I read that Count Petofi was based on Count St. Germaine, a medieval alchemist who cllaimed to have attained the secret of immortality. He does have an appearance in Charles Delaware Troll's continuation of the series.
Thank you. I shall attempt a posthumous Googling.
one of my personal all-time favorite moments on DS--that shot of the DS skeleton tarted up in Wanda Paisley's tea-gown, wig, and big feathery aigrette
That was one of the few genuinely scary moments, I think, the whole I Ching experience with her, I mean.
A show can be renewed and still be in trouble. During Laura, DC could have convinced ABC that he knew what to do to get the ratings up in the future. If Barnabas and all of 1795 didn't increase them further, though, I'm confused. I don't know what to say.
I had already decided that the Q/Petofi mindswap was the point where the quality started to slip, myself-- not because Petofi and 1897 went on too long, which was implied by someone here, but just because it was a silly stretch of the story, or at least not so well written or acted. Anyway, nice to see my view jiving with the viewing majority's for once.
MB--- You wondered at the idea that this bit of story was hard for some to understand. I remember the general mindset of mainstream viewers then. Science-fiction-ish ideas were utterly unfamiliar and confusing to the public. The "mindswap" was one of several premises that flummoxed most people. Remember, the adults then had not grown up familiar with dozens of SF and other-worldly concepts as we did. They were hard-wired differently.
To most people, you were who you were, and that included personality, face, body, everything. Separating mind from body was something that wouldn't occur to them, and they had trouble understanding what that even
meant. They see Quentin ordering Aristede around, and if you tell them it's Petofi, they'd say, no, I've seen DS before, that's Quentin. Look at the convoluted language they used in DS for it.... Quentin's mind and body are both seen as being just as much "him", so they felt they had to have him say things like: yes,
I'm Petofi, but inside this body of Petofi's the essense of Quentin Collins lives.... I forget the actual lines.
I think it was just beyond both actors to act like each other's characters. They might not have understood the need to act like each other. Anyway, Thayer David is great, but he was never the slightest bit Quentin. It got ridiculous to see him approaching people and weeping at them "I am Quentin Collins!!" especially since "Quentin" was doing a perfect Petofi impression.... and Quentin would never have acted like that. Quentin was a cynic and conniver, not some innocent weeping wandering lost lamb. All the voiceovers about this being a fate worse than death were silly, too.
The rationale for doing all this, from Petofi, made no sense. For Petofi's mind to jump into a 1969 Quentin via I Ching, Quentin (at least his body) has to live through all those intervening years and reach 1969 by the traditional slow route, for that body to be there to jump into. However, Petofi's about to exit Quentin's 1897 body and leave it in an I Ching trance, or lifeless, or something. It's not as if Quentin's mind was supposed to get its body back at that moment that Petofi leaves 1897. Though...
That would be a more reasonable plan. Quentin might not even have minded much, if Petofi sold him on the idea that Petofi would just temporarily possess Quentin's body, leap to 1969, and then Quentin's 1897 mind would get it back again. Who cares about 70 years from now?
Anyway, 1897 picks up a little later at the end when characters are dropping like flies.
Oh, and I love Petofi, even if he is one of the many variations on Sidney Greenstreet which flooded the airwaves back then. Until I got DS tapes in 2002, I was absolutely convinced that as a kid I'd seen the storyline in which Petofi appears in the present. I can almost picture one of the scenes.
