We’ve gone from the lean weeks of necessary pledge drives and musical crowd pleasing specials to an abundance of brand new television treats on Masterpiece and our local PBS stations. Last weekend saw season premieres for both Call The Midwife and Sanditon, as well as a new take on Marie Antoinette.

Reader, it’s the most wonderful television time of the year. It’s almost too much!

This is why I’ll be going all 1985 and watching these shows old school. One episode a week. I am resolved.

I learned my lesson years ago. A friend sent me a full season of Downton Abbey back when the UK would get the series months before the US. I binged the whole season on my computer. It was glorious while it lasted, but it left me feeling a bit hollow and sad when the last episode ended. Of course, I watched it all again when they aired later on PBS. I enjoyed it, but the excitement and anticipation weren’t the same. I missed that feeling.

Call The Midwife is easy to take an episode at a time because I only want to sob my heart out once a week. Marie Antoinette is something new so I’m still deciding how much I like it.

Sanditon, however, is a show I want to savor. Sanditon has been an emotional roller coaster. From watching the first episode yelling at the television about how “totally NOT Austen” moments are (a few WTHs may have been pronounced), to being drawn into the story, becoming fond of the characters, then furious over a season one ending that left us all dangling, I was, like many others, emotionally invested in Sanditon and bitterly disappointed when it was canceled.

We all know what happened next. Fan fury over the cancellation turned into a passionate campaign to bring us the rest of the story. I confess that I didn’t have much faith in the #SaveSanditon campaign as too many things had to fall into place to continue the series, but tumble neatly into line they did. We have two more seasons and are promised a proper ending. Skepticism vanquished, I curtsey gratefully to the #SanditonSisterhood for showing us how it’s done!

The second season of Sanditon did not disappoint. Bravo, writer Andrew Davies, for taking a few chapters of Jane Austen, fleshing out the characters and weaving them into a charming tale full of surprises.

PBS is now showing the third and very final season of Sanditon and I want to take it slow. One episode into the third season and although I think I might know where the story is heading, I know there will be unexpected twists along the way. I am so tempted to barrel through to the finale on PBSPassport or Prime, but the desire to make it last has won…at least for now. I don’t care if I see spoilers, because the journey itself is so delightful. I am resolved that after I have made these episodes last as long as I can, then and only then, will I stream Sanditon on a loop.

I think.

I’m pretty sure I can hold out.

I’m almost certain.

Time will tell.

I’m watching episode two of season three this evening. I’m excited, but so far, I remain in control. I’m already planning on how to ease the post Sanditon let-down. Because, you see, there is that final season of Endeavor coming up. Thank you Masterpiece and PBS!

Elyse Ashton, the author, is an actress, a voracious reader, a sometimes writer, an LA Press Club award-winning co-host of The Anglophile Channel’s Dish shows, a shamelessly enthusiastic historical dancer, and a great lover of English literature, her degree in French Literature notwithstanding. She’s a big geeked out fan of Jane Austen and Regency culture.