Discuss - Ep #0372

[Watching Project]

Robservations - #372

And if you'd care to look back, the first WP discussion topic for this ep:

Re: Discuss - Ep #0372

[DarkLady]

I think this episode might feature LP's first voiceover.

Welcome, Ben Stokes! Thayer David gives a near-perfect performance throughout this story line, even though he is forced to cut logs with an implausibly small hatchet.

Vicki continues to blunder her way through the eighteenth century, this time telling Joshua that Millicent "never married."

[dom]

Volume 29 MPI VHS tape has a cover photo that will forever bring me back to my youth to the day finding the book The Phantom and Barnabas Collins at the tiny paperback bookstore in Asbury Park, New Jersey. I got all my M. Ross DS books there. Once a week it was the bookstore and the record store that I spent my allowance. I remember they had a crystal ball in the glass counter at the register that I would marvel at while being rung up. The old man would go “in the back” and search for DS books for me. When he’d come out with one or more I would be thrilled – comparable to the thrill of a new Supremes 45 or a DS feature in the latest 16 Magazine.

Hooray! Thayer David is back as the servant Ben Stokes. I have been counting the days!

Nice opening scene. I believe “a repeat” of Vicki meeting Mathew Morgan building a fire in Collinwood’s drawing room fireplace. I don’t really see Joshua, a man of his times, acquiescing to being questioned by a governess, but in his doing so we get Ben’s adulthood bio since the war. Was there a war after the Revolutionary War? Ben must have received a lengthy sentence for ransacking a farmhouse to still be indentured to Joshua all these years later.

“You sound like Jeremiah and Barnabas; if they had their way he would sit at table with the entire family. There is in my brother and in my son a streak of sentimentality that I…” Joshua scolds Vicki when she affords Ben sympathy and the benefit of the doubt.

Vicki is still on track or should I say off the tracks by thinking out loud, saying to Joshua that Millicent had never married after he reveals that Millicent might be paired with Jeremiah. Dear lord this girl is reckless. I liked the slight smile Edmonds used to show Joshua’s glee at the thought of two marriages – a nice subtle touch.

Ben meets Angelique in the woods. Great scene. TD is brilliant and LP held her own against him. Loved the way Thayer has Ben say duPrés, lol. And the scene between Vicki & Ange was very good too. Vicki (still in reckless mode) and Ben in the woods – more perfection. Ange & Ben again, in her room, he becomes her slave – fantastic. Poor Ben, he's definitely a sympathetic character.

There’s no doubt how Ben feels about Joshua, and vice-versa, eh? Lol

This is a damn good episode!

[DarkLady]

Let's see: The Revolutionary War ended in 1783. We're now in 1795. We don't know how long ago Ben did his breaking and entering. He might very well have tried his hand at any number of jobs for any number of years before he had to resort to stealing just to stay alive. Even so, I think theft was punished harshly even in the young Republic.

He may have had an even harder time finding work because [spoiler]as we will find out soon, he was illiterate.[/spoiler]

Ben is one of my favorite characters in the whole series.

[DarkLady]

But to answer your original question, dom, the U.S. wasn't in another official war between the Revolution and 1795, unless you count the Whiskey Rebellion in western Pennsylvania in 1791. I'm assuming that Ben was no longer in the Continental army at that point.

[dom]

I thought it was AM doing the voiceover. I need to get an earhorn or Q-Tips, lol. Thanx DL for calculating answers to my questions. Ben is one of my favorite characters in this (or any other) storyline, also. What a wonderful actor TD is.

[dom]

More on Ben & Ange: I couldn't resist re-watching their time together in this episode. It made me think back to a recently revived topic re: favorite actor or character pairings. Ange/Ben or David/Parker get my vote. I'm wondering who should get the credit -- the actors or the writers or director? I can't imagine this level of craft coming anywhere but from deep within the actor, but perhaps it's the prefect melding of all three?

In the woods, Ange flirts with Ben to get him to warm up to her. I really enjoyed TD's nuanced performance here. It's made obvious that he is puzzled by her action's not believing he's worthy of romantic overtones, or perhaps from experience with rejection and generally being shunned by women. Yet he still manages an almost unseen smile at the thought and pleasure of her attention and even comes back after turning to leave to bid her adieu as a sign of respect and maybe even romantic hope (as I interpret it).

After concocting a potion, Ange summons Ben to her room -- B: "I don't know what I'm doin' here?" A: "You're here because I wanted you to come here." B: "You did?"  A: "Didn't you hear me calling you?" B: "You, wanted, me?" A: "Does that seem so strange?" B: "Yes...but it doesn't matter." Ben reaches out to embrace her. Ange stops him and says "Later", he must first drink her potion. He does, no doubt in anticipation of her affections, and becomes her slave. I love this scene. At first watch, I laughed out loud at Ben admitting that it is strange to him that she wants him there and says it doesn't matter and goes for it. Now, I am thinking about how Ange played the sex card and I am wondering if she also played that card to get Barn in Martinique -- like, is all this mess on her? Not that it really matters, it's just where my thoughts went after re-watching the scene.

[alwaysdavid]

Thayer David gives a near-perfect performance throughout this story line, even though he is forced to cut logs with an implausibly small hatchet

Very modern and looking similar to the one he was going to use to  hack Vickie's head off.

Volume 29 MPI VHS tape has a cover photo that will forever bring me back to my youth to the day finding the book The Phantom and Barnabas Collins at the tiny paperback bookstore in Asbury Park, New Jersey. I got all my M. Ross DS books there. Once a week it was the bookstore and the record store that I spent my allowance.

That conjures up the memory of my cousin and I passing one of those swilvel paperbck bookracks and seeing that book which he bought and we checked through the whole rack and found three more which I bought. When we got home my uncle said he couldn't buy anymore as at 25 cents they were too expensive. Fortunalty my mother never told me what I could spend my allowance on.

Vickie's reaction to everyone is really irking me. She shoud know by now that they all look like someone she knew. I did like how they had her meet Ben in the room where he tried to kill her.

I also thought the Ben/Angelique scenes were good.  I'd never seen this episode before as I only had some of the VhS tapes of 1795. It was the first one that I actually was into.

[MagnusTrask]

With help from a good online friend I now have a VCR again.   Yes, Ben's intro seems to refer back to Matthew Morgan's, though that wasn't Thayer David as Morgan then..... they seem to expect some viewers to remember, which is nice.   

Nightshade.... that comes from mushrooms, doesn't it?  Unless I'm mis-remembering, nightshade=belladonna=atropine, the latter of which caused my eye nightmare condition.   

Is this new music, when Ang picks up the discarded nightshade (a bunch of leaves, not mushrooms) from the ground?   It seems interestingly harsh and surreal.   It also occurred to me to appreciate once again that they continued to use the same music in 1795, rather than recording new "period" music.   I'm not sure why I like this.   Maybe I get PO'd when a show tries to drown me in "atmosphere" rather than concentrating on what matters in the story itself.

Not for one second does Victoria show any excitement or enjoyment about being in the past she supposedly loves so much.