‘Downton Abbey’ season 3 spoilers: Look who’s back downstairs!

We have another edition of our “Downton Abbey” photo series, and this time around, the focus is squarely on a man in Mr. Bates who has certainly been through his fair share of trouble already this season. While we don’t know for 100% certain that he is innocent when it comes to his estranged wife’s death, we have been led to believe that this was the case, and on Sunday night’s new episode a major revelation (along with a few frightening threats) led to him finally getting released from prison.

But is the man really going to stay free from jail for long? That is the question that is certainly worth asking at the moment, given what we know transpired while he was in jail. This is a show where every action has a consequence, and we do have a hard time believing that Bates will be rewarded at the end of the day for the way he earned his freedom … even if he may not have deserved to be locked up in the first place.

With that, we turn to the photo to the left from Sunday night’s new episode. What exactly is Bates looking at, and why does he look like a deer in the headlights? No one looks to be particularly pleased by whatever or whoever they are looking at, and we are not sure that this bodes particularly well for Brendan Coyle’s character at all. We do certainly think that he and Anna deserve happiness, but nothing in the world of these characters (especially for those downstairs) tends to come easy.

Do you think there is any particular meaning behind this photo?