DARK SHADOWS FORUMS
General Discussions => Current Talk Archive => Current Talk '24 I => Current Talk '15 II => Topic started by: dom on August 31, 2015, 12:52:59 AM
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Do we ever find out how or why 1970 Quentin aka Grant Douglas forgot who he was?
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I wish you could watch DS again dom... We know that Barnabas hit him with his car, presumably to kill him, as Barnabas was acting as a Leviathan agent. I think we still don't know why "Grant" was on his way to Collinsport in the first place, or why he had been living in Portland (?) recently. It would have been more than enough reason that Quentin would have wanted to welcome Barnabas and Julia back from 1897! I would want to do such a cool thing, in his place. He may also want to find his portrait, making periodic inquiries under an assumed name, living fairly far away so as not to attract notice... Maybe he was even afraid of Petofi turning up at this signnificant time.
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No, we never do find out why Quentin was in Maine at that time. Perhaps he was planning to use Carolyn to reintroduce himself to the family. He had learned about David in 1897 so he may well have some general information about the current branch of the family. Nor do we ever hear anymore about his relationship with Frederick Thorne.
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There are two audio stories released by Big Finish Productions (titled "The Darkest Shadow" and "The Haunted Refrain") which explain how Quentin lost his memory and why he began using the Grant Douglas name.
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Not that this has anything to do with anything, but I've had this dream a few times, that Quentin was a jazz musician in Chicago during the 1920's... Part of his unknown elaborate back story.
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The Signs That You Might Be Addicted To DS
You have dreams to fill in the DS characters' back stories!
[b003]
And you know what, I bet you're not the only one who's ever had them! [ghost_nowink] Not by a long shot...
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Exactly MB. DS Anonymous... I would be a card-carrying member for sure. [ghost_embarrassed]
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DS Anonymous? Perish the thought! No such entity should ever exist - no matter how far some of us may get into the show!! [ghost_nowink]
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(Let us continue to enable each other, as DS addicts.)
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Hallelujah Magnus!!! [ghost_cheesy]
Btw, my wife would sign me up immediately if there was a local chapter of DSA.
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Perish the thought!
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what drove me absolutely insane was after 1970PT everyone suddenly acted like Quentin was an ordinary member of the family who had always been around. it was very sloppy writing/continuity. [ghost_mad]
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They probably did that because the Gerard/Daphne storyline was just like the Quentin/Beth haunting and they decided it best to ignore it.
I always thought the present time family remembering Quentin's post 1897 was an indirect result of the Leviathan's messing the timelines together. [spoiler]Once Jeb destroyed the Leviathan Box, everyone's memories and the timeline settled correctly so now they no longer remember Quentin's haunting.[/spoiler]
what drove me absolutely insane was after 1970PT everyone suddenly acted like Quentin was an ordinary member of the family who had always been around. it was very sloppy writing/continuity. [ghost_mad]
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I honestly don't think there was really a narrative "reason" for it...
I just think they thought the lunch box/bubble gum card crowd wouldn't notice or care about such lapses in continuity. so they just dumped him in his old room with that stupid gramophone and called it a day.
but as an adult viewer stuff like that drives me nuts. [ghost_tongue]
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In all fairness, whenever DC was in town, he DICTATED the storylines to the writers. That's right, Dan Curtis was not only the producer, he was also the uncrowned head writer on the show. There were longish periods when Dan was in England or elsewhere pursuing other projects and in those periods, the stories actually managed to make sense. I think the first Laura Collins story (1966-67) was so well written because DC wasn't around to interfere--I believe he was in England throughout that period.
According to Sam Hall, if one of the writers tried to protest that what Dan ordered did not make sense, he would bark, "Are you writing the show or not? I can get a lotta people to write this show." So they would have to give in and do what he said, regardless of how loopy or incoherent.
In the final two to three years, the rhythm of the stories with all the cliffhangers and increasing avalanche of occulture meant that the writers themselves simply could not follow what was going on. Add in the fact that many if not most of the shows were taped way out of sequence.
The reintroduction of Quentin in 1970 was purely driven by the character's huge popularity. What I remember from what was revealed is that Frederick Thorne had been a previous alias adopted by Quentin before he assumed the Grant Douglas identity. Immortals have to keep doing this because otherwise, people become curious why somebody that old still looks so young. (It was before the invention of botox, guerilla plastic surgery, etc.)
cheers, G.
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I basically had that impression, but thanks for laying it all out that clearly, Gothick. Strange that he didn't notice that the show did perfectly well without him.
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Aha, MT, but maybe he did and didn't like it.
I read somewhere that he would come in with some story like "The Turn of the Screw" or "Rebecca" or whatever and tell the writers to use it. That must have driven them nuts.
In the years when I worked in offices, we always did our best stuff when the bosses were away or had decided to treat us with benign neglect--for a while. Inevitably they noticed us again and things just went south from there.
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This is why many fans are of the opinion that DS was often successful in spite of DC. There are several instances where the writers or producer Robert Costello did things while DC was away that DC was not happy about - one chief thing being not making Barnabas an all-out evil villain by also giving him a sympathetic side. If Barnabas had not had that sympathetic side, would he even be remembered today? Probably not, or perhaps simply as a footnote.
But we digress from the topic of this thread... [ghost_embarrassed]
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what drove me absolutely insane was after 1970PT everyone suddenly acted like Quentin was an ordinary member of the family who had always been around. it was very sloppy writing/continuity. [ghost_mad]
I always thought that as well Michael! He didn't even have a portrait (that the family knew about) as credentials. All he had as "proof" of his pedigree was his "resemblance" to the ghost no one should have been remembering!
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Though they could have remembered the photos of Quentin from the various family albums and seen his resemblance to them...
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where the real sloppiness and lack of continuity was was in the family's treatment of the character...
after 1897, during the "Grant Douglas" period, he was a total stranger, the children were afraid of him, and he was associated with the ghost that had haunted the house the previous year...
then the storyline shifted to 1970 parallel time.
when the story returned to "the present" everyone acted like he was an ordinary, everyday member of the family who had always been around. Roger was absent so he sat around sipping sherry and bickering with Liz like he was her brother. when David was taking pictures during the "Gerard" haunting Quentin told him he'd been asking to borrow his camera for "a year". a year??? a year earlier Quentin was a ghost haunting the place. no one was borrowing his camera. [ghost_huh]
they just glued the sideburns on, dumped him in his old Victorian room with that stupid gramophone ( to keep the "brand" consistent ) , and hoped no one would question the lapse in continuity. [ghost_blink]
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in any other time period Quentin could fully occupy the story. he was usually the "master of the manor"...
but in "the present" he was never really given a compelling raison d'etre. he was just sort of "there". he always stuck out like a sore thumb.
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The character became so popular that it was a given that they were going to hold him. But when they brought Quentin into the present, they clearly had no idea what to do with him. After he regains his memory and Amanda Harris is disposed of, Quentin functions more as a plot device than a character.
The [spoiler]Daphne fixation in 1970 [/spoiler]might have played out better if that had been Roger instead of Quentin. The 1897 Quentin was shown to be well versed in the occult and should not have been so easily ensnared.
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Well, unfortunately, continuity was never DS' strong suit and many things were wiped under the rug between time shifts. One of the more glaring was how David was terrified of Barnabas before Vicki was swept into the past - but despite the fact that time was suspended at present day Collinwood while Vicki was in 1795/96, when Vicki returns and time resumes at the exact point it was suspended, as 1968 unfolds there's no hint whatsoever that David fears Barnabas. At least with the shift to 1970PT, RT time continued at Collinwood, so while the audience saw the events unfolding in 1970PT, there was an unseen opportunity in RT for Quentin to ingratiate himself with the family.
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The character became so popular that it was a given that they were going to hold him. But when they brought Quentin into the present, they clearly had no idea what to do with him. After he regains his memory and Amanda Harris is disposed of, Quentin functions more as a plot device than a character.
The [spoiler]Daphne fixation in 1970 [/spoiler]might have played out better if that had been Roger instead of Quentin. The 1897 Quentin was shown to be well versed in the occult and should not have been so easily ensnared.
he was always sort of a "plot device". of all the regular characters Quentin was the least fully fleshed out. I never really understood what any of his motivations were other than to help Barnabas "fight monsters". other than that he didn't have much of a personality.
to me existed on the "Scooby Doo" end of the series' spectrum.
and all of the various "Quentins" were technically supposed to be different people. but the fact that they all looked and talked and acted exactly the same drove me crazy.
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Well, Q is more "in" with the family after PT because of events we missed in RT during PT. I think he had a very strong personality during Leviathans at least. Otherwise I agree with what everyone's saying.
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in the other time periods they could write him a narrative purpose. in "the present" he was sort of useless.
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I like 1840 Quentin the best, I think.
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One of the things that gave Barnabas such poignancy was his yearning for Josette. Once Beth and Amanda are killed off, Quentin never really mentions them again. It likely would have been the same with Daphne.(I know that Sam Hall's tv guide article used this as a plot point but it never really rang true to me.)
Though I do wonder if Quentin intended to merely question Carolyn about the present day family when he met her at the antique shop or if he was genuinely interested in making their acquaintance. Prior to the amnesia, Quentin should have retained his memories of Barnabas and Julia being from 1969. Yet it is not them that he chooses to make contact with.
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Prior to the amnesia, Quentin should have retained his memories of Barnabas and Julia being from 1969. Yet it is not them that he chooses to make contact with.
Considering how Barnabas more so than Julia (though she was still in on things) managed to screw up so much in 1897, would you want to contact either of them? [ghost_nowink]
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Me? Not on your life! But it seems to be a genetic trait that the Collinses are drawn to people and situations that would further complicate their lives.
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Sorry, this is a few days removed but I couldn't help putting my two cents regarding the whole Quentin thing. Quentin's a tragic figure and the best way to finish with him at the end of 1897 would be to see him wandering off into the bleak distance, condemned to roam the world for all eternity never to return to Collinwood.
If Quentin were to return in 1969 it would have to be for a compelling and logical reason which made narrative sense. Unfortunately there's nothing much in DS circa 1969 which makes narrative sense (which is part why I love it). Instead what we get here is what essentially what amounts to a hapless retread of the Jeff Clark/Vicki storyline. Having Quentin return as an amnesiac is nothing more than a half-assed copout. We've been through so much with this character during 1897 and now the writers decide to hit the reset button! (Maybe this was just a DC thing but I don't want to place the blame on one individual.) Okay, he starts to regain his memory with the whole Amanda thing but he's still a shell of his former self. And as for Amanda... Donna McKechnie comes across very well in interviews but I find her very wooden and un-engaging as Amanda.
Perhaps if Quentin had played a more active role in the storyline I could buy his presence in present time a little more but he doesn't -- he's just sort of... there. It's as if DC were trying to sell the idea that Quentin was a core member of the present day Collins clan, as integral as Roger or Carolyn or any of them -- all in a very short span of episodes. But Quentin's just too much of a rebel to fit in that easily. It's a serious misstep in this section of the show, in my opinion.
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that's what drove me crazy too...
one minute he was a total stranger. the next he was a core member of the family mentioned on par with Roger and Liz. after 1897 I always felt like the character was being forced on the viewer.
and after Selby had played the character as such a wonderfully malevolent ghost in 1969 and womanizing cad during the first half of 1897 once they tried to make him "nice" (or whatever the heck he was supposed to be) he was as dull as dishwater.
they took all the "juice" out of Quentin. and then having Selby essentially play the same character for the rest of the series didn't do him any favors either.
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I've always felt Quentin's stratospheric popularity within the fandom has much more to do with Selby's good looks and charisma than anything the character itself actually brought to the story.
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Yeah, Selby's natural charisma is really the only thing keeping those later Quentin characters afloat. The writing certainly did him no favours.
I've always thought that if they took real time and care with it, there would have been a way to successfully integrate him into present time but the show was going at such a rollicking pace at this point so they simply couldn't fit it in.
But Quentin had already become an icon by this stage so the sideburns and dark good looks were really all that was needed -- at least in DC's eyes. It's a shame really because the character deserved so much better.
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if they had returned him to some of his more roguish ways during the later time periods/storylines it might have been much more successful...
but as it stood each successive "Quentin" was duller than the last.
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I think they tried to make 1840s Quentin a little different. He is described [spoiler]as a "man of iron" and also was the architect of the Stairway through Time. And having him deposed and almost executed by Gerard/Judah was a new twist.[/spoiler]
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to me he seemed the same as all the others. nothing really distinguished one from the next...
I guess 1970PT Quentin was angrier and more belligerent (and wore louder sports coats).
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Having Quentin embrace "family values" was extremely out of character, as his relationship with the 1897 clan was dysfunctional and rather combative. The contemporary Quentin has very few of the roguish qualities that made his character stand out. It's unclear what, if anything, Quentin does for a living. Roger worked at the cannery.Carolyn worked at the antique shop. And Quentin?
Bangsnfangs, I certainly agree with everything you say regarding Amanda Harris. The character is pretty much a nonentity. Donna McKechnie is quite talented. She wouldn't have had the career that she's had if she wasn't. But she is sorely miscast as Amanda/Olivia. But she was very young and inexperienced and Dark Shadows was not the proper vehicle for her to use her gifts as a dancer.
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while the rest of the cast got to play new and different characters in each of the time periods I got the impression DC was "afraid" to give Selby another role to play.
so even though they are technically supposed to be different people the various "Quentins" are supposed to represent the same thing to the viewer. if you rooted for Quentin in 1897 you're supposed to root for him in 1840 even though it's actually a different character. but it isn't.
they just glued the sideburns on and told him to act the same. it was more an exercise in "branding" than character development.
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All this is over-stated, I think. This time around, I'm much more drawn in by present-day Quentin, pre-Parallel-Time. Having him be the cad of 1897 would not have been interesting. That would have been throwing Q back in where he doesn't belong. 1969 Quentin was more worldly, more mature, and more empathetic from all those years of experience. He's very centered and grounded "now", and while that doesn't scream out excitement, it's great storytelling and acting. It's subtle. It would be great storytelling if they'd pursued it and fleshed it out further, that is.
Up to the start of PT 1970, everything about Quentin does work and make sense. Of course he has a perfectly good reason for showing up at Collinwood shortly after Barnabas returens from 1897. Quentin has known this would happen at around this time for 70 years. Would you be able to stay away? How could you not witness this trick of time for yourself, and not greet the time traveller on his return home?
The amnesia creates some mystery which unfortunately isn't totally resolved, but it's not embarrassing. Once he regains his memory, of course he's going to help Barnajulia. They're all too busy Leviathan-fighting to build up a life or recent backstory for Quentin. He doesn't seem to be living at Collinwood pre-PT. Still living out of a suitcase at the Inn.
Post-PT, I agree with what everyone's said.
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That does make sense, Magnus, but my problem with it personally is that it isn't fleshed out enough and, amongst all the craziness, is a little too subtle. Toss that unconvincing romance with Amanda into the mix and there's just too much working against him. If his story arc following 1897 had had a little more polish and direction to it then I definitely would have had a greater investment in a wiser, world-weary Quentin, which made sense considering everything he'd experience up until that point.
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I thought 1970 PT Quentin had some interesting moments, as did 1840 Quentin. In both cases, there was an attempt to re-boot the character, but then in the insanity of churning through the episodes, they quickly went back to a kind of loveable rogue default for the character. The same thing happened with Joan Bennett's roles, apart from Judith who did get to pull out quite a few stops. I love Judith's final series of conversations with "dear Gregory."
G.