Just one more blog post, and I'm through with my Downtonathon - for now. Though I had mixed success with my predictions for Downton series four, I'm by no means dissuaded. Some of them were fulfilled at any rate - or sort of. Also, predictions are a good hook to hang follow-up posts on (and of course there will be at least one of those when the time comes). So here are the ones for series five:
Mary chooses Charles Blake: Fellowes has been canny when creating Mary's two new serious love interests (no, sorry, Evelyn Napier, I don't think you can be counted to be among them). Neither of them is in any way an obvious Mr Wrong, like - it had to be said - Sir Richard Carlisle was. Both of them are set to remind Mary of Matthew, but in different ways. Whereas Lord Gillingham has Matthew's tender love-lornness and high principles, Charles Blake is the one who tests Mary's mettle and makes her face up to the changing times. As with Matthew, Mary started out clashing with him, which in romantic tales is always a good sign. She ended up playfully smearing him with mud after a combined pig rescue where he could prove how efficient he was, and she could prove that she didn't mind mucking in - literally - in order to save the estate.
And this, surely, is why it has to be Blake. Romantically speaking, mud smearing beats a lingering kiss any day. As nice a fellow as he is - and not prepared to just roll over when Blake shows up, which does him credit - Gillingham comes across as a gold card version of Napier: a faithful Dobbin who doesn't give the wilful Mary the challenge she needs. It doesn't help that his infatuation with her - and her returning fondness for him - just aren't that convincing. Yes, they know each other of old, but he wasn't in love with her then. And suddenly he shows up and falls head over heels in the span of a few days, throws an impending engagement overboard and asks her to marry him. I couldn't quite believe it. In contrast, the Mary-Blake relationship crackled from the word go. It may be a bit of a reprise of her first fights with Matthew, but it works. Not that everything will be plain sailing, though...
There'll be trouble with the Blake inheritance: Blake may look like a great catch, but the estate he's to inherit has two disadvantages. 1) It's in Ulster. This may not be the Seventies, but still - will Mary want to live in Ulster, so far away from Downton? And what does Branson think about having a future Anglo-Irish - albeit North-Irish - landlord as a potential brother-in-law? 2) The current incumbent is still alive. Unlike Lord Gillingham, who has already come into his inheritance, Blake is only the heir apparent. What do we know of Sir Severus Blake? He might belong to the kind of men who, in Count Fosco's words, "live long and marry malevolently". If he feels like marrying a chorus girl on a whim, and suddenly produces an heir, then Charles will be absolutely nowhere.
But I wonder. I can't but feel that with a Hogwartsy name like Sir Severus, Charles Blake's relation is bound to enter the narrative at some point. And if he were of the simple, chorus-girl-marrying kind, where would the drama be? He could do that without ever coming near his present heir, let alone Downton, which would be a shame. I bet he has something up his sleeve, though. Charles has not proven to be a very eager heir, and there must be a reason why Sir Severus is not called Sir Jolly Cheeryble Blake. Perhaps - with potentially restive locals around the corner - he has a case for petitioning Parliament to end the entail?
Bates didn't do it: I admit, it's not a given, this. Things look pretty cut-and-dried at the moment, and Bates has always had an aggressive streak and a bit of a Wild West complex. Remember his unsuccessful stare-offs with the dispirited Thomas at the end of series three: you half expected the frustrated Bates to yell "Why won't you fight? - YOU'RE THE ONE WEARING THE BLACK HAT". Another small point is against him: the character who most resembles Bates in the Fellowes-scripted Gosford Park turned out to be a cool customer with murderous intent. And we were still meant to think it was good and proper that he and the sweet young lady's maid got it together.
But even so. Cast your mind back to the Christmas special of series two, when Bates was tried for the murder of his first missus. Remember the agony suffered by poor Anna when a plainly psychic (how could he know just the right questions to ask of every witness?) prosecutor reduced Bates's defence to rubble, and when it looked as if Bates was going to swing. And then came the hard trials she faced while he was in prison. Would he really, in a million years, risk putting her through all that again? Surely he would realise, before administering the mortal shove, that that would be even worse than what the horrible Green did to her. It's not as if it were the perfect crime either. Anna, Mrs Hughes, Mary and Miss Baxter all suspect what has (seemingly) been going on. If Miss Baxter had only felt a smidgen more affection for her benefactor Thomas, Bates's arch-enemy himself would know almost the full story by now.
Also, being aggressive is one thing, but being a cold-blooded murderer is another. I never for a moment thought Bates murdered his first wife: he may cave someone's head in when in a fit of rage, but poisoning is entirely unlike him, and so is dispatching a man while making sure it looks like an accident. Finally, whatever Mrs Hughes says, is Fellowes really expecting us to condone a straightforward lynching, however vile the victim may be?
This is my theory: Bates travels to London with the intention of killing Green. Green spots him first, however, and becomes so rattled he carelessly runs into the street and is run over. When seeing the broken corpse, it dawns on Bates that he would never have been able to go through with his plan, and he feels ashamed of not having killed Green for his wife's honour's sake. This is partly why he doesn't want to admit ever having been to London on the day (also, he realises how it might look).
There are a dozen ways in which this could come to light. My favourite scenario is this: Thomas finds out about Anna's plight, Green's death and Bates's trip to London without any help from Miss Baxter (he has many clues in his hands already, and some sleuthing skills: he did figure out about Miss O'Brien and "her ladyship's soap", something she never told him about). Instead of ratting as one would expect, though, he decides to keep mum so he can repay the irksome debt of gratitude he owes Bates for the latter's part in the Save Thomas campaign at the end of series three. He tells his old enemy of his intention but at the same time makes clear that he'll stand no more self-righteous needling from the likes of Bates. "I may be many things, but I'm not a killer." Beat. "As it happens, neither am I."
Bates then reluctantly reveals what really happened, while Anna eavesdrops - or Thomas, disgusted at not getting even, may testily suggest that Bates puts the wife's mind at ease, as a blind man can see that she's been worrying herself sick. At which point, by making sure Bates and Anna have it out, he will unwittingly have repaid his debt of gratitude after all.
Far-fetched, maybe. You could almost guess there was something fishy about me defending Bates, now couldn't you? Still, wouldn't it be very neat?
Gregson is a spy: There is something a bit James Bond-y about his card-playing talents and his "misspent youth". And he knew he might get into trouble when in Germany, which was why he gave Edith power of attorney. Yes, I'm sure he intended divorcing as well. At the same time, what a perfect cover that story is for an Englishman having a good nose around in "his new home country". If he's been unmasked as a spy for the English government, then no wonder everyone is being so unhelpful when Edith and Gregson's newspaper are trying to find him. The Weimar Republic may have been fearfully democratic, but I doubt it liked being spied upon. Gregson getting into a fight with brown-shirts does seem a bit silly in the circumstances, but who knows: he may have been trying to infiltrate them. In any case, I hope the English government - maybe after a bit of energetic lobbying from Edith - manages to locate Gregson and get him off whatever charges he may be facing. It would be an anticlimax if he were simply to disappear. But German citizenship is off, naturally.
Molesley faces up to Miss Baxter's past: Thomas's implied threat to Miss Baxter - "Do what I say or I will tell the family about your sordid past" - has one flaw. He recommended her for the job of lady's maid: even if he claims not to have known anything to her disadvantage at the time, any mud he slings on her will stick on him as well. But there is one person he can tell what he knows, if he wants to punish Miss Baxter, and that is Molesley. And lets face it: there's only so much non-ratting a villain can be expected to do in one series. In this case, I have little doubt that Thomas will split.
Most likely, Miss Baxter has been a nobleman's mistress, lured from her place as a lady's maid with his family to an apartment in London. Later, when he discarded her, she had to be inventive to make ends meet - maybe renting lodgings by the night and not asking too many questions. This is how Thomas may have come across her while on one of his London sprees. All this will be hard to stomach for Molesley, who's spent his whole life in a quiet village and may never a courted a woman properly before (except the unresponsive Anna), least of all a notorious one. Another hurdle for this couple will be Molesley's lowly position: he can't be expected to be content as a second footman forever. He will come up trumps in the end, though, and as a reward the intelligent Baxter will help him with his career planning (won't Lord Gillingham be needing a new valet?). But it will be a close run thing.
New faces we know about: Official gossip has let slip three new characters we will see in the new series:
Simon Bricker, art historian as played by Richard E. Grant. It is a truth universally aknowledged that a single gentleman in possession of an invitation to Downton must be in want of a love interest. With Mary (hopefully) out of the running, as well as Rose (surely she's too young for him?), this opens up interesting possibilities. But an art historian? Maybe his plot-line is not about love at all but about money? Perhaps he finds an old master and tries to buy it from the Crawleys for a song.
Lady Anstruther "Wasn't that a bit forward?" a worried Thomas asked when Jimmy revealed that he had sent a Valentine to his former employer, Lady Anstruther, whom he abandoned when she went to France but who is now back in Blighty. What with Lady A being played by formidable-woman-role expert Anna Chancellor, the answer to that question is most likely yes. Jimmy has hinted that his relationship with the Lady was pretty close. She can't have liked it when he left simply because he "didn't think he'd like the food" in France. My guess is she'll not be seeking to renew any affair they might have had: rather, she'll be wanting to slap him down and let him know that she's over him. Which will in turn demonstrate that she isn't, quite.
Kuragin, Russian refugee First, I imagined a wild-eyed man with a straggly beard to whom Daisy may show kindness by surreptitiously pilfering from the food store. Then again: he's a Tsarist refugee. Maybe it's an impoverished Russian aristocrat who has no need for the kindness of assistant cooks as long as he can scrounge on his fellow noblemen in England. I predict confrontations with Branson: maybe some choice memories from Revolutionary Russia will finally prove the death-knell to his old socialist ideals. Or Kuragin will prove such a pill that Branson becomes more socialist.
New faces/old acquaintances we don't know about: Will Miss Mabel Lane Fox, Gillingham's ditched fiancée, really give up without a fight and without putting in an appearance? I doubt it. And as an upstairs villain is still needed, maybe we will be seeing Sir Richard Carlisle again? Or the duplicitious Duke of Crowborough? Come on, it could happen.
Wednesday, 12 March 2014
Wednesday, 5 March 2014
Downtonathon: series four follow-up II (or, a plotter without a cause)
A virus is descending and putting a whole new meaning into "fevered imaginings". I'd better get cracking before I'm completely floored. But I just have to finish what I started: hopefully the subject matter will give me strength.
Here, then, are my remaining predictions for Downton Abbey series four and how they worked out:
Alfred leaves - but may possibly fall for Daisy first: YES. What took them so long, though? I never thought Alfred would last the whole series (excluding the Christmas special). To be fair, he was more bearable this time around than in series three, but I probably only think that because he got quite chummy with his old enemy Thomas (what would Auntie have said, after having given up her only friend for him?). His behaviour towards Daisy remained hard to stomach, and the crush on Ivy was just plain silly. It was highly satisfactory that, once his eyes were finally opened, Daisy turned him down, and in such a noble and forgiving way too that he couldn't possibly complain about it. You go, girl!
Talking of going girls: did anyone see the write-out of Ivy coming? I didn't. Maybe the actress got another part (though it must be hard to find a job better than Downton: ask Dan Stevens). It seems a bit of a cop-out otherwise. Newbies, as I've said before, need a bit of time to gain the amount of sympathy enjoyed by The Old Downton Guard, and it wasn't Ivy's fault that she was stranded in an uninvolving storyline of under-plotted romances. She might have done better had she stayed around for a while.
A housemaid and/or a nursery maid make their mark: NO. There was hardly a sight of one. A pretty nursery maid pushed the pram containing Sybbie when Thomas and Nanny West had their first dust-up, but she wisely chose to stay silent. After Nanny West left, her replacement was not endowed with a personality: instead, she faded into the group of Background Servants.
A confusing - but necessary - element of Downton is that the household contains more servants than the ones the story focuses on. I don't think this was the idea to begin with: judging from Behind the Scenes at Downton Abbey, Fellowes originally pared down the staff so as to be able to focus on them all (in a house of Downton's size, eight would have been the usual amount of footmen, not two). This became untenable after a while, though, because the household is so huge. Hence hall boys to whom we haven't been formally introduced turning up in cricket teams and shadowy maids helping the unmarried girls out (the girl who plays Madge, sometimes talked about but seldom seen, must feel a little bitter). But now when Ivy has left - and will maybe be replaced by a Background Servant - might there be room for a housemaid to come to the forefront again?
Thomas and Miss O'Brien are reconciled and once again become the perfect double act: ALAS, NO. Oh, how I miss Miss O'Brien! Even when she was plotting against rather than with Thomas, she was a darned sight easier to have around than the duds who've followed her. I do see why Siobhan Finneran left - she got a plum part in another series - but her parting is much regretted, leastways by me.
It's true that by this time, Thomas has enough savoir faire to go it alone as a villain. He was hampered in this series, however, and not just by O'Brien's disappearance. Having had a strong, redemptive storyline at the end of series three, it was hard to get him back into bad guy mode convincingly. He can never be allowed to become as black a sheep as he was in series one: on the other hand, Downton needs a baddie, so like it or not he has to step up to the mark. His position is not made easier by the fact that he has fulfilled his goals in life, at least where his career's concerned. As an under-butler, he cannot rise higher in the Downton household (at least not until Carson retires): he's even placed a bit higher than Bates. What's there for him to plot about now?
As a result of these circumstances, Thomas did a great deal of water-treading in this series. His ousting of Nanny West was marvellous, and I also hugely enjoyed the Truth Game scene with the spiteful Edna. But otherwise, he's stuck in a long-drawn-out storyline - still not resolved - where he tries to get O'Brien's and Edna's replacement, Miss Baxter, to spy for him (to find out what exactly?). Miss Baxter had all the hallmarks of a defecting baddie sidekick from the word go. In spite of Thomas getting her the job, after she has been out in the cold for quite a while, she shows precious little sense of gratitude and addresses him in tones of barely-suppressed loathing. We're supposed to wonder whether she will spill the beans regarding what she's heard and guessed about the Bateses' situation to Thomas, but it is pretty clear that she never will.
Maybe in this case this is just as well for Thomas: there are some things it is better for an under-butler not to know and be tempted to rat about. Nevertheless, I'm not a great admirer of defecting baddie sidekicks - say Micawber or, even worse, Newman Noggs and I shudder - and in the role of potential Thomas ally I even preferred Edna to Miss Baxter. She may not have liked him, but at least she was prepared to keep her part of a deal. Baxter plainly isn't, and the "Tell me what you know - No, shan't" scenes between her and Thomas are getting wearying. (But I have to admit the Baxter-Molesley romance is sweet.) Another unrewarding plot-line for Thomas was his suddenly flaring resentment towards Branson - where did that come from? It's not unbelievable in itself that he should resent Branson, but if that were the case, surely we would have seen more of it before?
Not that there's not some mileage to be got even from weak Thomas plot-lines. His self-deprecating mud-slinging scenes are great, even when we don't really know why he's mud-slinging in the first place. He may do a lot of smirking in the background while more substantial drama goes on around him, but he does it very prettily. I do hope there's something better storywise lined up for him in series five, though.
Here, then, are my remaining predictions for Downton Abbey series four and how they worked out:
Alfred leaves - but may possibly fall for Daisy first: YES. What took them so long, though? I never thought Alfred would last the whole series (excluding the Christmas special). To be fair, he was more bearable this time around than in series three, but I probably only think that because he got quite chummy with his old enemy Thomas (what would Auntie have said, after having given up her only friend for him?). His behaviour towards Daisy remained hard to stomach, and the crush on Ivy was just plain silly. It was highly satisfactory that, once his eyes were finally opened, Daisy turned him down, and in such a noble and forgiving way too that he couldn't possibly complain about it. You go, girl!
Talking of going girls: did anyone see the write-out of Ivy coming? I didn't. Maybe the actress got another part (though it must be hard to find a job better than Downton: ask Dan Stevens). It seems a bit of a cop-out otherwise. Newbies, as I've said before, need a bit of time to gain the amount of sympathy enjoyed by The Old Downton Guard, and it wasn't Ivy's fault that she was stranded in an uninvolving storyline of under-plotted romances. She might have done better had she stayed around for a while.
A housemaid and/or a nursery maid make their mark: NO. There was hardly a sight of one. A pretty nursery maid pushed the pram containing Sybbie when Thomas and Nanny West had their first dust-up, but she wisely chose to stay silent. After Nanny West left, her replacement was not endowed with a personality: instead, she faded into the group of Background Servants.
A confusing - but necessary - element of Downton is that the household contains more servants than the ones the story focuses on. I don't think this was the idea to begin with: judging from Behind the Scenes at Downton Abbey, Fellowes originally pared down the staff so as to be able to focus on them all (in a house of Downton's size, eight would have been the usual amount of footmen, not two). This became untenable after a while, though, because the household is so huge. Hence hall boys to whom we haven't been formally introduced turning up in cricket teams and shadowy maids helping the unmarried girls out (the girl who plays Madge, sometimes talked about but seldom seen, must feel a little bitter). But now when Ivy has left - and will maybe be replaced by a Background Servant - might there be room for a housemaid to come to the forefront again?
Thomas and Miss O'Brien are reconciled and once again become the perfect double act: ALAS, NO. Oh, how I miss Miss O'Brien! Even when she was plotting against rather than with Thomas, she was a darned sight easier to have around than the duds who've followed her. I do see why Siobhan Finneran left - she got a plum part in another series - but her parting is much regretted, leastways by me.
It's true that by this time, Thomas has enough savoir faire to go it alone as a villain. He was hampered in this series, however, and not just by O'Brien's disappearance. Having had a strong, redemptive storyline at the end of series three, it was hard to get him back into bad guy mode convincingly. He can never be allowed to become as black a sheep as he was in series one: on the other hand, Downton needs a baddie, so like it or not he has to step up to the mark. His position is not made easier by the fact that he has fulfilled his goals in life, at least where his career's concerned. As an under-butler, he cannot rise higher in the Downton household (at least not until Carson retires): he's even placed a bit higher than Bates. What's there for him to plot about now?
As a result of these circumstances, Thomas did a great deal of water-treading in this series. His ousting of Nanny West was marvellous, and I also hugely enjoyed the Truth Game scene with the spiteful Edna. But otherwise, he's stuck in a long-drawn-out storyline - still not resolved - where he tries to get O'Brien's and Edna's replacement, Miss Baxter, to spy for him (to find out what exactly?). Miss Baxter had all the hallmarks of a defecting baddie sidekick from the word go. In spite of Thomas getting her the job, after she has been out in the cold for quite a while, she shows precious little sense of gratitude and addresses him in tones of barely-suppressed loathing. We're supposed to wonder whether she will spill the beans regarding what she's heard and guessed about the Bateses' situation to Thomas, but it is pretty clear that she never will.
Maybe in this case this is just as well for Thomas: there are some things it is better for an under-butler not to know and be tempted to rat about. Nevertheless, I'm not a great admirer of defecting baddie sidekicks - say Micawber or, even worse, Newman Noggs and I shudder - and in the role of potential Thomas ally I even preferred Edna to Miss Baxter. She may not have liked him, but at least she was prepared to keep her part of a deal. Baxter plainly isn't, and the "Tell me what you know - No, shan't" scenes between her and Thomas are getting wearying. (But I have to admit the Baxter-Molesley romance is sweet.) Another unrewarding plot-line for Thomas was his suddenly flaring resentment towards Branson - where did that come from? It's not unbelievable in itself that he should resent Branson, but if that were the case, surely we would have seen more of it before?
Not that there's not some mileage to be got even from weak Thomas plot-lines. His self-deprecating mud-slinging scenes are great, even when we don't really know why he's mud-slinging in the first place. He may do a lot of smirking in the background while more substantial drama goes on around him, but he does it very prettily. I do hope there's something better storywise lined up for him in series five, though.
Wednesday, 26 February 2014
Downtonathon: Series four follow-up I
Finally! The whole of Downton Abbey series four has now been aired in the US, and I've decided to have no more compunction about spoilers. If you live in a part of the world where series four has not been shown yet, stop reading now...
Roughly a year ago, I tried my hand at some predictions on what might happen in this series. Here's how they worked out:
Close but no cigar for Lady Mary and Branson: YES. Well, to honest they weren't even close, but I look at it as one of the more successful predictions anyway. I wouldn't have minded seeing more of their mutually supportive friendship: it's touching considering how different they are that they should see the point of each other. As it was, Branson (I'm not calling him Branson to be mean as I rather like him, but seriously, Julian Fellowes, "Tom"? There can be only one!) had a somewhat disappointing series four. He had to briefly get embroiled with Edna again, not very convincingly, on the rebound character principle that we then would resent a new Branson love interest less and compare her favourably - not with lovely Sybil but with minxy Edna. As it happens that didn't work out too well, at least not for me. Branson's new woman, schoolteacher Sarah Bunting, has one unfortunate thing in common with Edna: she makes him feel guilty about having changed from his old firebrand socialist chauffeur days, instead of accepting him as the Crawleys' socially aware but balanced steward (and son-in-law). The poor man spent most of the series feeling ill at ease, and no wonder. Lets hope he ditches the Bunting girl in the next series and finds someone who'll love him for his new slightly more bourgeois self.
Thoroughly modern Edith: YES. But not as modern as one could have hoped. She only got to spend one night with her beau Michael Gregson before he went to Germany, ostensibly so he could become a German citizen and divorce his wife. (Ah, divorce tourists - happens all the time). I have my own theories about Gregson's Germany trip which I'll probably mention in a later post, but for now, let's just say he at least seems to be serious about Edith. Too bad he got her up the spout after only one try, then had to pick a fight with some brown-shirts in Munich and disappear from the face of the earth. I do think Fellowes is being unnecessarily mean to poor Edith in his plotlines. She really shouldn't blame Higher Powers when the one who "doesn't want her to be happy" is really a script-writer who prefers her sister. On the other hand, the more bad luck Edith has, the more viewer sympathy she's bound to get. She may have taken a few knocks, but she's still one of the characters who had a good (as in dramatically exciting) series four.
Jimmy gets entangled with Lady Rose: NO. Well, not yet. But it could still happen. Jimmy had a lousy time of it this time round, a little like Thomas in series one: committing small meannesses and suffering small humiliations. However, there's a reason why he's still around while fellow newbies Alfred (predictably) and Ivy (surprisingly) have been written out. He's more likely to get himself - and others - into trouble, which makes him a good potential plot-line generator. Moreover, he's still so shallow and selfish he's fairly crying out for a Seriously Upsetting Thing to happen to him which will make him Grow As A Person - and generate more viewable drama in the process. Rose could still be it. They did at least get chummy during this series.
Rose's suitors generate drama: NOT REALLY. Rose did have a suitor or two. Well, three if you count the luckless farmhand at the tea dance. But both he and the drunken chinless wonder, which we saw the last of in episode four (three in the US), were of little consequence to the action. Now Rose's main love interest, jazz singer Jack Ross, was a more important character, but sadly his plot-line was a bit of a non-starter. Much was said about how the first black character on Downton would enable the show to tackle "racial tensions". In the end, though, Fellowes chickened out rather: not one of the Downton regulars turned out to be a hardline racist, so there was little tension going on in that field, really. (At the same time, I can't help feeling grateful to Fellowes for not branding any character with this particular mark of Cain.) Jack proved to be an attractive character - sensible, urbane and blissfully un-chippy - but his very sensibleness made it hard to understand what he would see in flibbertigibbet Rose. Their romance was unconvincing. Still, if the intention was to convey the impression that it was Jack who had the lucky escape when they split up, it succeeded.
No, the series instead belonged to Lady Mary's suitors, of whom there were suprisingly many. I was incredulous when I heard the rumours that there were to be two suitors for her hand, but in fact there were three. And all three young, handsome, eligible, titled men with not a scratch on them from the war. This will sound cynical, but after Word War One the marriage market must have been a buyer's one for every able-bodied, surviving bachelor with a bit of money. So why would three of these gold prizes all go after Mary? To be even more cynical, all these three fellows need heirs. Mary is in her early thirties and could provide one, but she is not such a sure thing when it comes to heir-producing (you have to calculate in a few false starts, girl babies etc.) as a twentysomething like Rose, especially not if she dithers for much longer.
So what do they see in her? Would they really all rather go for the dark, difficult, arrogant one with lots of emotional baggage instead of the blonde, easy option? Er... On the other hand, put like that...
Anna and Bates start a family: NO. They had other things on their plate. Move over Edith: the Bateses had the most traumatic - and most dramatically powerful - storyline in the series. I glimpsed something about the "contoversial rape scene" before the episode in question was available to me, and I had my serious doubts about the whole thing, like so many viewers. I'm not normally a big fan of Big Mouth Batesy, and even Anna's pertness can get on my nerves sometimes - but this. After the psycho ex, and Bates's time in prison, could they not have been spared this? On balance, however, I think the riskily gloomy storyline paid off, and the marital reconciliation was all the sweeter for being hard-won. Incidentally, I don't think Bates killed the loathsome Green, but that's another story.
More perceptive fans had their doubts about Anna's ability to conceive as I was still anticipating happy family-making. Now, I believe they could be right, and childlessness might be the next hurdle the Bateses have to face. After this series, though, they'll know they can get through anything.
Yikes, three prediction follow-ups to go, including the most important one! I'll have to call it a day and continue in a later post - and then tackle new predictions for series five in the post after that. Sorry for wallowing, but I might as well while the going's good. Downton won't go on forever: as Fellowes said, "it's not Perry Mason".
Roughly a year ago, I tried my hand at some predictions on what might happen in this series. Here's how they worked out:
Close but no cigar for Lady Mary and Branson: YES. Well, to honest they weren't even close, but I look at it as one of the more successful predictions anyway. I wouldn't have minded seeing more of their mutually supportive friendship: it's touching considering how different they are that they should see the point of each other. As it was, Branson (I'm not calling him Branson to be mean as I rather like him, but seriously, Julian Fellowes, "Tom"? There can be only one!) had a somewhat disappointing series four. He had to briefly get embroiled with Edna again, not very convincingly, on the rebound character principle that we then would resent a new Branson love interest less and compare her favourably - not with lovely Sybil but with minxy Edna. As it happens that didn't work out too well, at least not for me. Branson's new woman, schoolteacher Sarah Bunting, has one unfortunate thing in common with Edna: she makes him feel guilty about having changed from his old firebrand socialist chauffeur days, instead of accepting him as the Crawleys' socially aware but balanced steward (and son-in-law). The poor man spent most of the series feeling ill at ease, and no wonder. Lets hope he ditches the Bunting girl in the next series and finds someone who'll love him for his new slightly more bourgeois self.
Thoroughly modern Edith: YES. But not as modern as one could have hoped. She only got to spend one night with her beau Michael Gregson before he went to Germany, ostensibly so he could become a German citizen and divorce his wife. (Ah, divorce tourists - happens all the time). I have my own theories about Gregson's Germany trip which I'll probably mention in a later post, but for now, let's just say he at least seems to be serious about Edith. Too bad he got her up the spout after only one try, then had to pick a fight with some brown-shirts in Munich and disappear from the face of the earth. I do think Fellowes is being unnecessarily mean to poor Edith in his plotlines. She really shouldn't blame Higher Powers when the one who "doesn't want her to be happy" is really a script-writer who prefers her sister. On the other hand, the more bad luck Edith has, the more viewer sympathy she's bound to get. She may have taken a few knocks, but she's still one of the characters who had a good (as in dramatically exciting) series four.
Jimmy gets entangled with Lady Rose: NO. Well, not yet. But it could still happen. Jimmy had a lousy time of it this time round, a little like Thomas in series one: committing small meannesses and suffering small humiliations. However, there's a reason why he's still around while fellow newbies Alfred (predictably) and Ivy (surprisingly) have been written out. He's more likely to get himself - and others - into trouble, which makes him a good potential plot-line generator. Moreover, he's still so shallow and selfish he's fairly crying out for a Seriously Upsetting Thing to happen to him which will make him Grow As A Person - and generate more viewable drama in the process. Rose could still be it. They did at least get chummy during this series.
Rose's suitors generate drama: NOT REALLY. Rose did have a suitor or two. Well, three if you count the luckless farmhand at the tea dance. But both he and the drunken chinless wonder, which we saw the last of in episode four (three in the US), were of little consequence to the action. Now Rose's main love interest, jazz singer Jack Ross, was a more important character, but sadly his plot-line was a bit of a non-starter. Much was said about how the first black character on Downton would enable the show to tackle "racial tensions". In the end, though, Fellowes chickened out rather: not one of the Downton regulars turned out to be a hardline racist, so there was little tension going on in that field, really. (At the same time, I can't help feeling grateful to Fellowes for not branding any character with this particular mark of Cain.) Jack proved to be an attractive character - sensible, urbane and blissfully un-chippy - but his very sensibleness made it hard to understand what he would see in flibbertigibbet Rose. Their romance was unconvincing. Still, if the intention was to convey the impression that it was Jack who had the lucky escape when they split up, it succeeded.
No, the series instead belonged to Lady Mary's suitors, of whom there were suprisingly many. I was incredulous when I heard the rumours that there were to be two suitors for her hand, but in fact there were three. And all three young, handsome, eligible, titled men with not a scratch on them from the war. This will sound cynical, but after Word War One the marriage market must have been a buyer's one for every able-bodied, surviving bachelor with a bit of money. So why would three of these gold prizes all go after Mary? To be even more cynical, all these three fellows need heirs. Mary is in her early thirties and could provide one, but she is not such a sure thing when it comes to heir-producing (you have to calculate in a few false starts, girl babies etc.) as a twentysomething like Rose, especially not if she dithers for much longer.
So what do they see in her? Would they really all rather go for the dark, difficult, arrogant one with lots of emotional baggage instead of the blonde, easy option? Er... On the other hand, put like that...
Anna and Bates start a family: NO. They had other things on their plate. Move over Edith: the Bateses had the most traumatic - and most dramatically powerful - storyline in the series. I glimpsed something about the "contoversial rape scene" before the episode in question was available to me, and I had my serious doubts about the whole thing, like so many viewers. I'm not normally a big fan of Big Mouth Batesy, and even Anna's pertness can get on my nerves sometimes - but this. After the psycho ex, and Bates's time in prison, could they not have been spared this? On balance, however, I think the riskily gloomy storyline paid off, and the marital reconciliation was all the sweeter for being hard-won. Incidentally, I don't think Bates killed the loathsome Green, but that's another story.
More perceptive fans had their doubts about Anna's ability to conceive as I was still anticipating happy family-making. Now, I believe they could be right, and childlessness might be the next hurdle the Bateses have to face. After this series, though, they'll know they can get through anything.
Yikes, three prediction follow-ups to go, including the most important one! I'll have to call it a day and continue in a later post - and then tackle new predictions for series five in the post after that. Sorry for wallowing, but I might as well while the going's good. Downton won't go on forever: as Fellowes said, "it's not Perry Mason".
Wednesday, 12 February 2014
Light at the end of the Beeb costume drama tunnel?
It is too early to cheer, but maybe, just maybe, we are nearing the end of the "new grit" trend in English costume drama. The high and mighty BBC, no less, are currently airing a new series based on The Three Musketeers, which they have cheekily scheduled to run at the same time as Mr Selfridge series 2 on ITV. I've not watched it - it's not airing in Sweden, and the DVD will be a while - but judging by the reviews, the series is nothing more nor less than a light-hearted romp.
All right, so the Beeb is clearly still eschewing "bonnet dramas". But nor is this a drama about "ordinary people". Leather-clad (yes, it's true - I've seen the pictures) posh young men swashbuckling their way through 17th Century France - is it possible to think of a concept more unlike that of The Village? It does look a lot like Auntie has finally realised that people must be amused. But who knows - this may just be this year's White Queen, a single sop to costume drama viewers who only want to have a good time before the network starts again with the earnest, muddy, social-history approach.
I may be wrong, but again judging from the reviews, the series looks likely to be something along the line of the Scarlet Pimpernel TV series starring Richard E. Grant, Elizabeth McGovern and last but not least Martin Shaw. This series not only played fast and loose with the original Scarlet Pimpernel books, but also with history. The approach of Musketeers sounds similar: the historical background becomes a sort of cloud-cuckooland where every adventure is possible. Richelieu having his unfaithful mistress shot in a wood is surely a parallel to Robespierre wearing buttons featuring the guillotine: not even the book version went that far, and as for the real historic personages, they wouldn't have dreamt of doing any such thing (it is to be doubted that Richelieu even had a mistress). I enjoyed what I saw of the Pimpernel TV series, much thanks to Martin Shaw's manly Chauvelin - much as I dote on Orczy's Chauvelin, I never imagined him looking anything like Martin Shaw, but hey, who's complaining? The actor saddled with playing the Alice-in-Wonderland version of Robespierre was also very good, in spite of his caricature of a part. I'm sure I will enjoy Musketeers in much the same way. Nevertheless, you do wonder: what is it with the Musketeer story that makes adapters take a cavalier approach both to Dumas and the history books?
A confession is in order here: I haven't read The Three Musketeers. My knowledge of what takes place in it is based on somewhat foggy memories of the Illustrated Classic and the film starring Michael York as d'Artagnan (which seems to have been faithful to the book if you go by the Illustrated Classic test). Even with this limited knowledge, though, I sensed that things were decicedly off-kilter in the 90s film version (starring Charlie Sheen as Aramis and a wolf-grinning Tim Curry as a libidinous Richelieu - I forget the rest). The trippy 2011 film (full of villain totty - I like it) was more honest in a way: it was clear by out-there set pieces such as the infamous airships that this film bore no resemblance to any known version of 17th Century France whatsoever, whether written by Dumas or otherwise. Both the new films had you scratching your head if you'd grown up with the Michael York version of events. As for history, you're more amazed when a film gets it (almost) right than otherwise. Buckingham in the 2011 film refers repeatedly to "King James", and what do you know, James I's Buckingham is the same as the skirt-chaser in Musketeers. Granted, in reality he wasn't quite stupid enough to carry on a flirt with France's queen while his patron was still alive - his "diplomatic" mission to France came later, much to the then English king Charles I's chagrin (Charles was Louis XIII's brother-in-law) - but all the same, that was darn close.
I don't think it's a coincidence that it's The Scarlet Pimpernel and The Three Musketeers which have been victims of cheerfully-off-the-rails adaptations. Simply put: if the history in a historical novel is already wonky, the temptation must be all the stronger to crack it up another notch. If the French Revolution is depicted as nothing more than a bloodthirsty rabble's revenge on mostly cuddly noblemen, why not go the whole hog and let Robespierre wear guillotine buttons? If you have to make Cardinal Richelieu, an able and loyal minister who was a blessing to his country, into the villain of the piece, then both history and the original story might need further tweaking, especially if you want viewers to sympathise with a undertaking aimed to cover up the French Queen's adultery with an English duke. Tellingly, Queen Anne in the 90s and 2011 films is innocent of any Buckingham hanky-panky, and part of the musketeers' mission is to heal the breach between her and the King so two vulnerable young hearts can beat as one (both films are set at the start of Louis XIII's reign, when Richelieu really shouldn't be around at all). There was no such sentimental nonsense in the Michael York version. The King and Queen were no longer naïve newlyweds, and obviously not the lovers of the century. The Queen did have an affair with Buckingham, but had to be shielded because... because... well, because she was against the Cardinal who did all sorts of wicked stuff. Like... banning duels.
Whether it's because of modern values or insufficient Frenchness, there are points of the original story that viewers like me have problems with when it comes to The Three Musketeers. This has been used before as an excuse for adapters to go wild, and I strongly suspect that the same is true of the BBC series. It'll be intriguing to find out whether Queen Anne is blameless in this version or not.
All right, so the Beeb is clearly still eschewing "bonnet dramas". But nor is this a drama about "ordinary people". Leather-clad (yes, it's true - I've seen the pictures) posh young men swashbuckling their way through 17th Century France - is it possible to think of a concept more unlike that of The Village? It does look a lot like Auntie has finally realised that people must be amused. But who knows - this may just be this year's White Queen, a single sop to costume drama viewers who only want to have a good time before the network starts again with the earnest, muddy, social-history approach.
I may be wrong, but again judging from the reviews, the series looks likely to be something along the line of the Scarlet Pimpernel TV series starring Richard E. Grant, Elizabeth McGovern and last but not least Martin Shaw. This series not only played fast and loose with the original Scarlet Pimpernel books, but also with history. The approach of Musketeers sounds similar: the historical background becomes a sort of cloud-cuckooland where every adventure is possible. Richelieu having his unfaithful mistress shot in a wood is surely a parallel to Robespierre wearing buttons featuring the guillotine: not even the book version went that far, and as for the real historic personages, they wouldn't have dreamt of doing any such thing (it is to be doubted that Richelieu even had a mistress). I enjoyed what I saw of the Pimpernel TV series, much thanks to Martin Shaw's manly Chauvelin - much as I dote on Orczy's Chauvelin, I never imagined him looking anything like Martin Shaw, but hey, who's complaining? The actor saddled with playing the Alice-in-Wonderland version of Robespierre was also very good, in spite of his caricature of a part. I'm sure I will enjoy Musketeers in much the same way. Nevertheless, you do wonder: what is it with the Musketeer story that makes adapters take a cavalier approach both to Dumas and the history books?
A confession is in order here: I haven't read The Three Musketeers. My knowledge of what takes place in it is based on somewhat foggy memories of the Illustrated Classic and the film starring Michael York as d'Artagnan (which seems to have been faithful to the book if you go by the Illustrated Classic test). Even with this limited knowledge, though, I sensed that things were decicedly off-kilter in the 90s film version (starring Charlie Sheen as Aramis and a wolf-grinning Tim Curry as a libidinous Richelieu - I forget the rest). The trippy 2011 film (full of villain totty - I like it) was more honest in a way: it was clear by out-there set pieces such as the infamous airships that this film bore no resemblance to any known version of 17th Century France whatsoever, whether written by Dumas or otherwise. Both the new films had you scratching your head if you'd grown up with the Michael York version of events. As for history, you're more amazed when a film gets it (almost) right than otherwise. Buckingham in the 2011 film refers repeatedly to "King James", and what do you know, James I's Buckingham is the same as the skirt-chaser in Musketeers. Granted, in reality he wasn't quite stupid enough to carry on a flirt with France's queen while his patron was still alive - his "diplomatic" mission to France came later, much to the then English king Charles I's chagrin (Charles was Louis XIII's brother-in-law) - but all the same, that was darn close.
I don't think it's a coincidence that it's The Scarlet Pimpernel and The Three Musketeers which have been victims of cheerfully-off-the-rails adaptations. Simply put: if the history in a historical novel is already wonky, the temptation must be all the stronger to crack it up another notch. If the French Revolution is depicted as nothing more than a bloodthirsty rabble's revenge on mostly cuddly noblemen, why not go the whole hog and let Robespierre wear guillotine buttons? If you have to make Cardinal Richelieu, an able and loyal minister who was a blessing to his country, into the villain of the piece, then both history and the original story might need further tweaking, especially if you want viewers to sympathise with a undertaking aimed to cover up the French Queen's adultery with an English duke. Tellingly, Queen Anne in the 90s and 2011 films is innocent of any Buckingham hanky-panky, and part of the musketeers' mission is to heal the breach between her and the King so two vulnerable young hearts can beat as one (both films are set at the start of Louis XIII's reign, when Richelieu really shouldn't be around at all). There was no such sentimental nonsense in the Michael York version. The King and Queen were no longer naïve newlyweds, and obviously not the lovers of the century. The Queen did have an affair with Buckingham, but had to be shielded because... because... well, because she was against the Cardinal who did all sorts of wicked stuff. Like... banning duels.
Whether it's because of modern values or insufficient Frenchness, there are points of the original story that viewers like me have problems with when it comes to The Three Musketeers. This has been used before as an excuse for adapters to go wild, and I strongly suspect that the same is true of the BBC series. It'll be intriguing to find out whether Queen Anne is blameless in this version or not.
Thursday, 30 January 2014
Milverton vs Magnussen
Hats off to Steven Moffat. For a second time in a short while, he has come up with a villain who makes my flesh creep - and not in a good way. While watching the last episode of the (excellent) series 3 of Sherlock, I was disturbed to find that my reaction to the modern-day equivalent of Conan Doyle's Master Blackmailer - called Charles Augustus Magnussen instead of Milverton (he's a Dane) - was a deeply conventional "yuck!".
Yet I had no such problems with the original. Charles Augustus Milverton - the villain in the Sherlock Holmes adventure of the same name - undoubtedly comes high up on the list of fictional characters you wouldn't want to meet in real life. A blackmailer who can hold on to a secret until just the moment when it can do most damage; who charges so much there's no comfortable way of paying him off; and who, if he doesn't get the loot, will make a show of your misery, so as to encourage other victims to pay up - one shudders to think. You do not need to have lived a very blameworthy life in order to become trapped by a man like that. At the same time, while I understood Holmes's revulsion, I didn't feel it myself. My view of the smiling, deceptively Pickwickian-seeming Milverton was not "yuck" but "mmm, different". He's not one of those baddies I've developed a serious crush on; I do not fool myself into believing that he has a wounded soul or could be redeemed by love. But he is interesting, and I did raise my eyebrows a bit when Holmes decided to let one of his victims murder him and get away with it.
The Charles Augustus Milverton story has another point of interest, apart from its title character, and that's the dodgy way everyone, even Holmes - especially Holmes - behaves in it. The society beauty Holmes and Watson are representing may be a poor innocent, if her "sprightly" letters to an "impecunious young squire" were written long before she met her noble, eligible fiancé. But were they? Milverton's murderer is an adulteress who claims that Milverton's revelations about her affair killed her husband. One cannot help feeling, though, that if her husband's "gallant heart" was broken because his wife betrayed him, it was not entirely the fault of the blackmailer who told him. As for Holmes, he masquerades as a plumber and gets engaged to Milverton's housemaid, merely in order to get information on how to burgle the house. The fact that he has a rival who will take care of the girl once her plumber vanishes into thin air doesn't really make up for the heartlessness of Holmes's plan - besides being exactly the kind of gambit a Fagin associate would have used. It's as if Milverton corrupts even his enemies: no fight with him, if it can have a hope of being successful, can be fair.
So much for Milverton. What then of Magnussen, and why doesn't he earn the Georgiana seal of villain approval? Just look at him. Shark-like - check. "Dead eyes" - check. Power-hungry - check. Extremely clever - check. Able to annihilate opponents in word skirmishes - check. What's more, he's played mesmerisingly by the Danish actor Lars Mikkelsen. And yet, unlike with his namesake, I sat there willing someone to kill him, and fast, before he caused any more damage.
Magnussen's M.O. is similar to Milverton's. In fact, of all the Sherlock episodes, this one was the one which most resembled an actual Sherlock Holmes story - until it went off on an enjoyable tangent of its own. Magnussen is a newspaper proprietor with an encyclopediac memory who can dig up some dirt on just about everyone - or someone they hold dear - and threaten to publish it in his rags. (Query: are newspaper proprietors the new villain black in English Drama? And is it entirely fair given that few of them, I imagine, are that involved in the scandalous stories their newspapers print? We don't see many wicked newspaper editors gambolling about: on the contrary, they heroically beat up brown-shirts in Munich.) This means he holds world governments in his hands. What he wants to do with all this power is unclear: what's all too clear is that he enjoys having it. Much more than the business-minded Milverton - who, unlike many blackmailers, fulfils his side of the bargain and hands over the guilty secret once it's been paid for - Magnussen is a power junkie.
But I'm usually partial to power junkies. So why not Magnussen? As so often, it's the details that do it. I've said it before and I'll say it again: it's not what a villain does that's important, it's how he does it. It's useless to say "I would never ever fall for a blackmailer" - well, it is if you're a villain-lover anyway - but blackmail remains one of the trickier things for a baddie to pull off. And Magnussen isn't in the business of making things easy for potential backers. In one of the first scenes, his mental notes of a hostile committee member contain the chilling words "Pressure point: Disabled daughter". Whoah. In most blackmail affairs there's some collateral damage but - hold on. A little later, he demonstrates the power he has over another, in herself incorruptible, committee member ("Pressure point: Husband") by licking her face. Urinating in Sherlock's fireplace doesn't win one any prizes in charm school either, but this was the detail that really gave Magnussen the "yuck" factor.
So, business man vs unreliable power tripper. Targeting people's own guilty secrets vs targeting their nearest and dearest. Somewhat dodgy victims and adversaries of the husband-cheating, possibly gold-digging, housemaid-heartbreaking kind vs effortlessly engaging enemies/victims (though to be fair, the modern Sherlock doesn't come out of it all smelling of roses either: there's even a version of the maid story included). Laughing in your prey's face vs literally licking it. On balance, I'd say that of the two Charles Augustuses, Magnussen is the one who most deserves being called "the worst man in London". Either that or I'm going soft.
Yet I had no such problems with the original. Charles Augustus Milverton - the villain in the Sherlock Holmes adventure of the same name - undoubtedly comes high up on the list of fictional characters you wouldn't want to meet in real life. A blackmailer who can hold on to a secret until just the moment when it can do most damage; who charges so much there's no comfortable way of paying him off; and who, if he doesn't get the loot, will make a show of your misery, so as to encourage other victims to pay up - one shudders to think. You do not need to have lived a very blameworthy life in order to become trapped by a man like that. At the same time, while I understood Holmes's revulsion, I didn't feel it myself. My view of the smiling, deceptively Pickwickian-seeming Milverton was not "yuck" but "mmm, different". He's not one of those baddies I've developed a serious crush on; I do not fool myself into believing that he has a wounded soul or could be redeemed by love. But he is interesting, and I did raise my eyebrows a bit when Holmes decided to let one of his victims murder him and get away with it.
The Charles Augustus Milverton story has another point of interest, apart from its title character, and that's the dodgy way everyone, even Holmes - especially Holmes - behaves in it. The society beauty Holmes and Watson are representing may be a poor innocent, if her "sprightly" letters to an "impecunious young squire" were written long before she met her noble, eligible fiancé. But were they? Milverton's murderer is an adulteress who claims that Milverton's revelations about her affair killed her husband. One cannot help feeling, though, that if her husband's "gallant heart" was broken because his wife betrayed him, it was not entirely the fault of the blackmailer who told him. As for Holmes, he masquerades as a plumber and gets engaged to Milverton's housemaid, merely in order to get information on how to burgle the house. The fact that he has a rival who will take care of the girl once her plumber vanishes into thin air doesn't really make up for the heartlessness of Holmes's plan - besides being exactly the kind of gambit a Fagin associate would have used. It's as if Milverton corrupts even his enemies: no fight with him, if it can have a hope of being successful, can be fair.
So much for Milverton. What then of Magnussen, and why doesn't he earn the Georgiana seal of villain approval? Just look at him. Shark-like - check. "Dead eyes" - check. Power-hungry - check. Extremely clever - check. Able to annihilate opponents in word skirmishes - check. What's more, he's played mesmerisingly by the Danish actor Lars Mikkelsen. And yet, unlike with his namesake, I sat there willing someone to kill him, and fast, before he caused any more damage.
Magnussen's M.O. is similar to Milverton's. In fact, of all the Sherlock episodes, this one was the one which most resembled an actual Sherlock Holmes story - until it went off on an enjoyable tangent of its own. Magnussen is a newspaper proprietor with an encyclopediac memory who can dig up some dirt on just about everyone - or someone they hold dear - and threaten to publish it in his rags. (Query: are newspaper proprietors the new villain black in English Drama? And is it entirely fair given that few of them, I imagine, are that involved in the scandalous stories their newspapers print? We don't see many wicked newspaper editors gambolling about: on the contrary, they heroically beat up brown-shirts in Munich.) This means he holds world governments in his hands. What he wants to do with all this power is unclear: what's all too clear is that he enjoys having it. Much more than the business-minded Milverton - who, unlike many blackmailers, fulfils his side of the bargain and hands over the guilty secret once it's been paid for - Magnussen is a power junkie.
But I'm usually partial to power junkies. So why not Magnussen? As so often, it's the details that do it. I've said it before and I'll say it again: it's not what a villain does that's important, it's how he does it. It's useless to say "I would never ever fall for a blackmailer" - well, it is if you're a villain-lover anyway - but blackmail remains one of the trickier things for a baddie to pull off. And Magnussen isn't in the business of making things easy for potential backers. In one of the first scenes, his mental notes of a hostile committee member contain the chilling words "Pressure point: Disabled daughter". Whoah. In most blackmail affairs there's some collateral damage but - hold on. A little later, he demonstrates the power he has over another, in herself incorruptible, committee member ("Pressure point: Husband") by licking her face. Urinating in Sherlock's fireplace doesn't win one any prizes in charm school either, but this was the detail that really gave Magnussen the "yuck" factor.
So, business man vs unreliable power tripper. Targeting people's own guilty secrets vs targeting their nearest and dearest. Somewhat dodgy victims and adversaries of the husband-cheating, possibly gold-digging, housemaid-heartbreaking kind vs effortlessly engaging enemies/victims (though to be fair, the modern Sherlock doesn't come out of it all smelling of roses either: there's even a version of the maid story included). Laughing in your prey's face vs literally licking it. On balance, I'd say that of the two Charles Augustuses, Magnussen is the one who most deserves being called "the worst man in London". Either that or I'm going soft.
Wednesday, 22 January 2014
There's really nothing wrong with Tara King
While waiting for the Doctor Who Christmas special and Sherlock series 3, I'm indulging in some vintage geek viewing: I'm watching The Avengers. No, not the superheroes - the old cult series featuring John Steed, the British special agent who belongs to a very quirky secret service department indeed, and his various sidekicks. More specifically, I'm watching the Tara King episodes. I've already seen the Emma Peel episodes - I bought that whole part of the series a few years back. Some of the Tara episodes I've seen before, but now I have all her episodes too. And I must say they're not half bad.
The consensus among the hard-line fans of The Avengers seems to be that compared to ultra-cool, leather-clad, upper-crust Emma Peel as played by Diana Rigg, Tara King is a bit of a poor fish. She is introduced as a new recruit of The Department who promptly falls in love with the much older Steed, and I agree that's not a great beginning. But for the life of me, I cannot see any marked deterioration between her episodes and the ones featuring Emma. She can fight like a whole man - in one episode, she defeats a karate champion, in another, she has already taken care of the bad guys by the time Steed rushes to her rescue - she's sassy, and were I a man (of the kind that's into chicks) I'd have no complaints on the looks front either. She may have to be rescued by Steed once or twice, but for the most part, she can hold her own with no problem whatsoever. Anyway, isn't there a single episode where Emma has to be rescued by Steed? There is, surely. Steed's magnificence is a given in this series, and if you've reached the point when you think "hold on, he's not that great", then you know it's time to take a break from it for a while. On the whole, Tara is one plucky agent and does not deserve the Damsel in Distress label given her by fans online (like here, on the Avengers Forever web site - a perfect gold mine if, like me, you have a yen for many of the sterling British character actors who appeared in the series).
So why does Tara get so much bad press? All right, it might be because real fans, as opposed to ignorant day trippers like myself, are more discerning and can appreciate all the small nuances of difference between RSC-trained Diana Rigg and relative newcomer Linda Thorson. But I think that at least partly Tara is the victim of Charismatic Character Successor Syndrome. When a popular character is written out - and Emma Peel was very popular indeed - the one who takes his or her place in the story has a tough time of it. This can lead to the new character being replaced with yet another one pretty soon, and this second replacement will ironically find things easier, as he/she is compared not with the inimitable original but with the undervalued replacement number one.
We find an example of this in Midsomer Murders. The first Inspector Barnaby's first sergeant, Troy (Sergeant Troy! Get the Hardy reference), was a great sidekick - bumbling, tactless, but loveable with it, and as crime sidekicks tend to be a good deal more intelligent than his superior gave him credit for. (The Troy of the books isn't like this at all - in the novel I've read he was sharp, vain and a somewhat nasty. A bit my type, actually.) He was replaced by Sergeant Scott, an over-confident ladies' man from The Big Smoke who was very surprised at the non-boringness of policing Midsomer. Scott was also a good sidekick. His arrogant attitude, which had to be tempered as his collaboration with Barnaby continued, provided a pleasing dramatic tension between him and his inspector, and the way witnesses responded to him was interesting: for instance, his confrontation with one possible suspect - another man's man - led first to glowering hostility, then to bonding during one of those fatal folksy celebrations found only in Midsomer. Nevertheless, he was soon replaced. Why? I'd say CCS Syndrome. He was in his turn followed by Constable - later Sergeant - Jones, an amiable sort, but a little personality-less. He's made it all the way into the new Barnaby era. I wonder if he'd stood a chance, though, if he'd followed directly after Sergeant Troy.
One argument in favour of my CCS Syndrome theory is that sometimes series makers consciously create a "rebound" character who temporarily fills in between a Charismatic Character and his/her real successor. This rebound character can be anything from a real dud to someone quite nice but not really up to scratch. Of course, it is not always easy to see which characters were meant to stay but were then written out because they did not catch on, and which characters were only meant to stay for a bit anyway. But surely the blighted Caan in Grey's Anatomy was never meant to become a fixture. (I know I go on about her ghastliness a little, but that's what you get when you deny Christina surgery.) By the time "Desert Storm Barbie" appeared, I for one didn't care that she wasn't Burke: I was just glad she wasn't Caan. A series dear to my heart appears set to use the rebound character gambit twice, once successfully, once less so - but more about that another time.
Tara's problem is not that she's too green, or too weak, or too gooey towards Steed. Her problem is that she's not Emma Peel.
The consensus among the hard-line fans of The Avengers seems to be that compared to ultra-cool, leather-clad, upper-crust Emma Peel as played by Diana Rigg, Tara King is a bit of a poor fish. She is introduced as a new recruit of The Department who promptly falls in love with the much older Steed, and I agree that's not a great beginning. But for the life of me, I cannot see any marked deterioration between her episodes and the ones featuring Emma. She can fight like a whole man - in one episode, she defeats a karate champion, in another, she has already taken care of the bad guys by the time Steed rushes to her rescue - she's sassy, and were I a man (of the kind that's into chicks) I'd have no complaints on the looks front either. She may have to be rescued by Steed once or twice, but for the most part, she can hold her own with no problem whatsoever. Anyway, isn't there a single episode where Emma has to be rescued by Steed? There is, surely. Steed's magnificence is a given in this series, and if you've reached the point when you think "hold on, he's not that great", then you know it's time to take a break from it for a while. On the whole, Tara is one plucky agent and does not deserve the Damsel in Distress label given her by fans online (like here, on the Avengers Forever web site - a perfect gold mine if, like me, you have a yen for many of the sterling British character actors who appeared in the series).
So why does Tara get so much bad press? All right, it might be because real fans, as opposed to ignorant day trippers like myself, are more discerning and can appreciate all the small nuances of difference between RSC-trained Diana Rigg and relative newcomer Linda Thorson. But I think that at least partly Tara is the victim of Charismatic Character Successor Syndrome. When a popular character is written out - and Emma Peel was very popular indeed - the one who takes his or her place in the story has a tough time of it. This can lead to the new character being replaced with yet another one pretty soon, and this second replacement will ironically find things easier, as he/she is compared not with the inimitable original but with the undervalued replacement number one.
We find an example of this in Midsomer Murders. The first Inspector Barnaby's first sergeant, Troy (Sergeant Troy! Get the Hardy reference), was a great sidekick - bumbling, tactless, but loveable with it, and as crime sidekicks tend to be a good deal more intelligent than his superior gave him credit for. (The Troy of the books isn't like this at all - in the novel I've read he was sharp, vain and a somewhat nasty. A bit my type, actually.) He was replaced by Sergeant Scott, an over-confident ladies' man from The Big Smoke who was very surprised at the non-boringness of policing Midsomer. Scott was also a good sidekick. His arrogant attitude, which had to be tempered as his collaboration with Barnaby continued, provided a pleasing dramatic tension between him and his inspector, and the way witnesses responded to him was interesting: for instance, his confrontation with one possible suspect - another man's man - led first to glowering hostility, then to bonding during one of those fatal folksy celebrations found only in Midsomer. Nevertheless, he was soon replaced. Why? I'd say CCS Syndrome. He was in his turn followed by Constable - later Sergeant - Jones, an amiable sort, but a little personality-less. He's made it all the way into the new Barnaby era. I wonder if he'd stood a chance, though, if he'd followed directly after Sergeant Troy.
One argument in favour of my CCS Syndrome theory is that sometimes series makers consciously create a "rebound" character who temporarily fills in between a Charismatic Character and his/her real successor. This rebound character can be anything from a real dud to someone quite nice but not really up to scratch. Of course, it is not always easy to see which characters were meant to stay but were then written out because they did not catch on, and which characters were only meant to stay for a bit anyway. But surely the blighted Caan in Grey's Anatomy was never meant to become a fixture. (I know I go on about her ghastliness a little, but that's what you get when you deny Christina surgery.) By the time "Desert Storm Barbie" appeared, I for one didn't care that she wasn't Burke: I was just glad she wasn't Caan. A series dear to my heart appears set to use the rebound character gambit twice, once successfully, once less so - but more about that another time.
Tara's problem is not that she's too green, or too weak, or too gooey towards Steed. Her problem is that she's not Emma Peel.
Tuesday, 14 January 2014
Beating the January blues
It's strange - just before the new year, I tend to feel very purposeful and optimistic. I'm convinced that I will have the energy to get up to all sorts of things in the year to come and not get stuck in a rut like during a goodish part of the year that was. And then January comes along, and most of the energy vanishes, just like that. Typical.
This time last year, I was going through a real low patch, and I'm determined I won't let it happen again. But the January blues can very easily descend on you if you don't find a convenient cultural pick-me-up to get you through it. Last year they were worsened by post-Downtonian withdrawal syndrome, which I'm suffering from this year as well, albeit not to the same degree. An engrossing book or TV series would be just what I need - easier said than done, though.
Book-wise, I've already had my first disappointment when starting on Affinity by Sarah Waters, which I thought was a sure thing, bearing in mind what a page turner Fingersmith was. Frustratingly, it started out with pages and pages of scene-setting in a Victorian women's prison. What I appreciated with Fingersmith was its ability to get on with the story and not get bogged down with too much "look, I really know this period, me" local colour. I'm sure Affinity improves, but I have no patience for it right now, when I'm in need of a quicker reading fix.
Next out was Death at Wentwater Court, a light-hearted country-house mystery by Carola Dunn set in the Twenties. For a book in this genre, however, there turned out to be precious few twists, both mystery-wise and character-wise. The damsel in distress is revealed to be just that - a damsel in distress, and spineless with it, not a scheming minx as I was half hoping. Agatha Christie it ain't: the cynicism in her characterisation can annoy me sometimes, but I longed for a dose of it here. Still, it was a sweet tale, and at least I managed to finish it.
Right now I'm reading a gentle romance, The Memory Garden by Rachel Hore. And yes, it's pleasant - I've waded through many a worse book. I wish it could be a bit more engaging, though. It used to annoy me when, say, film reviewers complained about a rom com's "predictability". Well, duh, I thought, you don't watch a rom com for its original storylines - just tell us if it was heart-warming and witty, because that's what we really want to know. However, I must reluctantly admit that I'm starting to see the reviewers' point. When romantic pairings are all too obvious from the word go, then the obstacles thrown in the lovers' way can seem rather contrived.
The novel's heroine is a little drippy for my taste, too, though I tell myself I should give the poor woman a break after all that she's been through. She seems to take offence at the slightest thing that her likely new love interest does or does not do, and then she mopes around and feels "lonely" in her Cornwall cottage. She has months off work, she's got a contract for writing a book about something she's interested in, she's rented a cottage in Cornwall, she can sleep in mornings - honestly, is a spot of loneliness really something to worry about in the circumstances? I'm reminded, though, about how ubiquitous the Feisty Heroine is getting, when my reaction to a somewhat messed-up heroine is one of irritation. Isn't it only human to be over-wary before starting a new relationship and a bit pathetic at the same time? All heroines can't be of the fearless huntress variety. Still, remembering all the complications one is used to encounter in a love story, I can't help thinking: you're single, he's single, just do it, will you?
This time last year, I was going through a real low patch, and I'm determined I won't let it happen again. But the January blues can very easily descend on you if you don't find a convenient cultural pick-me-up to get you through it. Last year they were worsened by post-Downtonian withdrawal syndrome, which I'm suffering from this year as well, albeit not to the same degree. An engrossing book or TV series would be just what I need - easier said than done, though.
Book-wise, I've already had my first disappointment when starting on Affinity by Sarah Waters, which I thought was a sure thing, bearing in mind what a page turner Fingersmith was. Frustratingly, it started out with pages and pages of scene-setting in a Victorian women's prison. What I appreciated with Fingersmith was its ability to get on with the story and not get bogged down with too much "look, I really know this period, me" local colour. I'm sure Affinity improves, but I have no patience for it right now, when I'm in need of a quicker reading fix.
Next out was Death at Wentwater Court, a light-hearted country-house mystery by Carola Dunn set in the Twenties. For a book in this genre, however, there turned out to be precious few twists, both mystery-wise and character-wise. The damsel in distress is revealed to be just that - a damsel in distress, and spineless with it, not a scheming minx as I was half hoping. Agatha Christie it ain't: the cynicism in her characterisation can annoy me sometimes, but I longed for a dose of it here. Still, it was a sweet tale, and at least I managed to finish it.
Right now I'm reading a gentle romance, The Memory Garden by Rachel Hore. And yes, it's pleasant - I've waded through many a worse book. I wish it could be a bit more engaging, though. It used to annoy me when, say, film reviewers complained about a rom com's "predictability". Well, duh, I thought, you don't watch a rom com for its original storylines - just tell us if it was heart-warming and witty, because that's what we really want to know. However, I must reluctantly admit that I'm starting to see the reviewers' point. When romantic pairings are all too obvious from the word go, then the obstacles thrown in the lovers' way can seem rather contrived.
The novel's heroine is a little drippy for my taste, too, though I tell myself I should give the poor woman a break after all that she's been through. She seems to take offence at the slightest thing that her likely new love interest does or does not do, and then she mopes around and feels "lonely" in her Cornwall cottage. She has months off work, she's got a contract for writing a book about something she's interested in, she's rented a cottage in Cornwall, she can sleep in mornings - honestly, is a spot of loneliness really something to worry about in the circumstances? I'm reminded, though, about how ubiquitous the Feisty Heroine is getting, when my reaction to a somewhat messed-up heroine is one of irritation. Isn't it only human to be over-wary before starting a new relationship and a bit pathetic at the same time? All heroines can't be of the fearless huntress variety. Still, remembering all the complications one is used to encounter in a love story, I can't help thinking: you're single, he's single, just do it, will you?
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