Gerard, you are too much!

Poor David, he had enough to deal with before that iron butterfly The New Miss Winters came to stay!

And the mental picture you've conjured of of Betsy Durkin 'going off' on Quentin's ghost is amusing me no end! He wouldn't have stood a chance against her. 

Me too!

Does anyone else here find the casting of an Asian woman as the doctor/scientist a bit .....stereotypic?

No more stereotypic than the casting of Caucasians as the rich family with the house on the hill.   

And yeah, Julia99 - it's come back to me...do seem to remember that Barnabas had a hissy fit with Julia early on regarding her assertive 20th century attitude.  It was hilarious, and something that always informed my observations about their interactions from that point on.  Perhaps that's why I remembered it as subtext.

She certainly is beautiful.  I know nothing about her acting, but she could possibly be very interesting in the part.  However, I wonder if they are considering a name change.  However good she may turn out to be in the role, she just doesn't seem like a Julia HOFFMAN. 

I saw on the IMDb that Ms. Hu has several times played characters with Euro-sounding surnames (including her role on "Boomtown").  And she is of Chinese, Hawaiian and ENGLISH descent.  Maybe the WB's Dr. Hoffman will have a similar background.

That said, Kelly Hu really is a stunner.  I totally remember her from X-Men 2, and she was rather formidable in that role.  Given her looks and some of the the ass-kicking roles she's played, maybe they'll play up the strong, independent side of the Dr. Julia Hoffman character.  A woman like that might be intimidating or off-putting to the 18th century-raised Barnabas, which would add an interesting twist to the Julia/Barnabas relationship.  I think Frid's Barnabas found Hall's Julia too forward and assertive as well, but that was somewhat subtextual.

OK - first off, vw, I have to say that I am SOOOOOO jealous of you having met Robia LaMorte. I loved Jenny and have yet to get over her death back in Season #2 of Buffy - and that scene when Giles discovered her body. "Passion" ranks as one of my all-time favorite Buffy episodes.

Hopefully, she'll get that part on General Hospital...but how cool would she be as Dr. Julia Hoffman in the new WB Dark Shadows?

I for one am an out of the closet fan of the 1991 series and completely agree:  it wasn't a rehash, it was more of a reimagining.

I recently (over Christmas holidays) rewatched the 1991 DS and just loved it - again.  I think the idea of Victoria/Josette was brilliant, and it really worked, esp. with Joanna Going in the dual role.  Maybe I'm just a fan of the Julia character (I know Barbara Steele is resented by some), but I adored the 1991 Dr. Hoffman, and I thought the story moved along at a nice clip.  There really weren't many wasted scenes.

I'm still disappointed that we never got to see what happened next.  I was totally shocked when they killed off yummy Michael T. Weiss's Joe Haskell, and my guess is he would have soon resurfaced as Peter Bradford, had the series continued.  Somebody (MB?) recently posited that Angelique may have shown up in the present day as Roger's long lost wife (and David's mother), Laura Collins, and that would have been an interesting revamp on the original as well.

That being said, it was disappointing that Jean Simmons was given little to do, either as Liz or as Naomi.  Really hoping that the new series (if it happens) will do something with Blair Brown, esp. if as they claim, they aren't gearing the WB's Dark Shadows to the teen/twenties crowd.

Ever since Hollywood began, they've been telling and retelling stories - what's wrong with that?  "A Star is Born" for example, has been made four different times (with two different titles).  That doesn't make the story any less compelling.  If anything, it demonstrates (as does the undying nature of Dark Shadows) that there are some stories that are MORE compelling than the average, and these invite numerous retellings.

Like Mark, I'm cautiously optomistic about the new series.  The original show offered timeless stories of love and loss, betrayal and redemption.  So did the 1991 series, but in a different way.

And of course I'm not the first one to mention that the original series itself retold or reimagined other stories.  Who was it that said there are really only four basic original stories in the whole world, and that every story descends from these?  Dark Shadows is one I don't mind hearing over and over again.

Blair Brown as Liz?  Okay, now I am officially excited!  Really hoping this doesn't fall through...

Given the names attached to this project, who else is thinking it's almost for sure that the new Dark Shadows will make in on the air this fall?

BTW, is it definite that the Dr. Julia Hoffman character will appear on the new show?  Sorry if I missed confirmation elsewhere on the forums of this.

Despite circumstantial evidence to the contrary (my avatar), I would have to say Dr. Julia Hoffman.