Rambles are great. Everyone knows I do them all the freaking time here. True! There was a lot of stress on Matthew, obviously. I mean, I think he still loves her clearly, but almost all of the season two Matthew/Isobel scenes I can remember involve Matthew being annoyed at Isobel or be like “Mother.” Which is actually very interesting, because I think it speaks to how Matthew has changed a bit. This isn’t bad development or anything, but when he first came to Downton he was bent on it not letting it change him (“Why would they want to?”). It did. Not for the worse at all, but Isobel hasn’t changed. She’s older than Matthew, her character is more fixed, and she isn’t given any plotlines that would encourage character development anyways so. Some new distance is natural and some strain is perfectly fine. I’m just concerned this could be a new thing for the rest of Downton. That, or Isobel will just be written off completely.

I think Isobel is a great foil to Cora in the area of motherhood. I mean, if we’re actually supposed to take everyone’s age into account (which I don’t think we are since everyone at Downton is clearly ageless), she had Matthew much later in life than Cora had her children. And Isobel is much more supportive and generally has a much healthier relationship with her son than Cora and her daughters. But I would love to know more about Matthew background and his father. Also, Matthew and Lavinia’s father. Since I believe both Lavinia’s dad and his were named Reginald. And I feel like Matthew was definitely closer to his mother and being a lawyer instead of going into medicine may have been an issue of brief strain in the household. But enter Reginald Swire. Who is also a lawyer! I could see a cool father relationship emerging from that. But that’s just my crazy headcanon.

See, rambling all around. They were both called Reginald, right? Or am I making this up?