As Josette has already remarked, yes, I am behind
Fashion notes first . . .
Mrs. Johnson's bathrobe. I love it. Fits the character and seems exactly like the kind of thing she'd wear too.
And then there's that deplorable nightgown/piano scarf from hell that Julia was wearing the morning after. Egad. I forgot about this one. I think I'd done like a mental block because it was just too scary for words. Add it to the pile of clothes they should have doused with Quaker State and set alit.
Add that nasty piece of polyester to the yellow and green sheets and it was just oh, it was yeech.
But then we have Tom. Tom, who in those nice tight trousers and long sleeved shirt, with the sleeves rolled up to reveal those shapely arms, was a miracle of lusty understatement
Roger is doing his best to wreck his status as a well-dressed man. That orange turtleneck was a fashion disaster if I ever saw one.
As for Liz. Well, that's my favorite outfit, but it was just so wildly inappropriate for the situation (which I suppose tells us something about her mental state). I mean, I've had a couple of velvet pieces of clothing before, not many, but enough to know that you don't escape from a mental hospital 100 miles away, make your way home somehow (I have this sudden picture of Liz hitching a ride with a trucker), wander through the forest and yet still look like you just pulled the dress on. Velvet isn't the most forgiving of fabrics.
Anyhow onto the show . . .
I would like to begin by discussing Tom. I have to hand it to him. Sure he's a vampire and all, but compared to a lot of the vampires on DS, he's actually not that bad. Think about this here:
1. He doesn't want his victims to change. There's none of this let's play dress-up and "by the way, your name is Phyllis" crap. Although I admit that in Julia's case a fashion makeover might have been in order
2. He doesn't talk his victims to death like some others I could name. In fact, he seems to have do precious little exhortation to get his victim to do what he wants (which is kind of telling.
3. He's got a yen for the middle-aged. Not just Julia, but he looked pretty interested in Liz too. Now as someone who is on the wrong side of 30, I find this kind of reassuring (in a sick and strange way, but you knew I wasn't exactly normal, right?)
4. And he's such a total hottie.
What more can you ask for?
It's heartening to see that the medical profession relies on cheap school supplies to do their research. See kids, you too can start planning your own monster. All you need is a marble notebook and you're good to go!
Regarding Julia and her "illness," did none of these people ever fake being sick to stay out of school before? You would think that they would be sticking the thermometer next to the light bulb or moaning about nausea or something. And actually, Julia could have assured herself uninterrupted time by just telling Willie tersely that she had "female problems."
And talking about Julia. I love this subplot. It was refreshing in a way. And then we had her looking so very . . . satisfied, heh. It was fun too to see Barnabas having to be the responsible one. Made for much more interesting viewing.
Was anyone hoping that after Adam dashed him to the terrace that Jeff's tongue might have been injured?
I sort of addressed this in my reply to Josette on the 7/17 Idle Thought, but I think in essence my problem with how Barnabas and Julia handle the Adam situation is that they don't seem to have the most basic negotiation skills. Five minutes with a copy of
Gray's Anatomy would have probably bought them a lot of time.
In a disturbing trend, Jeff continues to occcasionally make sense. Although he predictably ruins it by saying things like "She'll do anything I tell her." What a horse's ass.
The lighting in the second set of episodes was godawful. Frid's hair looked like it was green; it was that bad.
And the award for lamest excuse of the day? It of course, goes to Barnabas, who answers the door in smoking jacket and informs his cousin that Julia is staying over "so they can work on the book." Yep. You have to wonder what the locals think these two are up to, hehe.
Barnabas came up with a pretty good plan to trap Tom, but then he went about it by revealing to Julia exactly what he intended to do, which was not precisely the smartest thing to do. Hello? She's in the vampire's thrall? Ring any bells?
I positively loved the scene between Mrs. Johnson and Nicholas. HAA was a great addition to the cast.
If there's anything more that annoys me beside Barnabas and the Mr. Science plot, it's this stupid premature burial story.
I wish they had had Tom bite Liz. At least then her monomania would have been a much more interesting one.
Luciaphil
