Discuss - Ep #0365

[Watching Project]

Robservations - #365

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

Re: Discuss - Ep #0365

[DarkLady]

The séance! THE séance!!!

I had forgotten that it happened immediately after Barnabas saw Sarah.

Magic time! Vicki becomes Sarah's medium (nice job by AM, too). Barnabas’s alarm increases as Sarah slips back to 1795. I wonder when my new nursemaid will arrive, she says. I hope she'll look like the picture I drew. She asks, Barnabas, will you still love me after you marry Josette? [Everyone--especially Barnabas--starts at this seeming contradiction to the family history. ] Why are you appearing to David? someone asks. She replies, I came to tell him the story of how it all began. But poor Sarah is afraid of the dark, it seems.

The big switcheroo finally happens as the present-day Collinses are confronted by the very confused Phyllis Wick--and the even more confused Vicki finds herself standing not far from the Old House, which she can see through the trees. It looks strangely different to her, and she suddenly realizes that it is-- new. Frightened and bewildered, she calls out, Where am I?

[DarkLady]

One last, telling detail: The suddenly commanding Roger questions Phyllis. She replies, My name is Phyllis Wick. I was engaged by the solicitor in Boston, and I am ready to report to Mrs. Naomi Collins. I’m to be the nursemaid to a nine-year-old girl named Sarah. The others are astounded to hear her mention “Mrs. Collins.” No such person exists in 1968. Barnabas stands behind her, speechless and immobilized with shock. He is the only person present who has any idea of what has actually happened--and he can't tell anyone.

[MagnusTrask]

Wouldn't it have been good if they'd held off on converting to color until gets to 1795?

[DarkLady]

Maybe, MT--but then we would have missed the hideous yellow of Elizabeth's caftan.

The (I think) final shot of Vicki standing near the amazingly new-looking Old House is pretty spiffy. The colors look very bright and fresh, at least in the Robservations thread.

[dom]

I don’t get where Julia is coming from in this episode? I felt that she & Barnabas came to a finite understanding yesterday. Now she’s going for broke? I feel that Julia suggesting a séance is off the wall. Why does she want to contact Sarah, defend David, etc.? Is it that Barn told her he cares very little for her? SFW? This would be the perfect time for her to leave town – Barn implied that he was going to leave Julia alone to appease Sarah. I just don’t get it? Is this all for David’s sake? Is Barn not part of the equation? Julia definitely has something to lose – has she had enough and cares not about being exposed?

I love Liz in this episode. She is so authoritative and defiant, even calling Barnabas on to the carpet for his callous attitude. Also, I very much enjoyed the levity provided pretty much solely by Roger. Julia smiles at Roger's comment, "I'm at my worst with ritual."

Had to thrill at Sarah via Vicki calling Carolyn a liar. I expected a lot more from Barnabas under the circumstances. He really didn’t show any reaction except to freeze. I am wondering if Phyllis Wick ever made it to the Old House or if she died in the carriage accident? Should Barn even know her or be aware of her?

And away we go!

Love Dorrie Kavanaugh’s voice & her character’s hair (lol) and overall 'look'. I'll have to look her up on-line. I always picture Robin Strasser in the role once I forget what DK looks like. I can’t imagine what I’d think if I saw this as a kid watching back in ’67. I might have ended the episode then and there, not showing Vicki in the woods asking, “Where am I?” but whatever. Either way it’s a great Friday cliffhanger.

I am dying to know if that’s what the Spratt Mansion looked like when the location scout found it or if they spruced it up for still shots, and if they spruced it up specifically for 1795 or if they did it for general purposes before the series started. I’m pretty sure that the photo shoot of “Barn” at the “Old House” shows it to be in disrepair, peeling and chipped paint on the columns, etc. I love the spruced up shot of the Old House. I hope we see more than just the one we see in this episode. No red brick out front though, a blooper of sorts?

Big episode in the show's history; I'm surprised the original print wasn't stolen. I hope we've seen the last of the B&W kinescopes.

[Gothick]

Dom honey, alas, the kinescopes continue, though there are far fewer of them coming up.  But an important one is just a couple of episodes down the pike. You'll remember as soon as you see it.

xo, T.

[Uncle Roger]

I liked Dorrie a lot too. Sadly, she doesn't have a lot of credits, due to her untimely passing in 1983. Aside from the film Hester Street and the mini-series The Awakening Land, her most significant credit was probably as one of the later Cathy Craigs on One Life to Live. And your comparison to Robin Strasser is right on the money. The part of Cathy was offered to Robin some time after Dorrie had left the show.

[alwaysdavid]

A storm rages as Roger and Elizabeth discuss David. Julia states that Sarah is a ghost and proposes a seance and Barnabas objects. Julia reveals she has participated in a seance before.  They must be in an unbroken circle and think of Sarah.  Vickie appears out of it and when Carolyn fakes a trance she reveals that it is a lie and Vickie is possessed of Sarah.  She babbles, disappears and is gone replaced by Phyliss Wick and Vickie appears in the woods or is she in the spirit world with the dead.

[Roland]

A lot of character inconsistency abounds at this point in the series.

Every episode now it seems we're confronted with a character who scoffs at the very notion of the supernatural - even though they've all been through a phoenix and several ghosts at this point. Today it's Roger's turn.

And speaking of Roger, his expressed distaste for seances stands in marked contrast to a few months back when he pretty much ruined Barnabas' food-free costume ball by rudely insisting they all participate in an exercise to contact the dead.

I like the way AM adopts the speech patterns of little Sarah in her moments of possession. Quite impressive.

[MagnusTrask]

I think Roger's reaction to the end of Laura was that something they could and would never understand was now over, and that they must forget and move on.  It seems he did a really good job with that.

The family had become used to denying the faint hints of the supernatural they's experienced growing up at Collinwood, long before Vicki arrived.