Original Intent?

[Luciaphile]

Spoilers












I wrote a bit about this in the Idle Thoughts thingy, but wanted to address this further.

Does anyone know what the game plan for 1897 was at this point in the story?  Because right now the hints we're given really don't match up much with what happens later on.

Beth is wearing a dress completely atypical for a servant and there's no indication that she's supposed to be one either.  When the kiddies were doing their roleplaying the other day, they mentioned that "they" (i.e. Beth and Quentin) lived in that room.  

There's a mention of Quentin in a picture with his brothers and sisters (note the plural).

Then we've got the tantalizing reference to Oscar Collins, a date of 1887 and the idea that Jamison was old enough to be corresponding at that point in time.

So I'm wondering what the writers had plotted out at this point.  Speculations, anyone?

Luciaphil

[jennifer]

I agree with you there were a few things here they don't add up here and Beth didn't seem like a servant here at all The clothes are all wrong! Did the writers look back at past storylines to see if they jived!It does make the watching more interesting when you know the 1897 story to see what is different.

jennifer

[Gerard]

I always wondered about that dress, too.  Back in 1897, she wore stuff that even Carolyn Ingalls wouldn't don on her worst days mothering the Ingalls clan in that little house on the prairie, and yet, when she's spookin' around, it looks like she's getting ready to visit the Vanderbilts in Newport.  Maybe it's something she managed to pick up on the "other side".

Gerard

[Dr. Eric Lang]

If I knew nothing of the 1897 story line, my impression at this point would be that Quentin and Beth had a baby together. They are a "ghost couple" with a cradle so that much seems to be what they're trying to get across. Maybe they intended for Beth to be Quentin's wife; a servant girl that Quentin eventually married after getting her pregnant.

The dress itself may not have been indicative of Beth's status in the household; I think Dan Curtis just thought "ghosts wear white" and that's all there was to it. Josette always appears in a wedding gown she never actually wore, let alone was buried in.

The letter Roger read from 1887 from Quentin to Jamison was intriguing. Louis Edmonds may have simply mistakenly said the wrong year. Jamison could not have been an adult in 1887 unless he was quite aged by the time Elizabeth and Roger were born in the early '20's.

[kuanyin]

I don't think the writers gave much thought to it. They wrote what they had to for that day. Molly/ Amy, what's the difference? Naomi being given jewels by sailors/Naomi being an alcoholic married to a repressive/abusive man, what's the difference?

[VAM]

I think in one of the DS sources they mention the reason (which slips my mind) Oscar was changed. Kinda like the Molly/Amy deal which was the choice of the moment.DS reminds me of a grab bag that way...

[jennifer]

I think it also mentions that sometimes the writers forgot things and send someone down to the lot at the studio to ask the fans about past events!

jennifer

[Bob_the_Bartender]

Hey gang,

It's too bad that the Dark Shadows writers couldn't have conferred with Jonathan Edwards of "Crossing Over" fame to resolve this ghostly question concerning Quentin and Beth.  (Maybe Dan Curtis put a call into either "Criswell" or the psychic Maurice Woodruff for some "spiritual guidance.")

Bob the Bartender

[Birdie]

My opinion is that the script changed as things went along.  I don't think it was or is much different  on other soaps.   Being brought up watching soaps, I know they change or ignore things.  On Days of Our Lives there was another child of Tom and Alice who just disappeared never to be mentioned again.  The poor thing does not even get the Christmas ornament hung on the tree every Christmas, sob, poor slob.  It is the nature of the beast.

Birdie

[sheenasma]

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When the stuff and nonsense is done, and we get back to the grit, there will be a scene that references Beth having been a servant...when the kids go off to an old room in the servant's quarters, and Amy, as Beth, says she remembers it, is is "her" room

n

[Joeytrom]

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In the beginning of 1897, it appears that Edward is married to Jenny and had her locked away in the tower.  She even tries to kill him.  DC must have then been able to get Diana Millay back on the show, so the writers changed Edward's wife to Laura.  The original intent for 1897 had probably been changed many times, especially when the story got under way.

DC stated 1897 was to run for three months originally.  it was most likely a simple planned story then.  Quentin kills a relative of Magda, she places the werewolf curse on him.  As a werewolf, Quentin kills Beth. Q is found out by Judith and Edward.  One of them shoot him and he dies in the room.  They seal up the room to prevent anyone from discovering Q's secret and state he went to France to live.

[Gothick]

I've been watching some of the current shows on video, and found it mordantly amusing when Barnabas was actually scripted the line:  "The past is forgotten.  Only the present matters."  That must have been the heraldic proclamation for DS writers.

According to Sam Hall in the interview he gave to Mr. Gross, Dan Curtis had a habit of dictating sudden changes in the storylines.  It's my view that DC is to blame for a lot of the stuff that doesn't add up over time in the development of the more complicated, extended storylines.  If you think the inconsistencies in the prelude to the 1897 storyline are bad, don't even try to curl your brain around how they set up 1840.  Almost nothing matches what the characters learned in the setup storyline.

It does seem weird to have the cradle walled up in Quentin's room, though, since it was NEVER there during 1897.

Steve

[Midnite]

It does seem weird to have the cradle walled up in Quentin's room, though, since it was NEVER there during 1897.

Oh it wasn't.  Q dispatched the kids to sneak it to the West Wing from the Old House.

[Gerard]

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In the beginning of 1897, it appears that Edward is married to Jenny and had her locked away in the tower.  She even tries to kill him.  DC must have then been able to get Diana Millay back on the show, so the writers changed Edward's wife to Laura.  The original intent for 1897 had probably been changed many times, especially when the story got under way.

DC stated 1897 was to run for three months originally.  it was most likely a simple planned story then.  Quentin kills a relative of Magda, she places the werewolf curse on him.  As a werewolf, Quentin kills Beth. Q is found out by Judith and Edward.  One of them shoot him and he dies in the room.  They seal up the room to prevent anyone from discovering Q's secret and state he went to France to live.

You know, if only they had Jerry Springer back then, the whole clan could get it outta their system, break a few chairs, toss around a buncha "hoe's", and within an hour, they'd all be back at that big trailer called Collinwood, all problems solved.

Gerard

[tripwire]

the above sounds all very typical of ds, write it from day to day, and the heck with the rest...but, they did seem to have some idea about magda and the curse.