Without getting into anything specific, I shall assert that real life in 2025 has been …a challenge. When it’s all too much, there is only one place I go.

Downton Abbey.

Downton Abbey is my ultimate comfort watch. At any given moment, I can switch on the show or one of the films, and find myself right at home. The plotlines are no longer stressful because I know exactly what is going to happen. I have watched so many times, I can happily (and annoyingly) recite the dialogue along with the actors. I know when my favourite gowns will make their appearances on screen. I sit up a little straighter in readiness for when one of Dame Maggie Smith’s best lines is imminent. The moments that made me cry or laugh the first time still make me cry and laugh. I wallow in those emotions over and over again.

It is embarrassing to try to count how many times I’ve watched. The Downton Abbey theme is my alarm clock ringtone because I don’t get crabby when Downton wakes me at some unholy hour. I’ve made the pilgrimage to Highclere Castle three times. I have t-shirts, teacups, and ornaments.  Quotes spring into mind at more real life moments than I care to admit.  I try not to annoy everyone and speak them aloud in the presence of those who may not be nearly as obsessed. 

I’m a big, ridiculous, geeked out Downton Abbey fan. This is out of character for me. I enjoy many shows, but I’m seldom this emotionally engaged. I almost never buy…merch! Why a woman raised in the public housing projects of the American midwest is this crazy to spend time in this world of stately homes and aristocratic struggles may not be completely unexpected. Why Downton Abbey messes me up the way it does is something I can not logically explain. It wrecks me. It’s cathartic, though, and I keep going back for more. But now….it’s the end.

The trailer for Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale has made me absolutely sob. It really hurts.The emotions elicited by this trailer are over the top, even for me.   Even the tagline “The time has come to say goodbye” makes me feel wobbly.

I can’t wait to see more Downton, but there is a foreboding sense of loss knowing this is the very end. But it’s not like all of us haven’t gone through this before. I should be used to it by now. When the series ended, my mascara was hitting my chin. Just remembering Mrs. Hughes singing “Auld Lang Syne” still breaks my heart. When the music swelled and the opening credits started rolling on the first film, there I went again, humiliating myself by turning into an absolute puddle of feels and mopping my face with the enormous wad of tissues I had in my purse. We didn’t know at the time there would be more films. Was it our final visit to the world of the Abbey? When the second film shamelessly turned into “Singin’ In The Rain”, I was okay with it. Maybe it was because I can quote that film, too, but it was far more likely because it was Lady Mary dubbing the lines in the library. It was, after all, more Downton. A plot from another adored film, “Mrs Miniver”, was recycled at the flower show in season one. That was a sweet callback and, because it’s Downton, that is okay by me. 

But I was not okay when the Dowager Countess died in Downton Abbey: A New Era. I was not okay when Dame Maggie Smith died last year on my birthday. The clip in the finale trailer of her portrait hanging prominently in the Abbey has me choking already. When the final credits roll on this film, I know I will not be okay. I’m blubbing just typing this. It’s pathetic, really.

What is the matter with me? I have Downton Abbey Derangement Syndrome! 

How did this happen? The Downton Dish was a real learning curve for all of us at The Anglophile Channel and will always be special as we remember the fun we had morphing from a polite, tea soaked discussion to a full on wacky recap of our favourite show. That is, no doubt, part of my attachment. Part of it is the characters who we’ve all watched grow and change over the years through the witty storytelling of Julian Fellowes. Part of it is the place. Highclere Castle is like a dream to me. It feels like a safe place where, with a very few exceptions, everyone cares. 

Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale will be our last visit to this happy, safe world. Pondering the end brings up the same sort of emotions I felt when my grandparent’s home was sold. The house still exists, but there is no place for me or the people I loved there anymore. Years later it is still painful. Seeing Downton Abbey coming to an end is going to ache like that, in a similar, smaller way. Yet it’s a gift. It’s an opportunity to spend one last interlude in that imaginary space with the beloved characters I’ve spent so much time watching since the American premiere on PBS Masterpiece in 2011. Anticipation is mixed with dread. One last visit, a brand new story, our familiar faces, those sumptuous, swoon-worthy costumes and sets are all a very potent draw. But I don’t know if I can bear to be first in line at the cinema and have it over with all too quickly. Should I wait?  I did for Downton Abbey: A New Era, knowing we would be bidding goodbye to the Dowager Duchess Of Grantham. I wanted to keep the character of Violet alive as long as possible and do my weeping in the privacy of my own home. Dare I venture out to watch The Grand Finale in public? There is no doubt this film will leave me looking like a raccoon. 

Imagine what it was like for the cast and crew. It had to have been incredibly emotional to say farewell at the wrap. If the Downton grief hits hard for me…it must be nothing compared to their bittersweet experience of working on this last film. So, yes, I will summon my courage to support Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale. They made it for us. The fans. 

I shall be there, bedecked in waterproof mascara —wearing a dress that can’t be tear stained.

But I can’t promise to be coherent by the time those final credits roll. If you hear a noise like a foghorn, it will be me blowing my nose. If you hear a woman wailing in the back row, please come over and give me a hug. This is going to be rough. By the end credits, I may feel like I need grief therapy, but I’ll probably just drown my sorrows in a very Downton Abbey cup of tea. Then I’ll start watching all over again…from the very beginning.

Elyse Ashton, the author, is an actress and Los Angeles Press Club Award winning co-host of The Anglophile Channel’s Dish shows. She gives her opinions very decidedly.