[hygtfrdes]

I love this show, and I loved this series, the finale included. It's never pretended to be anything other than a high-quality soap opera...how many episodes in the first series did Cora and Violet go on about the inheritance problem and Mary's prospects?...but throughout it's managed to weave in historical elements and the social problems of being in service during this evolving time period. I was talking with co-workers today about how clever it is to stage an aristocracy vs. help soap opera with literary and cinematic production values in this time period, when the aristocracy norm and the institution of service was being buffeted and busted open by the social change of the surrounding decades. The aristocracy as-was really, truly ended with the onset of WWII, if not before; I'm hoping that, in Series 3, things get really unpredictable in the household as far as the role of master vs. servant.

(Which is a long way of saying I want Mrs. Hughes to flip her shit and PWN everyone's faces and then set fire to the countryside, like a respectable madwoman).