Discuss - Ep #0417

[Watching Project]

Robservations #417

[Lydia]

As Barnabas was telling Ben that Ben would be giving him peace by staking him, I wondered how an actor puts himself in the frame of mind of a vampire asking to be staked.  I don't have the answer, which may conceivably be the reason why Jonathan Frid is an actor and I am not.

I had no trouble, however, imagining myself as Ben, as he was trying to persuade Barnabas not to go see Josette, and I felt great sympathy for him.  Barnabas's mental state was such that he should not have been allowed to make a decision like that, but Ben was helpless to stop him.

I suppose Natalie was lying when she said she read her own death in the Tarot cards, but I'm not 100% sure.  In this period of Dark Shadows, the writers didn't miss an opportunity to milk such a thing for drama, so if Natalie had been telling the truth, surely we would have seen her gasping as she saw the layout of the cards - but on the other hand, I don't think of Natalie as being as good a liar as she apparently was today.  And if she was lying, then why did she come into Josette's room?  Barnabas didn't make a sound.  If you lie about the Tarot cards, will you have seven years of bad luck?  Oh, well, that last point may be irrelevant.  With Angelique around, any further bad luck would be completely superfluous.

[buzz]

Lydia,

My thoughts are that Frid would put himself in a situation where he had absolute loathing for what he was doing but could not help himself. Any number of real life cirmcumstances could substitute for the vampire curse, ie alcoholism, drug addiction, sex offender. If an actror put themselves in that mind set it would give them something to work on by making their sickness real. I think Frid did an excellent job in this respect. 

[MagnusTrask]

I expected more "evil" os something, at this point, to bring us full circle to where BC was when set free in 1967.   I guess we have to put his 1967 mindset down to having been entombed.

Does this Natalie prediction come back to bite her on the ass during the remade version of 1795/6?

 

[EmeraldRose]

I felt sorry for Barnabas and Ben. Angelique was being her "witchy bitchy" self, and couldn't stay away. It was pretty spooky to see her face grow so large.  And  her trademark laughter - I love it! I had the impression that Natalie was lying about the tarot cards just to get Josette to leave.

----- Sally -----

[Sunny_Collins]

I agree with EmeraldRose, that Natalie said she was in danger of dying simply to persuade Josette to leave Collinwood.

Poor Ben, he has been called upon to do some horrific things no one should ever have to do. Too bad Angelique stopped him from carrying out his promise to Barnabas. She seems to have a one-track mind, always set on revenge against somebody, and most times mainly Barnabas.

[Roland]

I expected more "evil" os something, at this point, to bring us full circle to where BC was when set free in 1967.   I guess we have to put his 1967 mindset down to having been entombed.

Maybe Barnabas seemed more evil in 1967 because the people there didn't mean anything to him.  They weren't really his "family" (although they all looked amazingly like them).  Funny how Vickie made a big deal about the similarities in appearance but Barnabas never mentioned or, apparently, even noticed them.

[MagnusTrask]

Oh, Barnabas was a murderous maniac in 1967.    Even though you can see hints of the better man he used to be occasionally, by this point he's despicable.   

As for the resemblances, somehow I figured that they were some supernaturally-caused subjective experience on Vicki's part.   

[Josette]

Funny how Vickie made a big deal about the similarities in appearance but Barnabas never mentioned or, apparently, even noticed them.

When Barnabas was having his party and wanted everyone to dress up as their ancestors, he very appropriately assigned all the correct roles.  He never said it was because they looked the same, he probably implied more of their role in the family or their personalities, but he did cast everyone as the person they resembled.

[Lydia]

When Barnabas was having his party and wanted everyone to dress up as their ancestors, he very appropriately assigned all the correct roles.  He never said it was because they looked the same, he probably implied more of their role in the family or their personalities, but he did cast everyone as the person they resembled.

It would have been sort of neat if, when Vicky got to 1795, the actors played different people from the ones they dressed up for at the party - if, for example, Joan Bennett had played Abigail, Nancy Barrett had played Josette, and Louis Edmonds had played Andre Dupres.