Lets talk about the dumbest things the writers ever did.

[Lydia]

Things twist all over the place.  Sometimes you can see the Tower from the drawing room windows, and sometimes you can't.  I think (though I can't pinpoint episodes) that sometimes you see the sunrise from the drawing room windows and sometimes you see the sunset.  As for the car driving up, I imagine the driveway sort of twisting around so that it's visible at some point from the drawing room windows, but I don't think that fits with the view of the driveway that we got when Mrs. Johnson came for her job interview with Mrs. Stoddard, and Matthew Morgan watched her arrival.   I wonder if the writers were thinking about all this when they decided to make the playroom a now-you-see-it-now-you-don't thing.

[Angelique Wins]

Are we saying that the main entrance to the house is supposed to be on the back of the house?    I'm slow tonight, maybe more so than I realize.

Well, the way it first started out was that they actually showed the FRONT of the house where the big doors are and where the covered drive is.  But the view that we are used to seeing:  big sprawling mansion with the big solarium windows on the right hand side and the tower to the left is actually the BACK side of the real house (Seaview/the Carey Mansion) that they used for DS.

I think they just LIKED the BACK view much better, and continued to use it.  Anybody who hadn't seen the beginning episodes would just naturally figure that what they are looking at is the front of the house.  And since outside shots were never done again, nothing has to be explained.  LOL!

Judy

[Joeytrom]

In the episode where Roger is seen driving his car out of Collinwood (when David tries to kill him), I believe he takes it from the back or side and then circles through the front and then out of the estate.  You can also see David watching from his room window.

The DS exterior/interior matchup has nothing on Happy Days, which I believe was the worst setup I ever saw.  The exterior is a colonial style house that is sqaure shaped with large columns by the front door.  The first 2 seasons got it right with the inside, but when they switched to a live audience, they made the back door by the garage right alongside the front door with a lviing room that had a multi-directional wall that would have made a very odd looking exterior!  They even showed on column at the front door despite the fact the kitchen was where the oppiosite column should be.

[Doug]

I've heard when the show went to color, they started to use only still shots. They said the reason
why it was too expensive to continue to shoot outside of Seaview Mansion and the old Spratt House.

[Doug]

Another thing that has bothered me for awhile. When Willie found and entered the secret room of
mausoleum, searching for the family jewels and noticed Barnabas's chained coffin, have any of you
noticed how clean the secret room was after 175 years?

They should have made the secret room damp, dusty and full of cob webs. That is what they did on
the first DS movie and the 1990 remake series. I'm not questioning the outside of the secret room
where Joshua, Naomi and Sarah graves are, you can think the caretaker is keeping that part of the
mausoleum clean.

[MagnusTrask]

Presumably no one had been in there all that time, and maybe it was sealed enough that bugs didn't get in.    It was Grand Central Station in the past, but only because Barnabas went back to change things.

[Pansity]

Here's one I haven't seen anyone mention yet. In 1840 [spoiler]we're told by Gerard about how Tad and Quentin both perished during a storm at sea.  Remembering off the top of my head, I recall there's a storm, strong enough to endanger the ship, with high waves. First one then the other goes overboard (I forget the order).

THEN Quentin walks in, saying that they were swept overboard, and the two of them together made their way to land,where they slowly worked their way back to where they could get passage.

Run that one by me again -- the storm is violent enough to endanger a large clipper ship, but two people can find each other in the middle of an ocean and swim to shore.  [/spoiler]

Oh, and I'm also the friend whom Angeliquewins mentions downtopic mentioned [spoiler]the Beth off the cliff thing. To elaborate, its not so much THAT she went over,but how they set it up to happen. Sudden mindswitch back, OK, I can buy that. Him coming toward her, seeing she is scared to pieces of him.  Now I can see anyone that hysterical not registering that they've backed toward the cliff, not the solid ground on either side. But HE sees her at the edge, and doesn't stop and calm her down, but keeps coming. And LOL the way they have her duck under his arm, its like they're doing a spin in a waltz.  Think Last Crusade and Henry grabbing Indy -- if Q had grabbed her and thrown his weight backward they'd have fallen BACKWARD not forward and over the edge.[/spoiler]

The third is the lack of motivation with the Amanda Harris thing. You have to work really hard to justfy from what you  see that they ARE madly in love.  Its all tell, with very little in the way of scenes to show it in action.

Jeannie

[Taeylor Collins]

I agree with those who stated that [spoiler] Victoria being pushed off Widows Hill was an ALL TIME low. However, if the show had lasted it would have been SUPER COOl if VICTORIA had returned one day after the fans thought she was dead and gone.  What a great SHOCK that would have been!! DUN DA DUN! I think it would have been amazing to bring her back as an evil doppelganger or something.  And finally giving AM the juicy part she deserved.  Eventually the real Victoria could have returned and revealed that she was not killed by the Leviathans but only captured. My other would be the destruction of THE LEVIATHAN Storyline.  I loved the beginning of this storyline.  It is so creepy and atmospheric. When Barnabas returns from the past via the altar and utters the Leviathan speech, it always gives me cold chills.  This was a potential threat to the ENTIRE WORLD so it was dumb of the writers (or more specifically Dan) to panic and try to end it so soon.[/spoiler] Another dumb thing I think the writers or probably Dan did is as follows. On the BEHIND THE SCENES 1991 Mpi video, JF talks about how he thought the storyline changed TOO often.  I AGREE.  They should have moved a little this way and a little that way.  They still could have done all the wonderful storylines but also could have extended the life of the the show by not changing storylines so abruptly!!  I am also in the group who hates the fact that as [spoiler]Angelique dies Barnabas confesses his love.  EWW.  HATE IT WITH FERVENT PASSION![/spoiler]


Just some thoughts from Taeylor.

[bluefielder]

[spoiler]Barnabas telling Angelique he loved her[/spoiler] was the all-time screwup by the writers.