Dameon Who?

i believe it was magnus who said it best about demeon edwards..."to me he's just that ghost in a leisure suit".

that sort of summed it up for me with this little subplot.it seemed like filler to me while most of the "majors" were off shooting the movie during parallel-time.i watched it and then forgot it instantly.to this minute i cannot recall a single detail of it.

and in general the wardrobing in parallel-time was extremely weird.

a ghost in an orange leisure suit...only on d.s..

Dameon always reminded me of Mr. Best in that I was never quite sure why he was needed.

Sally

I'm surprised that I even remember anything about the Dameon Edwards story. The 1970 Parallel Time storyline has never been one of my favorites.

Go figure.

It just goes to show that you pay attention well. And even when the storyline isn't a favorite. What more devoted DS fan can there be? 

and in general the wardrobing in parallel-time was extremely weird.

a ghost in an orange leisure suit...only on d.s..

One of the major aspects of 1970PT is that the color scheme is so radically different than Real Time (it's the same in 1841PT). The bright, vibrant, bold colors (and the often wild patterns) are a false facade that attempts to mask the darkness at the heart of everything that's happening there.    As we ultimately learn, the myths we're presented with at the outset are all lies designed to cover horrible and often ugly truths.

But one thing - Dameon's suit wasn't orange:

It was gray. Now, his shirt's color, on the other hand, has been a point of some debate. 

Oh, I loved Emory Bass' portrayal of Mr. Best!  I re-watched some of his scenes last month when my second Leviathan DVD set came in.  Really superb work.  Bass was so cold and calculating--glacial even as he purred over how "lovely" dear Amanda was.  Exquisite!

I think Bass came back for another role in 1840 or 1841 PT, but I'm not remembering the details now.

One character I wish they had done more with during this time period was Claude North.  He got a tremendous buildup, was portrayed very intriguingly by Brian Sturdivant, then he was just GONE after only four episodes or so.  I saw signs during that period of the writers struggling to keep up with DC's "sparkle, Neely, sparkle!" approach to plotting.

G.

DC's "sparkle, Neely, sparkle!" approach to plotting.

What do you mean?

Claude North was confusing.  They seemed to interject his name at every opportunity, as if something about him would turn out to be earth-shattering.    I wonder if he was thrown in because of his strange voice and presence, with the idea that either he'd be magnetic and catch on, just on the strength of that presence, or not, and if he didn't, they could choose not to develop the character.

Claude North was another character whose reason d'etre I could never figure out, just like ectopoleyester Dameon.  (Although I now know what the big deal about Dameon was.)  I do know - and correct me if I'm wrong - that Claude was you-know-who's boyfriend, and that he apparently "lent her out" to you-know-who to use to bring back Angelique, and then figured maybe that wasn't the best thing to do.  Okay, fine.  But - once again - they made such an initial big deal about it and then he's gone.  Actually, I'm glad he did vanish rather quickly.  I didn't like him.  He came off as a snooty, snotty, self-centered, arrogant critter, the kind of person who patronizes the Splash Bar in New York City. 

Gerard

Claude North was another character whose reason d'etre I could never figure out, just like ectopoleyester Dameon.  (Although I now know what the big deal about Dameon was.)  I do know - and correct me if I'm wrong - that Claude was you-know-who's boyfriend, and that he apparently "lent her out" to you-know-who to use to bring back Angelique, and then figured maybe that wasn't the best thing to do.  Okay, fine.  But - once again - they made such an initial big deal about it and then he's gone.  Actually, I'm glad he did vanish rather quickly.  I didn't like him.  He came off as a snooty, snotty, self-centered, arrogant critter, the kind of person who patronizes the Splash Bar in New York City.

Gerard,

The enigmatic Claude North couldn't have made that good a deal with you-know-who when Claude lent out you-know-who to that nasty PT 1970 Herbert Marshall-lookalike. ( I mean, Claude was chilling-out in the Collins mausoleum and Claude looked like an underpaid undertaker in that cheezy black raincoat of his!)

As to your right-on description of Claude as that "snooty, snobby, self-centered, arrogant critter," Claude could almost be a contestant on "The Apprentice" or even the show's "gracious" host, the smug and arrogant Donald Trump, imho.   

Bob the Bartender, President of the Alec Baldwin Fan Club 

Bob the Bartender, President of the Alec Baldwin Fan Club 

BtB, I've so missed your President of... sign offs. I'm really glad to see one after such a long time! 

Oh, I loved Emory Bass' portrayal of Mr. Best!  I re-watched some of his scenes last month when my second Leviathan DVD set came in.  Really superb work.  Bass was so cold and calculating--glacial even as he purred over how "lovely" dear Amanda was.  Exquisite!

I was just watching those episodes on Tuesday! Mr. Best is one of my favorite few episode characters from the show. [spoiler]Being Death you'd think he would have popped up more often (I wish he had!)[/spoiler]

ectopolyester

I'm out to make that a word now.   Maybe if I put it on Wikipedia...

The actor playing Claude North struck me as being too young to be playing this timeless ancient being.   It seemed forced.   I may remember wondering whether this was his first job.     And yes, he doesn't seem to have profited much from this irresistable deal with always-drunk PT Stokes.

Death Incarnate seemed like a bureaucrat.  Maybe he was.   Anyway, you'd think the fact that Amanda was already immortal thanks to the Tate painting would have come up at some point, even if that got cancelled out by the suicide.   Come to think, shouldn't the painting still affect her after she's alive again?  I know, it's all magic so don't get all technical.    Anyway, she gets multiple extreme longevity options and I'm still waiting for mine....

i didn't really get 'claude north' either.

but from what i recall(and it's been some time since i watched this storyline)he was introduced very late in the parallel-time story.shortly before the story shifted to 1995 and then back to the 'present'.

since parallel-time was a completely self-contained story without any threads that picked up in real time(apart from perhaps roxanne's resemblance to her p.t. counterpart)there wasn't really anywhere to go with claude.

but,yeah,he seemed like one of those things/characters on d.s. that gets alot of build up without any real payoff.

They might have been ready to rearrange everything in favor of a popular CN, extending the storyline, or maybe having a RT Claude.

DS doesn't seem to me to be any more guilty of building up a character one way only to find out that the reality is quite different. Such devices are used over and over again in writing, I mean, a classic example would be the wizard in The Wizard of Oz. No one could say his reality matches the build-up. And, yes, one can say that even though he was ultimately very different, he served an intricate/essential part of the story by giving the scarecrow et al. what they needed, but the same is also true of Claude as [spoiler]he got Roxanne to speak, which destroyed Angelique,[/spoiler]which was most certainly an intricate/essential part of 1970PT. It just also happened that after he served his main purpose, he was killed off - but that's hardly surprising in the DS universe, no matter the time period or time band. 

The actor playing Claude North struck me as being too young to be playing this timeless ancient being.

I don't believe the Claude we see in 1970PT was meant to be timeless and ancient. In Ep #1047 they did show the gravestone of a Claude North who died in 1866 - however, later on in Ep #1055 that man was explained as having been the present Claude's grandfather - and I don't think we have any reason to doubt that.

A red herring, maybe. 

When I hear someone has the same name as an ancestor, my skepticism works differently from most people's, after years of DS.    I say, "Hah!  Right!  Just an ancestor?  That's the same guy!   How naive do you think we all are?!"    That wasn't good preparation for the real world, was it...?

A red herring, maybe.

Even though people on DS tend to lie - and lie a lot - when there's really no reason within the storyline to assume otherwise, it's probably best to go with the explanation given as the real story. 

That wasn't good preparation for the real world, was it...?

Probably not.