DARK SHADOWS FORUMS
General Discussions => Current Talk Archive => Current Talk '24 I => Current Talk '15 I => Topic started by: Cousin_Barnabas on June 24, 2015, 07:32:47 AM
-
I never realized until Depp Shadows that Victoria had been arriving at Collinwood in October ever since the original series.
In Depp Shadows, Willie explains that it is October, and that is why there are pumpkins.
In the WB pilot, the night Victoria arrives is Halloween. (Thanks to MB for the script!)
In the 1991 series, the pilot script references the month as October. (Again, thank you, MB, for the script!)
And, finally, in the original DS novelization, the author references October as the month Victoria arrives in Collinsport.
Is this mentioned anywhere in Shadows on the Wall or the original script for the pilot? Marilyn Ross could simply have made it up, but with every project since referencing October, it would seem to have greater precedent than just the novels.
-
Interesting. I don't recall the time of year, or the month, ever being mentioned, but that would explain why Vicki runs around in a trench coat all the time in what I had always thought was late June/early July.
G.
-
In Shadows on the Wall, Vicki arrives (by bus!) on a stormy October night.
-
Since the series was suppose to be aligned with current dates, Victoria arrived in late June (the 27th, to be exact).
Gerard
-
In Shadows on the Wall, Vicki arrives (by bus!) on a stormy October night.
Thanks for the info, Midnite! I guess the precedent was indeed set at the very beginning of the series.
Since the series was suppose to be aligned with current dates, Victoria arrived in late June (the 27th, to be exact).
What in the series indicates this, though?
-
There are quite a few episodes that reference dates through various methods, such as newspapers, etc., having the date coincide with the one on which the episode initially aired.
Gerard
-
There are quite a few episodes that reference dates through various methods, such as newspapers, etc., having the date coincide with the one on which the episode initially aired.
I shall have to look for this.
But even if the dates of the newspapers are current to the airdates, it doesn't explain for all of the time lost due to several episodes taking place over the course of a single day. I think the story of Victoria's arrival takes place over only a couple dozen days, but in reality is many months in terms of airdates. On my next viewing, I will have to look and see if any of the Art Wallace episodes indicate a calendar month.
Interesting. I don't recall the time of year, or the month, ever being mentioned, but that would explain why Vicki runs around in a trench coat all the time in what I had always thought was late June/early July.
This is my thinking exactly! haha
-
the book 'dark shadows. the first year' does a breakdown of each show "day" during the first year...
given the snail's pace it moved during that period it wasn't a lot of "days". the "night" of Victoria's arrival in Collinsport lasted a week. her first full, action packed "day" lasted a staggering sixteen episodes. the entire bleeder valve/car crash incident occurs on that one "day" even though it was actually three full weeks of episodes. that mystery was solved on "day three".
all in all only 52 "days" passed until a certain "cousin from England" shows up at the front door.
-
in other words Vicki's first 24 hours at Collinwood occupied over a month's worth of episodes. [ghost_rolleyes]
-
Very interesting, Michael. I shall have to take a look at this book when I have the chance!
-
She arrived 49 years ago on June 27, 1966, and nothing has ever been the same since.
Happy Anniversary DS!
G.
-
Having episodes coincide with air dates, when some episodes cover just one day, has always been a problem with all soaps. They deal with it by ignoring it. On an episode of The Golden Girls, Blanche makes reference to the daily comic-strip soap-opera Apartment 3-G. Dorothy states she hadn't read it since 1961. Blanche replies: "Well let me get you caught up with today's strip. It's later that same day..."
Gerard
-
Soap time is usually vastly different than real time. It's not uncommon for a kid to be aged from a toddler to high school/college age in a handful of episodes. Conversely, I recall some poor woman. (on Days of Our Lives, I think) who was pregnant for about 18 months.
-
Vicki runs around in a trench coat all the time in what I had always thought was late June/early July.
Though as I've sometimes said, when it comes to the weather in New England, especially at the coast, there are times when I'd never question someone wearing a trench coat in late June/early July. And one of those times is today because it's an overcast 64 degrees outside! (And it's only 66 inside my house - so I'd never question a fire in the fireplace, either! [ghost_nowink])
-
It's a chilly grey day here too. I should have been spending the day watching Dark Shadows, but instead, stupidly, I have been cleaning the living room and getting rid of stuff.
I keep having to put the blankets on my bed away, then get them out again... New England weather!
G.
-
And don't forget that sometimes it was the dead of winter and characters would run around outside in sleeveless dresses. Soap opera time, even though it's suppose to coincide with our own, regardless of the show, always has weird parallel-time going on. As Uncle Roger pointed out, children age rapidly but pregnancies can last longer than an elephant's and other such sundry time-passage stuff. It has to do with the story and plots. On I Love Lucy, Little Ricky aged normally for the first years (yes, I know it's not a soap). However, when the Ricardos and Mertzes went to Europe, he was three and in nursery school. When they returned, he was almost six and a first-grader. DS was great at just ignoring the passage of time. When Vicki went to 1795/96, it was 1967. In current time she was gone for just a few minutes but when she popped back it was 1968. The writers didn't face that problem with having Barnabas (and Julia) travelling back to 1897; the plot coincided it day-by-day when it moved from past to present. Parallel time did the same thing. The 1840/41 plot did provide a coinciding problem when Barnabas, Julia and Eliot returned to the present, but some sloppy covering of it by having Elizabeth ask them (paraphrasing): "Where have you been?" tried to keep the monkey-wrench out of the works.
Gerard
-
I'm somewhat ashamed to admit I still watch one of the few remaining daily soaps. 'the bold & the beautiful'...
like DS and in typical soap fashion a single show "day" can last for weeks. however unlike DS they have a special Thanksgiving and Christmas episode every year. on the Thanksgiving show the entire cast gathers at the home of one character for dinner. on the Christmas show they all volunteer at a homeless shelter.
the get around the continuity bugaboo by making these "stand alone episodes" that can get inserted into the week on the correct day but doesn't really effect the overall progression of any of the storylines. the actors are "in character" but for the purposes of those episodes characters that normally cannot stand each other "put their differences aside" for the day and focus on their good works or the "spirit of the holiday". so regardless of what's happening with the plot they can produce these episodes and acknowledge the holidays without really throwing anything out of whack.
there's no "cliffhanger" and the next day they can all go back to lying to, hating and backstabbing each other.
-
there's no "cliffhanger" and the next day they can all go back to lying to, hating and backstabbing each other.
Michael, I hate to correct you, but that's not The Bold and the Beautiful that you're watching. It's Congress on C-Span.
Gerard
-
[ghost_grin] [ghost_grin] [ghost_grin]
-
I've seen 1966 about 3 times now. I got it in 2011... What struck me was how the first months were devoted to covering the space of the first few days Vicki and Burke were in town. I wondered when and how they were going to break out of that, and have time flow fairly normally. They did, but I forget how. I think part of it involved just pretending that Vicki and Burke had been there "forever", for months, instead of still being new arrivals. That feels right for the casual viewer's who's been watching for months, but weird if you've been paying close attention to when each fictional day started and ended, as I was this last time around. They'd stay on day one or two or three forever, and it seemed as if they'd never move on to the next day, sometimes.