Upstairs, Downstairs : The perfect wife for James… A Crawley girl?

One Mary Crawley of course. She was one of those 'tough blue blooded hunting females' as Hazel said who could manage him and tell him to put his big boy pants on and get over it.

Or maybe Edith? She would have taken anybody and they both have been generally unfortunate in life. Misery loves company.

Mary reminds me of Diana. Blue-blooded, pretty, strong-willed, intelligent. We know how that went. James just didn't have the self-confidence to marry a woman of his class. "I gave up years ago of him marrying into the aristocracy" says Miss Roberts.

Edith reminds me of Hazel (with the exception that Hazel wasn't blue-blooded). Like Hazel she wanted to work for a living. The potential was there for her to be a bit of a doormat in a relationship, like Hazel. But her aristocratic background would have made her a better mate for James than Hazel, I think. She wouldn't have been a doormat, if at all, to the same degree as Hazel.

Edith and Jamesinteresting. But James was ultimately a tragic figure, Edith not necessarily so, despite her story so far. I have a feeling Edith will do well in the end.

Edith does very well in the end, marrying Bertie in the Christmas special.

Mary and James would have suited each other to a "t." When he started his whining and ranting, she would raise her eyebrows and leave the room. Arguing with him would be beneath her. He had the aristocratic background Robert and Cora wanted for the eldest daughter of an Earl. No fortune beyond what he inherited from his mother, but they'd live at Downton supported by Mary's money. While she was off running the estate with Tom, James would live it up as a country squire. All his needs met. He and George would be good friends because emotionally they're the same age.

If James couldn't make it with Diana, what makes you think he could have made it with Mary?

Diana was a monstrous, wicked (to use James's expression) girl. As Tom observes of Mary, she is much nicer than most people believed her to be and I agree. She has moments of great warmth and sensitivity that, in my view, were seriously lacking in Diana.

However, at the outset of DA, the issue was no male heir to inherit, so they were scrambling for distant relations as was the case with Matthew, a distant relation, but still a Crawley. So a marriage between James and Mary would have been unthinkable. In the aftermath of Matthew's death, Mary romances two noblemen, all the more reason that James, yes, the grandson of an earl and the son of a Viscount would have been unsuitable. He had no title of his own and, as Mrs. Kenton, the housekeeper at Somerby Park tells Hudson, a Marquis (Bunny) would trump a commoner (James) for Lady Diana's hand.

I think Edith would have irritated James to the point of distraction. James DID has the perfect wife if only given the chance, in Hazel. She wasn't a doormat, as most seem to think, and could have made James very happy, but for his misguided and utterly futile attraction to Georgina. As for Lady Sybil, she found the love of her life, so that's that.

I don't know. People have made the case for why Mary would be good for James. But in what way would James be good for Mary? What would cause *her* to go for *him*? I don't see it. I think she would have quickly recognized his flaws and said "No thank you."

Wellhe's as snobbish as she is. Plus I agree (and LOL) with the poster above who stated that he would play well with Master George.

Someone please remind me: who is going to inherit Southwold? Lady Marjorie and her brother both perished on the Titanic, right? Would James have come into money when his grandmother died? (although we know he would have burned through it faster than you can say "Lord Grantham")

An unseen and unnamed cousin of Marjorie's inherited Southwold. He is mentioned in passing in "Word of Honour", but so quickly it is easy to miss. Like DA it would have been someone in the male line, of which James was not.

IIRC the death of the dowager countess was never mentioned. Sir Geoffrey said, at the time of LM's father's death, was that her mother was "amply provided for." But what she would have had to bequest upon her own death is unclear.

Bequeath, not bequest.

i wanted him to marry Georgina. They were very well suited to each other.

I think James and Georgina would have been happy for a while, but James is not known for his faithfulness. He always wanted what he couldn't have, but once he had it, he didn't want it anymore. He wanted Sarah, he wanted Hazel, he wanted Diana. In varying degrees he got all of them, but then he didn't want them.