‘Downton Abbey’ Season 4: How Will Lady Mary Move On?

After the shocking ending to Season 3 Downton Abbey will have to, somehow, let Lady Mary move on with her life without her husband Matthew Crawley, played by Dan Stevens, who died in a car accident at the end of the final episode.

Matthew was one of the public’s favorite characters and central to the story line, but when actor Dan Stevens announced that he would not renew his contract after Season 3, creator Julian Fellowes decided to kill him off.

Michelle Dockery (Lady Mary Crawley) appears in the cover of Haper’s Bazaar UK magazine’s August edition and talks about what will happen to her character in Season 4.

Spoilers: if you do not want to find out details about the new season, stop reading here.

Michelle told the magazine (as we already knew) that the new season opens several months after Matthew’s death and shows a defiant Mary, who is still in mourning and refuses to wear anything other than black.

In Downton Abbey’s Season 4, Lady Cora (Elizabeth McGovern), Mary’s mother is trying to introduce her to new suitors, but Mary is not interested. She turns to estate affairs instead, since her son is now the heir to Downton.

“She’s really grown up. When I look back to series one, she was a teenager really, a petulant, spoiled girl, and now she’s a woman,” Dockery said.

She added that Stevens’ departure “has opened a whole door of opportunity for Mary.”

Dockery also said that she plans to stick with the series until it is finished (we don’t know when that may be).

“There’s a part of me that doesn’t want it to end, because I love it so much…and once it’s all over, I’m sure there will be a period when I feel slightly at a loss,” she added.

Downton Abbey Season Four will focus on Mary’s struggle to come to terms with her husband’s death, her baby, and possible new love interests.

[Image via Helga Esteb / Shutterstock.com]