I am a writer and love to read. I've been inspired by many variety of writers, from Stephen King to Danielle Steele, especially televisions show writers, from Breaking Bad, Downton Abbey, and Better Call Saul. Three of my all time favorite series' ever written. I mostly love to write historical romances so Downton Abbey is right up my alley.

Thanks to all who have read/reviewed my For Ever and Ever series, including Second Chances. It wasn't easy. Re-watching the series, I noticed a lot of flaws. Most of the characters weren't utilized correctly and were often misused. I found most of the characters unlikeable upstairs and down, except Matthew of course, and Tom until they had his character force Henry with Mary. Completely out of character. And don't get me started with Mary. It all undid her development. As for Edith, I think she would take grasp of what it meant to be a modern woman. Her marriage to Bertie didn't make sense to me, it didn't fit her character. Things were starting to change for woman after the first war and jobs were opening up. After Gregson dies she inherits the paper company and I think Matthew would have helped her with that, and help her cope with Gregson's death. I saw potential for a friendship between Matthew in Edith and he would be the go between, the common ground between Mary and Edith.

Another reason I kept Edith single, it didn't feel natural to just to marry her off to a random somebody. Back then there were many reasons why some women did not marry, including the availability of eligible young men (whose numbers decrease dramatically during wartime), the availability of livelihoods for women, social status issues, that could also arise where it was unacceptable for a woman to marry below her social rank but her parents lacked the funds to support a marriage within their social rank. We'd have to be realistic here, Tom and Sybil would have never been accepted by the family and she would have been disowned. So going by the shows logic, I don't have the family bothered by Edith being a 'spinster' because that would have made the Crawley's hypocrites. Edith would have been scrutinized anyway, for being jilted at the alter also if Gregson had lived and she had married him.

The First World War prevented many within a generation of women from experiencing romance and marriage or having children.

The only person I didn't change was Carson. LOL.

But that only begins to scratch the surface. My main issues is how they handled the effects of WWI. There was a bit of potential. We get a bit of that with the character Lang and how O'Brien helped him. And I was thinking that she would do the same for Matthew. They showed potential for this in series 2, when Mary asks him 'what's it like' and when he visits the village hospital and see's all the wounded, even as he's talking with Robert, he gets this far off look. He is clearly haunted.

The contrast between the effects it has on Matthew and Lang would have showed how shell shock affected people in different ways, it wasn't the same for everyone.

Realistically and statistically speaking, I believe Matthew would have been one of many that suffered from shell shock. They also had an opportunity to have a disabled main character, and to show how people of that time period treated people with such. They were seen as weak or ignored. (Cora was one of such people. I had to do away with her because I despise her character in the show and would have had a nasty time writing her.) And this plays into Matthew's personality because he is a confident and strong and independent man, to have that all taken away, leaves a person broken. He is a broken man. And it would have taken years for him to rebuild back his life, with the help of Mary and his family, which I depict throughout my stories.

I did extensive medical research and it's more likely that he would have survived with a incomplete transection of his spine, and would have regained some sensation or little to no feelings. Why I chose to do this, I didn't want to use it as a plot device like Fellows did, will he, won't he be with Mary and have children. I did it for character growth and a more realistic depiction.

His disability and shell shock makes Matthew and Mary's relationship stronger and it brings out sides of them that we never see in the show. And they go on to have a family and happily ever after that they should have had. And not just them each but other major and minor characters as well.

I don't blame Dan for leaving. I agree with him, that they weren't giving him much to do. I believe he would have probably stayed if he was given a challenge such as this and he would have been excellent. His role in Legion was an example of that. Second Chances, also not only gives the character's a second chance, but also a second chance of their characterization and how they should have grown. The character's I enjoyed developing the most was Mary, Matthew and Tom.

The Downton Trio, much like The Golden Trio in Harry Potter.

-A love letter to all my fellow Downton and M/M fans. Thanks again so much!