Downton Abbey was just that sunny moment, a visitor from days past whose reappearance reminded us why we were so keen to wrap Downton's cosy duvet around ourselves in the first place. It was so stuffed with familiar old standards - the Crawleys being confronted by the twentieth century, Violet and Isobel butting heads, a scandal brewing at the Abbey, Carson trumping about toast and etiquette, Mary being snide to a house guest - that it brought back the froth, vim and glamour of the early antebellum episodes. For the first time in a long time, I was back under Downton's slightly suspect, you-know-you-shouldn't-really, chocolate éclair charm. Who couldn't be cheered by a frisky Mrs Patmore shivering over Rudoph Valentino and wanting to jig about, provoking a censorious Mr Carson to emit a jowl-shaking bass-note so resonant it must have emptied the Abbey's dovecotes? Or by Mr Molesley, a photocopy of a photocopy of an Alan Bennett character, entering Carson's man-cave and asking to plunge down the ladder of preferment? It's just that kind of fond, low-stakes silliness we first came to Downton for, and this episode had it, and much more, in good supply. The non-Carson portion of this week's gentle comedy came from Lady Violet and Isobel. It not being cricket of the Dowager Countess to lay into a grieving mother, we've had to endure a temporary ceasefire between the two of late, but thankfully hostilities have now resumed. Defending the honor of cap-clutching McGuffin, Pegg, Mrs Crawley set about solving the case of the missing paper knife. That the resolution - her finding said object down the back of a Chesterfield - lacked narrative tension shouldn't put ITV execs off using this plot thread as a backdoor pilot for an Isobel spin-off. Solving entirely tension-free crimes could be her USP. Sock missing from the dryer? Someone taken the last cookie from the barrel? Call Crawley; she'll sort it and give you a high-horse lecture on social justice to trunk.
A genuine pleasure in the episode was the nursery scene between three of Downton's widowed spouses. Tom, Isobel and Mary's declaration that they, having known giddying, all-encompassing love, were the lucky ones, was simple, warm and affecting. Mary may not be ready to be happy yet, but with a new enemy with whom to butt heads in Charles Blake, odds are on that she'll be in another clinch before long. Will she end up with the persistent family friend, the dishy viscount (due a return next week), or the "traitor" who's got her so riled? I've a feeling it'll be the pal she can't stand. I think I saw a rom-com once where that happened.
A genuine pleasure in the episode was the nursery scene between three of Downton's widowed spouses. Tom, Isobel and Mary's declaration that they, having known giddying, all-encompassing love, were the lucky ones, was simple, warm and affecting. Mary may not be ready to be happy yet, but with a new enemy with whom to butt heads in Charles Blake, odds are on that she'll be in another clinch before long. Will she end up with the persistent family friend, the dishy viscount (due a return next week), or the "traitor" who's got her so riled? I've a feeling it'll be the pal she can't stand. I think I saw a rom-com once where that happened.