Dark Shadows is in one of its most “High Concept” phases today. Mad scientist Julia is trying to transfer the “life force” of recovering vampire Barnabas into a Frankenstein’s monster named Adam. She is having difficulty concentrating because she is in the grip of an elaborate spell cast by wicked witch Angelique, a “Dream Curse” in which each victim has the same nightmare, is compelled to describe it to someone they saw in the nightmare, and that person is then the next to have the nightmare.
The episode is so completely dominated by these plot elements that the writers couldn’t find time to give the characters motivations. Julia is supposed to tell the nightmare to housekeeper Mrs Johnson. Julia is busy in the house by the sea where the lab is, and there is no reason for Mrs Johnson to go there. So they just have Mrs Johnson show up without a reason. She talked with Angelique on Friday and is in a trancelike state when she enters today, inviting us to imagine Angelique cast a spell that caused her to go to Julia.
Well-meaning governess Vicki also turns up at the house by the sea. She wants to talk to Barnabas about a note he left saying that he would be going away and a man named Adam would be coming. What Vicki lacks isn’t so much a reason to be on this set as it is a reason to be on the show. For thirteen months now, whatever Barnabas is doing has been the A plot of Dark Shadows. Barnabas has systematically refused to let Vicki into his life in any substantive way. In this scene, he confirms that Vicki will not be allowed into the action when he assures her that “loving me would have been the worst mistake of your life.”
For a little while, Vicki was in a B plot about her romance with a man named Peter who insists on being called Jeff. There is no longer any obstacle to Vicki and Peter/ Jeff being together or any connection between Peter/ Jeff and any other story. Besides, Peter/ Jeff is a repellent screen presence, and if Vicki wants to spend time with him we’d frankly prefer she do it when the cameras are off. She and Barnabas do some recapping, and then she goes back to the shelf where the writers are evidently determined to keep her.
Julia conducts the procedure. There are lots of closeups of gadgets meant to suggest sophisticated medical devices. So many of these are operating in the lab that we wonder why they didn’t hook Adam up to machines that were supposed to make his heart beat and his lungs pump during the many many days he spent lying on the table in this unrefrigerated room. After all, the principle governing the inclusion of machines on this set is clearly “the more, the merrier.”
As the procedure goes on, Barnabas smiles and says with absolute delight “I’m getting weaker. I feel life slipping away from me.” Dark Shadows is already deep into its Monster Mash period, and this kind of misplaced glee is usually the keynote of dramas that are loaded with vampires and witches and Frankensteins and whatnot. But this line is the first time they’ve really sounded that note, and it will be two and a half years before the show outdoes this instance of it.
Some of the equipment crackles and fizzes, and there are explosions. Julia cannot continue, and leaves the room thinking the procedure has failed. Barnabas stays behind to make a speech to the lifeless body, only to see the eyes open. He realizes it is not lifeless at all. The plan was that his original body would die and he would wake up as Adam; he is puzzled that they are both alive.
Dark Shadows Commentary 