Perhaps if we had responded to PBS’ darn fundraising pleas…
[spoilers below]
Via Marshall Ramsey Fan Pageapalooza
Lady Sybil and Cousin Matthew would still be among the living.
Maybe. Maybe not.
Probably not.
On Monday, the NY Times’ Arts Beat blog featured a terrifically insightful Q&A with Downton creator and writer Julian Fellowes. In it, Fellowes described handling the desire of both Jessica Brown Findlay (Lady Sybil) and Dan Stevens (Matthew Crawley) to move on from Downton for bigger, more visible projects.
For reasons I can’t justify with facts, I was less put off by Brown Findlay’s departure than by Stevens’. Lady Sybil’s untimely demise was a gut punch, but the storyline worked and I admired the writers for not holding back. A show full of perfect happiness wouldn’t be much of a show.
But Matthew’s death by bloody car accident soon after the birth of his son and heir, realized after Stevens’ public announcement of his departure from the show, well…I haven’t been able to tease apart my feelings about the actor leaving versus the character’s demise. Check back once I have watched the season three finale a few more times.
I’m glad, though, that Mary’s baby boy arrived to secure his mother’s future as well as that of the estate. This American would not be excited to revisit that matter again.
In the Times piece, Fellowes also addressed the spoiler issues that arose as a result of having such an eventful season air in the U.S. months after it premiered in the U.K. All involved seem to agree it’s an issue to be avoided with season four if at all possible.
Are you all caught up? Did you manage to stay spoiler-free until the end?
Related post:
OneChicklette 
I am all caught up….and I DID avoid spoilers! I don’t know how I managed that, seeing as every blogger seemed to already have seen all the shows before PBS. However, I do like my old lady Sunday night ritual I learned from my mommy. FYI-it’s a faux old ritual, as I haven’t yet reached decrepitude. Thanks so much for sharing. I knew Dan Stevens wanted to leave, but I was mistakenly sad for Brown Findlay. Now all is right with my world.
I love Sunday rituals too. Now why can’t I find a follow button for your blog?
Because I’m obnoxious and self hosted, so I lack all the cool WordPress.com thingies like that (and “like” buttons *sob*), but I still get to call myself WordPress. The things they don’t tell you when starting out, right? What I do with goobers like me is just add the address to the “blogs I follow” page. Or the email option, but that gets annoying sometimes. Sorry.
I managed to avoid spoilers on what happened to Matthew until I read this very post. Not to fear, though, I saw an interview with Dan Stevens before season three stared here in the US where it was stated that this would be his last season. Still haven’t seen the last two episodes but who cares about that? It’s my favorite guilty pleasure. And I agree with you, Lady Sybil’s demise was a definite gut punch.
When I started reading your comment I got very nervous!