Can't they make up their minds?

[Josette]

We all know the show is full of inconsistencies, but having invented a story, you'd think they could at least remain true to their own premise!!

Initially, there is the mysterious breathing in the box, and later the room.  That and all the comments about it make it sound horrendous.

We then see a sequence of Joseph, Alexander, Michael and finally Jeb.  Each is worse than the previous incarnation.  We know they have all sorts of evil plans for taking over humanity.

Roger is told about this, yet he thinks he can bluster at Jeb as though he's just an ordinary not-nice guy.

But, especially Bruno, thinking he can kill Jeb and then take over as the Leader!!  Even Nicholas has said that Jeb is the one indispensable.    He's the creature that grew from the box.  Bruno was so anxious to serve him when he arrived.  This isn't just some ordinary band of "bad guys" where someone might plot a mutiny and want to take over.  Jeb is their supernatural creature leader.  They all have blind obediance to him.  Not only is it unthinkable that Bruno could plan such an attack on  him, but clearly it would be impossible for him to take over.

And, as to Jeb - what a change.  Most of the time he seems fearful!!!  Aside from the fact that it's Jeb who turned into his true form to commit murder, even Alexander and certainly Michael were far more menacing than he is now.

[Raineypark]

Plotting by committee is SUCH a grand way to write a story.  Especially when it appears the committee was never all in the same room at one time.

"What did we do yesterday?"
"I don't remember."
"Never mind...just change it today."
"Works for me!"

 

[vampire675]

My idea is that they were working on the premise that evil characters are by nature distrustful of each other, and end up defeating each other instead of the forces of good.
This is always the results in the eternal struggle of Good vs. Evil.
Good works together, Evil works against itsef as well as against Good.

Vampire 675

[Josette]

My idea is that they were working on the premise that evil characters are by nature distrustful of each other, and end up defeating each other instead of the forces of good.
This is always the results in the eternal struggle of Good vs. Evil.
Good works together, Evil works against itsef as well as against Good.

I quite agree, if this were just a collection of evil characters.  But they set it up as though Jeb is the evil character (and Nicholas) and the others are more or less slaves to him.  The idea that one could not only turn on him, but imagine that he could replace him seems to contradict the whole set up.

[onyx_treasure]

But, especially Bruno, thinking he can kill Jeb and then take over as the Leader!!  Even Nicholas has said that Jeb is the one indispensable.    He's the creature that grew from the box.  Bruno was so anxious to serve him when he arrived.  This isn't just some ordinary band of "bad guys" where someone might plot a mutiny and want to take over.  Jeb is their supernatural creature leader.  They all have blind obediance to him.  Not only is it unthinkable that Bruno could plan such an attack on  him, but clearly it would be impossible for him to take over.

     I got the impression that followers were promised that they would become leviathans, too.  However when Barnabas was being lectured by Oberon, he indicated they were just using the humans.  Maybe, Bruno was lied to like everyone else.  Barnabas said to Oberon that people would not follow them if they were asked to do things that they could not do.  Barnabas was unable to murder Julia just because the Lung Brat told him to.   Elizabeth had trouble with those demands, too.  Bruno seemed to want the power and began to chaf at the demands of a petulant, childish leader.  Elizabeth was beginning to resent being ordered about by Jeb.  She told him this was still her house and he sent her to her room.  It just goes to show that there was a leadership vacuum because of Jeb's lack of charisma.
    The story also mentions that during the ceremony Carolyn is supposed to change.  Jeb even believed it but I think that was also a lie.  I think it was supposed to be like Rosemary's Baby.  Rosemary did not quite recall that she was raped by the Devil.  I think that would have been Carolyn's experience, too.   

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Plotting by committee is SUCH a grand way to write a story.  Especially when it appears the committee was never all in the same room at one time.

"What did we do yesterday?"
"I don't remember."
"Never mind...just change it today."
"Works for me!"

 

Actually, the writers would often hold marathon brainstorming sessions at Sam Hall's kitchen table. But the thing is, the ideas they would come up with had to be run past DC before they could actually make it into storylines. And apparently it wasn't unusual for DC to shoot down almost every one of their ideas and then impose his own...

That having been said, though, it's also true that often the writers couldn't remember exactly what had happened in previous storylines. In fact, they'd sometimes go out to the fans who were seemingly always gathered outside the studio to ask them questions about what had happened. And quite obviously, if it's a case that they relied on what they were told, a few of those fans obviously never remembered correctly either.

Hmmm...maybe it really was true that a lot of the '60s/'70s DS fans had short attention spans...
(But I guess I wasn't one of them because I've recently come across copies of letters that a cousin in Illinois and I used to write to each other, and we would often go on and on in great detail about past DS storylines, with both of us always seeming to have had everthing down pat, even to the smallest detail. Pity we didn't live close enough to NYC to stand outside the studio on those days when the writers needed help jogging their minds.
I only wish I still had that sort of memory for the things I currently do because somedays I can't even remember everything I did the day before, much less what I might have done and/or watched months or even weeks beforehand. (But I suppose the recent post count problem is more than proof of that, isn't it? ))

[Raineypark]

somedays I can't even remember everything I did the day before,

NOW you tell me this?