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* PleaseWakeUp: [[spoiler:Cora to Sybil.]]
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* PlatonicValentine: Mrs. Patmore sends one to Daisy in the Series 4 premiere since neither woman has one.
* PleaseWakeUp: [[spoiler:Cora and Tom to Sybil.]]
* PleaseWakeUp: [[spoiler:Cora and Tom to Sybil.]]
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-->'''Jimmy''': I've never been James in my life. I was Jimmy to Lady Anstruther.
-->'''Carson''': I don't care if you were Father Christmas to Lady Anstruther. You're James now and will stay James while you're at Downton.
-->'''Carson''': I don't care if you were Father Christmas to Lady Anstruther. You're James now and will stay James while you're at Downton.
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* NomDeMom: While seeing a fertility expert in Series 3, Mary uses her mother's maiden name Levinson to disguise herself.
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*** When William [[spoiler:lies dying]], Thomas expresses support for him. much to the shock of everyone else present. He says he doesn't know what they're so surprised for, and points out that whether or not be likes William, they're both working class boys, and later enlisted men, and they get a lot of the same crap.
*** After [[spoiler:young Sybil]] dies in childbirth, Thomas walks out of the kitchen in a daze and weeps by the stairs, having earlier expressed fondness and friendship from their time working side by side in the hospital. He's still visibly shaken by it in the next episode.
*** After [[spoiler:young Sybil]] dies in childbirth, Thomas walks out of the kitchen in a daze and weeps by the stairs, having earlier expressed fondness and friendship from their time working side by side in the hospital. He's still visibly shaken by it in the next episode.
to:
*** When William [[spoiler:lies dying]], Thomas expresses support for him. much to the shock of everyone else present. He says he doesn't know what they're so surprised for, and points out that whether or not be he likes William, they're both working class boys, and later enlisted men, and they get a lot of the same crap.
*** After[[spoiler:young Sybil]] [[spoiler:Sybil]] dies in childbirth, Thomas walks out of the kitchen in a daze and weeps by the stairs, having earlier expressed fondness and friendship from their time working side by side in the hospital. He's still visibly shaken by it in the next episode.
*** After
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** Lady Edith, who will go to any lengths to discredit Mary in order to marry Matthew and become mistress of Downton. In reverse, Lady Mary, whose sole reason to make Edith unhappy seems to be spite, especially in later seasons when Edith has log moved on from provoking her.
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** Lady Edith, who will go to any lengths to discredit Mary in order to marry Matthew and become mistress of Downton.
** In reverse, Lady Mary, whose sole reason to make Edith unhappy seems to be spite, especially in later seasons when Edith haslog long moved on from provoking her and doesn't have any strength left to counter her.
** In reverse, Lady Mary, whose sole reason to make Edith unhappy seems to be spite, especially in later seasons when Edith has
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** Carson's former colleague wants to blackmail him with his past as a comedian. The lord doesn't think less about him.
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** Carson's former colleague wants to blackmail him with his past as a comedian. The lord earl doesn't think any less about him.
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* MirrorCharacter: For how much Mary and Edith loathe each other and are discussed by other characters only in terms of [[{{Foil}} contrast]], they are quite similar in how they both feel passed over by their families early on (Mary in regards to the inheritance, Edith for a purpose in life), both undergo a lapse in judgment and have to cover up a potentially scandalous situation as a result (Mary hiding the corpse of a man who died in her bed during an illicit encounter, Edith hiding her extramarital pregnancy and subsequent child), both react to a situation of loss by shutting down for quite some time, both need a while to find personal value in themselves outside of a marriage (Mary as a widow, Edith as the spinster she thinks herself to be for the longest time), and both find some strength to cope in building a friendship with their brother-in-law Tom Branson, despite initially finding his and Sybil's relationship unacceptable. Granted, they are also both haughty and manipulative and spend too much time on making each other miserable.
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** Lady Edith, who will go to any lengths to discredit Mary in order to marry Matthew and become mistress of Downton.
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** Lady Edith, who will go to any lengths to discredit Mary in order to marry Matthew and become mistress of Downton. In reverse, Lady Mary, whose sole reason to make Edith unhappy seems to be spite, especially in later seasons when Edith has log moved on from provoking her.
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For the rest:
* [[DowntonAbbey/DowntonAbbeyTropesAToC A to C]]
* [[DowntonAbbey/DowntonAbbeyTropesDToF D to F]]
* [[DowntonAbbey/DowntonAbbeyTropesGToI G to I]]
* [[DowntonAbbey/DowntonAbbeyTropesJToL J to L]]
* [[DowntonAbbey/DowntonAbbeyTropesQToS Q to S]]
* [[DowntonAbbey/DowntonAbbeyTropesTToZ T to Z]]
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This page is for tropes that have appeared in ''Series/DowntonAbbey''.
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* TheMaidenNameDebate: [[spoiler: After Carson marries Mrs. Hughes, there's a lot of joking over the difficulty of now calling her Mrs. Carson, so they decide that she will continue to be called Mrs. Hughes among the household.]]
** Though Anna had never been called by her surname (Smith) when she was a housemaid, when she becomes Mary's lady's maid, she technically should be. Since Mary's known her for years, and her husband goes by solely "Bates," she stays on FirstNameBasis with her.
* MaliciousSlander:
** Miss O'Brien and Thomas slander Mr Bates on more than one occasion in an attempt to get him fired.
** Thomas tries to stir things up by telling Molesley that O'Brien is planning to quit. It's only down to PoorCommunicationKills that the rumour gets as far as it does before being quashed, and all it achieves is to make her dislike him even more.
* MalignedMixedMarriage: Lady Rose, a Christian, marrying Atticus, a Jew, in Season 5. While the Crawleys are typically relaxed about it--justified in this case since Cora's father was Jewish--Atticus's father and Rose's mother Susan both hate the idea, and Susan is willing to do some slimy things in order to stop the match.
* MamaBear:
** Do NOT insult Cora's granddaughter.
** No matter what you've done, if you're one of Violet's descendants, she WILL find a way to protect you. Examples include:
*** Covering the Kemal Pamuk scandal by claiming his political enemies are trying to discredit him. Oh, and briefly floating the idea of assassinating the Turkish ambassador.
*** Supporting Sybil and Tom's plan to marry, despite Tom's revolutionary ideals going against everything Violet stands for.
*** Paying Edith's expenses when she [[spoiler: goes to Switzerland to give birth to an illegitimate child]].
*** Saving Mary's reputation by claiming she was in Liverpool to attend a convention, when in fact she was there [[spoiler: having an affair with Lord Gillingham]].
* ManipulativeBastard:
** Miss O'Brien, whose [[ZanyScheme schemes]] include [[spoiler:trying to get Bates fired and to expose Lady Mary's affair with Mr Pamuk]].
** Lady Edith, who will go to any lengths to discredit Mary in order to marry Matthew and become mistress of Downton.
** Thomas tries to be one but isn't always successful.
** Kemal in making it impossible for Mary to refuse his sexual advances.
** Vera uses [[spoiler:Lady Mary's secret to get Bates to return to her and takes him for all his [[UnexpectedInheritance inheritance]]. She even goes so far as using her [[DivorceRequiresDeath death]] to frame Bates.]]
* ManlyTears:
** Bates.
** Robert, [[spoiler:after Cora's miscarriage.]]
** Also Thomas, surprisingly, [[spoiler:after the blinded Lieutenant Courtenay commits suicide.]]
** Branson, when he is reunited with Sybil after they fled Ireland separately.
** Thomas, Branson, Robert and Carson [[spoiler:at Sybil's death]].
** Carson after [[spoiler:Mrs Hughes accepts his marriage proposal]]
** Carson at the wedding of William and Daisy
** Carson in [[spoiler:his last scene with Robert in the final episode]]
* ManVersusMachine: In Season 4 the Abbey gets an electric mixer for the kitchen. Daisy is thrilled, but Mrs Patmore observes correctly that electric appliances like that are going to put them out of jobs eventually.
* MarriageBeforeRomance: By the time starts, Robert and Cora have been happily married for over two decades, but they started out like this. Robert married her for her money, and then fell in love afterward.
%%* MarryForLove:
%%** That's what the audience hopes for Mary and Matthew. It ends up happening.
%%** Sybil and Branson do this; [[spoiler: unfortunately, it all goes wrong very soon when Sybil gives birth.]]
%%** Also Rose and Atticus, [[spoiler: Mary and Henry, and Edith and Bertie.]] In the latter case, he gains a rather prestigious title shortly after proposing (the first time), but that's just an added bonus.
* TheMatchmaker: The mothers: Violet, Cora and Isobel.
* MiddleChildSyndrome: Edith. Her parents aren't abusive or cruel towards her, but she gets constantly overlooked next to her two sisters (particularly Mary).
* MilhollandRelationshipMoment:
** Carson's former colleague wants to blackmail him with his past as a comedian. The lord doesn't think less about him.
** Thomas expects to shock and disgust Mrs Hughes by revealing his homosexuality. She is understanding.
** Lady Mary treats the fact that she [[spoiler: was sexually assaulted by a visiting diplomat]] as [[DefiledForever a significant piece of dirty laundry]] that might put the kibosh on her marriage plans with Matthew. When she tells him and [[ValuesDissonance begs his forgiveness]], he shrugs it off as "nothing to forgive."
* MistakenForTerrorist: When an important general is dining at Downton Abbey in Season 2 during the war, Tom Branson hatches a plot to attack him with something concealed inside a soup tureen. When the other staff catch onto his plan, they assume that he has a gun or a bomb and intends to murder the general. Instead, the tureen contains ink, engine oil, cow excrement and other icky substances to render the general CoveredInGunge.
* ModestyBedsheet: Kemal Pamuk in the shots of him lying dead in Mary's bed.
* MomentKiller: Poor Anna and Mr Bates.
** HEY WOULD ANYONE LIKE A RIDE ON THIS HAYCART?
** Couldn't you wait one more minute before taking out the trash?
** Ethel plonking down at the table effectively kills the nice talk they were having.
** Mary coming to book the motor as Branson and Sybil were having a talk about their future comes to mind.
** O'Brien was this to Thomas, showing up whenever he was having a moment with Jimmy. Of course, this was all part of her EvilPlan...
* MoodDissonance: A particularly jarring example in [[spoiler:4x03, with scenes of the family, servants and guests enjoying the party upstairs whilst Anna is being brutally raped downstairs.]]
* MoralityPet: Cora and Lang for O'Brien, Lieutenant Courtenay for Thomas.
* MrFanservice:
** Kemal Pamuk. In-universe, too. Turned out to be [[spoiler:a short-lived and creepy [[JerkAss jerkass]].]]
** Starting with Season 3, Jimmy. He eventually grows a personality (albeit one of a peacock) and a plot line (albeit one of a jerkass [[TheCasanova Casanova]]).
* MultigenerationalHousehold: Although technically the Dowager Countess has her own house, she's at Downton so often that by Season 3, you have four generations under one roof.
* MundaneMadeAwesome: Alfred's cooking class is given a soundtrack more fitting for an impending war.
* MyGodWhatHaveIDone: O'Brien first only seems to show moderate guilt when she [[spoiler: knows that she is the direct cause of her mistress's miscarriage]], but the look of this trope is truly visible on her face when she learns that [[spoiler:Cora had never intended to get rid of her and she's now caused them exquisite pain for ''no reason whatsoever''.]]
* MyOwnPrivateIDo: Sybil and Branson try to elope to [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gretna_Green Gretna Green]], but Mary and Edith chase them down and talk her out of it.
* MySecretPregnancy: Edith in Season 4. [[spoiler:It's still pretty secret even after the baby is born.]]
* NaiveNewcomer: Daisy and, to some extent, William.
* NeverLearnedToRead: Thomas finally bonds with Andy in Season 6 when he discovers that Andy can't read, and pledges to teach him.
* NeverMyFault: While moving Pamuk's corpse in Season 1, Mary rebukes Cora twice for dropping him even though she's the one who keeps dropping his feet (Cora and Anna are carrying him with an arm over each shoulder).
* NiceToTheWaiter: "Them upstairs," for the most part. Possibly borders on PoliticallyCorrectHistory. Contrast with [[NoHeroToHisValet No Hero to His Valet]].
* NinjaMaid: Anna takes to the role of [[AmateurSleuth plucky girl detective]] like a duck to water.
* NobilityMarriesMoney: This forms the backstory.
** Lord Grantham went to New York to find his bride. A significant fraction of the first season's drama comes from the fact that her money can't be separated from the land and title, 30 years later, as they only had daughters.
** In later episodes, their money is gone and the money Matthew has he won't give to the estate, so the impoverished posh people need to find some more new money.
** In the Season 4 finale a broke British lord pursues Martha Levinson and pushes his daughter at her son Harold.
* NoHeroToHisValet: Thomas to the Duke of Crowborough, although this is more to do with the fact they've been having an affair and the Duke dumps him. Subverted with Bates and Robert.
* NoPeriodsPeriod: Subtle but devastating in the form of Robert's absolute squeamishness about all things feminine. Throughout the series, even the mildest reference makes him recoil in disgust...a trait that ultimately plays at least a partial role in [[spoiler:Sybil's death]], since he's too disgusted by the finer details of the matter to [[spoiler:listen to expert advice about action that might have saved her]].
* NotGoodWithRejection: The family's disappointment after the Duke of Crowborough didn't ask for Mary's hand was understandable, but they (and even the servants) behaved like they were '''entitled''' to a marriage between Mary and him. Like not proposing to Mary was a slander on his part towards the family, and not a polite rejection he had every right to. Of course, in part this was because of how obvious he made it that he was only interested in marrying Mary for money.
* NoTitle: For any of the regular episodes, though each ChristmasEpisode has one.
* TheNotLoveInterest: Daisy and Mrs Patmore are inseparable, and the most important person in each other's lives (especially in Daisy's case, who is learning all her life skills from the older woman). It's largely a mother-daughter sort of relationship.
* NotSoStoic: Bates. Robert. Even Carson gives Mary hugs when she needs them.
* NotWhatItLooksLike: The season 2 ChristmasEpisode features a failed attempt at this. Lady Rosamund finds her temporary love interest genuinely ''in flagrante'' with her maid. He tries to brush it off, with little success:
-->'''Lord Hepworth''': My dear this is... isn't what it seems.\\
'''Rosamund''': Is there room for misinterpretation?
* NouveauRiche: Rosamund's late husband Marmaduke was the grandson of a manufacturer. Sir Richard Carlisle is a newspaper man.
** Cora's parents are nouveau ''très'' riche.
* ObliviousToLove: Daisy to William. Mary appears to be oblivious to Matthew's growing interest in her in early episodes. And Isobel, bless her, manages to give the "IDontWantToRuinOurFriendship" speech to Dr Clarkson without ever being consciously aware that he wants a RelationshipUpgrade! That, it must be admitted, takes a special kind of obliviousness, or possibly tactfulness.
* OfCorsetHurts:
** [[SpiritedYoungLady Sybil]] complains about having to wear her corset, saying that men don't wear them so she doesn't see why she should. Her more traditional sisters roll their eyes and Mary suggests she's gotten fat.
** Also Mrs Patmore:
--->'''Cora''': Mrs Patmore. Is there any aspect of the present day that you can accept without resistance?
--->'''Mrs Patmore''': Well milady... I wouldn't mind getting rid of my corset.
* OfCorsetsSexy
* OfficialCouple: Mary and Matthew. From the start, the romance between these two characters has been one of the primary focuses of the series and the back and forth nature of their relationship has served as a major conversation topic between the rest of the characters. [[spoiler:Which is why it's all the more shocking when he is suddenly killed halfway through the series.]]
* OfficerAndAGentleman: Matthew, once he enlists as a captain in the British army during World War One in Season 2. It is also revealed that the Earl was this too.
* OffscreenMomentOfAwesome:
** In the Christmas special the Crawley family play charades, whilst Richard sneers at them, telling Lady Grantham that he would never allow himself to look so foolish. His turn is next, at which point Violet says: "how soon your maxim will be tested". Unfortunately, we never get to see how he handles it.
** In the War, William and Matthew get cut off from their unit and surrounded by Germans [[spoiler: for three days, without being captured or seriously wounded. They somehow make it back to their own lines but get listed as MIA in the confusion.]]
* OhCrap: Several, with one example being Baxter when [[spoiler: she recognizes the suicidal overtones in Barrow's words to Molesley.]]
* OohMeAccentsSlipping:
** Patrick Gordon is either Canadian or he's been living in Canada since the Titanic sank, depending on who he really is. At one point he says one of the very few words that Canadians pronounce differently from Americans - "house" - and he pronounces it like an American.
** The lower class characters usually have pronounced Northern accents, and while most of them do fairly well at aiming for proper Yorkshire there's one or two that are all over the Pennines and noticeably not authentic.
* OldFlame:
** An ancient suitor of Mrs Hughes appears in Season 1. He married another girl when she turned him down to work at Downton. Now he's a widower and proposes again.
** Prince Kuragin, for the Dowager Countess Violet. The attraction is clearly still there, on ''both'' sides, but she has a large number of inhibitions, including (1) the fact that his wife might yet be alive in Hong Kong, (2) she isn't sure if it's quite proper for people of their age to marry, and (3) the simple fact that he is a refugee with nothing.
* OldMaid :
** Mrs Hughes and Mrs Patmore are actually spinsters -- as the housekeeper and the cook, they rate "Mrs" as a courtesy title.
** This is the reason why the family wanted Mary (who begins the series in her early 20s) to be married off as quickly as possible, "before the bloom is quite gone off the rose", as the Dowager Countess puts it.
** Later, Edith is the one fretting over this, once one sister is engaged and the other married and pregnant. And then she's left at the altar by a man twice her age -- that's got to sting. And after ''that'', her next beau is married, his wife is institutionalized, and with it being 1920 he can't divorce her on the grounds that they have no possibility of a real relationship. And then he disappears to Germany and is murdered. [[spoiler: Edith almost accepts her fate as a spinster, but in the very last episode she marries a man whom she truly loves and who accepts that Marigold is her daughter. The fact that he's a marquess, meaning Edith will outrank her entire family, doesn't hurt. Robert, Cora and Edith are understandably overjoyed.]]
* OldRetainer: Mr Carson and Mrs Hughes.
* TheOner:
** Episode 3 of Season 2 has an absolutely gorgeous tracking shot showing [[spoiler: the wounded soldiers moving into Downton Abbey]]. It's only a little over a minute long, but that's quite lengthy for a 45 minute episode.
** There's also one in the next (fourth) episode, when Clarkson talks first to Thomas and then to Mrs Hughes.
* OneSteveLimit:
** Skimming the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Downton_Abbey_characters full character list]] reveals a few common names (e.g. Charles, John) given to more than one character, but given the setting, most male characters are referred to by their surnames anyway. A minor exception concerning two major characters occurs when the family start addressing Branson as "Tom", which is similar to Thomas. (But conveniently, Thomas has been promoted by now to the point where he's "Mr Barrow.")
** Anthony Strallan and Anthony Gillingham, who are fairly prominent love interests for Edith and Mary respectively. The latter goes by Tony.
* OopNorth: The working-class characters tend to have local Yorkshire accents, with the middle- and upper-class characters having applicable RP accents. Although, it should be pointed out that Robert is still a Yorkshireman born and bred, it's just that people of his class, no matter where they are from in England, ''always'' have RP accents, never regional ones. It's down to [[BoardingSchool schooling]] and immediate family/peer influences.
* OrbitalKiss: Mary and Matthew. Branson and Sybil in Season 3 after she returns to Downton from Ireland.
* OOCIsSeriousBusiness: When Thomas expresses angry solidarity with an injured William, the entire kitchen stops and stares.
** More dramatically, when Miss Baxter hears that Thomas said something genuinely kind and encouraging to Molesley, she realizes he must have intended that to be the last thing he ''ever'' said to Molesley and rushes back to the house to find him - just in time to save his life.
* OutWithABang: Mr Pamuk. Mary supposes he suffered a heart attack or stroke.
* PairTheSpares:
** Edith and Sir Anthony were leaning to this direction in season 1, up until Mary spoils it at the garden party. However, he reappears in the Christmas special [[spoiler:and they eventually get engaged, only for him to leave her at the altar because he thought she'd be throwing her life away.]]
** The series finale features [[spoiler: Edith/Bertie and Isobel/Lord Merton reuniting and getting married (the latter couple off-screen), and also [[ShipTease Ship Teases]] Molesley/Baxter, Mrs. Patmore/Mr. Mason, Daisy/Andy and Tom/Laura Edmonds (Edith's editor), the latter two without any prior buildup. Thomas and Violet are the only main characters left completely single.]]
* ParentalFavoritism: Poor Edith. Her mother's hard-pressed to finally choke out something about her being "helpful" as she pets and praises the beauty of her other two daughters, especially Mary. Carson also admits that Mary is his favorite of the three. [[LampshadeHanging Lampshaded]] by the parents:
-->'''Robert:''' Poor old Edith, we never seem to talk about her.\\
'''Cora:''' I'm afraid Edith will be the one to care for us in our old age. \\
'''Robert:''' What a ghastly prospect.
* {{Parody}}:
** There is an [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CGXam5nv7rw internet version]] of the show, but in a dolls house. With Penguins.
** The UsefulNotes/ComicRelief skit, "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r5dMlXentLw Uptown Downstairs Abbey]]".
** ''[[https://vimeo.com/117672810 Breaking Abbey]]'', a [[CrossOver crossover]] with ''Series/BreakingBad'' starring Hugh Bonneville, Jim Carter and Rob James-Collier.
** ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'' created a fake promo which imagined how the show would be advertised if it aired on Creator/SpikeTV.
--> "the hot one" (Mary), "the really hot one" (Sybil), "and the other one" (Edith)
** And [[SesameStreetCred amazingly enough]], even ''Series/SesameStreet'' got in on it with "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPqL-1aSbn0 Upside Downton Abbey]]."
** Fellow PBS show ''{{WesternAnimation/Arthur}}'' has an episode called "Fountain Abbey."
** Michelle Dockery appeared in a [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vwj3_BfnzUE Funny or Die sketch]] where she thinks she really is Lady Mary, which gets more and more awkward after she takes a role in a gritty cop show.
* ParodyEpisode: ITV commissioned a strictly-for-laughs mini-episode for their Christmas 2014 "Text Santa" charity appeal, which begins with Robert announcing he has frittered the family fortune and wishing he had never been born. Whisked away by an angelic Creator/JoannaLumley, Robert is promptly [[ItsAWonderfulPlot presented with a vision of what a Crawley-less Downtown might look like]], and we were introduced to Creator/GeorgeClooney's brasher, spiffier Lord Grantham 2.0. The mini-episode is one big sportingly humorous TakeThat at Downton's familiar narrative devices — telegrams of doom, Robert losing the family fortune, Edith's tragic love-life, Branson fretting about his place in the world, Thomas lurking behind the curtains (part of his job description) and even a sporting dig at creator Julian Fellowes' obsession with ensuring the right cutlery is used, despite the series' increasingly zany plotlines.
* PassiveAggressiveKombat:
** Several instances, but Lord and Lady Flintshire take the cake.
** The Dowager Countess seems to be an expert when interacting with Lady Isobel in Season 1, but when Cora's mother shows up, they both take this trope to new heights.
* PerfectlyArrangedMarriage: From the first time Matthew is introduced on the show, the older Granthams try to push him and Mary together, entirely out of convenience's sake (the marriage would keep the estate in the family). Fortunately, they turn out to fall deeply in love with each other anyway.
* PetTheDog:
** Thomas will appear to be an irredeemable, [[TheSociopath sociopathic]] JerkAss well on his way to passing the MoralEventHorizon; but then, occasionally, something will happen to demonstrate his humanity, or his [[FreudianExcuse Freudian]] [[ArmouredClosetGay Excuse]] will be reinforced, and he'll revert back to JerkassWoobie. Damn him.
*** See episode 2x02 for a stellar example; Thomas briefly returns to Downton Abbey after what is implied to be a few years at the front, gets in a few choice insults and leaves to work in the village army hospital without appearing to have changed at all; however, while there, he becomes emotionally attached to a young lieutenant with gas blindness, reading his letters, encouraging him to keep fighting and very nearly [[ComingOutStory coming out]] to him after speaking about his own difficult past. When the soldier is due to be transferred against his will to another medical facility, Thomas goes to bat for him against the head of the hospital, and after the man's [[spoiler: suicide]] is seen sobbing uncontrollably in a store cupboard.
*** In the first Christmas special he combines this with a [[KickTheDog Kick The Dog]] moment when he kidnaps the dog Isis in the hopes of gaining a promotion for ''finding'' his Lordship's ''lost'' dog. [[spoiler:Isis gets out of the shed where she's been locked, and Thomas frantically searches the woods but can't find her anywhere. When he gets back to the house, all covered in dirt, he's told that a child found Isis and brought her back. He actually pets the dog.]]
*** When Thomas dances with Daisy, just because she expresses a wish to learn. Even O'Brien smiles.
*** When William [[spoiler:lies dying]], Thomas expresses support for him. much to the shock of everyone else present. He says he doesn't know what they're so surprised for, and points out that whether or not be likes William, they're both working class boys, and later enlisted men, and they get a lot of the same crap.
*** After [[spoiler:young Sybil]] dies in childbirth, Thomas walks out of the kitchen in a daze and weeps by the stairs, having earlier expressed fondness and friendship from their time working side by side in the hospital. He's still visibly shaken by it in the next episode.
*** He also shows affection for baby Sybbie due to his fondness of Sybil and when he suspects the nanny isn't treating her well he exposes it to Cora.
*** In the second Christmas special, Alfred reveals Thomas still refuses to hear a bad word against Jimmy (despite him nearly sending Thomas to prison and making homophobic remarks about him in front of the other staff), and [[spoiler:when Jimmy is attacked by thugs on his way home from the fair, Thomas intervenes and is attacked in his place when Jimmy runs away. He not only doesn't reveal the reason he was attacked to anyone else on the staff, but he asks Jimmy to be his friend -- suggesting Jimmy might become a [[MoralityPet Morality Pet]] for Thomas in Season 4.]]
** O'Brien gets a few PetTheDog moments when she's the only one to really sympathise with ShellShockedVeteran Lang, as her brother went through the same thing.
** O'Brien's obvious reluctance to testify against Bates.
** When the Countess sees a bereft valet (made to feel useless because of his employer's insistence on doing things by himself) and asks him to take her cup.
** Bates's sympathy for Thomas when the Jimmy Kent scandal threatens to get him fired without a reference. [[spoiler: Bates more or less single-handedly helps Thomas keep his job, even though [[BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor he only intended to ensure him a good reference]].]]
** A particularly lovely one from the otherwise terminally crotchety Mrs Bird who, after reducing Daisy to tears on learning that she's put soap and aniseed into the dinner (to make the family miss the currently-absent Mrs Patmore), then tells her to dry her tears, saying: "there's worse crimes than loyalty".
* PimpedOutDress: And hats. Ladies' hats were probably more elaborate in TheEdwardianEra than in any other period before or since. The women's evening gowns are simple in line, but often very heavily decorated. Once again, spot-on; from 1909 or so on, women's dress, particularly formal gowns, moved toward very simple, classic lines reminiscent of the Empire/Regency period as opposed to the elaborate styles of the 1890s and early 1900s. Interestingly and probably not coincidentally, corsets began to fall out of style at this time, to be replace by brassieres and girdles.
* PlatonicLifePartners: Mr Carson and Mrs Hughes. [[spoiler:Until season five when they suddenly get engaged.]]
* PleaseWakeUp: [[spoiler:Cora to Sybil.]]
* PlotTriggeringDeath: The entire story is set in motion by the deaths of James and Patrick Crawley, who were Robert's original heirs.
* PoliticallyCorrectHistory: Frequently subverted to [[WillingSuspensionOfDisbelief keep the show believable]] and [[RuleOfDrama create tension]], although generally in the form of [[StrawmanBall one or two characters representing contemporary prejudices]] and being defeated by more enlightened viewpoints. Sometimes this reflects genuine conflicts at the time, continuing the EndOfAnAge theme, but frequently the "modern" opinions are a little ''too'' modern.
** A case in point is the treatment of Thomas' homosexuality; only Carson, Alfred and Jimmy seem genuinely disgusted by it (and even much of that is due to the prevailing ConflictBall) while everyone else seems accepting of his sexuality, or at least turning a blind eye.
--->'''Lord Grantham''': I'm not asking you to abandon your beliefs, Alfred. Just to introduce a little kindness into the equation.\\
'''Alfred''': Am I not to stand up against evil?\\
'''Lord Grantham''': Evil? Thomas does not choose to be the way he is. And what harm was done, really, that his life should be destroyed for it?\\
'''Alfred''': Well—\\
'''Lord Grantham''': Let he who is without sin cast the first stone. Are you without sin, Alfred? As I am certainly not.
** TheRoaringTwenties was indeed more accepting of homosexuality and thinking more modernly about several topics than the later decades.
** In Season 4, Jack Ross, a black jazz singer, has a relationship with a Marquess's daughter, young Lady Rose -- something which would have been ''unthinkable'' in 1921. She's mostly in the relationship to spite her mother (though she does love him) and most characters react with a protective concern towards Rose and politeness to Jack, but are ''far'' less reactionary to his presence than they would have been in real life. Only Rosamund and Edith actually express strong feelings about it.
--->'''Rosamund''': It's a pretty pass when you have to be rescued by a ''black'' band-leader.
--->'''Edith''': Granny, is it really suitable that Rose has brought this man here?
** Then again, being black in England, even at the time, would certainly be less dangerous on average than much of the United States in the same period (barring perhaps relative "safe spaces" like Harlem). If Rose and Jack had met in the U.S., it's very likely Jack would've been ''lynched'' or at the very least imprisoned and/or tortured.
* PrecisionFStrike:
** At one point Lord Grantham refers to [[HateSink Ms. Bunting]] as a harpy, which given the time period would have been unbelievably shocking.
** In the series finale, after Mary [[spoiler:ruins Edith's engagement to Bertie by telling him about Edith's daughter out of wedlock]], Edith calls her a bitch--twice! Mary is stunned into silence.
* PrefersProperNames: Carson insists on calling everyone by their proper names, signifying his strict and serious nature. When the new footman tells him that he prefers to be called Jimmy and that everybody calls him that, Carson completely ignores this and calls him James anyway.
* PrettyInMink: Fur trimmed coats are worn a lot, as they would have been for such families at the time. Violet once turns down her maid offering to get her fur for a picnic, only because she thinks tweed would be more appropriate attire for that event.
* PutOnABus:
** Housemaid Gwen Dawson, at the end of season 1[[note]]because actress Rose Leslie was off to film a larger recurring part in ''Game of Thrones''[[/note]].
** [[spoiler:O'Brien]] has left by the beginning of Season 4.
** Ethel, Alfred, Ivy and Jimmy leave their positions at Downton and are not seen again.
----
----
* TheMaidenNameDebate: [[spoiler: After Carson marries Mrs. Hughes, there's a lot of joking over the difficulty of now calling her Mrs. Carson, so they decide that she will continue to be called Mrs. Hughes among the household.]]
** Though Anna had never been called by her surname (Smith) when she was a housemaid, when she becomes Mary's lady's maid, she technically should be. Since Mary's known her for years, and her husband goes by solely "Bates," she stays on FirstNameBasis with her.
* MaliciousSlander:
** Miss O'Brien and Thomas slander Mr Bates on more than one occasion in an attempt to get him fired.
** Thomas tries to stir things up by telling Molesley that O'Brien is planning to quit. It's only down to PoorCommunicationKills that the rumour gets as far as it does before being quashed, and all it achieves is to make her dislike him even more.
* MalignedMixedMarriage: Lady Rose, a Christian, marrying Atticus, a Jew, in Season 5. While the Crawleys are typically relaxed about it--justified in this case since Cora's father was Jewish--Atticus's father and Rose's mother Susan both hate the idea, and Susan is willing to do some slimy things in order to stop the match.
* MamaBear:
** Do NOT insult Cora's granddaughter.
** No matter what you've done, if you're one of Violet's descendants, she WILL find a way to protect you. Examples include:
*** Covering the Kemal Pamuk scandal by claiming his political enemies are trying to discredit him. Oh, and briefly floating the idea of assassinating the Turkish ambassador.
*** Supporting Sybil and Tom's plan to marry, despite Tom's revolutionary ideals going against everything Violet stands for.
*** Paying Edith's expenses when she [[spoiler: goes to Switzerland to give birth to an illegitimate child]].
*** Saving Mary's reputation by claiming she was in Liverpool to attend a convention, when in fact she was there [[spoiler: having an affair with Lord Gillingham]].
* ManipulativeBastard:
** Miss O'Brien, whose [[ZanyScheme schemes]] include [[spoiler:trying to get Bates fired and to expose Lady Mary's affair with Mr Pamuk]].
** Lady Edith, who will go to any lengths to discredit Mary in order to marry Matthew and become mistress of Downton.
** Thomas tries to be one but isn't always successful.
** Kemal in making it impossible for Mary to refuse his sexual advances.
** Vera uses [[spoiler:Lady Mary's secret to get Bates to return to her and takes him for all his [[UnexpectedInheritance inheritance]]. She even goes so far as using her [[DivorceRequiresDeath death]] to frame Bates.]]
* ManlyTears:
** Bates.
** Robert, [[spoiler:after Cora's miscarriage.]]
** Also Thomas, surprisingly, [[spoiler:after the blinded Lieutenant Courtenay commits suicide.]]
** Branson, when he is reunited with Sybil after they fled Ireland separately.
** Thomas, Branson, Robert and Carson [[spoiler:at Sybil's death]].
** Carson after [[spoiler:Mrs Hughes accepts his marriage proposal]]
** Carson at the wedding of William and Daisy
** Carson in [[spoiler:his last scene with Robert in the final episode]]
* ManVersusMachine: In Season 4 the Abbey gets an electric mixer for the kitchen. Daisy is thrilled, but Mrs Patmore observes correctly that electric appliances like that are going to put them out of jobs eventually.
* MarriageBeforeRomance: By the time starts, Robert and Cora have been happily married for over two decades, but they started out like this. Robert married her for her money, and then fell in love afterward.
%%* MarryForLove:
%%** That's what the audience hopes for Mary and Matthew. It ends up happening.
%%** Sybil and Branson do this; [[spoiler: unfortunately, it all goes wrong very soon when Sybil gives birth.]]
%%** Also Rose and Atticus, [[spoiler: Mary and Henry, and Edith and Bertie.]] In the latter case, he gains a rather prestigious title shortly after proposing (the first time), but that's just an added bonus.
* TheMatchmaker: The mothers: Violet, Cora and Isobel.
* MiddleChildSyndrome: Edith. Her parents aren't abusive or cruel towards her, but she gets constantly overlooked next to her two sisters (particularly Mary).
* MilhollandRelationshipMoment:
** Carson's former colleague wants to blackmail him with his past as a comedian. The lord doesn't think less about him.
** Thomas expects to shock and disgust Mrs Hughes by revealing his homosexuality. She is understanding.
** Lady Mary treats the fact that she [[spoiler: was sexually assaulted by a visiting diplomat]] as [[DefiledForever a significant piece of dirty laundry]] that might put the kibosh on her marriage plans with Matthew. When she tells him and [[ValuesDissonance begs his forgiveness]], he shrugs it off as "nothing to forgive."
* MistakenForTerrorist: When an important general is dining at Downton Abbey in Season 2 during the war, Tom Branson hatches a plot to attack him with something concealed inside a soup tureen. When the other staff catch onto his plan, they assume that he has a gun or a bomb and intends to murder the general. Instead, the tureen contains ink, engine oil, cow excrement and other icky substances to render the general CoveredInGunge.
* ModestyBedsheet: Kemal Pamuk in the shots of him lying dead in Mary's bed.
* MomentKiller: Poor Anna and Mr Bates.
** HEY WOULD ANYONE LIKE A RIDE ON THIS HAYCART?
** Couldn't you wait one more minute before taking out the trash?
** Ethel plonking down at the table effectively kills the nice talk they were having.
** Mary coming to book the motor as Branson and Sybil were having a talk about their future comes to mind.
** O'Brien was this to Thomas, showing up whenever he was having a moment with Jimmy. Of course, this was all part of her EvilPlan...
* MoodDissonance: A particularly jarring example in [[spoiler:4x03, with scenes of the family, servants and guests enjoying the party upstairs whilst Anna is being brutally raped downstairs.]]
* MoralityPet: Cora and Lang for O'Brien, Lieutenant Courtenay for Thomas.
* MrFanservice:
** Kemal Pamuk. In-universe, too. Turned out to be [[spoiler:a short-lived and creepy [[JerkAss jerkass]].]]
** Starting with Season 3, Jimmy. He eventually grows a personality (albeit one of a peacock) and a plot line (albeit one of a jerkass [[TheCasanova Casanova]]).
* MultigenerationalHousehold: Although technically the Dowager Countess has her own house, she's at Downton so often that by Season 3, you have four generations under one roof.
* MundaneMadeAwesome: Alfred's cooking class is given a soundtrack more fitting for an impending war.
* MyGodWhatHaveIDone: O'Brien first only seems to show moderate guilt when she [[spoiler: knows that she is the direct cause of her mistress's miscarriage]], but the look of this trope is truly visible on her face when she learns that [[spoiler:Cora had never intended to get rid of her and she's now caused them exquisite pain for ''no reason whatsoever''.]]
* MyOwnPrivateIDo: Sybil and Branson try to elope to [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gretna_Green Gretna Green]], but Mary and Edith chase them down and talk her out of it.
* MySecretPregnancy: Edith in Season 4. [[spoiler:It's still pretty secret even after the baby is born.]]
* NaiveNewcomer: Daisy and, to some extent, William.
* NeverLearnedToRead: Thomas finally bonds with Andy in Season 6 when he discovers that Andy can't read, and pledges to teach him.
* NeverMyFault: While moving Pamuk's corpse in Season 1, Mary rebukes Cora twice for dropping him even though she's the one who keeps dropping his feet (Cora and Anna are carrying him with an arm over each shoulder).
* NiceToTheWaiter: "Them upstairs," for the most part. Possibly borders on PoliticallyCorrectHistory. Contrast with [[NoHeroToHisValet No Hero to His Valet]].
* NinjaMaid: Anna takes to the role of [[AmateurSleuth plucky girl detective]] like a duck to water.
* NobilityMarriesMoney: This forms the backstory.
** Lord Grantham went to New York to find his bride. A significant fraction of the first season's drama comes from the fact that her money can't be separated from the land and title, 30 years later, as they only had daughters.
** In later episodes, their money is gone and the money Matthew has he won't give to the estate, so the impoverished posh people need to find some more new money.
** In the Season 4 finale a broke British lord pursues Martha Levinson and pushes his daughter at her son Harold.
* NoHeroToHisValet: Thomas to the Duke of Crowborough, although this is more to do with the fact they've been having an affair and the Duke dumps him. Subverted with Bates and Robert.
* NoPeriodsPeriod: Subtle but devastating in the form of Robert's absolute squeamishness about all things feminine. Throughout the series, even the mildest reference makes him recoil in disgust...a trait that ultimately plays at least a partial role in [[spoiler:Sybil's death]], since he's too disgusted by the finer details of the matter to [[spoiler:listen to expert advice about action that might have saved her]].
* NotGoodWithRejection: The family's disappointment after the Duke of Crowborough didn't ask for Mary's hand was understandable, but they (and even the servants) behaved like they were '''entitled''' to a marriage between Mary and him. Like not proposing to Mary was a slander on his part towards the family, and not a polite rejection he had every right to. Of course, in part this was because of how obvious he made it that he was only interested in marrying Mary for money.
* NoTitle: For any of the regular episodes, though each ChristmasEpisode has one.
* TheNotLoveInterest: Daisy and Mrs Patmore are inseparable, and the most important person in each other's lives (especially in Daisy's case, who is learning all her life skills from the older woman). It's largely a mother-daughter sort of relationship.
* NotSoStoic: Bates. Robert. Even Carson gives Mary hugs when she needs them.
* NotWhatItLooksLike: The season 2 ChristmasEpisode features a failed attempt at this. Lady Rosamund finds her temporary love interest genuinely ''in flagrante'' with her maid. He tries to brush it off, with little success:
-->'''Lord Hepworth''': My dear this is... isn't what it seems.\\
'''Rosamund''': Is there room for misinterpretation?
* NouveauRiche: Rosamund's late husband Marmaduke was the grandson of a manufacturer. Sir Richard Carlisle is a newspaper man.
** Cora's parents are nouveau ''très'' riche.
* ObliviousToLove: Daisy to William. Mary appears to be oblivious to Matthew's growing interest in her in early episodes. And Isobel, bless her, manages to give the "IDontWantToRuinOurFriendship" speech to Dr Clarkson without ever being consciously aware that he wants a RelationshipUpgrade! That, it must be admitted, takes a special kind of obliviousness, or possibly tactfulness.
* OfCorsetHurts:
** [[SpiritedYoungLady Sybil]] complains about having to wear her corset, saying that men don't wear them so she doesn't see why she should. Her more traditional sisters roll their eyes and Mary suggests she's gotten fat.
** Also Mrs Patmore:
--->'''Cora''': Mrs Patmore. Is there any aspect of the present day that you can accept without resistance?
--->'''Mrs Patmore''': Well milady... I wouldn't mind getting rid of my corset.
* OfCorsetsSexy
* OfficialCouple: Mary and Matthew. From the start, the romance between these two characters has been one of the primary focuses of the series and the back and forth nature of their relationship has served as a major conversation topic between the rest of the characters. [[spoiler:Which is why it's all the more shocking when he is suddenly killed halfway through the series.]]
* OfficerAndAGentleman: Matthew, once he enlists as a captain in the British army during World War One in Season 2. It is also revealed that the Earl was this too.
* OffscreenMomentOfAwesome:
** In the Christmas special the Crawley family play charades, whilst Richard sneers at them, telling Lady Grantham that he would never allow himself to look so foolish. His turn is next, at which point Violet says: "how soon your maxim will be tested". Unfortunately, we never get to see how he handles it.
** In the War, William and Matthew get cut off from their unit and surrounded by Germans [[spoiler: for three days, without being captured or seriously wounded. They somehow make it back to their own lines but get listed as MIA in the confusion.]]
* OhCrap: Several, with one example being Baxter when [[spoiler: she recognizes the suicidal overtones in Barrow's words to Molesley.]]
* OohMeAccentsSlipping:
** Patrick Gordon is either Canadian or he's been living in Canada since the Titanic sank, depending on who he really is. At one point he says one of the very few words that Canadians pronounce differently from Americans - "house" - and he pronounces it like an American.
** The lower class characters usually have pronounced Northern accents, and while most of them do fairly well at aiming for proper Yorkshire there's one or two that are all over the Pennines and noticeably not authentic.
* OldFlame:
** An ancient suitor of Mrs Hughes appears in Season 1. He married another girl when she turned him down to work at Downton. Now he's a widower and proposes again.
** Prince Kuragin, for the Dowager Countess Violet. The attraction is clearly still there, on ''both'' sides, but she has a large number of inhibitions, including (1) the fact that his wife might yet be alive in Hong Kong, (2) she isn't sure if it's quite proper for people of their age to marry, and (3) the simple fact that he is a refugee with nothing.
* OldMaid :
** Mrs Hughes and Mrs Patmore are actually spinsters -- as the housekeeper and the cook, they rate "Mrs" as a courtesy title.
** This is the reason why the family wanted Mary (who begins the series in her early 20s) to be married off as quickly as possible, "before the bloom is quite gone off the rose", as the Dowager Countess puts it.
** Later, Edith is the one fretting over this, once one sister is engaged and the other married and pregnant. And then she's left at the altar by a man twice her age -- that's got to sting. And after ''that'', her next beau is married, his wife is institutionalized, and with it being 1920 he can't divorce her on the grounds that they have no possibility of a real relationship. And then he disappears to Germany and is murdered. [[spoiler: Edith almost accepts her fate as a spinster, but in the very last episode she marries a man whom she truly loves and who accepts that Marigold is her daughter. The fact that he's a marquess, meaning Edith will outrank her entire family, doesn't hurt. Robert, Cora and Edith are understandably overjoyed.]]
* OldRetainer: Mr Carson and Mrs Hughes.
* TheOner:
** Episode 3 of Season 2 has an absolutely gorgeous tracking shot showing [[spoiler: the wounded soldiers moving into Downton Abbey]]. It's only a little over a minute long, but that's quite lengthy for a 45 minute episode.
** There's also one in the next (fourth) episode, when Clarkson talks first to Thomas and then to Mrs Hughes.
* OneSteveLimit:
** Skimming the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Downton_Abbey_characters full character list]] reveals a few common names (e.g. Charles, John) given to more than one character, but given the setting, most male characters are referred to by their surnames anyway. A minor exception concerning two major characters occurs when the family start addressing Branson as "Tom", which is similar to Thomas. (But conveniently, Thomas has been promoted by now to the point where he's "Mr Barrow.")
** Anthony Strallan and Anthony Gillingham, who are fairly prominent love interests for Edith and Mary respectively. The latter goes by Tony.
* OopNorth: The working-class characters tend to have local Yorkshire accents, with the middle- and upper-class characters having applicable RP accents. Although, it should be pointed out that Robert is still a Yorkshireman born and bred, it's just that people of his class, no matter where they are from in England, ''always'' have RP accents, never regional ones. It's down to [[BoardingSchool schooling]] and immediate family/peer influences.
* OrbitalKiss: Mary and Matthew. Branson and Sybil in Season 3 after she returns to Downton from Ireland.
* OOCIsSeriousBusiness: When Thomas expresses angry solidarity with an injured William, the entire kitchen stops and stares.
** More dramatically, when Miss Baxter hears that Thomas said something genuinely kind and encouraging to Molesley, she realizes he must have intended that to be the last thing he ''ever'' said to Molesley and rushes back to the house to find him - just in time to save his life.
* OutWithABang: Mr Pamuk. Mary supposes he suffered a heart attack or stroke.
* PairTheSpares:
** Edith and Sir Anthony were leaning to this direction in season 1, up until Mary spoils it at the garden party. However, he reappears in the Christmas special [[spoiler:and they eventually get engaged, only for him to leave her at the altar because he thought she'd be throwing her life away.]]
** The series finale features [[spoiler: Edith/Bertie and Isobel/Lord Merton reuniting and getting married (the latter couple off-screen), and also [[ShipTease Ship Teases]] Molesley/Baxter, Mrs. Patmore/Mr. Mason, Daisy/Andy and Tom/Laura Edmonds (Edith's editor), the latter two without any prior buildup. Thomas and Violet are the only main characters left completely single.]]
* ParentalFavoritism: Poor Edith. Her mother's hard-pressed to finally choke out something about her being "helpful" as she pets and praises the beauty of her other two daughters, especially Mary. Carson also admits that Mary is his favorite of the three. [[LampshadeHanging Lampshaded]] by the parents:
-->'''Robert:''' Poor old Edith, we never seem to talk about her.\\
'''Cora:''' I'm afraid Edith will be the one to care for us in our old age. \\
'''Robert:''' What a ghastly prospect.
* {{Parody}}:
** There is an [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CGXam5nv7rw internet version]] of the show, but in a dolls house. With Penguins.
** The UsefulNotes/ComicRelief skit, "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r5dMlXentLw Uptown Downstairs Abbey]]".
** ''[[https://vimeo.com/117672810 Breaking Abbey]]'', a [[CrossOver crossover]] with ''Series/BreakingBad'' starring Hugh Bonneville, Jim Carter and Rob James-Collier.
** ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'' created a fake promo which imagined how the show would be advertised if it aired on Creator/SpikeTV.
--> "the hot one" (Mary), "the really hot one" (Sybil), "and the other one" (Edith)
** And [[SesameStreetCred amazingly enough]], even ''Series/SesameStreet'' got in on it with "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPqL-1aSbn0 Upside Downton Abbey]]."
** Fellow PBS show ''{{WesternAnimation/Arthur}}'' has an episode called "Fountain Abbey."
** Michelle Dockery appeared in a [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vwj3_BfnzUE Funny or Die sketch]] where she thinks she really is Lady Mary, which gets more and more awkward after she takes a role in a gritty cop show.
* ParodyEpisode: ITV commissioned a strictly-for-laughs mini-episode for their Christmas 2014 "Text Santa" charity appeal, which begins with Robert announcing he has frittered the family fortune and wishing he had never been born. Whisked away by an angelic Creator/JoannaLumley, Robert is promptly [[ItsAWonderfulPlot presented with a vision of what a Crawley-less Downtown might look like]], and we were introduced to Creator/GeorgeClooney's brasher, spiffier Lord Grantham 2.0. The mini-episode is one big sportingly humorous TakeThat at Downton's familiar narrative devices — telegrams of doom, Robert losing the family fortune, Edith's tragic love-life, Branson fretting about his place in the world, Thomas lurking behind the curtains (part of his job description) and even a sporting dig at creator Julian Fellowes' obsession with ensuring the right cutlery is used, despite the series' increasingly zany plotlines.
* PassiveAggressiveKombat:
** Several instances, but Lord and Lady Flintshire take the cake.
** The Dowager Countess seems to be an expert when interacting with Lady Isobel in Season 1, but when Cora's mother shows up, they both take this trope to new heights.
* PerfectlyArrangedMarriage: From the first time Matthew is introduced on the show, the older Granthams try to push him and Mary together, entirely out of convenience's sake (the marriage would keep the estate in the family). Fortunately, they turn out to fall deeply in love with each other anyway.
* PetTheDog:
** Thomas will appear to be an irredeemable, [[TheSociopath sociopathic]] JerkAss well on his way to passing the MoralEventHorizon; but then, occasionally, something will happen to demonstrate his humanity, or his [[FreudianExcuse Freudian]] [[ArmouredClosetGay Excuse]] will be reinforced, and he'll revert back to JerkassWoobie. Damn him.
*** See episode 2x02 for a stellar example; Thomas briefly returns to Downton Abbey after what is implied to be a few years at the front, gets in a few choice insults and leaves to work in the village army hospital without appearing to have changed at all; however, while there, he becomes emotionally attached to a young lieutenant with gas blindness, reading his letters, encouraging him to keep fighting and very nearly [[ComingOutStory coming out]] to him after speaking about his own difficult past. When the soldier is due to be transferred against his will to another medical facility, Thomas goes to bat for him against the head of the hospital, and after the man's [[spoiler: suicide]] is seen sobbing uncontrollably in a store cupboard.
*** In the first Christmas special he combines this with a [[KickTheDog Kick The Dog]] moment when he kidnaps the dog Isis in the hopes of gaining a promotion for ''finding'' his Lordship's ''lost'' dog. [[spoiler:Isis gets out of the shed where she's been locked, and Thomas frantically searches the woods but can't find her anywhere. When he gets back to the house, all covered in dirt, he's told that a child found Isis and brought her back. He actually pets the dog.]]
*** When Thomas dances with Daisy, just because she expresses a wish to learn. Even O'Brien smiles.
*** When William [[spoiler:lies dying]], Thomas expresses support for him. much to the shock of everyone else present. He says he doesn't know what they're so surprised for, and points out that whether or not be likes William, they're both working class boys, and later enlisted men, and they get a lot of the same crap.
*** After [[spoiler:young Sybil]] dies in childbirth, Thomas walks out of the kitchen in a daze and weeps by the stairs, having earlier expressed fondness and friendship from their time working side by side in the hospital. He's still visibly shaken by it in the next episode.
*** He also shows affection for baby Sybbie due to his fondness of Sybil and when he suspects the nanny isn't treating her well he exposes it to Cora.
*** In the second Christmas special, Alfred reveals Thomas still refuses to hear a bad word against Jimmy (despite him nearly sending Thomas to prison and making homophobic remarks about him in front of the other staff), and [[spoiler:when Jimmy is attacked by thugs on his way home from the fair, Thomas intervenes and is attacked in his place when Jimmy runs away. He not only doesn't reveal the reason he was attacked to anyone else on the staff, but he asks Jimmy to be his friend -- suggesting Jimmy might become a [[MoralityPet Morality Pet]] for Thomas in Season 4.]]
** O'Brien gets a few PetTheDog moments when she's the only one to really sympathise with ShellShockedVeteran Lang, as her brother went through the same thing.
** O'Brien's obvious reluctance to testify against Bates.
** When the Countess sees a bereft valet (made to feel useless because of his employer's insistence on doing things by himself) and asks him to take her cup.
** Bates's sympathy for Thomas when the Jimmy Kent scandal threatens to get him fired without a reference. [[spoiler: Bates more or less single-handedly helps Thomas keep his job, even though [[BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor he only intended to ensure him a good reference]].]]
** A particularly lovely one from the otherwise terminally crotchety Mrs Bird who, after reducing Daisy to tears on learning that she's put soap and aniseed into the dinner (to make the family miss the currently-absent Mrs Patmore), then tells her to dry her tears, saying: "there's worse crimes than loyalty".
* PimpedOutDress: And hats. Ladies' hats were probably more elaborate in TheEdwardianEra than in any other period before or since. The women's evening gowns are simple in line, but often very heavily decorated. Once again, spot-on; from 1909 or so on, women's dress, particularly formal gowns, moved toward very simple, classic lines reminiscent of the Empire/Regency period as opposed to the elaborate styles of the 1890s and early 1900s. Interestingly and probably not coincidentally, corsets began to fall out of style at this time, to be replace by brassieres and girdles.
* PlatonicLifePartners: Mr Carson and Mrs Hughes. [[spoiler:Until season five when they suddenly get engaged.]]
* PleaseWakeUp: [[spoiler:Cora to Sybil.]]
* PlotTriggeringDeath: The entire story is set in motion by the deaths of James and Patrick Crawley, who were Robert's original heirs.
* PoliticallyCorrectHistory: Frequently subverted to [[WillingSuspensionOfDisbelief keep the show believable]] and [[RuleOfDrama create tension]], although generally in the form of [[StrawmanBall one or two characters representing contemporary prejudices]] and being defeated by more enlightened viewpoints. Sometimes this reflects genuine conflicts at the time, continuing the EndOfAnAge theme, but frequently the "modern" opinions are a little ''too'' modern.
** A case in point is the treatment of Thomas' homosexuality; only Carson, Alfred and Jimmy seem genuinely disgusted by it (and even much of that is due to the prevailing ConflictBall) while everyone else seems accepting of his sexuality, or at least turning a blind eye.
--->'''Lord Grantham''': I'm not asking you to abandon your beliefs, Alfred. Just to introduce a little kindness into the equation.\\
'''Alfred''': Am I not to stand up against evil?\\
'''Lord Grantham''': Evil? Thomas does not choose to be the way he is. And what harm was done, really, that his life should be destroyed for it?\\
'''Alfred''': Well—\\
'''Lord Grantham''': Let he who is without sin cast the first stone. Are you without sin, Alfred? As I am certainly not.
** TheRoaringTwenties was indeed more accepting of homosexuality and thinking more modernly about several topics than the later decades.
** In Season 4, Jack Ross, a black jazz singer, has a relationship with a Marquess's daughter, young Lady Rose -- something which would have been ''unthinkable'' in 1921. She's mostly in the relationship to spite her mother (though she does love him) and most characters react with a protective concern towards Rose and politeness to Jack, but are ''far'' less reactionary to his presence than they would have been in real life. Only Rosamund and Edith actually express strong feelings about it.
--->'''Rosamund''': It's a pretty pass when you have to be rescued by a ''black'' band-leader.
--->'''Edith''': Granny, is it really suitable that Rose has brought this man here?
** Then again, being black in England, even at the time, would certainly be less dangerous on average than much of the United States in the same period (barring perhaps relative "safe spaces" like Harlem). If Rose and Jack had met in the U.S., it's very likely Jack would've been ''lynched'' or at the very least imprisoned and/or tortured.
* PrecisionFStrike:
** At one point Lord Grantham refers to [[HateSink Ms. Bunting]] as a harpy, which given the time period would have been unbelievably shocking.
** In the series finale, after Mary [[spoiler:ruins Edith's engagement to Bertie by telling him about Edith's daughter out of wedlock]], Edith calls her a bitch--twice! Mary is stunned into silence.
* PrefersProperNames: Carson insists on calling everyone by their proper names, signifying his strict and serious nature. When the new footman tells him that he prefers to be called Jimmy and that everybody calls him that, Carson completely ignores this and calls him James anyway.
* PrettyInMink: Fur trimmed coats are worn a lot, as they would have been for such families at the time. Violet once turns down her maid offering to get her fur for a picnic, only because she thinks tweed would be more appropriate attire for that event.
* PutOnABus:
** Housemaid Gwen Dawson, at the end of season 1[[note]]because actress Rose Leslie was off to film a larger recurring part in ''Game of Thrones''[[/note]].
** [[spoiler:O'Brien]] has left by the beginning of Season 4.
** Ethel, Alfred, Ivy and Jimmy leave their positions at Downton and are not seen again.
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