Discuss - Ep #0268

Robservations - #268

Once again Joan Bennett was excellent.  I particularly liked her expression as she approached Widows Hill.  Clearly suicide was not what Elizabeth wanted, but she just couldn't see any alternative.

I was startled by the first call of "Elizabeth!" before the credits.  And I wondered: are those widows real, or are they in Elizabeth's mind?  And then I wondered: how does Elizabeth think of herself - as Elizabeth or as Liz?  And would it sound quite the same if the widows called out "Liz-zee!  Liz-zee!"?

I suppose that the reason Carolyn is wearing pants these days is because she doesn't want to wear a skirt when she's on a motorcycle, but it's interesting that the pants never get mentioned.  I'll bet they bug her mother even more than Buzz does.

I agree, I just love Joan Bennett in these episodes....these were Elizabeth at her best.

Elizabeth is faced with three choices.....tell the truth, marry a man she loathes, or end her life. Elizabeth still feels she can't run the risk of making Carolyn hate her, but Carolyn already appears to be doing that since she believes Elizabeth has forgotten all about her daddy (which is sooooo not true!). Marriage to a man like Jason would be repulsive, a man who will never let her forget what happened 18 years ago and will always be there to remind her. In Elizabeth's mind, suicide appears to be the only way out of this mess, more of a necessity rather than by choice, I do agree.

I love those scenes between her and David and her and Carolyn. She was sadly saying goodbye to them in her own way, and neither of them knew it. It's so sad.

Great episode....again.

Good Show. JB was great, she did so much with so little. Maybe they were trying to get the story back to Liz and finish so she could go on vacation.

I like what everyone else has said. I think Carolyn knew something was up. Just her conversation with Vickie. But she didn't do anything about it. Liz must have gone out the back door to Collinwood or Carolyn would have seen her; and stopped her.

Couple things loved to have seen Liz on th beach with David, but not in heals. Why wasn't david in the family Bible?

Also Liz wrote April 10th, just think that we watched the show on April 4. Maybe Liz just didn't want to pay taxes that year.

Elizabeth is faced with three choices.

Carolyn brought up a fourth choice today that hadn't occurred to me before: Elizabeth could run away.  Suddenly I had a vision in my mind of Liz grabbing $500 out of her savings account and running off and living in a squalid little apartment in Altoona, hoping nobody would ever find her.

The mention of Joan Bennett's vacation interests me.  If Dennis Patrick had not wanted out of the show, then quite likely we would have had several weeks of Jason without Liz.  I don't think the writers would have done the Gaslight thing that they had Trask doing with Judith; Jason was having too much fun tormenting Liz to want to get rid of her.  Perhaps Elizabeth would, in fact, have run away - maybe because Jason was just too much for her, or maybe because the police were after her for Paul Stoddard's murder.  It's hard to imagine her letting go of the reins of Collinwood and the family business at this point, but I'm sure the writers could have made it believable.  After all, they made everything else on Dark Shadows believable - right?

The mention of Joan Bennett's vacation interests me.

Joan wasn't going on vacation any time soon. She appears heavily for many more episodes and continues to appear even after the blackmail storyline concludes. She doesn't have an extended period of time off until the August '67 episodes and these current episodes were originally shown in the beginning of July. 

David appears to be much more intuitive than his cousin Carolyn - who btw deserved a good swift kick in the pants today.

I too kept picturing Liz walking on the beach in heels, lol. It would have been fantastic to see Liz & David on the beach together in location footage. And I couldn't help but wonder if the secret place he was talking about was the cave in which Maggie escaped through, but I don't think we were meant to think anything of it.

I kept asking myself today (I watched three eps ending with this one. It is so hard to stop watching to keep in step with the watching project): If Roger had threatened to leave Collinwood and take David with him, I wonder if that might have made Liz cave in? Probably not - but I'm sure it would have made for quite the scene. And has anyone wondered why Liz might not take Roger into her confidence (not saying he is the better choice) being he killed someone, kept it a secret, etc.

Well, we don't have to speculate - Carloyn is still seeing Buzz.

I did not like the scenes involving the widows at all - ruined the episode - not totally but... I'd have much preferred the original whistling wind sounds to represent the widows calling and still could have handled Liz's dialogue as is. And I could have done without the widows making an appearence - it just looked so damn stupid. I guess they must have hit the H2O instead of the rocks cause they looked a hell of a lot better than Josette did after landing, lol. I mean, even Bill Malloy came back in a seaweed suit.

Okay, hasn't it already been established that Josette married Jeremiah and jumped off Widows Hill? You'd think she'd get a mention, as much as we had to hear about the three widows and their waiting for a fourth jumper, etc.

And no, I did not wake up on the wrong side of the bed...

Be sure to check out these (hopefully  ) humorous topics related to this episode:

From "Caption This!":

From "Complete This Phrase / Fill In The Blank(s)":

And no, I did not wake up on the wrong side of the bed...

You could have fooled me. 

Okay, hasn't it already been established that Josette married Jeremiah and jumped off Widows Hill? You'd think she'd get a mention, as much as we had to hear about the three widows and their waiting for a fourth jumper, etc.

Oh, but Josette was French!  You can't expect three respectable widows to accept a French chit as a member of their little club!

I guess they must have hit the H2O instead of the rocks cause they looked a hell of a lot better than Josette did after landing, lol.

They were locals, and knew enough to wait for high tide.

I think there was a blooper today.  Elizabeth wrote April 10th, but this episode originally aired on July 5th!

It was wonderful and heartwretching to watch those scenes of Elizabeth with David and Carolyn - how much they meant to her.  (Indeed, what about Roger?)  That hug between Elizabeth and David - and the way Elizabeth talked on the same level with David - brought tears to my eyes. 

Poor Elizabeth didn't really want to commit suicide, but she couldn't find any other way out.  Great acting by JB.  I'm so happy that Vicki was able to save Elizabeth.  Vicki wasn't "totally clueless" yet! 

----- Sally -----

I think there was a blooper today.  Elizabeth wrote April 10th, but this episode originally aired on July 5th!

I think the point in the series hasn't been reached yet at which dates provided in the eps approximate the air dates.  The climax of the Laura storyline didn't match up either.

I've been hypermarathoning, so that one episode bleeds into the and the next, etc..    I'll deposit a few remarks here and hope that I'm in the vicinity if #268.   This is probably forbidden so I'm not expecting answers, which would tilt the thread OT. 

Is it possible that Barnabas, in 1967 and 1795 the "first time around" (without V Winters there) didn't know Ang was a witch?   That might be enough to explain the inconsistent history from BC, and bitterness toward Jeremiah.

DS is totally adult in this storyline.    It became great again, but it may have never been completely adult like this again.    Was this due to M Marmorstein?

Julia shortly after she appears: "If you knew me at all, you'd know I'm afraid of nothing."   !!!

I thoutght ECS at W Hill was great.

I've been hypermarathoning, so that one episode bleeds into the and the next, etc..    I'll deposit a few remarks here and hope that I'm in the vicinity if #268.   This is probably forbidden so I'm not expecting answers, which would tilt the thread OT. 

Is it possible that Barnabas, in 1967 and 1795 the "first time around" (without V Winters there) didn't know Ang was a witch?   That might be enough to explain the inconsistent history from BC, and bitterness toward Jeremiah.

Discussion of these comments continues here: 

Did we just see 1795 version 2?