After an awesome first season and two episodes that are inspiring cautious optimism, Downton Abbey is on again tonight. I’m loving being back on the estate and watching everyone trying to be proper while secretly telling each other with their eyes how desperately unhappy they are deep inside. I’m even developing a fondness for the scenes set in the trenches, which look suspiciously a lot less vast than actual trench warfare in the Somme.
But I’m keenly feeling the absence of one very important element: a snarky blow-by-blow episode guide. Reading a recap of every episode with a scene-by-scene breakdown is one of the greatest joys of modern TV watching, especially if it reads like it was written by that bitchy but hilariously funny Radio-Television-Film major you hung out with an university. I’m not talking about a critique or a review. What I mean is a fan’s guide to TV drama we want to chew over with other fans.
To be fair, in my life I’ve only found a handful of such guides that measured up, ones that are as fun to read as the show was to watch. My first was a fan page about the original Beverly Hills 90210, back before “Don’t be evil” had entered our lexicon as a slogan and urls looked like Bletchley Park code. This one was less admiring fandom than cruel mockery, but considering the source material, it was perfect. You can still read recaps of seasons 5 through 9 on www.theinquisitor.com, which I urge you to do as penance if you actually had the bad judgment to watch these seasons when they aired.
My recent discovery is the excellent Friday Night Lights recap on Television Without Pity. FNL is about a small Texas town, the football coach, his wife and daughter, and the lives of his players. If you don’t cry at some point when watching this show or don’t have a moment when your breath catches, you have a heart as impervious as pigskin. It’s written by Drunken Bee (er, not her real name) and is literal and meta all at once. One minute she’s examining the realities of the characters’ lives and the next, commenting on the choices made by the actors portraying these characters, and the next, considering the subtext of the editorial choices made by the writers. It makes me love the show all over again. (If you know what’s good for you, run to your nearest Amazon page and order all the DVDs for seasons one to five.)
With Downton Abbey, I want to read insightful analysis on why Lady Mary, Lady Edith and Lady Sybil aren’t knifing each other in the back and ruining each other’s love lives like they did so deliciously in the first series. (Thank you, Gigi from Powder Room Graffiti for acknowledging this sad state of affairs.) I want to know if anyone else thinks Lady Mary seeking romantic advice from the butler strains credibility (I mean, talking to him while he rests in bed? Really?). And what do we think of Maggie Smith’s Countess, who seems in touch with her softer side? Sigh. I miss the old series one battle axe.
I know I can’t be the only one. Can I? Can I? Send me your favourite DA recaps and put me out of my misery!
I like The Guardian. http://www.guardian.co.uk/tv-and-radio/tvandradioblog/2011/sep/18/downton-abbey-series-two-episode-one
Happy Snarking!
I’ll check it out for next season. Thanks!