Did we just see 1795 version 2? / was Re: Discuss - Ep #0268

[Lydia]

Is it possible that Barnabas, in 1967 and 1795 the "first time around" (without V Winters there) didn't know Ang was a witch?   That might be enough to explain the inconsistent history from BC, and bitterness toward Jeremiah.

Definitely off-topic for this episode, but I've got to answer, because I absolutely adore this theory.  When I read it, my head practically exploded with joy.

Just one problem: it can't be true.  [spoiler]Sarah said: "I'm going to tell you what happened."  Therefore...[/spoiler]  Vicky's presence changed nothing.  [spoiler]I do wonder, however, exactly what evidence was presented at Phyllis Wick's trial, given that Phyllis didn't have the Collins Family History to incriminate her.[/spoiler]

[MagnusTrask]

... I absolutely adore this theory.  When I read it, my head practically exploded with joy.

Just one problem: it can't be true.  [spoiler]Sarah said: "I'm going to tell you what happened."  Therefore...[/spoiler]  Vicky's presence changed nothing.  [spoiler]I do wonder, however, exactly what evidence was presented at Phyllis Wick's trial, given that Phyllis didn't have the Collins Family History to incriminate her.[/spoiler]

First, Sarah saying "I'm going to tell you what happened" is a missing piece I've wanted and needed for some time now, to help explain what was happening with that seance and why.   Where does she say this exactly?   (Episode numbers don't help me since I'm watching on tape.  Pivotal events do.)

Despite everything Sarah can do, she remains a naive little girl.   This shows in everything she says and does in 1967.    She doesn't even seem to know completely what she is sometimes.     So, she wants very much to show Victoria (I'll always remember her as that, and didn't remember everyone called her 'Vicki" when I got the VHS... I prefer Victoria) how it all happened, if she said what you say she said, to explain Barnabas so that they all can deal with him presumably, perhaps stopping him without destroying him....

But Sarah doesn't realize that by popping VW back to 1795 in the only way she could think of, in the place of her governess that V probably reminded Sarah of (probably just that impulsive a decision), the history she wanted to show Vicki and everyone else in 1967 through Vicki I suppose, would be changed.  If a 1967 audience was unsophisticated as regards time-travel explanations, imagine how naive an eight-year-old from the 18th century must be.    "Change" history?  What do you mean?

Or.... Sarah was trying to change things in 1795 because they went so badly.    Maybe Barnabas wouldn't turn out this way, and he wouldn't be trying to kill people.    It seems irresponsible to send V back in the place of a governess who was going to die for being a witch, but as an eight-year-old (and on TV they always wrote child characters younger than their actual ages), perhaps she thought that Victoria was a wise grown up and would fix everyhting.    Kids are supposed to trust grown-ups and teachers and sometimes actually do.    Sybil Goolie or whatever the original governess's name was may not have been as good a govewrness as Vicki.    Sarah may have thought she was saving her very nice (presumably they got along and were close) original governess by simply popping her into a safe comfortable Drawing Room and better century.....and sending the smarter teacher/mommy (that's what a governess is, right?) back to fix everything.

I wonder who's going to clean up the mess if your head explodes again.

[Joeytrom]

At the seance, Sarah says "To tell the story, the story of how it all began" and then she begins talking through Vicky.

In the original 1795, with Abigail there, I can see her accusing Phyllis Wick, the newcomer, for all the tragedies happening and still calling on Reverand Trask to excercize the evil in the house.  Angelique would still have helped the accusations against Phyllis as she did with Vicky.  I think 1795-2 was the same only with Vicky instead of Phyllis there.

[spoiler]when Vicky returns to the present, she & Liz are at Peters grave and she tells Liz that she refuses to believe that she just took Phyllis' place and that originally Peter couldn't have fallen in love with Phyllis as he did with Vicky. Thing is that is exaclty what must have happened and she is in denial about it.[/spoiler]

PS- where is the tread on the various 1795/1796 time travels somone once wrote where each visit resulted in a parallel 1795?

[Midnite]

At the seance, Sarah says "To tell the story, the story of how it all began" and then she begins talking through Vicky.

Yes, Magnus, it occurs only moments before Vicki disappears into the past.

In the original 1795, with Abigail there, I can see her accusing Phyllis Wick, the newcomer, for all the tragedies happening and still calling on Reverand Trask to excercize the evil in the house.  Angelique would still have helped the accusations against Phyllis as she did with Vicky.  I think 1795-2 was the same only with Vicky instead of Phyllis there-

I can see Angelique framing Phyllis in the original too.

where is the tread on the various 1795/1796 time travels somone once wrote where each visit resulted in a parallel 1795?

If you mean the one with Dr. Eric Lang's diagrams:

Time Paradoxes--1795 & 1897!

If not, hmm, it's not coming to me right now.

[Lydia]

Magnus, here's the link to the relevant Robservation:

I was looking at it because I wanted to know why Sarah wanted to tell the tale, anyway.  I'm still not too clear on it.  Apparently she was talking about telling it to David, who wasn't there, but it was Vicky whom she sent back into the past, even though she had never met Vicky, if I remember correctly.  Perhaps she thought that Vicky, as David's governess (but how did Sarah know that?), would pass the story along to David.  Or perhaps Barnabas's subconscious was involved somehow.

And how did Sarah pull off the time-travel thing, anyway?  She never came across as powerful.  Maybe she messed up a bit, and Magnus is right: the story as we saw it was not what originally happened.

As for Phyllis: yes, she could have been easily framed, but it would have had to be done differently, and that would have changed things - I think.  Surely Phyllis had references?

I wonder who's going to clean up the mess if your head explodes again.

To repeat: my head did not  explode - but (to quote the Duke of Wellington on the subject of the Battle of Waterloo) it was the nearest run thing you ever saw.  And if my head did explode, my house is such a mess that nobody would notice.

[MagnusTrask]

Your apartment and Waterloo would have the same decorator.

I think Sarah is not all-knowing or all-powerful, but she can observe everything that everyone is doing, without having to appear.    She sees all, being a ghost, but doesn't understand very much of it, being an eight-year-old girl.    She has probably gotten to know everyone at the estate in her own limited way.

I was disappointed with how the time-travel methods became more preposterous as they kept going back to 1795.     Sarah's seance seems far-fetched, but it was solid compared to [spoiler]ex-vampires and college professors just doing it by force of will, whatever that means.   Or profs telling others to do it that way.    Witches, okay, I guess.    Or slingshotting around the Sun.   In a space coffin.[/spoiler]

I've been thinking about Sarah, and how we get to think about what childhood is, watching her.     She's perpetually 8, but old, dealing with large mystifying issues problems and phenomena.... she gets as much of a handle on it as she can, but her understanding can never grow because she's stuck at 8.... she doesn't quite understand what she is or why the grownups went away, after 175 years.... she knows right and wrong and is powerful but naive...

That eternal unchanging incorruptible innocence coming back to confront the gnarled bitter murderous maniac Barnabas is, is one of the most important things about DS.    It's not just extremely touching; it's what we all must struggle with (consciously or unconsciously), put in extreme terms, so we can see it sharply and clearly.

We're not all fiends, but we all drift in a certain direction after years of what we like to think is personal evolution but which is often conditioning and unintentional cynicism from a job routine, moral compromises we get used to and have to rationalize; we alter our expectations of ourselves with time.... what if our child self were to turn up one day when we're fifty or sixty, and we found he/she had purer morals or qualities we didn't realize we'd lost?   All the decades would seem to collapse, and we'd be shocked and aware of all the moral drift over a lifetime.

I'm thinking of a story I left off on in 2000, and if I could figure this out I could put something about a child character into it, based on what Sarah gets me thinking about.   If only I didn't have new carpet fumes in the building giving me nervous system disfunction, and if I could only sleep... my brain might start getting it done.