adam – Page 6 – Dark Shadows Commentary

Episode 506: That man again

All of the storylines in the part of Dark Shadows set in 1968 bear a heavy weight of repetitious elements. The “Dream Curse” consists of countless reenactments of the same dream sequence, almost all of them followed by at least one scene in which the character who had the dream struggles with a compulsion to tell it to someone else, and then by a speech in which we hear the details of the dream yet again. That curse was set by wicked witch Angelique, who for no particular reason keeps insisting that her name is Cassandra. Angelique is a time traveler from the eighteenth century, as is shouting man Peter, who for no particular reason keeps insisting that his name is Jeff.

Mad scientist Eric Lang tried to cure Barnabas Collins of vampirism by an experimental procedure that involved the creation of a Frankenstein’s monster. Angelique killed Lang before he could finish the experiment, but fortunately for Barnabas his best friend Julia is also a mad scientist, and she completed it. Barnabas named the creature Adam. Lang left behind an audiotape explaining that Barnabas will be free of vampirism as long as Adam lives, but that he will revert if Adam dies. Barnabas and Julia have not heard this message, but it has been played for the audience many times. Yesterday’s episode closed with yet another replay of the message, and today’s opens with still another. Since the message is nearly a minute long, it will soon have accumulated a full episode’s worth of airtime.

After the message, we see a new set. It represents the rocky shore below the cliff on Widows’ Hill. Barnabas is there with his servant Willie, looking for Adam. Adam jumped off the cliff yesterday. Since episode #2, that plunge has always been shorthand for certain death, so the opening voiceover introduces a new idea when it tells us that Adam’s leap merely “appeared to be” his self-destruction. Barnabas believes that Adam is still alive, though Willie does not. The two of them stand around and shout Adam’s name over and over; after the fifth or sixth repetition, Mrs Acilius and I cracked up laughing. At least they could have broken it up a little, and alternated “ADAM!!!” with “STELLA!!!”

Willie had the dream last night, and now feels compelled to tell it to heiress Carolyn. Adam had abducted Carolyn and held her for a couple of days before he dove from the cliff; she is now at home in the great house of Collinwood. Willie wants to sneak into Collinwood to talk to Carolyn. Barnabas points out that Willie was only recently released from the mental hospital where he was confined after he took the rap for Barnabas’ abduction of another young woman, Maggie. If he sneaks into Carolyn’s bedroom it will go badly for him. Barnabas directs Willie to search for Adam inland, prompting Willie to flash a grin. The very first night Willie was back from the hospital, he disobeyed Barnabas’ orders and ran off to visit Maggie. So his grin tells us to expect that he will disobey Barnabas’ orders again, this time to visit Carolyn.

Willie goes to the great house. We see him standing by the wall, below the second-storey window of Carolyn’s room. In her room, Carolyn talks with her mother, matriarch Liz. She explains to her mother that she is neither frightened of Adam nor angry with him, but that she pities him, because he seemed like an inarticulate and lonely little child. After this conversation, Liz leaves the room. Willie scales the wall, slips in through Carolyn’s window, grabs Carolyn, holds her mouth shut, and forces her to listen while he starts to tell the dream. Carolyn bites Willie, screams, and Liz comes.

Willie flees through the window. Carolyn explains to her mother that she is neither frightened of Willie nor angry with him, but that she pities him, because he seemed to be deeply terrified by his dream. She says that she is afraid that she, too, will have the dream.

Three people who live in the house have already had the dream. One of them is Julia, who is careful about who she talks to. The others are strange and troubled boy David, who regularly confides in both Carolyn and Liz, and housekeeper Mrs Johnson, who tells everyone everything. It is surprising that neither of them has mentioned it to either Carolyn or Liz.

Episode 505: Prepare yourself for an ordeal

Sheriff Patterson, leading his deputies through the woods in search of a very tall man named Adam who has escaped from gaol, finds a scrap of Adam’s clothing on a tree. He looks ahead and sees the Old House on the estate of Collinwood. He remarks “That’s the old Collins house. Every time anything goes wrong around here, that’s where all roads seem to lead.” He takes his party toward the house. Once they are gone, Adam comes out from behind a tree, and goes in another direction. Unknown to the sheriff and his men, Adam is a Frankenstein’s monster. He is four weeks old and has a vocabulary of fewer than a dozen words, but he easily outwits Collinsport’s entire law enforcement community.

The Old House is home to Barnabas Collins, whom the audience knows to be a recovering vampire. The sheriff calls on Barnabas and recaps the story for his benefit. In his post about the episode, Danny Horn ridicules every part of this preposterous scene, getting half a dozen genuine laughs. I won’t compete with him, but I do want to point out that while in both Wednesday’s episode and yesterday’s, the sheriff said it took twenty men to subdue Adam and take him into custody, today he says it took six. Maybe by next week it will be down to one deputy and a mynah bird.

Adam has abducted heiress Carolyn Collins Stoddard. When he eludes the police, he goes to the abandoned structure where he has cooped her up. He had left her there to go look for food. That mission was interrupted by his arrest. Now, she asks to go home. He is carrying her back there when they meet the sheriff, his deputies, and Barnabas at the top of Widows’ Hill. From the second episode, we have known that people plunge to their deaths from this hill. We’ve heard stories about several such incidents, have seen a number of characters come close to falling from it, and in #425 we saw gracious lady Josette make the fatal leap. Carolyn slips from Adam’s arms to the edge of the cliff; the deputies see him pull her up. She runs into Barnabas’ arms, and Adam falls.

After Adam’s fall, we hear a message that is very familiar to us, but that Barnabas and his friends have never heard. Adam was created in an experimental procedure that was meant to relieve Barnabas of his vampirism. His creator, mad scientist Eric Lang, died shortly after recording an audiotape explaining that as long as Adam lives, Barnabas will be human, but that he will become a vampire again if he outlives Adam. This message plays out over images of the waves crashing into the rocks of the shore. It’s an effective visual complement to the message, a metaphor for the overwhelming power that will engulf Barnabas and the rest of them if Adam is in fact dead.

Episode 504: A talent for making everyone feel guilty

Well-meaning governess Vicki was the main character of Dark Shadows for its first year, but has been receding further and further to the margins since. Today she returns after a 14 day absence, the first time she has been off screen so long.

Vicki is in the drawing room of the great house of Collinwood with her employer, matriarch Liz. Liz is distraught because her daughter Carolyn has been abducted by a strange man. Liz fears that Carolyn is dead or dying; Vicki urges her to set those fears aside. The police telephone; they have captured the man, but Carolyn was not with him, and he has not answered any of their questions. Liz and Vicki set out for the gaol to see him.

They are accompanied by a sheriff’s deputy. The Collinsport police are exceptionally useless, but even by their standards this deputy is a low performer. Though the man is so strong that it took twenty men to subdue him and bring him in, the deputy enjoys taunting him. He sticks his service revolver in the cell; the man is shackled to the wall, but he is so tall he sweeps his hand into contact with the gun. If the script didn’t say otherwise, he could easily take it from the deputy. Liz orders the deputy to stand back out of the man’s line of sight. Since she owns most of the town, he grudgingly obeys.

The deputy puts his weapon within Adam’s reach.

Yesterday, Liz went looking for Carolyn at the Old House on the estate, home to her distant cousin Barnabas. She found Barnabas’ servant Willie on the ground, suffering from a fresh head wound. Willie told her that the man had been by a few minutes before, and that he had been carrying the unconscious Carolyn. He also referred to the man as “Adam.” When Liz asked him why he used that name, he denied that he did and began jabbering about some bad dream that had frightened him. Today, Liz addresses the man as Adam, and he responds, proving that Willie does in fact know more about him that he will admit.

Liz and Vicki tell Adam that they will treat him as a friend if he tells them where Carolyn is. Adam knows the word “friend.” He repeats it, and adds “food!” Again he says “Friend, food!” The women do not know what he is driving at. They give up and go home.

Returning viewers know that Adam has stashed Carolyn in an abandoned structure that looks exactly like Fred and Wilma Flintstone’s house, that he calls Carolyn “Friend,” and that he had gone out to look for food for her when he was captured. He is dejected when he cannot make it clear that she is hungry.

Liz and Vicki return to Collinwood. They spend several seconds taking off their coats in unison. In the early days of the show, there were a number of scenes designed to emphasize Liz and Vicki’s resemblance and to present each as the other’s reflection in support of a storyline that led us to believe that Vicki was Liz’ unacknowledged daughter. That storyline was forgotten long ago, and it isn’t entirely clear what director Jack Sullivan is getting at here.

Back in the drawing room, Liz tells Vicki her reasons for believing that Barnabas knows a great deal about Adam. Apparently the doors separating the drawing room from the foyer amplify sound, because as the camera takes us from the drawing room to the foyer Liz and Vicki’s conversation only becomes more audible. Liz’ new sister-in-law is in the foyer. This woman calls herself Cassandra, but regular viewers know that she is in fact wicked witch Angelique. Vicki knows that perfectly well. Vicki traveled back in time in #365 and spent nineteen weeks living under the same roof as Angelique while Angelique wrought havoc on the Collins family of the 1790s and framed Vicki for her crimes. Angelique’s only disguise as Cassandra is a black wig- otherwise, she looks, sounds, and moves exactly as she had when Vicki knew her in the eighteenth century. As a result, Vicki is very much on her guard around her.

Angelique/ Cassandra enters the drawing room. Liz excuses herself, and Angelique/ Cassandra demands to know why Vicki doesn’t like her. When Vicki says that she resembles someone she didn’t get along with, Angelique/ Cassandra proclaims that she isn’t that person, bursts into tears, and runs out. Vicki stays in the drawing room, but the camera follows Angelique/ Cassandra to the staircase, where we see her smile gleefully.

Liz returns, and Vicki tells her she may have misjudged Cassandra. It doesn’t speak well of Vicki’s brainpower that a single display of crocodile tears would override the memory of their long and painful acquaintance, but since Barnabas and the others who are doing battle with Angelique/ Cassandra refuse to accept Vicki’s help, she may as well forget everything she knows. Liz tells her that she doesn’t think she misjudged Cassandra, and says she doesn’t trust her either.

Back in the gaol, the idiotic deputy goes back to Adam’s cell to taunt him some more. When Adam protests, the deputy opens the door and waves his baton at him. He places himself within easy reach of Adam, who grabs him and knocks him unconscious.

Yesterday, the high sheriff said “I’m not a stupid man.” He may not have been as stupid as is this grinning imbecile, but it is on his responsibility that he has a badge and a gun.

Another deputy enters. He sees his moronic colleague on the floor, the bars twisted in the window, and no sign of Adam.

Adam is 6’6″, so it’s difficult to see how he could fit through this opening. Perhaps he is not only tremendously strong, but is also a contortionist.

Episode 503: Man made monster

Adam the Frankenstein’s monster has abducted heiress Carolyn and taken her to an abandoned structure. Carolyn says the structure looks like a root cellar. She doesn’t have a television, or she would have recognized it at once. It’s the old Flintstone place.

Screenshot by Dark Shadows Before I Die.

Adam was created in an experimental procedure mad scientist Julia Hoffman completed, an experiment that Julia’s late colleague Eric Lang designed to free old world gentleman Barnabas Collins from vampirism. The experiment was a success, but Barnabas and Julia are the world’s worst parents. They have kept Adam chained to the wall of the prison cell in the basement of Barnabas’ house for the first three and a half weeks of his life. As far as Adam is concerned, it is normal for people to confine one another in underground spaces.

The cell was in the basement of the house when Barnabas and his little sister Sarah were growing up there in the eighteenth century; in #260, we found that Sarah had found a secret passage leading out of the cell, suggesting she must have spent a lot of time there in her nine years of life. Perhaps the cycle of abuse that Adam is perpetuating goes back a very long way.

Barnabas is out searching for Adam and Carolyn. Julia is in his house, along with his servant Willie. Julia finds that Willie has had a nightmare and is compelled to tell Carolyn about it. The nightmare is part of The Dream Curse. One person after another has the same dream, which the audience sees dramatized every time. Then that person wrestles with a compulsion to tell the nightmare to someone else. We usually see that, too. Finally, the person does tell the dream, giving a speech to repeat the material to us yet again. This time-waster will go on indefinitely, and is supposed to end with Barnabas reverting to vampirism.

Julia knows all about this. She had the dream herself, and has interacted with others who have had it since. Today, she tries to hypnotize Willie into forgetting the dream.

It is very strange Julia hasn’t tried this before. She has a phenomenal ability to use hypnosis to erase memories, so regular viewers would expect her to turn to that right away. When she starts giving Willie the instructions, kaleidoscopic colors pulse on the screen, suggesting that she will have yet another great triumph. Willie does have a vision of Carolyn in the Flintstone house, so Julia must have unlocked his capacity for extrasensory perception. But he still remembers the dream, and is still driven to tell it to Carolyn.

The sheriff comes by. He tells Julia and Willie about evidence that Adam has a connection with the house. They deny everything. Willie is a panicky mess. He is still upset because of the dream, and the barking of the police tracking hounds outside triggers his memories of the nights when Barnabas’ bloodlust prompted dogs to howl. Julia is able to parry all of the sheriff’s questions and observations, but she is too shaken to produce her usual stream of perfectly plausible lies.

Adam comes to the house. He is hungry, and it is the only place he has ever seen food. The sheriff sees him, threatens to shoot him unless he stops, and opens fire immediately. Adam isn’t killed; in fact, he is so healthy that it takes twenty (20) men to subdue him and take him to gaol.

The sheriff sticks around and tells Julia and Willie that Adam gave them a look of recognition. Julia dismisses that, and the sheriff protests “I’m not a stupid man!” Regular viewers know that he is in fact an utterly stupid man, and that Julia is extraordinarily intelligent. Typically, she wouldn’t need more than five seconds to distract him from whatever was on his mind and get him chasing after an imaginary squirrel. But she is so run down from the ongoing crises that she is reduced to challenging him to “Prove it!”

Episode 502: Some experience with the criminal mind

Yesterday, matriarch Elizabeth Collins Stoddard and her daughter Carolyn were in their drawing room quarreling about some family matters when a strange man stumbled into the house. The man was 6’6″ tall, his face was scarred, he trailed a length of chain from a shackle he wore on one ankle, and could speak only a few words. When Carolyn tuned the radio to an Easy Listening station, the man found that the listening was not at all easy for him. Saying “Not music!,” he smashed the radio. This prompted Liz to threaten him with a letter opener. Frightened, the man clutched at Carolyn. The situation escalated when Liz’ distant cousin Barnabas burst in and pointed a rifle at the man. Finally, the man ran out of the house, carrying Carolyn with him.

Today, Liz is moping in the foyer. Local man Tony Peterson, who had gone on a few dates with Carolyn some months ago, comes to the door. He and Liz discuss the situation. Liz laments the harsh tone she took with Carolyn during their argument. She tells Tony that she supposes there is a generational difference between them. He and Carolyn hide their feelings, while Liz expresses hers. This is an exceedingly strange thing for Liz to say- the whole foundation of her character is denial. In the first months of Dark Shadows, Liz was a central character, and the show was largely a study of that psychological defense mechanism and its consequences. She has moved to the margins of the action since then, but hasn’t changed her personality. Indeed, Liz’ conversation with Carolyn took a harsh turn precisely because she refused to face the unpleasant facts Carolyn was reporting to her.

Tony comforts Liz. Screenshot by Dark Shadows Before I Die.

Liz and Tony go to the Old House on the grounds of Liz’ estate, home to Barnabas. They find Barnabas’ servant Willie on the ground by the front door of that house; the door is open, and Willie is nursing a recent head wound. He confirms that the man had been there and that he was carrying Carolyn in his arms. He says that Carolyn appeared to be unconscious. Tony announces that he will go after them, and Willie tells him he will need a gun. “He’s strong, that Adam,” says Willie.

Liz demands to know why Willie called the man “Adam.” Willie denies that he did. That only irritates Liz, who insists that Willie tell her what he knows about the man. Willie repeats his denial, and says that he is worried about a nightmare. He keeps going on about this topic, to which Liz angrily responds “I don’t want to hear any more about your dream!”

Liz confronts Willie. Screenshot by Dark Shadows Before I Die.

Adam has taken Carolyn to an abandoned root cellar somewhere in the woods. This is a new set. Regular viewers, knowing what a rarity new sets are on a show with this one’s budget, will expect something important to happen there. What happens there today is that Adam and Carolyn struggle to communicate with each other. She asks him what he wants; he manages to say “Kill Barnabas!,” a goal which people who have been watching for the last several weeks will agree he has excellent reasons to pursue. He holds a burning pine cone and is surprised to find that it hurts when the fire reaches his hand; she is startled to find that he didn’t know that, and says that he is like a baby. She tries to leave the root cellar, but he won’t let her get to the door.

Liz spoke for the audience when she said she didn’t want to hear any more about Willie’s dream, but it is dramatized for us anyway. It ends with the image that frightens Willie the most, a wolf’s head. Longtime viewers can well understand why this might be a terrifying symbol to Willie. When Willie first worked for Barnabas, Barnabas habitually beat him with his heavy wooden cane topped with a metal handle in the shape of a wolf’s head. In those days, Barnabas was a vampire, and when he felt bloodlust dogs would howl. As Barnabas’ blood thrall, that sound would therefore tell Willie that either he himself would soon be drained of more blood, or that he would be forced to help Barnabas prey on someone else. So it makes sense that for Willie, terror has a canine face.

Episode 501: You’ve lied your way out of worse situations

Virtually every episode of Dark Shadows begins with one of a handful of still images of the exterior of a mansion in Newport, Rhode Island, known in those days as Seaview Terrace.* Before the series went into production, Dan Curtis took the cast up to Newport and shot some video of them on the grounds of the mansion. In 1966 and the first half of 1967, bits of that footage were occasionally inserted to give the show a more spacious and less static feeling. When they started shooting episodes in color at the end of July 1967, they could no longer use those inserts, and they had neither the time nor the budget to go back to make more.

Now, Dark Shadows uses green screen effects to create the illusion of exterior shots. Twice today, they show us actors in front of the still of Seaview Terrace that most frequently appears at the opening, with foliage hanging next to them to give an illusion of depth. The result isn’t as satisfactory as the location inserts were, but it’s nice to know the makers of the show are trying to broaden their canvas.**

Frankenstein’s monster Adam has escaped from the Old House at Collinwood and finds his way to the principal mansion on the same great estate. There, he stands outside the windows and listens to a conversation in the drawing room between matriarch Liz and her daughter Carolyn. Carolyn tells her mother that she saw Cassandra, Liz’ brother Roger’s new wife, having a romantic moment with local man Tony. Liz’ keynote has always been denial, and true to form she refuses to believe Carolyn. They go on with this until Adam stumbles through the front door and terrifies them.

Adam can only speak a few words. He smiles when he says one of his favorites, “music.” Carolyn turns on a radio we have never seen before and we hear Francois Lai’s theme to the movie “A Man and a Woman,” an instrumental hit of the 1960s which played on the jukebox at the Blue Whale tavern in #307. Adam scowls, declares it “not music,” and smashes the radio. I’ve always had a fondness for the tune, but listening to this arrangement I have to admit he has a point.

Liz reacts to Adam’s violent act by grabbing a letter opener and threatening him. Panicked, he grabs Carolyn. Two more residents of the estate burst in. They are old world gentleman Barnabas Collins, master of the Old House, and Julia Hoffman, permanent houseguest in the great house. Barnabas has a rifle and threatens to shoot Adam if he doesn’t put Carolyn down immediately. Adam flees into the woods, still carrying Carolyn.

Julia stays in the drawing room with Liz. It dawns on Liz that Barnabas must have been hunting Adam. Julia denies this, and Liz asks why Barnabas had a gun. In response, Julia talks very fast and says very little. That gives us a wonderful little scene. It’s always exciting when a brick falls out of the wall Liz built between herself and reality, and Julia is one of the most accomplished liars in drama.

Liz realizes that Barnabas and Julia know more about Adam than they are letting on. Screenshot by Dark Shadows Before I Die.

*A family named Carey bought the place in 1974, so these days it is usually referred to as the Carey mansion.

**The screenshots are from John and Christine Scoleri’s post on their blog Dark Shadows Before I Die.

Episode 500: Ruined another life

Dark Shadows never followed the traditional soap opera pattern of building up through the week to a slam-bang spectacle on Friday. Its one-hundredth week is a case in point. Yesterday was a big event, with two special makeups representing the rapid aging of wicked witch Angelique, a confrontation between heiress Carolyn and lawyer Tony, and the blinding of artist Sam. Today is mostly recapping.

A few minutes of action break up the chatter. Frankenstein’s monster Adam fights with his keeper Willie and breaks out of his cell. Recovering vampire Barnabas and his friend, mad scientist Julia, come in and find Adam hitting Willie. Barnabas orders Adam to stop. He loses his temper and beats Adam with his cane, leading Adam to fight back. This indicates that Barnabas has lost his control over Adam.

Barnabas talks about all the people he has killed and maimed, prompting Julia to feel sorry for him. Screenshot by Dark Shadows Before I Die.

The only moment from this one that stuck with me came when Barnabas was lamenting his role in attracting Angelique’s attention to Sam. While he is talking about all the misery he has brought to people over the centuries, Julia interjects “You’ve suffered too!” When Julia says things like this, my wife and I mimic her and say “You mustn’t blame yourself!” Julia’s misplaced sympathy for Barnabas is the foundation of her character, and it becomes steadily more bizarre as the show progresses.

Episode 498: One step closer to the dream

Sarcastic dandy Roger Collins has remarried. His previous wife, undead blonde witch Laura Murdoch Collins, was Dark Shadows’ first supernatural menace, posing a threat to the life of their son David from #123 until she vanished amid a cloud of smoke in #191. The ghost of gracious lady Josette joined in the battle against Laura. Among other things, Josette compelled artist Sam Evans to paint a series of pictures warning of Laura’s evil plans. Laura responded to those paintings in #145 and #146 by causing a fire that burned Sam’s hands so badly it seemed he might never again be able to paint.

Roger’s new wife is also an undead blonde witch, though she wears a black wig all the time. This wiggéd witch calls herself Cassandra, but is actually Angelique, who in the 1790s killed many of Roger’s ancestors and turned his distant cousin Barnabas into a vampire. Angelique/ Cassandra has returned to the world of the living because Barnabas’ vampirism is now in remission, and she is determined to restore it.

Before he met Angelique/ Cassandra, Roger became obsessed with a portrait of her. Barnabas concludes that this portrait is essential to her power. He orders his servant Willie to steal it from the great house of Collinwood. Barnabas takes the portrait to Sam and commissions him to paint over it so that Angelique will look tremendously old. He doesn’t offer Sam any explanations, but we heard him tell Willie his theory that what happens to the painting will also happen to Angelique. If her likeness is aged to reflect her actual years, then she will vanish from 1968 and be confined to the past. At the end of the episode, Angelique’s hands have aged dramatically, suggesting that Barnabas is correct.

This is David Ford’s first appearance on the show since December, and he had shaved his mustache in the interim. The fake is not up to the makeup department’s usual standards. Screenshot by Dark Shadows Before I Die.

Portraits have been a very prominent part of the visual composition of Dark Shadows from the beginning, and a battlefield on which supernatural combat could be joined for almost as long. So it is hardly surprising that the show would eventually get around to doing a story based on Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray.

It would seem Barnabas has little time to lose. Angelique/ Cassandra has distributed some malware to the minds of the people around Barnabas by means of a dream that one person after another will have. The first dreamer is beckoned into a Haunted House attraction by someone, opens some doors behind which there are scary images, is terrified, and cannot find relief until telling its details to the beckoner. That person then has the dream, changed in only two particulars, the identity of the beckoner and the image behind the final door. When everyone’s brain has been hacked, this worm is supposed to reset Barnabas as a vampire.

Yesterday, David had the dream, and Willie was his beckoner. Today, we open in Barnabas’ house, where Willie is paralyzed with fear. David has already told him the dream, and Willie knows he will have it. With all the previous instances of the dream, the audience had to sit through a highly repetitious dream sequence, then a scene in which the character agonizes about whether to tell the dream to the next person, and finally a speech repeating all the details of the dream. At least this time we skip the second and third of those rehashings.

Since Willie is so close to Barnabas, it seems likely that he will be the last to have the dream before it gets back to Barnabas and makes him a vampire again. So it’s no wonder that Barnabas decides it’s time for the high-stakes gamble of a burglary at Collinwood.

There’s also a scene in Barnabas’ basement. Barnabas’ vampirism is in remission because some mad scientists created a Frankenstein’s monster, whom Barnabas named Adam. They connected Barnabas to Adam in a way that drains the symptoms of the curse from Barnabas without manifesting them in Adam. Barnabas has no idea how to raise any child, let alone a 6’6″ newborn with the strength of several grown men, and so locks him up in the prison cell where he used to keep Sam’s daughter Maggie.

The imprisonment of Maggie was a dreary, unpleasant story, but Adam’s time in the cell is even harder to take. Maggie was established as a strong, intelligent person who knew her way around, she could speak, and she had many friends who cared about her. So we never quite gave up hope that she would get away and be all right in the end. But Adam has none of that. As a result, his scenes in the basement are a tale of extreme child abuse, made all the harder to watch by Robert Rodan’s affecting portrayal of the big guy’s misery.

Moreover, Maggie was a major character, introduced in the first episode and connected to everyone else. It’s unlikely they would kill her off unless the show had been canceled and they were going out with a bang. But only the people holding Adam prisoner know who he is, and Frankenstein’s monsters meet their deaths practically every time they feature in a story.

Worst of all, the show is basically very silly right now. A story about a child locked in a cell from birth can be made bearable only by joining it to some kind of deep insight into the human condition, and there is little prospect that anything like that will crop up among all the witches and vampires and other Halloween paraphernalia. My wife, Mrs Acilius, watched the whole series with me in 2020-2021. She was avidly rewatching it with me this time. But when they took Adam to the cell, she suggested I start watching it on days when I get home from work before she does. I’m sure she isn’t the only Dark Shadows fan who takes a pass on the Adam story.

This is the first episode credited to director Jack Sullivan. Lela Swift and John Sedwick took turns at the helm until #450, when executive producer Dan Curtis tried his hand at directing a week of episodes. Swift and Sedwick then returned to their usual pattern. Sedwick will be leaving in a few weeks; Sullivan, who has been with the show as an associate director since the third week, will be Swift’s alternate until November, and from #553 on will be credited as Sean Dhu Sullivan.

Episode 496: A walking dead man

In the 1790s, wicked witch Angelique turned scion Barnabas Collins into a vampire. When Barnabas realized what she had done to him, he killed Angelique.

In 1967, Barnabas was freed from a long captivity once more to prey upon the living. In 1968, Angelique also returned. Wearing a black wig and calling herself Cassandra, Angelique met sarcastic dandy Roger, ensorcelled him into marrying her, and thereby established herself as a resident of the great house of Collinwood. Wiggéd witch Angelique/ Cassandra found that Barnabas’ vampirism had gone into remission as a result of treatments he had received from mad scientist Eric Lang. She killed Lang before he could complete the process meant to make the cure permanent, but the senior mad scientist in the area, Barnabas’ friend Julia Hoffman, finished his work.

Angelique/ Cassandra and Julia know these facts about each other, but it is unclear how much Angelique/ Cassandra knows about Lang’s process. In particular, when today’s episode begins we do not know whether she has figured out that the main part of it was building a Frankenstein’s monster named Adam and trying to transfer Barnabas’ “life force” into him. Still less do we know whether Angelique/ Cassandra is aware that when Julia took over the experiment she brought Adam to life without killing Barnabas, and that as long as Adam is alive Barnabas will be free of the effects of the vampire curse.

Julia lives at Collinwood as a permanent guest. Today’s episode opens with her and Angelique/ Cassandra coming home, both smiling and chirpy, talking about an exciting conversation they had while they were out together. They had visited Angelique/ Cassandra’s former professor, Timothy Eliot Stokes. Stokes is an expert on paranormal phenomena. In #488 Barnabas told Stokes that Angelique/ Cassandra was a witch and he resolved to join Julia and Barnabas in the battle against her. Julia tells Roger that the exciting conversation she and Angelique/ Cassandra had at Stokes’ home was about the occult.

Considering what these three people know about each other, this conversation would have been fascinating to watch. Julia and Stokes want to probe for Angelique/ Cassandra’s weaknesses; she wants to make sure neither of them has any powers she doesn’t know about, to find out their plans, and if possible to bring them under her influence. Properly written and played by actors as accomplished as Grayson Hall, Lara Parker, and Thayer David, that scene might have been one of the highlights of the whole series. But it doesn’t happen. They just tell us about it in the first 30 seconds of the episode, then move on. It’s one of the major what-ifs of Dark Shadows.

Yesterday Adam escaped from the cell in the basement of Barnabas’ house where he has been confined and met several members of the family who live in the great house. They spend the day recapping that incident. Roger tells Cassandra that Adam seemed to know Barnabas, and she is all ears. It quickly becomes clear that Adam’s existence is news to her, that she is putting everything together, and that Adam is now in grave danger from her.

Angelique/ Cassandra takes in the news Roger has brought her. Screenshot by Dark Shadows Before I Die.

Episode 495: A nice boy

In #134, strange and troubled boy David saw his mother Laura Murdoch Collins for the first time in years. To everyone’s surprise, not least his own, David reacted to Laura with terror. It turned out that he had good reason for this reaction, as Laura was actually an undead blonde fire witch come to lure him to his own death.

In #489, David learned that his father Roger had remarried. Like everyone else in the great house of Collinwood, David was stunned to learn that Roger had known his new wife for less than a day before he married her. Unlike the others, his speechless reaction prompted Roger to jump to the conclusion that he disliked his new stepmother. Roger scolded David and sent him to play outside until he could come back and be charming.

While outside, David had stumbled upon the new Mrs Collins kissing a man other than her husband. Later, he found her alone in the drawing room, told her what he had seen, and informed her that he would tell his father about it.

Roger’s new wife wears a black wig and calls herself Cassandra. What the audience knows, but neither Roger nor David do, is that she is actually an undead blonde witch. Roger does have a type.

The new Mrs Collins’ real name is Angelique. She has come to 1968 from the late eighteenth century to resume her punishment of Barnabas Collins, whom she turned into a vampire in their time, but who has now been freed from the symptoms of the curse. When David told Angelique/ Cassandra that he would report her misconduct to Roger, she used her magic powers to strike him dumb. When his muteness became inconvenient for her in #492, she cast another spell to erase his memory and restore his speech. To execute this spell, she took fire from the hearth and spoke words to David that caused him to drift into a trance. We remember #140, when Laura urged David to stare into the flames of this same hearth while she told the story of the Phoenix, causing him to drift into a trance. From that point on, he liked his mother very much.

Today, David meets Roger in the foyer of Collinwood. He tells his father that Angelique/ Cassandra took him into town, where she bought him a Swiss army knife. He says she would have bought him anything he wanted. Thus we learn that, though she is a wicked witch (as well as a wigged one,) Angelique/ Cassandra is in some ways a typical step-parent. When Roger says he is glad to see that David now likes Angelique/ Cassandra, David is mystified. As far as he can recall, he always liked her.

Roger sends David to answer a knock at the door. It is their distant cousin Barnabas. This is the first time we have seen David and Barnabas together since #333, when David barely escaped with his life after Barnabas caught him looking at his coffin. David now greets him quite calmly.

David leaves. In the foyer, Roger scolds Barnabas for his rudeness to Angelique/ Cassandra. Barnabas could hardly be expected to fail to recognize his old nemesis, but he has indeed shown an extreme lack of prudence in his uninhibited talks with her. Not only has he created unpleasant scenes to which Roger is bound to object, but he has also let Angelique/ Cassandra know exactly what he does and does not know about her.

Roger says that if Barnabas cannot be friendly to Angelique/ Cassandra, he shouldn’t come to the great house anymore. Barnabas asks if Roger shouldn’t ask his sister Liz, who after all owns the house, what she thinks. Roger says that will be unnecessary, since Liz has even less tolerance for rude behavior than he does. Barnabas is promising to do better when Liz runs in, frightened by a tall man she met on the grounds. Liz told the man he was on private property and directed him to leave. The man said nothing at all in response to this challenge or to her subsequent questions. He stood still and appeared to be mute until he spoke Barnabas’ name. Liz ran from him when she saw that he had a shackle attached to his leg. Roger flies into a panic, assuming that a shackled man must be dangerous and remembering that David is alone in the woods. He gets his gun, and rushes out. Barnabas accompanies him.

In the woods, David is playing Mumblety-Peg with his new knife. The tall man shows up; when David finds that the man cannot talk, he says that he is glad. He says that he often wishes no one could talk. He goes on at considerable length about the disadvantages that come with the ability to speak. He then explains to the man that you play Mumblety-Peg by dropping the knife into the ground so that it sticks there. The man becomes excited and grabs the knife. David objects and demands he return it. They struggle; David falls and hurts his ankle. David grumbles that all the man had to do was give him his knife back. The man looks alarmed and picks David up. David doesn’t like that one bit, and insists he be put down.

David’s shouting brings Roger and Barnabas. Roger points his gun at the man and orders him to put David down. When the man does not move, Barnabas tells Roger not to shoot. David, in the line of fire, seconds this recommendation. Barnabas talks to the man in a soothing voice, gesturing towards the ground, and the man does set David down. David runs to Barnabas and gives him a hug.

This is the second time David has run into Barnabas’ arms. The first was in #315. David had been trapped in the hidden chamber in the old Collins family mausoleum, where Barnabas was confined in his coffin from the 1790s until 1967. Barnabas learned that David was there, suspected he might have deduced his secret, and decided to kill him. David got out of the chamber just as Barnabas was approaching it, and ran from it directly to him. He had not in fact figured out Barnabas’ secret while in the hidden chamber, but Barnabas’ behavior in the minute before someone else came along was menacing enough that David caught on that he had sinister plans for him. For the next ten weeks, his fear of Barnabas would deepen, leading him to discover the whole horrible truth about his distant relative. All that is forgotten now, evidently.

Roger jumps to the conclusion that the tall man had “tried to kill David!” He shoots him in the shoulder and runs after him with his gun, over Barnabas’ objections. Roger had been quite unconcerned with David’s well-being throughout the first year of the show. In the first months, he openly hated the boy and continually tried to persuade Liz to send him off to an institution; in #83, he coldly manipulated David into attempting to murder someone who posed a problem for him; even after other characters had begun to realize that Laura was a deadly threat to David, Roger continued to press eagerly for her to get full custody of him and take him away; and in #313, when David was trapped in the mausoleum, Roger could barely be bothered to take part in the search. Roger’s behavior will therefore be less likely to suggest to regular viewers that he is overcome with paternal feeling than that he is a panicky fool who is much too excited about an opportunity to shoot someone.

The tall man is Adam, a Frankenstein’s monster created in the procedure that caused Barnabas’ vampirism to go into remission. Though he is 6’6″, Adam is only a couple of weeks old, effectively a baby. Barnabas has been keeping him in his basement, chained to the wall in the prison cell he maintains for those times when he has abducted a pretty girl and has to keep her from running away. The opening voiceover tells us that “no man has suffered more” than Barnabas, just as we cut to Adam, despondent in his shackles. Barnabas comes in to give Adam a cup of broth and a couple of minutes of rigidly formal social interaction, then leaves him alone again. Somehow this sequence makes it difficult to sympathize as deeply with Barnabas as the narration would have us do.