i believe it was magnus who said it best about demeon edwards..."to me he's just that ghost in a leisure suit".

that sort of summed it up for me with this little subplot.it seemed like filler to me while most of the "majors" were off shooting the movie during parallel-time.i watched it and then forgot it instantly.to this minute i cannot recall a single detail of it.

and in general the wardrobing in parallel-time was extremely weird.

a ghost in an orange leisure suit...only on d.s..

there is a throwaway line in this episode that for some reason i have always loved...

after jeff 'forgets' that he had just seen reverand trask vicki reminds him and he tells her that that's  "impossible".

vicki counters with "what's impossible is that you can't remember something that just happened a minute ago".

i just love it.

it wasn't just vicki who was "dense" about barnabas.

no one except julia and dr.woodard ever figured out what barnabas was.it was an integral part of the plot that everyone else think he's normal.

even characters like maggie and carolyn who wre bitten by barnabas conveniently "forget" it when it the plot necessitates it.

not necessarily "unpopular" but i think one of the most underated storylines is the first laura collins story in 1966.
it's so well written and diana millay is so brilliant in it.she has confrontations with joan bennett and nancy barrett that are all-time favorite scenes for me.louis edmonds and mitch ryan are great here and alexandra moltke's vicki has a very appealing "nancy-drew-ish-ness" during this period that i really liked.this comes very close to being my favorite storyline.

i'm also with those who really liked the leviathan storyline(at least the first two thirds of it)as well as 1970 parallel-time.they both created very unique atmospheres that the show didn't have in other time periods.i also liked that they were stories set in the "present" rather than the distant past.

as for characters the relentlessly slagged victoria...whose supposed "i-don't-understand-ish-ness" is wildly overblown across fandom...remains my favorite character.alexandra brought a sweetness and melancholia to the role(plus she's so darn easy on the eyes)that i find quite dreamy.

the reason i say i'm surprised that this storyline ranked so highly in a poll isn't just so much because i don't think it's particularly good(which i don't)but also because during my time on this board it's often maligned for it's "sloppiness" and "inconsistency".more than any other storyline besides 'leviathans' it's the subject of much criticism.

the fact that it ranked so highly alongside 1795 and 1897 and at the expense of all 'present day' storylines makes me wonder if perhaps some fans simply enjoy the time travel storylines as a rule.that the theatricality of the storylines set in the past makes them preferable to those set in the 'present' just on priciple.

i enjoy the time travel storylines but to me those characters aren't "real" in the same way the present time characters are because i know they are in effect "temporary" and that most of them will probably end up getting killed-off when the story makes it's inevitable return to the present(i guess the exception would be the 1840 storylines because the show ends with them.)

i always think of the 1967 episodes(laura,the introduction of barnabas,the introduction of julia)as being the show's high point and it surprises me that those episodes wouldn't top anyone's list of favorite stories.

indeed.

at various points in the early episodes we see liz at matthew morgan's cottage,widow's hill,the old house and other locations on the collinwood estate.but she does leave the house itself.

i remember later in the series(after the jason mcquire storyline)when we see liz in town thinking how odd it was to see her away from collinwood.

i find that quite surprising.

perhaps i'm in the minority but i'm of the mind that 1897 went on too long in general and the petofi stuff in particular really started to bore me.

the early part of 1897 was populated by lots of vivid,colorful female characters(always my fave on the show)like judith,jenny,laura,beth,magda and the somewhat more bland rachel.but by mid-to-late storyline many of these characters were gone or on hiatus and the show become something of a boys club ruled by barnabas,quentin,petofi,aristede,trask and others...in a few episodes i think there were only male characters.
that's kind of boring to me.there are lots of other characters whose return i would have welcomed more than petofi's.