Here is a New Yorker parody of Downton Abbey and its obsession with death, for all of you to enjoy over spring break! 

Have We Jumped the Shark?

So season Three ended with quite a surprise, didn't it?

Abruptly, Matthew was snatched from us without any type of warning. Although otherwise, nearly every plot line seemed resolved- the estate was in good hands, all those of interest were married (or dead) (or Edith), Bates was back and happy, Thomas never left, etc. Which leaves the question: What else is there? How much longer can we follow the Downton Estate?

I can't imagine that we'll continue very much longer. The world is changing still quite drastically- I mean, it's now the scandalous, roaring twenties! The aristocracy cannot last that much longer. And who do we follow? Will we revisit the Abbey in twenty years, with a now eligible Sibyl and (what we can assume to be named) Matthew? In the midst of World War II? I doubt it.

Realistically, we'll pick up right where we left off. That's fine. The Abbey will be in mourning for a good while. What else will be new? Lady Rose, as the resident young hooligan, will try and steep the house in scandal- to no avail. Branson might be some ladykiller, or just fall off entirely. Downstairs, they'll be some tiff between Alfred and Jimmy, which will end with Daisy probably marrying one of them. Maybe Lord and Lady might divorce, alluded to by Shrimpy's sad marriage?

Most of those who I know watch the show say that their stay at Downton is over. I might agree. I can't see much more to do- I've wandered the halls enough.

Looking Forward: What's Next for Downton?

The almost-idyllic finale of Downton's third season, with its sharp turn at the last minute, has left its viewers with all sorts of things to contemplate as we await the next installment.

What will the unknowingly widowed Lady Mary do now that she has an heir but no husband? Will she remarry? It seems to me that killing off Matthew was a means of making Mary single and desirable again; once the audience thinks they can see how a character's future will go (in Mary's case the moment she married and intended to have children), they begin to lose interest in that character. Having Mary on the market again, her and her son's fates uncertain, will get the viewers back to the edge of their seats. Aside from the possibility of a romantic interest renewed, will Mary and Branson bond over the loss of their spouses? Will they raise their children side by side or will Branson eventually leave the wealthy world he is still so unaccustomed to?

There is no doubt in my mind that we will see a number of new staff members in season 4, as we have in the past three seasons. My guess would be that the nanny will get a lot more screen time as well, given that she now has two Granthamlets to look after. How will Lord Grantham react to losing the man he came to see as his son? Will the scheming, vindictive O'Brien be redeemed the way the now-dear Thomas was? (Or will she remain a cruel and malicious character who we love to hate and who will, to quote from class, die alone?) How will Thomas and Jimmy's newfound trust and companionship fare? How will the entire family and household deal with Matthew's death?

While we may not all end up watching the next season, I hope that at least a few of us continue to follow along. I know I will.

Reading too much into things..?

The ending of Lady Audley's Secret gives us a lot to consider. We can speculate, as we did on Tuesday in Madison that Lady Audley isn't actually dead and is in fact pretending in order to get out of a messy situation and work her way into a better one.

For that to be true though, I feel like it would depend on her kind of 'mad'. Is she simply upset about being abandoned, does she have postpartum depression, or is she actually a lunatic? If she is simply angry, I don't see her disappearing again, more likely her story has actually ended. If she s slightly unstable and upset about her circumstances, maybe she really did waste away—maybe she really was just tired, being a loon can really take a lot of a person. And can probably be linked to physical health factors that can lead or contribute to death. But if she is a full blown lunatic, a sociopath, then she very likely could have faked her death. She could very well be lurking around the corner of the story, waiting for everyone to be so distracted that we/they don't see her slip out and into a new story, full of new characters to terrorize. Or to live a new life, less complicated.

However, all of this speculation seems like just good fun, or silly on our part, like we are unhappy with the ending and thus we need to make up something more exciting. I personally like the ending of Lady Audley's Secret, even if it is a bit of a cop out...

"I hope that no one will take objection to my story because the end of it leaves the good people all happy and at peace" (Braddon 446).

Maybe, as suggested in Madison, peace is being used as a trick term and doesn't actually mean peace and is really alluding to something else. But maybe Braddon just wanted a happy ending and did the most convenient thing; killed off Lady Audley. It would not be the first nor would it be the last time a writer has done so. I guess it seems to me that after all the trauma, the characters deserve a happy ending, or maybe Braddon is just a sucker for happy endings too. Either way, I am in favor of taking the ending of Lady Audley's Secret at face value and accepting that she is probably not actually still alive and that everything has worked out in favor of happiness.

More Than One Secret?

"It is more than a year since a black-edged letter, written upon foreign paper, came to Robert Audley, to announce the death of a certain Madame Taylor, who had expired peacefully ay Villebrumeuse, dying after a long illness, which Monsieur Val describes as a maladie de langueur" (Braddon 445).

While our class was in Madison on Tuesday, someone brought up the idea that perhaps Lady Audley was actually alive at the end of Lady Audley's Secret.  This thought wormed it's way into my head and I began to think, "Why not?"  As we know from previously in the text, Lady Audley has successfully faked her death before to change her life and circumstances and what would stop her now?

Before the conclusion of Lady Audley's Secret, Lady Audley confesses all of the things that she has done to keep her identity secret and to maintain the style of life that she has chosen for herself.  For me that confession seemed like an ending of sorts - the secret was out and there was an answer for the mysteries that had been plaguing Robert Audley for most of the serial.  Despite some of the confession being false (though Lady Audley thought that she'd killed George Talboys), we would never have know that Lady Audley was wrong.

What if the secret is that Lady Audley didn't die peacefully of an illness referred to as "maladie de langueur" or as the footnote points out "anemia or general fatigue?"  Part of me wishes to believe that Braddon didn't leave it so cut and dry.  The "general fatigue" or the "wasting disease" that Lady Audley purportedly died of was Braddon's way of saying that she grew tired of her situation and moved on to a different one.  To me, dying just seems too tidy a thing.

Braddon concludes by saying, "I hope that no one will take objection to my story because the end of it leaves the good people all happy and at peace" (Braddon 446).  What about the "bad?"  Even if Braddon doesn't place Lady Audley in the "good" people category, perhaps Lady Audley isn't "at peace" because she still hasn't found the life or security that she has been searching for and she isn't dead (the idea of "rest in peace" as something we associate with the dead and being buried).  Her presence still haunts Audley Court because she hasn't found the place that she's meant to be.

What do you think?

The Biggest Cliffhanger

What I found most compelling about the finale, besides the obvious death of Matthew, was his death in placement to the episode. When I think cliffhanger, I think about a completely grave event happening on screen, a smash to black and then a wait until the next episode tells me the fate of the characters on screen. In this regard the cliffhanger I find most compelling is how Downton itself will deal with the death of Matthew, not Mary or any of the other inhabitants of the estate but the show itself.

Obviously Matthew is an integral character to the show, he progresses story lines and interacts with other characters as a main character should; he and Lady Mary's romance has become one of, if not the most, popular on the series. While his death is still raw to me, what I'm interested in now is seeing, come season four, how the show will continue to progress and evolve without one its of the key elements. Lady Mary, the baby, Downton itself, where will their fate lie as we move away from the “certainty” the finale tried very much to portray. The uncertainty that is sure to come following Matthew's death is poetic, it mirrors the uncertainty fans have in Downton's future.   

Cliffhangers

What else would we talk about?

Really, though, I'm sure that the rest of the episode was all fine and dandy in its own right - I recall a hilarious scene with Moseby, some heartwarming moments with Thomas (of all people), and I believe a wee bairn came into the mix at some point. It's just that, when a story does something like this - abruptly killing off a main character (and a "main" main character, at that) - there's rarely much else people talk about.

The effect is only amplified when the character is killed off at the end of an episode, because that's what people come away from the watching thinking about. And when it's at the end of a season, well...

Essentially, there are two ways such a move can go: well, or poorly. There's no middle ground, because, with a twist like this, an indifferent reaction from the audience is just as bad as an angry one - potentially worse, even. At least anger implies some degree of investment. The best case scenario is that the audience is horrified and saddened (make 'em gasp and cry, and all that), and cannot wait until the next installment to see what happens. How will the remaining characters react? Is character X even really dead? Sometimes, after all, these characters return in the most unlikely of ways. Of course, ideally this also creates even more tension in the audience simply because, if such an important character can die so suddenly, then this means that other characters can be bumped off, too, at any given moment. Now, for my part, I don't expect anyone to start saying "Valar Morghulis" or "only death is real" any time soon - ie, I doubt character are going to start dying off in droves at random or the show's themes are going to become excessively morbid - but the show has shown this season that it is capable of killing off characters to create tension, for better or for worse. Since it's not "Supernatural," the odds of these characters coming back are not high - this means that the show's formula and the way characters interact with one another can and will change with these and any following deaths. Change, whether or not we like it, is exciting; if the show can make good use of the deaths, it will continue to draw a large audience for this reason. If not, then it may be boarding the train for cancellation town sooner than expected.

What do Downton Abbey and Jane Austen fandom have in common? This blog post from  The Journal of Victorian Culture  may be of interest! We look forward to hearing from our bloggers about tonight's "Scotland episode"/ finale...

Lady Audley's Secret: Vol. 2 Ch 9 - Vol. 3

I was one of the last to sign up for a blog post, and I wasn't sure how I'd like doing a post on Lady Audley when I wrote my name down, but after reading this installment, I'm glad I did! These chapters contained a number of intense, suspenseful moments that were quite entertaining to read. 

The reading starts with Robert conducting more investigation into the matter of Helen Talboys' disappearance, which concludes with Robert determining that he has collected enough evidence to prove that Lady Audley and Helen are indeed one and the same—that is—at least enough evidence to finally confront Lady Audley face to face with plain language. No more letters or warnings. The gloves are coming off!

Robert's visit to Audley Court and Lady Audley's conversation with Sir Audley are probably my favorite parts of this section.

He arrives at Audley Court  and quickly finds a place where he can talk to Lady Audley alone.  The confrontation that follows is quite intense and loaded with tension. Lady Audley denies the accusation, obviously, but Robert made a very compelling case, compelling enough to convince Lady Audley that he was a real threat. Later on, in private, we see Lady Audley say something along the lines of, "if he were standing right here, I'd kill him."

Of course, Lady Audley can't allow Robert to reveal her secret, and there's a long section of conversation between Lady Audley and Sir Audley in which she tries to bias Sir Audley against Robert. 

I found it quite amusing how obvious her acting was, (although of course it would look obvious to the reader) and unfortunate that Sir Audley—blinded by his love for Lady Audley—began to believe her, because at first, Sir Audley came to the defense of Robert. He said that perhaps Robert wasn't the brightest of fellows, but surely he wasn't mad. But by the end of the conversation, Lady Audley's tears had at least convinced him to reconsider. 

It will be interesting to see to what lengths Lady Audley will go to to protect her secret. Will she follow through on her promise? Will she kill him? Will Robert bring her to justice? I guess we'll have to find out!

The Roar of the Twenties

Through 3.6 of Downton Abbey, we begin to see the various new tension in the house take place of the old tensions, during Autumn of 1920.  The "roaring twenties" have begun, and relationships, friendships, rivalries, the separation between "upstairs" and "downstairs" of the estate, and the imminent expansion are all being tested.  

One of the first tensions we are aware of is Tom wanting to give baby Sybil a proper Catholic baptism.  However, tension is initiated here by Robert's firm reluctance to this, because he did not have a Catholic upbringing.  However, the rest of the family, including Violent, push him to accept and attend the baptism.  We see that the rest of the family, except for Robert, is becoming more accepting of changes such as this. After Robert attends the baptism, more tension arises, but this time between Robert, Matthew, and Tom in terms of what to do with the Downton estate.  

It is evident throughout a lot of this episode that Robert feels and is out of the loop.  One time that we see this is through Mary and Matthew's fertility tensions.  Cora seems incredibly aware of Mary's issue, her small operation, and her reason for going to London, whereas Robert is completely unaware.  Indeed, this is because Mary potentially being infertile would be detrimental to Robert's traditional views of the continuance of Downton.

More tensions circulating around the estate are brought up as Matthew, Robert, and Tom decide how to approach it.  Matthew and Tom believe that Downton needs to change its approach to its land in order to accomadate to the changing times.  Even Violet, tending to be very reluctant to change, supports this, as well as supporting other non traditional things in this episode, such as Edith's employment.  However, Robert, with his traditional values, is stuck in the past and, for a long time, is reluctant to change.  Instead of this crisis, his focus is on the imminent cricket match.

Throughout the cricket match though, as the new permanent resident of Downton, Tom, tries to persuade Robert to focus on the future of the estate, Robert eases in.  The cricket match is worked into the show very nicely: to bring the whole group together, and to allow for focus on specific side conversations.  Finally, the cricket match, which started very disjointed, ends with Robert, Brandson, and Matthew embracing after a win, finally.  This allows us to think that change, collaboration, and good things are on the way for Downton.

Favorite quote of the episode: 

Violet: “It seems a pity to miss such a good pudding.”

When Did Thomas Become Sympathetic?

The episode opens with the conclusion of Bates’s imprisonment. This was a notably long plot line  and the audience is allowed some happy shots of Bates and Anna walking around the estate and admiring their future home. Anna and Bates discuss how Lord Grantham will have to let Thomas go now that Bates is back, and Bates remarks “revenge is sweet.”

This was an unsettling moment. Thomas has become more sympathetic as the show has progressed, and I think Bates reveling in the downfall of Thomas creates a moment of internal analepsis. We've examined these moments before, Steph pointed out the scene where Daisy reflected on all that’s happened in the past three seasons. This internal analepsis  Bates created was more focused. When I bristled at the thought of Bates taking down Thomas, I immediately thought back to the sneering, scheming Thomas of season one. That Thomas would never have cried over Sybil’s death, and I probably would have been rooting for Bates to take him down.

Of course, this moment of reflection was only building towards the climax of the Thomas/Jimmy plot line  Now that Thomas has become more sympathetic, we’re pushed into the role of a helpless observer. The sequence of Thomas sitting in room, with tense music building and building, is almost farcically contrasted with the easy flirting and banter between Alfred and  Ivy as they head back to the house. The cuts between the cheerful pair and the agonized, singular Thomas serve to highlight Thomas’s desire for something he can’t have. And as Alfred and Ivy fall apart on a sour note, Thomas decides to go to Jimmy. The quick disintegration of Alfred and Ivy is a foreboding warning for the viewer, and as if that’s not enough, Thomas’s approach is filmed in unsettling colors and angles. Some of the camera angles on Thomas are noir-ish, they’re shot from below and he’s in heavy shadow as he approaches Jimmy. This is not a romantic moment, it’s a moment laden with tension and fear.

In the aftermath of this scene, the audience’s sympathy is on Thomas. This only complicates the Bates vs Thomas plot line  and the audience is placed in more ambiguity. Unlike season one, we don’t have the easy decision between a snarky, evil Thomas a saintly Bates. We have a more complex and sympathetic Thomas, and Bates…is about as saintly as ever.

What are some other character progressions or shifts in dynamics that you've noticed?  

Downton Abbey on steroids

I was surprised to see that last night both episodes 6 and 7 of Downton Abbey (Season 3) were aired on Wisconsin Public TV. Oddly enough, PBS/Masterpiece is only making episode 6 available for streaming online at their website. I suggest, therefore, that for discussion and blogging we still stick mostly to episode 6 (since not all of you may be able to view 7). I am looking forward to your insights and critiques!.

Lady Audley's Secret uses a more subtle type of suspense than Great Expectations or Downton Abbey. It doesn't throw the characters into mortal peril seconds before the end of an installment. For example, George Talboys, the young man introduced as a major character near the beginning, goes missing. But, he doesn't go missing in a captured-by-bandits, sort of way, he just wanders off into the countryside. It doesn't even happen as the final action of the chapter. George's scene of disappearance is not nearly as dramatic as Braddon could have made it. Everyone else doesn't even realize he's missing until the next chapter. The chapters leading up through Chapter 13 are peppered with Talboys sightings.

Great Expectations and Downton Abbey would handle this type of situation very differently. Dickens probably would have had George go missing at the end of an installment, and there would have been more exciting physical action in the process of running off. Downton probably would have ended an episode with George running off to the sound of dramatic music. We'd probably get to see where he really is, and get a better idea of his motives. The main difference I've found between the way Lady Audley's Secret deals with suspense and how our other two serials deal with suspense is that Lady offers less immediate satisfaction, but the mysteries last much longer.

Foreshadowing and Suspense

While reading through the first thirteen chapters of Lady Audley’s Secret, I noticed in particular the use of foreshadowing to create suspense. The title of the work sets the reader up for some kind of mystery; we know from the outset that we will read about Lady Audley and that she has a secret. Indeed, the reader meets the kind, bubbly, curly blonde Lucy Graham--and her mysterious black ribbon. At the conclusion of the first chapter, Lucy has just accepted Baronet Audley’s marriage proposal (in a very strange manner) and stares out the window with a forlorn expression, murmuring how “every trace of the old life melted away -- every clue to identity buried and forgotten -- except these, except these” while holding her necklace (Braddon 17). So here is her secret! Lady Audley has a past and one cannot help but conjecture that this past will catch up with her in an unfortunate way. 

Unlike Great Expectations that frequently leaves the reader at an intense moment of action--Pip running home, Estella kissing Pip--to create suspense, Braddon uses foreshadowing and direct addresses to the reader to create suspense. After we learn that Lady Audley’s secret is connected to the necklace, the next few chapters set up the connections that the reader begins to forge: we meet George Talboys on the boat from Australia and learn of his wife and son, we meet the young Robert Audley and learn of his friendship with Talboys, we learn of the supposed death of Helen Talboys just a week before, and so on. The next important clue in connecting these events comes with direct foreshadowing in Chapter 7; the first-person narrator (yet unnamed) muses to the reader that “if any one could at that moment have told the young barrister that so simple a thing as his cousin’s brief letter would one day come to be a link in the one only criminal case in which he was ever to be concerned, perhaps Mr. Robert Audley would have lifted his eyebrows a little higher than usual” (55). The connections the reader has begun to make in his or her mind are solidified: Lady Audley (whom we begin to guess is Helen Talboys) does not want Robert Audley and George Talboys to visit Audley Court, but somehow they will and a crime will occur. 

With this foreshadowing, Braddon uses missed connections to create even more suspense. When Robert and George finally make it to Essex, clueless George and mischievous Lady Audley manage to miss each other an uncommon amount of times (similar to Pip almost getting caught after bringing food to the convict in Great Expectations). The reader at this point knows something foul is bound to happen (based upon the direct foreshadowing of chapter 7) but are pulled to keep reading to find out just what and when it will happen.

Indeed, something foul does happen and Lady Audley is involved; the particulars are not yet revealed, but Robert Audley's slow collection of clues and the narrator's analysis draw us in as readers curious to be a part of the murder mystery.

The Follow Through

"But not only Downton. Us. We must never take us for granted. Who knows what's coming?"

The trick to good narrative storytelling is the follow through. Action is exciting, but the aftermath is always the best payoff. If things reset at the end of each episode, then there's no narrative to look forward to (although there may be other benefits, re: most sitcoms pre-2000s). How does the show deal once someone has died? How do we get back to status quo/what changes are caused by the death? At the end of Episode Five, all these questions immediately come up and remained to be answered. Episode Six delivers, giving us a quiet, introspective installment, but also one of the most involving and emotional episodes of the season.

Because of the soapy roots of the show, viewers are allowed to wildly speculate about any number of twists coming up. Will Branson go insane with grief? Will Mary and Edith ever be so compassionate towards one another again? Will Lord and Lady Grantham tape off areas of Downton in a fight for territory? If one plot gets settled by the end of the episode, the others can only be hinted at for future use. Sybil's death is in some way a catalyst for the show to have the characters re-examine themselves and look to the future. The most forward-thinking and independent woman of the show is gone, as well as the most un-impeachable, so now it's up to the rest of the characters to fill the void in her memory.

On top of that, we get three extra plots: Ethel as a cook, the complicated love quadrangle (with weird arms sticking out all over the place), and the extended Bates-in-prison plot. It makes for a very packed episode, the likes of which we haven't really seen since season one.

The love squid situation is especially notable for how the writers are exploring and deepening the characters. Apparently the only way to characterize the footmen and scullery maids is by whom they want to sleep with. Granted, there might not be many aspirations much beyond marriage for the life of servant in that time, but it's interesting that we're presented with these complications first, and then learn that the new maid likes the foxtrot and wearing rouge. And then there's poor Thomas (and honestly, it's a credit to the writers that I ever even wrote the words "poor Thomas"). Combined with his open grief for Lady Sybil, and apparent new friendship with Anna, we are getting to the point where any time he blatantly hits on Jimmy, I put my head in my hands in commiseration. Now we have ourselves a well-rounded character. All he has to do next time is prove he's still evil at heart by murdering a farmer or something and he'll be all set.

This is also the episode where Lord Grantham's vendetta against change also comes to a head. First there is the subject of religion (and I quite enjoyed everyone ganging up against the priest, way to go pragmatic Crawley's!), then the estate's finances, and finally a clever dovetail into the Ethel plot line that moves Robert's frustration forward and nicely confirms Ethel's place in the village. And honestly, at this point, all the women in Downton should just buy themselves NOW pamphlets and wear jeans around the house.

In the past the team at Fellowes Inc. hasn't been too great on giving us the on-screen dialogues we need to hear, particularly regarding Mary's confession of her "damaging" to Matthew. And while I was initially very wary of the fact that the episode begins directly after Sybil's funeral, the rest of the hour was packed with enough rewards that I didn't find myself minding at all.

Viewer's Voice Award goes to Mrs. Patmore:

"You know the trouble with you lot? You're all in love with the wrong people."

Anachrony in S.3 Ep.5

While watching Season 3, Episode 5 of Downton Abbey, I found myself focusing on the ways in which the episode related to Gérard Genette’s piece, “Order in Narrative”.  As Genette explains, there is the time of the story and then there is the time of the telling, which he calls narrative time.  The writers’ use of anachrony, or chronological inconsistencies, stood out to me from the very beginning of the episode.

While the narrative lengths of breaks between episodes are always seven days, the lengths of the gaps in the time of the story have varied a great deal.  Gaps between previous episodes have ranged from a few days to many months.  Since the length of the gap in “story time” between episodes is always different, I look forward to seeing how much time the creators will write-in before continuing the story in the next episode.  In this instance, while the break in narrative time was seven days, the gap in “story time” between Episode 4 and Episode 5 was only a couple of days, as evidence by the death of Lady Sybil at the end of Episode 4 and Lord Grantham saying goodbye to the visitors paying their respects at the opening of Episode 5.  I was happy to see that not much time had passed between Sybil’s death and the beginning of Episode 5.  This use of time gave the writers a great opportunity to develop characters and character relationships in the context of Sybil’s death, which was a highly emotional ordeal for most characters in the story.  For example, with Sybil’s death still fresh in the minds and hearts of the characters and audience, the writers were able to more fully develop the issues in Robert and Cora’s relationship.

My favorite example of anachrony in this episode occurred during the scene in which Daisy tried to teach Alfred how to do the foxtrot in the servants’ hall.  I assumed that this scene would simply be another goofy example of the awkward tension between Daisy and Alfred, but a short line from Daisy changes the feel and purpose of the entire scene.  When she shows Alfred how to hold his arms, she pauses and says that it reminded her of when Thomas tried to show her how to dance the grizzly bear.  This internal analepsis, as Genette would call it, takes the audience away from the present moment in the story and causes one to think back to a seemingly insignificant moment from Season 1.  Then, a close-up shot of Daisy is used as she says, “It was a long time ago.  A lot has happened since then”.  And in that short moment, the viewer is reminded of the many events that have occurred since Daisy and Thomas danced in the servants’ hall.  Personally, I thought of the war, William’s death, Matthew’s injury, Sybil and Branson, Lavinia Swire, and Bates’ trial, just to name a few.  In the tradition of a serialized narrative, all of these stories and events came together at once, connected by the common thread of Daisy’s memory.

There are numerous other examples of how the writers used the discordance between narrative time and story time to develop the plot.  Which were your favorites?