The show is so frustrating for me. It's impossible to care about ANY of the characters, which are completely unsympathetic in the bad sense of the word. They look like… sketches, not real characters. Yes, I think bidimensionality is their problem, and the attempts to make them more rounded sound fake and so scripted.…

unfortunately, the number of this sunday show that it can not have been an outlier induced by the Globes… :/

Shameless has always been a slow burning series in each season

yes, but in that case HBO had put the episode in clear one day earlier.
I don't think they have done the same now…

TVbythenumbers, http://tvbythenumbers.zap2i…

yes, this is why I was saying I still believe it's an outlier (and we know an army of gay men watches the Globes), because that abysmal number of watchers just doesn't make any sense knowing the story of the series' ratings.

"looking for results" could be the title Looking could appoint to itself, considering the numbers of the première… (which I still hope they are an outlier, but still!)

Just watched the episode, very nice and good reintroduction to the main three characters - even if we know the regular cast has been expanded to six, the new regulars have little role in the story (Doris appears a lot but she doesn't do much more than comical relief; Kevin appears only at the end and Richie not at…

Petra's scene at the end is REALLY good and unexpected, even with the tear slowmo and all that stuff it manages to be authentically moving.

The Karofski-Blaine stuff is classic plot-over-characters Glee at its worst. And frankly, Karofski doesn't really deserve that.

ok interesting, thanks!

In a world where divorce was basically a no option (at least at those levels of society), marrying Mary would guarantee you an exceptionally good life (I wonder if the groom would get also the position at the House of Lords in case of an early death of the Earl, at least until the majority of George).
Mary is also the…

making 1924+34 -does- require a genius IQ from the point of view of an almost illiterate poor person.

the love triangle of the 4th season was indeed the upper limit of soapiness for the series.
However, "many" suitors is a bit excessive, after all she had only two (three, if you could poor Napier, but not even himself is aware of his own existence)

Well, in some ways she -is- a great marriage prize, being the mother of the heir of quite an important (and prosperous, as the season begins) estate. It's also clear that she will become the actual manager of the estate, with a great deal of power.

I think it's not such a deep plot reason, Molesley has always been used for almost comical effects to lighten the atmosphere up.
He's evolving too, though; we have started to see that on his interactions with Baxter.

definitely!
I actually like how they managed to resolve the issue of Mary's suitors by

What she says are absolutely correct statements (even if that too can be questioned) for the 2014 point of view, in 1924 things were quite different. At least, you cannot say everything everywhere!

I never found the off-screen events that bothersome.
Most events of the various storylines happen on-screen, or at least the main fallout (see Edith's pregnancy - I'm actually glad we haven't seen on-screen all the Swiss storyline! but we witness its consequences on the various characters and its effects on the…

I have watched the season already (being in Europe) and I agree that it's definitely an improvement with respect to the fourth season. There are no earth-shaking plots, mind you, but Downton was never a land of Scandal-like twists and turns.