As I drove home from work, I thought to myself: "Great Dark Shadows episode coming up!" And it was even better than I remembered. Peter Turgeon did a fine job of portraying Dr. Woodard's horror at what he learned from Julia's notes.
And Grayson Hall sure earned her keep. I had forgotten how much Julia dragged her feet about killing Dr. Woodard, and how Barnabas kept pulling and pushing her along.
Was this the first time that Barnabas was ever shown in the act of appearing? As the bat was chirping away and Dr. Woodard stood there, I thought to myself that he could have managed a phone call in the time it took for Barnabas to appear - but I can't blame him for being unable to pull himself together enough to do so.
Dave had already signed his death warrant with Barnabas, but if he had gone along with Julia he could have lived.
I'm not so sure about that. Barnabas was on the point of strangling Julia umpteen times, despite the fact that Julia was totally committed to her great experiment. I don't think he would have trusted Dr. Woodard enough to let him stay alive, even if Woodard had agreed to cooperate with the experiment.