Downton Abbey: The Final Season Episodes 5 and 6 – A Christian Perspective

I will be analyzing each episode of the final season of Downton Abbey from a worldview perspective. I will be doing them two at a time to make space for my series on “The Expanse.” There will, of course be SPOILERS for each episode, and I will assume readers know about each previous season and episode’s content as well. It will be assumed that readers are familiar with the characters and circumstances. I will not be summarizing the plot of the episode; I will merely interact with the content from a perspective of worldview. BE COURTEOUS AND DO NOT BRING UP LATER EPISODES THAN THE ONE DISCUSSED HERE IN YOUR COMMENTS.

Episode 5

Mr. Mason moved into his new place, and the whole drama surrounding this shows a kind of balance of justice and pragmatism by those involved. He was effectively stripped of his place because a new owner came in and gave him the boot–despite his being tied to the land for so long. This raises many questions about justice, a sense of place, and the balance of all of these concerns. It was good to see it ending well for him, so far.

Episode 6

Trust is something that can be lost, and it is hard to gain. A Christian perspective, I would argue, entails a kind of believing the best of others until proven otherwise. After all, isn’t that how we would like to be treated ourselves? Thomas Barrow has given others many reasons to lose their trust in him. Now that he is reaping the rewards of his own incessant sowing of discontent, he has fully come to realize just how hard it is to regain that trust. In his character, so far, we see in a way the state that all of us have been in or will be in–a state in which we must confront the fact that we have sinned, fallen short of expectations, and cannot earn our way back. Baxter has continued to be an example of grace shown to Barrow in his situation, but his own recalcitrance on accepting her grace shows, perhaps, how far he has fallen. The question is: Will he be able to come back?

Finally, we are left wondering about the relationship of Lady Edith and Lady Mary. When will they ever come to terms? Is it possible that they will? Again we see the impact of broken trust on a relationship. I’m hopeful that grace can make its appearance here as well.

More!

Be sure to let me know what you thought of the episodes, and what worldview-level issues you saw them raise, in the comments below.

Links

Be sure to check out the page for this site on Facebook and Twitter for discussion of posts, links to other pages of interest, random talk about theology/philosophy/apologetics/movies and more!

Eclectic Theist– Check out my other blog for my writings on science fiction, history, fantasy movies, and more!

SDG.

——

The preceding post is the property of J.W. Wartick (apart from quotations, which are the property of their respective owners, and works of art as credited; images are often freely available to the public and J.W. Wartick makes no claims of owning rights to the images unless he makes that explicit) and should not be reproduced in part or in whole without the expressed consent of the author. All content on this site is the property of J.W. Wartick and is made available for individual and personal usage. If you cite from these documents, whether for personal or professional purposes, please give appropriate citation with both the name of the author (J.W. Wartick) and a link to the original URL. If you’d like to repost a post, you may do so, provided you show less than half of the original post on your own site and link to the original post for the rest. You must also appropriately cite the post as noted above. This blog is protected by Creative Commons licensing. By viewing any part of this site, you are agreeing to this usage policy.