“Don’t you think you should call me Elsie?” “Mrs. Hughes! Not while we’re at WORK!”

Downton Abbey's back (yay!), and for the last season (sob!). It’s a bittersweet reunion. I’ve got some mixed feelings. So many interesting story lines were wrapped up last season, and two of my favorite characters – Tom and Rose – have scooted off to carefree and (presumably) egalitarian lives in America.  

I’m rooting for Lady Edith this season. This girl needs some love!! She can’t even win when she’s settling. She’s been dissed by her big sister, deceived by a scurrilous scarred war veteran, left at the altar by a near-senior citizen, scorned for getting a job, and seduced by her boss—who just happened to be hiding a secret insane wife (hello, Jane Eyre!). When Edith’s lover tries to get a divorce in Germany, he’s murdered by fucking 1920’s Hitler! Can’t a girl catch a break? No! She’s pregnant. After giving the baby to a nice tenant farmer family, she can’t stay away. The farmer’s wife flips out, convinced Edith is sleeping with her (come on, he’s not so great a prize) husband. Currently Edith owns and runs her former fiancé’s newspaper empire, and Ep 1 has her on the phone with her passive-aggressive dick of an editor, who can’t handle having a female boss. My advice? Move to London, Edith! Yesterday! Fire the dick editor! Knock some heads together! Get yourself some of that Roaring Twenties sexual freedom!

My hopes for Lady Edith aside, the prize for best story line in Season 6, Ep 1? Hands down it’s nervous bride Mrs. Hughes, who sends flighty cook Mrs. Patmore to broach the delicate subject of marital sex expectations with Mr. Carson!

Oh. My. God.

“She wants to know if you’d expect her to do her…ahem…wifely duty?” 

“Why of course, I’d expect any good wife would want to do her wifely d—OH! THAT DUTY!”

Cue scarlet-faced butler.

Mr. Carson’s subsequent soliloquy on the merits of his beloved Mrs. Hughes was very, very proper, and very, very touching. And that’s why we all love Downton.