A New Dark Shadows?

Okay, here are the Dark Shadows we've actually had:  The original series, the 1991 remake, the 2004 pilot, two movies, the Marion Ross novels, the Lara Parker novels, the CD series, the Innovation comics, the Gold Key comics, the Off Off Broadway play of the same name back in the 1980s and of course various/sundry explorations in fan fiction.

Suppose a new Dark Shadows were to be created.  Maybe on the SciFi Channe or HBO, or perhaps some regular network, or it could be made for syndication.  Further suppose that it is being reborn as a weekly, hour-long series for the upcoming 2007-08 season.

Hey, we can dream, right?

As an exercise in imagination, how would you prefer to see DS reborn?  And please, please, please feel free to explain your answer.  

Live on tape. George Clooney did this with Fail Safe. I'll bet actors would go berserk over it.

I love the characters and stories too much to let them go completely. A new imagining I would definitely love to see, encorporating new AND old storylines with tight plots and dialogue. I'm not sure a Next Generation idea would work because there are too many things from the original series that would still be affecting the "future".

I was originally thinking of something Next Generation style, but I voted for a prequel about an unexplored period of Collins history, that's a great idea I hadn't heard of before. Maybe something like that could focus on characters being transported into future periods like the 1960s as much as the classic focused on transporting characters back in time?

I voted for a TNG approach. I love the old stories as well, but we've got our DVDs to satisfy us for that aspect. It's time to move on. We're forty years down the road, and I think DS would have a certain aspect of allure with the characters having aged accordingly. Not to mention that 40 years has passed. 40 years which could be very useful in setting up new mysteries that started in the past a la Liz's thing with Jason and Paul at the beginning of the original DS.

 

I'm having second thoughts here You make some good points there, Brandon. I really like the idea of the TNG approach - I'm torn between the TNG and the Prequel. But then again, considering the possibilities in time travel, the only difference between the two is in which time period the series begins, right?  A new DS could cover everything from a prequel to a sequel and everything in between -

I love the characters and stories too much to let them go completely. A new imagining I would definitely love to see, encorporating new AND old storylines with tight plots and dialogue. I'm not sure a Next Generation idea would work because there are too many things from the original series that would still be affecting the "future".

Competent storytelling would get around this.   "Lost" deals with the past but they tell the backstory economically so that it doesn't take over or overwhelm the present.

I never got retellings.   Why do it again?

Live on tape. George Clooney did this with Fail Safe. I'll bet actors would go berserk over it.

And they shouldn't tell them it's live until right before they go on.

I'd favor the TNG approach, even though Big Finish seems to be doing that.  I would like to see David as the master of Collinwood, behaving as Roger did (the apple doesn't fall far from the tree, you know!).  David's kids and Carolyn's (did she remarry?) kids could be the "focus" the way Vicki, Carolyn, Maggie, et all. were for the original series.  However, the show would need a new hook.  Sadly, since Angelique, Barnabas and Quentin were all immortal, it would be difficult to have the original actors return.  Could they be recast?  Or perhaps find ways of introducing new Witches and vampires and werewolves to the fold.

Perhaps Sam Hall's article in TV Guide after the show went off the air could be a template for what happened and the show could start relatively fresh.

Say, Collinsport as a casino resort.  the Cannery and fleet are facing EPA troubles due to pollution and overfishing.  Environmental protesters picket the cannery and one of them with a secret, a young woman who learns that he is actually David's daughter from a hushed up indiscretion years before.  A series of disasters puts the Collines on the brink of financial ruin, bizarre things, like the sudden inexplicible rotting of the fleet's catch one day, the tide turning red with blood for no reason.  The illigitimate daughter is possessed by the spirit of Angelique returning for revenge.

Just a few things off the top of my head...

In my story, Future Shadows, Amy Jennings Collins is the mistress of Collinwood. She hasn't left Collinwood in ten years, since the disappearance of her husband, David Collins. Amy and David's son, Christopher Collins, has inherited the werewolf curse. And Willie's son, Dr. Julius Loomis, has inherited the Old House, where he performs experiments in the basement laboratory.

I see I'm the only one to have voted for a spinoff.

The problems with TNG approach have already been touched upon--although, as of the series end, only Quentin was still immortal.  It would be tricky, albeit not impossible, to design such a show without having to deal in detail with the storylines of the original.  Perhaps references to a rash of witch-hunting in the late 1700s, or things David and Carolyn simply refuse to discuss from their youth (such as David's mother!).  Workable, yes.  But, and this is JMHO, rather tricky to pull off.

(Hmmm...now I'm imagining David having married Amy, and that somehow he's arranged to prevent the werewolf curse from being passed down--adoption perhaps?  Or a pact with gypsies?  In return for what?)

Okay, this is soooo weird.  Because while I was typing the above, Para L. Time posted their idea.  A total coincidence, really!

Myself, I've always loved the little details about the background that we never really got much information about.  We know, for example, that Isaac Collins originally landed at Mermaid's Bay, south of today's Collinsport.  I've often wondered what that town is like.  Are there any Collinses there?  Could Judah Zachary have had a disciple or two in that town?  Are they still there, in one way or another?  Perhaps that is where Mrs. Johnson came from?  Or Paul Stoddard?  Wouldn't it be interesting if one of the prominent families in that town is named Winters?  Or Bradford?

I've already kinda/sorta created my own idea of how to re-imagine the show, here:  http://www.geocities.com/zahir13/dark/dsi.html

Honestly, I've always wondered about the Collins family when Jamison was a relatively young man, in the 1920s.  Something about silent movies and the flappers, about Prohibition and the world still reeling from the first World War, coupled with excitement over discoveries in Egypt--much could be made of this.

Or what of the years between 1840 and 1897?  We have two names from that era--Benjamin and Theodore Collins.  But we know next-to-nothing about either one.  Ah, the possibilities!

I see I'm the only one to have voted for a spinoff.

The only problem w/a spin-off is it's just that, a 'spin-off', and therefore not the same show.  I mean, Happy Days was Happy Days, and Laverne & Shirley was Laverne & Shirley.  

But the problem is, with a TNG approach, that while the powers that be would throw a bone to the original fans, they would be looking to hook an all new, and forgive me, younger television viewing demographic.

ST:TNG worked because it had such a HUGE storyline universe to expand upon, with not much from the original series impacting events and characters. Collinsport is a universe unto itself with not much room to manuever around past events. There would still be a lot of people around who remembered the events of 40 years prior.

So, there must be writers familiar enough with DS to make sure the new plots don't break continuity... if they want the job they'd better bone up fast.

As for network interference... we're talking about the way it should be.   Networks can always screw it up, and it's inevitable these days.   Someone would have to be there to fight that.

The immortals could be recast.

I feel compelled to point out there was precious little continuity in the original series.  Remember Jeremiah Collins, Elizabeth's grandfather?  Or Josette's death in 1797?  Or Collinwood being built in the 1820s?  And how about those cousins in the 1840s--where did they come from?