? Turns out it was death by lorry while delivering news of a baby boy to the family at Downton. His death was presaged, of course, by two events in the first two episodes of this Third Series. The first shot of the second episode was Mary and Matthew in the death trap convertible talking about how shocked they Grantham household would be. More importantly, though, Mary sealed Matthew's fate when they were making up through the door the night before their wedding. When they kissed, she opened her eyes to look upon him. She fucking cursed their marriage and cemented Matthew's future in the form of a tombstone.

WG: I knew from the moment I (repeatedly) saw dark clouds hovering over the impossibly beautiful fields of Scottish heather that something dark was going down. When Matthew seemed so ridiculously and over the top happy and care free in his car, my suspicions were further affirmed. Reminded me of Ben Gazzarra swerving from side of the highway and nearly picking off the Swayze in Road House. Too much too soon. I like that Fellowes is shaking things up, and willing to kill off favorites. But too melodramatic. Would you be surprised if Season 4 opened and Young Mr. Sybil is 5 years old (they are naming the boy Sybil, right?), and Matthew's death was just a dream that he was having?

OMD: Yeah. Stevens has a life outside of acting. He publishes a literary journal and has been on the judge on the Man Booker Prize panel. Stevens's was apparently not going to come back for a fourth season from the onset of the series. He was out so it just was down to how he was leaving.

So Mary and Matthew had to have dabbled in F2FA, right? I've said it once, and I'll say it again: Lady Mary Crawley's anus is a deathtrap.

WG: Even light can't escape it.