'Downton Abbey' Series Finale Recap: A Happy Ending

After six years of white-tie dinners, hospital dramas, murder trials, suitors courting Lady Mary, suitors leaving Lady Edith, Carson’s horror at nicknames, and a dead Turk, we’ve come to the end of Downton Abbey, the TV show.

Downton Abbey, the fictional place? As Lord Grantham says, “We never know what’s coming, of course. But I’d say we have a good chance.” (No, they don’t, not with the Wall Street crash and World War II coming, and even further modernization that would have the Dowager Countess rolling in her grave. But let’s not spoil it for them.)


The series finale wrapped up nearly every dangling thread. No longer can we say “Poor Edith,” because Bertie came back to marry her and make her a marchioness (take that, Mary). Thomas went from a repentant villain who tried to commit suicide to the next butler. And love seems to be on the horizon for everyone from Daisy and Andy, to Mrs. Patmore and Mr. Mason, to maybe even Tom and Edith’s editor.


Maybe we are sentimentalists like Henry Talbot, but it’s fine that Downton Abbey gave every character a happy ending, like Oprah gives away cars. For a series that began with the sinking of the Titanic, how can we begrudge everyone their two-by-two life boats?