This point may be a one-way ticket back to Borington but for anyone doubting the show’s ability to hold your attention, let me offer you one simple word: sex. Yes, despite the haughty exterior, these upper-class folk are no strangers to going upstairs-downstairs, nor are the servants. I haven’t even mentioned one of the most interesting parts of the show, which is that we get to know the servants as well as we know the nobility, which makes for some neat dynamics. But while we get to know them, they get to know each other, in the biblical sense.
Two events occur in the first few episodes that have implications for the entire run of the show to this point, and both involve some taboo sex. One involves at least one elicit gay affair between the servant Thomas and one of the house’s guests, which complicates the amount of sympathy we have for the often cold and ruthless Thomas. The other, involving Lady Mary, is an interesting parallel to the Thomas affair, with different fallout that’s appropriate to her status and cultural mores of the time. What I’m saying is Downton Abbey does not shy away from the natural urges of members of this society, despite the cultural tendency to assume the only stiff thing to discuss is one’s upper lip.
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