HAPPY 45TH BIRTHDAY, "DARK SHADOWS"!!

Yes, it's hard to believe, but 45 years ago today Victoria Winters took that train to Collinsport and our world has never been the same since!  So do yourself a favor and play Episode #1 tonight and relive those first moments of the Collins saga.  Happy birthday!

In honor of the anniversary, a few days ago I decided to watch the episodes that aired on June 27 of each year that DS ran.  (In the case of 1970, I watched the episode that aired June 29 because June 27 fell on a Saturday that year.)  I was curious to see how much the show changed in one-year intervals.

What I found was that the 1966 and 1967 episodes were very much of the same tone and continuity (with the latter referencing events in the former), but that the '68, '69, and '70 episodes had very little, if any, connection to each other.  Each one was set in a different time period, and featured different cast members.

Even more interesting, Jonathan Frid appeared in only one episode, and Barnabas was rarely mentioned in the others.  (Granted, his character didn't appear until 1967.) On the other hand, Alexandra Moltke appeared in three of the episodes, while Joan Bennett, Nancy Barrett, Louis Edmonds, and Humbert Allen Astredo each appeared in two episodes.

Because I've always watched the episodes sequentially, they've always flowed together and I could see the overall continuity. Watching them in this way really emphasized how complex DS was (and is), and how much was packed into those five years.

Happy 45, DS.  Here's looking at you, kid.

*raising glass*

Gothique

It was 45 years ago.  I was just a yungin'.  (And for me, the first date was a day later, as the local ABC affiliate broadcast it initially for the first few years a day later and at an earlier time.)  It was a nice, summer day, and my mom was encouraging (and threatening) me to go outside and play.  Those were the days when moms wanted you out of the house on summer days, as early as possible, and not come home until it was supper time.  You did come home, maybe, for lunch - or else you went by some friend's house and his mother would feed you (your mother and all others would return the favor).  But that morning I lolligagged in the house in the morning and watched some game shows.  When the last one, airing at 10:30, finished, I was ready to comply with my mom's request/demand.  But a commercial came on with eerie music and an intriguing title showing a spooky house and a young boy leaning out of a window and it was coming on next at eleven.  From that moment, until April 1971, I was hooked, even though the initial storyline had no ghosts (only mentions of them) and lots of plot things going on I had a difficult time understanding.  But I watched it, and my friends started to as well.  When, months into it, a real "live" ghost did step out of a portrait, we went wild.  

Gerard

Hi  Gerard  wow!!  amazing isnt  it?  I used to  watch it at a neighbors  house  across the street  from us.   And
then some days  we would watch  it on our own Tv  sets.  Ahhh   the memories.
               Love   Anne
 

Hi  Charles   i would watch  it at neighbors  house across the street from us and then on our own Tv sets
at  my house.   Ahh  the memories .    Happy 45th  DS  and  many more.
                                       Love  Anne

wonderful!

i can't wait for august. and the movie. this is really an exciting time for our little story.

 

I didn't discover Dark Shadows until the introduction of Barnabas.  My Mother hated the show, but it didn't matter.  It helped me escape, if only for 30 minutes each day, an otherwise unhappy childhood.  Thank you Collinwood, for giving me something to look foward to each weekday afternoon.

Happy birthday, DS! 

Who the heck knew back in the day, when we scrambled to get home for the show, there would be a time forty years later we would still be talking about it?  I remember started watching the show a few episodes before Barnabas was let loose.  I started to tune in as the show came on before Wee Willie Webber, a cartoon program on Channel 6 in Philadelphia.  In my anticipation to catch the cartoon program at the very start, I discovered DS.  I remember when Barnabas came out of the coffin I told my mother there was a vampire who was NOT Bela Lugosi!!  I was nine years old.

I can't wait to see the movie either.  Some many new elements to mix in with the old.

nancy

Like michaelhacketttodd, I didn't originally discover the show until after Barnabas arrived.  Other kids were talking about it so I joined the bandwagon.  My mom didn't particularly mind me watching it, since I was a good kid and I had a pretty high tolerance for scary shows and movies without getting nightmares (my mom did used to watch Twilight Zone together back in the day).  At any rate, I was thrilled to rediscover the early episodes via SciFi channel during the 90's, even though they were only a hint at what would be to come.  Last night I celebrated the anniversary by watching episode 1 on YouTube.