Downton Abbey Season 3 Episode 3

SPOILER ALERT! This post is intended for those who have already seen Season 3 Episode 3!

A bit of a quiet episode today, but hang in there- next week is a big one! This one was sort of setting up future action.

Poor Ethel the prostitute. Mrs. Hughs and Ethel keep trying to avoid that word and Cousin Isobel keeps saying it. She definitely is a...you know, what Cousin Isobel said...but Ethel is a much nicer person now than when she thought she was the bees knees in Season 2.

Isobel: She's been working as a prostitute.

Mrs. Hughs:  My my, that's not a work you hear in this house every day.

Hopefully Ethel can rebuild her life together with Mrs. Crawley. Poor little Charlie. Will his lovely grandmother be strong enough to protect him from his evil mustachioed grandfather? I rather enjoyed this story line and I hope we get to see lots of Ethel and Charlie in the future.

Violet: Edith, dear, you're a woman with a brain and reasonable ability. Stop whining and find something to do.

Yes, Violet, thank goodness you are encouraging Lady Edith to set out in a new direction. Journalism! Matthew is quite impressed I think. But Violet and Cora are not.

Violet: What do you mean you wrote to a newspaper? No lady writes to a newspaper.

Edith: What about Lady Sarah Wilson? She's the daughter of a duke and she worked as a war journalist.

Violet: Well, she's a Churchill. The Churchills are different.

Mary: Have we no Churchill blood?

Cora: I think Granny's right.

Violet: Can somebody write that down?





Wasn't Tom supposed to be the journalist in the family? Now he is just burning down the houses of Sybil's former childhood playmates. And she finally looks a little concerned about what kind of a whack-job she has actually married. Took her long enough! Although he was looking kinda sexy when he was wet and disheveled and running from the coppers...

But it looks like Tom the firebrand has to stay in England indefinitely now, so the baby will have to be born at Downton. Yay!!! Can we now find Branson something to do that doesn't involve burning down the houses of the aristocracy? Write radical newspaper articles to annoy his father-in-law?

And was anyone else slightly disappointed with Jimmy...I mean James the new footman?  I mean, he is OK looking but he's not THAT much better looking than Alfred. Oh well, if Mary and Matthew can't figure out how to conceive an heir to Downton, perhaps the new footman can be of assistance!

Mary: Well done, Carson. That must have cheered up the maids.

Violet: He looks like a footman in a musical review.

And poor Daisy has been overshadowed by the new scullery maid just when she was getting her nerve up to be "forward" with Alfred. Pooh! But good to get some new blood below stairs I suppose.

The stars of this episode were undoubtedly Mrs. Hughs' new electric toaster and the bouillon spoon.

Mr. Carson: I was worried that Mr. Branson might take it into his head to burn the house down, but I didn't think that you would.

Mrs. Hughs: No? I should never take anything for granted, Mr. Carson.

Alfred: Tea spoon, egg spoon, melon spoon, grapefruit spoon, jam spoon...

*******************************************************************************

Archbishop of York: I don't want to sound anti-Catholic

Robert: Why not? I am

Archbishop of York: Not in any real way, I'm sure

Robert: I don't want to thumbscrews or the rack, but there always seems to be something of Johnny Foreigner about the Catholics.

Gasp! I know this was almost 100 years ago, but really Mr. Fellowes! Would Lord Grantham really have said that? I guess this is foreshadowing future difficulties with his Johnny Foreigner Irish son-in-law, but really!

******************************************************************************

Violet:  A guinea? For a bottle of scent? Did he have a mask and a gun?

*******************************************************************************

Mr. Carson: Hard work and diligence weigh more than beauty in the real world.

Violet: If only that were true.

Awwwwww...Bates and Anna are still in love and Bates is in favour with the gaol staff again. Whew!