Discuss - Ep #0098

[Watching Project]

Robservations #98

[MagnusTrask]

Mrs. J gets to work at Collinwood right away, for Burke that is.   David was awfully clever figuring out Mrs. J's exact purpose there, and realizing he could test Mrs. J by offering that deal to keep quiet.   She hears the sobbing, goes up to the locked room... thinks the ordinary thought, well I'll just let her out... then sees not only the lock, but that it's old, with dust and cobwebs on it.   Gears turn silently in Mrs. J's head...  She decides going to the police is out.   I DO believe in spooks, I DO believe in spooks...

[Janet the Wicked]

The bonus feature on this DVD includes interviews with Mitch Ryan and Conard Fowkes, a wonderful bonus indeed.

Fave line comes from Liz to Mrs. J: Perhaps I should caution you about "certain" members of the household.

Mrs. J’s first day on the job and already she is having words with Matthew. Gotta love that woman.

[michael c]

mrs. johnson's early days at collinwood were truly brilliant. some of my favorite scenes ever come out of these weeks.

[spoiler]mitch ryan and conard fowkes are an interesting chapter in the DS history. a relic from the brief period when a lawyer, a cannery owner or a fisherman could serve as the show's male "leads". from 1967 on nearly all of the male characters are some sort of supernatural being.[/spoiler]

[alwaysdavid]

Elizabeth tells Matthew that Mrs Johnson is coming and to welcome her. Good luck there.  Dinner is served at eight at Collinwood. No wonder they are up at all hours of the night.  Mrs Johnson is told to ignore Roger. How funny. It sound like Roger has never spent much time at Collinwood having been sent away to school and then to Augusta, but he acts as if he is the ruler of the roost.  Elizabeth is in full Mistress mode and tells Mrs J. that she is not to go into the basement. David is instructed to not be rude to Mrs J.
Mrs. J. makes David lunch which she brings to the drawing room while he informs her that he usually eats in the kitchen or the dinning room.  So there is an unseen dinning room somewhere.  Mrs J. tries to get to know David and he of course gets on his favorite subject of ghosts.  Matthew overhearing breaks his mistresses instructions and is rude to Mrs J. telling her she shall be sorry if she asks questions.
At 3 AM Mrs J goes to the basement.  David grabs her and she claims she heard a noise. David suggest she is a spy for Burke. After David leaves the sobbing is heard.  I kept waiting for either Matthew or Mrs Stoddard to catch her, but she gets away with her defiance of the rules.

[Lydia]

I always imagine Mrs. Johnson's bedroom as being on the first floor near the kitchen, so when Matthew took her bags up to the second floor, it was a bit of a shock.  Did Liz say the third door on the right?  I had pretty much decided that the door from the landing goes into a junction of halls ("Change trains here for the east wing") so that's another thing for me to rethink.

Mrs. Johnson talked with David surprisingly easily as he ate his sandwich, drawing him out and showing exaggerated incredulity.  At this stage of David's life, she might make a more congenial and successful tutor for him than Vicky is.

David was awfully clever figuring out Mrs. J's exact purpose there, and realizing he could test Mrs. J by offering that deal to keep quiet.

I'm not so sure about that.  In David's world view, everybody has an ulterior motive, and he's obsessed with Burke, so it would be easy for him to put together the theory that he came up with, even if it weren't true.