Hi, Doctor and K9, what I recall from my own listening is that a fan (maybe David, b/c I know he was around back then--don't know about the others) was commenting that he saw the movie in a theatre at the time and his friends were saying that the story did not feel like DS to them and they felt it WASN'T DS. Presumably, they were expecting the second movie to involve Barnabas, or at least material more directly related to what was shown in the original series. I think once you drop that expectation--that it's going to be somehow a re-telling of a story from the OS--it's actually a much better film--and certainly would have a greater likelihood of being seen as such, if the story it told were all there. As Darren carefully explains in the tape, the whole climax, and point of the story, is missing from what we have now.
One comment about Darren's summing up of the missing climax: [spoiler]Darren quotes a line of dialogue where someone, I think the John Karlen character, says after the recovery of the bodies of Charles and Angelique (btw, I had missed that Angelique's remains were left in the same cubbyhole where Charles was walled up alive--egads!) that it's clear now that Angelique wasn't a Witch. I still feel from what is seen and shown in the movie that it's ambivalent. The Chinese would describe Angelique as a "hungry ghost," a spirit who had acquired great power due to having suffered a death through injustice. At the very least, it's clear that when Angelique was alive, she was a very strong-willed woman who had the ability to make others do her bidding. Witchcraft or sheer human charisma? I think it is ambivalent and that blurry area is, to me, one of the most satisfying things about the story.[/spoiler]
btw, I do not know if it was ever announced here, but Wallace did an earlier podcast with KLS about hoDS. I plan to listen to it at some point soon.
G.
