How M/M via DS Non-Ironically Ruined My Life Meme: Is It Over Yet?
"I feel like I'm only half myself without ... [them]."
[Downton Abbey S3 Spoilers Ahead]
Day 15 - Describe your thoughts while watching the Downton Christmas Special.
Taking advantage of the long weekend to travel, I am now running a day behind on this meme. But it is perhaps serendipitous since the S3 finale -- aka the CS 2012 (or the "CS of Doom" as eolivet calls it) airs in the US on PBS tomorrow night. So there perhaps is not a better time for a play-by-play on my first viewing of the last episode of Downton I may ever watch (for watching Downton without Mary and Matthew I imagine would feel ... disembodied somehow, like I had lost my better fictional half -- and it certainly would bring less than half the enjoyment).
So ... my thoughts? In a word: blank. My mind was blank. I was numb. I had already been spoiled (and thank God -- that is certainly not an experience I would have wanted to go into blind). I had not wanted to see it on Christmas (for obvious reasons), so I saw Les Misérables (the film) instead -- which I did not enjoy nearly as much as I would have had I not obsessed over tumblr pages filled with images of Matthew's final death shot right before the matinee showing began.
But, alas, in the wee hours of the morning of what native Downtonians celebrate as Boxing Day, I could not sleep and broke down and watched the episode. It was a tense viewing experience and, because I knew what was coming, I really enjoyed none of it, especially what were the final scenes of Mary and Matthew together. Every tender word was like a cut. It was just so wretched and unjust and utterly, utterly senseless.
Of course, on the other hand, I was hyper alert to Julian Fellowes' signposting and the meta-leval commentary hidden (well, thinly veiled, more like) within. Like the deer-stalking metaphor: "they are noble creatures and ... deserve a clean death." ... Or Matthew's sendoff to Mary -- his wish and belief that she will be true to herself, that she will be "[his] Mary always, for [his] ... is the true Mary." ... Or the dark humor, like Mary's ill-timed joke about scratching up the car ... Or, most significantly, the haunting parallel of Mary and Matthew standing on the train platform in almost identical colors to the iconic train scene from 2x01 -- a nod to Fellowes' favorite scene if ever there was one. Though truthfully, it was more than a nod because of its significance. In 2x01, there was such pathos, such uncertainty; they both knew it could have been the last time they saw one another and it was an attempt at closure, a goodbye. And likewise, the CS 2012 was very much Fellowes' goodbye to Mary and Matthew: his "ideal marriage," his future Earl and Countess, his "perfect love," his OTP.
On the eve before the end of the Mary/Matthew ship for the US audience, I am fascinated by what unspoiled viewers here will make of the episode (or for that matter, spoiled viewers who have not actually seen it for themselves). I do not believe it in and of itself will be a death knell for Downton, but I still firmly hold to my prediction that the cumulative effect of the disappointment and heaviness of S3 will dampen enthusiasm for Downton in the hiatus. I have said it before and I will say it again: I will be very surprised if this time next year Downton remains in the zeitgeist.
[Downton Abbey S3 Spoilers Ahead]
Day 15 - Describe your thoughts while watching the Downton Christmas Special.
Taking advantage of the long weekend to travel, I am now running a day behind on this meme. But it is perhaps serendipitous since the S3 finale -- aka the CS 2012 (or the "CS of Doom" as eolivet calls it) airs in the US on PBS tomorrow night. So there perhaps is not a better time for a play-by-play on my first viewing of the last episode of Downton I may ever watch (for watching Downton without Mary and Matthew I imagine would feel ... disembodied somehow, like I had lost my better fictional half -- and it certainly would bring less than half the enjoyment).
So ... my thoughts? In a word: blank. My mind was blank. I was numb. I had already been spoiled (and thank God -- that is certainly not an experience I would have wanted to go into blind). I had not wanted to see it on Christmas (for obvious reasons), so I saw Les Misérables (the film) instead -- which I did not enjoy nearly as much as I would have had I not obsessed over tumblr pages filled with images of Matthew's final death shot right before the matinee showing began.
But, alas, in the wee hours of the morning of what native Downtonians celebrate as Boxing Day, I could not sleep and broke down and watched the episode. It was a tense viewing experience and, because I knew what was coming, I really enjoyed none of it, especially what were the final scenes of Mary and Matthew together. Every tender word was like a cut. It was just so wretched and unjust and utterly, utterly senseless.
Of course, on the other hand, I was hyper alert to Julian Fellowes' signposting and the meta-leval commentary hidden (well, thinly veiled, more like) within. Like the deer-stalking metaphor: "they are noble creatures and ... deserve a clean death." ... Or Matthew's sendoff to Mary -- his wish and belief that she will be true to herself, that she will be "[his] Mary always, for [his] ... is the true Mary." ... Or the dark humor, like Mary's ill-timed joke about scratching up the car ... Or, most significantly, the haunting parallel of Mary and Matthew standing on the train platform in almost identical colors to the iconic train scene from 2x01 -- a nod to Fellowes' favorite scene if ever there was one. Though truthfully, it was more than a nod because of its significance. In 2x01, there was such pathos, such uncertainty; they both knew it could have been the last time they saw one another and it was an attempt at closure, a goodbye. And likewise, the CS 2012 was very much Fellowes' goodbye to Mary and Matthew: his "ideal marriage," his future Earl and Countess, his "perfect love," his OTP.
On the eve before the end of the Mary/Matthew ship for the US audience, I am fascinated by what unspoiled viewers here will make of the episode (or for that matter, spoiled viewers who have not actually seen it for themselves). I do not believe it in and of itself will be a death knell for Downton, but I still firmly hold to my prediction that the cumulative effect of the disappointment and heaviness of S3 will dampen enthusiasm for Downton in the hiatus. I have said it before and I will say it again: I will be very surprised if this time next year Downton remains in the zeitgeist.