Discuss - Ep #0467

[Watching Project]

Robservations #467

And if you'd care to look back, the first WP discussion topic for this ep:

Re: Discuss - Ep #0467

[MagnusTrask]

The entire Lang/Barnabas scene was drastically rewritten and restaged, so as to make it much shorter for the redo.   Maybe both Lang and Barnabas from the future jumped into their 1968 bodies via I Ching, so as to change how the meeting played out...

I don't agree at all with a remark from yesterday's thread, about Barnabas being a "screamer".   Each and every one of us is a "screamer", given pain or shock that's enormous enough.

An image of Liz looking like Naomi is edited in during Roger/Joshua's rant scene toward her, showing a larger budget for the show I guess.

This may be the third time I've seen these episodes, in adulthood anyway.  I don't remember my childhood viewings like most others here do.   My impression last time was that Roger was channelling Angelique herself in the hospital, but all along, he might have been himself but as a slave to Ang.   Anyway, I wrote in my notes:  "Today, the part of Angelique will be played by Louis Edmonds!"   In the hospital, I get the sense that LE was playing a woman.

[dom]

Hopefully last episode was a Friday cliffhanger because the weekend would have given us time not to notice Barn’s new wardrobe in the reenactment. Barn’s got a new best friend, eh? Stupid Barnabas. Well, at least he knows it’s Angelique messing with Lang – that’s a definite improvement over the typical build to a character’s realization the writers can make us endure. Ange is casting spells on/controlling Roger from the great beyond. But Roger is able to retain a modicum of self-will – I’ll do anything for love, but I won’t do that!

After thoughts: I hope Lang’s stay is a relatively short one. I concentrate too much on my dislike of the character and Powell’s acting style and my mind starts wander. I’ve gotten so used to (liking) Joshua that I am now having trouble liking Roger. Lang’s praise of Julia to Barn made me feel as if we are seeing the very beginnings of the Julia/Barnabas alliance – like the writers are planting the seed.

[MagnusTrask]

A few minutes ago, I had the thought that Barnabas is trying hard to stay evil, but the writers and the direction of the storyline are pressing him too hard to soften up.   I wonder if some of us feel that way in real life, wanting to be one way, but we can't resist the tide of events forcing us in the opposite direction.

I'm surprised you ever liked Roger, dom.  He always struck me as an upper class snob, who's being presented to us as "okay" by the writers, but who I always suspected would walk by a homeless guy on the street without giving a nickel, but giving a snide remark.  Maybe that's my politics showing through, but I felt that way as a child.

I like Roger as a character now, but only because of my having seen 1966, in 2011 for the first time.  I don't "like" or respect him, but think he's a good and enjoyable character.   And of course L Edmonds is great, playing him.   Now with the WP, seeing him in '67 and '68, Roger makes sense to me, which he never did until I saw 1966.   No matter how pleasant he's being, there's a scoundrel underneath it all, though tamed and somewhat reformed.

[DarkLady]

Dr. Lang has ordered up a perfect day for his patient: The sun is shining, the birds are singing, a leafy tree is almost close enough for Barnabas to touch. Kudos to JF for a wonderful performance.

Roger thinks he's Joshua and that Elizabeth is Naomi (once again in a beautiful gown). "Joshua" tells "Naomi," In all the time we’ve been married, I’ve never laid a hand on you [I suppose he means in anger, since they did somehow conceive Barnabas and Sarah], but-- Elizabeth is confused at first but finally gets fed up and slaps him. Roger comes back to himself. Do you have any idea what you were saying? Elizabeth asks. I don’t remember saying anything at all, he answers in bewilderment. He admits, Sometimes I hear the woman in the portrait speaking to me.

Funny to see Lang's old-fashioned reflector with a leather headband! I remember doctors actually wearing them.

Barnabas warns Lang about the danger from Angelique, but Lang is too full of himself to listen. Meanwhile, the fire in the drawing room at Collinwood is burning especially brightly….

[alwaysdavid]

Roger continues to stare at the painting and acting in a weird manner.  The painting is not all that. Thanks DL for naming the instrument. I could not remember what what they were called.  Lange has an extreme headache and then it's over. Barnabas suspects Angelique. I guess 200 years gave him time to think about her shennanigans and think that she may the one doing all the unexplained.