Up to episode 91

[arashi]

Just some thoughts on the recent episodes I've been watching...........

What do we do with a drunken sailor - of course Bill's favorite song would be royalty free like London Bridge. Let's beat the audience over the head with it! I love all the ghost talk. Foreshadowing events they never even dreamed they were going to try and pull off. David mentioned another girl ghost whose name he didn't know, Sarah perhaps?

David is a little monster, I'm surprised he didn't grow up to be a serial killer. He murders animals, plays funeral and is obsessed with murder. The kid is FUH-REAKY. He basically locked Vicki in that room to die and everyone's response was "Oh, that was naughty!" Given the kid's past behavior I'd be sending him to a psychologist.

Too bad David Henesy decided to bow out of acting, even as a kid he had some serious talent.

Carolyn is a complete and utter bitch. What a spoiled little snot she is. I want to climb into the TV and sock her one. Her jealousy of Burke's attention to Vicki is making it very hard for me to like her. I'm glad this aspect of her personality is humbled later on. Especially in the scene I just watched where after bringing up Bill Malloy's ghost, something she knew Burke would be interested in hearing about, she threw a tantrum because Burke decided to drive Vicki to Bangor so he could question her about it. I don't know if she likes setting herself up to get angry for attention or what. I loved when Liz told her that "Her world was falling apart because she found the world didn't revolve around Carolyn Stoddard." and she (Liz) was glad.

Oh my God, the damn PEN! After that spate of episodes where it was all anyone talked about will it ever be brought up again?

Roger has been running around acting ridiculously suspicious about EVERYTHING. [spoiler]He didn't have anything to do with Bill Malloy's murder, so why he acts as if he has so much to hide is insane. Granted I know he's trying to cover up his actual role in the manslaughter case with Burke those 15 years ago (or whatever), but still. And speaking of that what possible evidence was he going to present at that meeting? There's a lot of things he could put forth in theory, but not prove.[/spoiler]

[buzz]

They softened up all the characters later, didn't they? Neither David, Carolyn or Roger have many redeeming traits early on. I was surprised when I first watched these episodes for the first time how nasty they were, since I first started watching DS in its original run sometime after Barnabas appeared. I guess Roger was the worst of the lot in many respects, but this aspect of his personality was glossed over in later years. 

[dom]

I believe Roger was scheduled to be killed off in the pre-airing show synopsis. Perhaps he was written so despicably so that everyone who would eventually be watching the series would cheer his death. Of course that all changed. Much like the 13 week Barnabas character - so villainous! I kept thinking, "There's no way he is going to be able to get out of this. How can this be?".

I too started watching DS after Barn's arrival. I started well into 1897. I was shocked at how nasty many of the characters had started off (including Barn & Quentin). It was a great experience, though. Like watching a whole other show. Kept my eyes glued to the screen.

Never really cared for the present day characters until I saw them from the beginning. Now most of them are my faves.

[buzz]

Coming in a bit later I never know how nasty Willie was originally, nor the relationship between Carolyn with Burke and Joe. Watching these episodes in order now one gets a better understanding of continuity since these incidents were referenced from time to time. Vikki going to the past and being frightened by Ben, who she calls Matthew Morgan (who?) makes a lot more sense to me now! 

[arashi]

It's surprising how venomous most of the characters are in the beginning. It's pretty cut-throat.

I actually took a break from watching the pre-B episodes as I thought they were getting a bit tedious (damn that pen!). If it's a slow week at work I should bring in some episodes to help pass the time.

[michael c]

i recently completed the 1969 "present day" episodes and had to make a choice...

did i want to continue on to the 1897 storyline or do something else.having watched 1897 relatively recently i decided to go back to the beginning and watch the 1966 episodes.i haven't watched these episodes in their entirely since i first watched them about seven years ago.

so i'm sort of with you arashi.

personally i adore the pen plot.in some ways it's more surreal that what comes later on.in a program that will come to be defined by vampires,time travel and parallel worlds a major storyline focused on something as ordinary as a fountain pen(be it as it may a gorgeous and rare silver filigreed fountain pen!)is pretty far out if you think about it.

in retrospect these episodes take on a flavor all their own.

it's true that the original characters were much more well defined and,in many cases,quite nasty early on.later on they become more neutral,in effect "blank slates",for the supernatural storylines to be projected onto.

[arashi]

Good point, mscbryk. It is kind of amazing all this hubbub over a fountain pen!

I still don't get Roger's deal.

It is nice to see the original cast getting something to do, storylines of their own, personalities!

[michael c]

whenever i watch these episodes one character i find endlessly entertaining is maggie evans.

later on she becomes something of a generic d.s. ingenue but here she's such a tough-talking little cookie.and a gossip to boot!

she's something of the proverbial "working girl with the heart of gold" or the "good girl fron the wrong side of the tracks".

she's a nice alternative from the high-strung carolyn and the virginal vicki.

[Mysterious Benefactor]

The characters were nicely differentiated during the Art Wallace period. Sadly, later...

[michael c]

speaking of art wallace...

i read in "the first year" that wallace left the program after only 13 weeks into it's run.
so it's somewhat remarkable that he continued to get a credit thoughout the show's run.
especially given how far removed the series became from wallace's original vision and so many of "his" characters had departed eventually.

i was even more surprised that he was given an opening credit in the 1991 revival series given that that version had virtually nothing to do with any of wallace's concepts(minus the bit with vicki on the train).

and speaking of maggie evans...

that perky and somewhat annoying girl on the "progressive car insurance" ads sort of reminds me of mags.

[Mysterious Benefactor]

speaking of art wallace...

i read in "the first year" that wallace left the program after only 13 weeks into it's run.

If the book says that, then whoever wrote it has no idea what they're talking about. Wallace was still writing scripts through Ep #85, and he continued as head writer through the intro of Barnabas. Maybe the writer got confused by the fact that Wallace wrote all the scripts up to Ep #40, and then he alternated with Francis Swann. 

so it's somewhat remarkable that he continued to get a credit thoughout the show's run.
especially given how far removed the series became from wallace's original vision and so many of "his" characters had departed eventually.

i was even more surprised that he was given an opening credit in the 1991 revival series given that that version had virtually nothing to do with any of wallace's concepts(minus the bit with vicki on the train).

So long as any of the characters Wallace created are used, his original contract guarantees Wallace a credit thanks to a lawsuit Wallace won against DC.

[michael c]

oh oh!

i think we might have yet another case of d.s. "false memory syndrome" here.

because the person in question certainly does know what he's talking about...it's writer ron sproat who penned the foreward to this book.

he says he came onto the show thirteen weeks into it's run "after wallace had left" and that he had had a hard time connecting with the material wallace had "left behind" concerning the intrigue at the cannery.

perhaps he just doesn't recall that wallace was still around for several months.

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Hmmm - Ron Sproat isn't credited with a script until Ep #94. It certainly seems odd that he could have been working on the show for 6 weeks before he wrote a script - especially given how tight DC was when it came to the money. To have paid Sproat for that length of time to get up to speed seems way out of character for DC. WAY OUT OF CHARACTER!    For example, Francis Swann was already writing scripts almost as soon as Wallace brought him on board.

As for Wallace, there are a few interviews with him and with Robert Costello in which it's made clear that Wallace was around nearly the whole first year of DS. My favorite Wallace interview was published in the DS Files series of books back in the '80s - and in that one it's also confirmed that he was around for the creation of Barnabas.

[Gothick]

MB, I also read Art Wallace's interview in the old DS Files book (which I don't think I own any longer--moving multiple times over the years is tough on a personal library), and I was very surprised when I saw Malcolm Marmorstein's interview on one of the DS: the Beginning DVD sets recently, and Marmorstein actually claimed credit for inventing the character of Barnabas!  If I recall correctly, Art Wallace also claims credit for inventing the character in that old interview, and then there's the story of Bob Costello finding the name of Barnabas on a tombstone in an old cemetery.  In the newer Malcolm Marmorstein interview, he says that he chose the name Barnabas from a list of names he found in a book, and he ran it by Costello, who then supposedly spotted that tombstone somewhere.

The continuing revision of the early history is almost as intriguing as some of the original storylines...

G.

[Mysterious Benefactor]

And as with the actors, the further away the stories are related from the actual time the events took place, the more (to put it politely) questionable the memories become.    And one doesn't have to read too far into some of the latter writers' remarks to realize that to this day they're still in some sort of weird competition with Wallace for who wrote the show better. In particular, Sproat and Hall seem unwilling to give Wallace any credit whatsoever for his contributions to DS, and their disdain for him is often palpable (but then, when it comes to Marmorstein, Hall hated his writing as well). Funny how back in '75 the US courts saw Wallace's contributions very differently...