My last reference to the bossy big sister/ bratty little brother dynamic that is so well represented in the relationships that work on Dark Shadows.
Category: DSED Comments
Episode 1114: The Unshakeable
How Barnabas found his soullessness-mate.
Episode 1115: The Gun Runner
I put in a word for Virginia Vestoff and Donna Wandrey.
Episode 1116: That’s Us In There
I mention Lela Swift, principal director of Dark Shadows throughout its run and, for the last part of the show, its line producer.
Episode 1117: Meanwhile, Again
In which I mention two episodes of Columbo that would have been better with Jonathan Frid as the murderer.
Episode 1118: Getting Ahead
In which I suggest that the “Head of Judah Zachery” might be a borrowing from C. S. Lewis’ 1945 novel That Hideous Strength, a best-seller in which a group of devil worshipers take their orders from a severed head kept in a box in a curtained room.
Episode 1119: Why Are We the Way We Are
In which certain performances lead me to surmise that actors were consulting videotapes of old episodes, and I wonder if that’s why the tapes of some famous episodes went missing.
Episode 1120: House of Hurt Feelings
Why I agree with Danny Horn’s frequent assertion that to make an audience care about a character, that character has to “make a friend, make a joke, make a plot point happen.”
Episode 1122: The Lost World
In which I complain about Barnabas Collins’ habit of introducing himself to people as their enemy.
Time Travel, part 12: Nevertheless, They Persisted
In which I explain that Mrs Acilius and I started streaming Dark Shadows every day when Covid shut down live theater in our town, and compare the process of watching the show to attending a play done on a bare stage.
Dark Shadows Commentary 