Speaking of which...  I rewatched the 1991 pilot recently and I swear it has more boom mikes in shot than *any* episode of the original series...

As the saying goes, the more things change...

NOT ONE Dark Shadows website has seen fit to publish the petition URL, though I sent it to them all...  I wonder how the WB DS might have turned out if fandom had put a little less effort into hurting each other and a little more effort into supporting the new show?

Quite how some unsubstantiated scraps between fans has directly damaged the prospects of the new Dark Shadows is a mystery to me...  I don't see any corelation whatsoever.  The WB doesn't want Dark Shadows - they've viewed it, it doesn't work for them... end of argument.  It's an argument that isn't going to defeated with a petition with a hundred or so signatures... doubtless even a thousand.

For those reasons and others, I have serious reservations about running/endorsing any fan campaigns - as I posted earlier last week in the WB thread:

"Personally, I find that whole rationale very difficult to follow...  If we were midway through a season, fans would at least know what we were fighting for...  But for the time being, the pilot is an unknown commodity, and I don't think protesting for something so vague does the show any favours.  If you've seen it and passionately think it's the greatest thing on TV, then sure - but to me, begging for a reprieve just because it has the words "Dark Shadows" at the beginning simply isn't a good enough reason."

Getting the new DS on the air is a battle to be fought.  But we're not the ones who are going to win that fight.

End of criticism.

One minor correction, some Spanish language markets did receive Dark Shadows on videotape rather than 16mm film.  For instance, the episode where Julia first discovers Barnabas' coffin (#289) survives on videotape only from a Spanish language dub - the English audio heard on it today is actually taken from a kinescope copy.

It is remarkable that the DS archive is virtually intact - especially compared to other soap operas of the same period.  As much as its cult status has played its role, doubtless the main reasons DS has endured is because it's survived to be repeated and exploited on home video.  Without that, it would never have attained the fan following it has - I think it would otherwise only be regarded as a mild curiosity.

I think the cancellation of "Angel" has done considerable harm to the chances of "Dark Shadows".  After the hystrionic and sustained reaction its fans have put up, I suspect that the WB execs will be far more wary of the counter-productive aspects of picking up a show that brings an established fan-base.

I took a look at the primary "Save Angel" site and frankly it beggars belief - one day's campaign mission was to send Jordan Levin as many funeral wreaths as possible...  And alarmingly many people with too much time on their hands seem happy to comply and fork over their money for the numerous other pointless campaign efforts.

After weeks of nuisance campaigns from these people, I suspect it's tarred all genre fans with the same brush.  And with certain elements of DS fandom already planning "Save DS" campaigns, it looks like DS won't do anything to buck the trend.  Personally, I find that whole rationale very difficult to follow...  If we were midway through a season, fans would at least know what we were fighting for...  But for the time being, the pilot is an unknown commodity, and I don't think protesting for something so vague does the show any favours.  If you've seen it and passionately think it's the greatest thing on TV, then sure - but to me, begging for a reprieve just because it has the words "Dark Shadows" at the beginning simply isn't a good enough reason.

Groundbreaking it probably ain't, but the WB doubtless won't have Angel-esque grief waiting if it yanks "Jack and Bobby" after three weeks 

It's my understanding that the show could have been cancelled and gone off the air before he was to be staked.  And it probably would have been had the ratings not gone through the roof.

I've never been bought by the whole "threat of cancellation" story for 1967.  It sounds quite dramatic until you consider that they were given 26 weeks to raise the ratings - six months worth of episodes.  To me, that sounds like a pretty leisurely timeframe for a situation apparently so drastic.  It's waaaaaaaaay more notice than the show had when eventually was yanked in 1971.

People also overlook the fact that the show had already been renewed from its initial six month order in 1966 - that in itself suggests that it was doing acceptable business.  I tend to think that DS was it was renewed, just with more stringent expectations than before - not the outright make-or-break situation it's since been painted as.  In tangent with the folklore of Barnabas' creation, I supect it's another of those anecdotes that's become subtly more dramatic over the course of time.

There's some photographs of her at the 1993 festival on this page:

http://www.collinwood.net/fest02/93.htm

Either the creators know what they're doing, and BELIEVE in what they are doing, or they don't.....and I can't imagine allowing a group of random strangers that much input into any thing I really cared about......

You're assuming that the creators are the ones who appoint the focus groups - they're not.  Audience focus is largely the network's domain, as it's a marketing issue, not a creative one.

I think fresh opinion is useful.  Doesn't mean it's always right, but it's useful.  If you're working on something and absorbed with it, you automatically have total tunnel vision... particularly on pilots, where deadlines and crucial decisions are happening all the time.  It's healthy to have the concepts and ideas challenged - if the work's good enough, it stands on its own two feet unassisted, as it should.

Any mass-media product has to find an audience - the focus group is no different from an audience greeting "Dark Shadows" on their TV sets come the fall.  Testing is important, but it's not a question of changing stuff fundamentally to fit an audience.  It's an altogether more subtle process, and the results can easily be as much a positive contribution as a negative one.

It's all a question of perspective.  If you totally obliterate your concept because a focus group says so, you either don't believe it yourself, or know deep down that it doesn't have an identity of its own, I think.

People with good stories to tell and belief in their work will fight for the fundamental stuff regardless - it's those fights that encourage and propagate good work and ideas...  I think it's totally healthy for DS or any other show, in that respect.