Vicki's parentage

[dom]

Was Vicki's parentage addressed at all in the 1991 Dark Shadows? Was it even an issue?

[Uncle Roger]

I think it was vaguely hinted at. Elizabeth seemed to have more than one reason for bringing Vicki to Maine. But it never became much of a plot point.

[Mysterious Benefactor]

The plan was to explore that storyline in the second season that never was - which is one of the reasons why it was explored in the comics based on the series. The comics revealed that Liz was indeed Vicki's mother.

[dom]

Interesting, MB, thanks for your reply. I'll have to research that to see how it played out.

[Mysterious Benefactor]

Honestly, it's been so many years since I've read the comics that I don't remember exactly how it played out. But I still have all the issues...

[dom]

I'm hoping to find it spelled out on-line somewhere. I don't usually have good luck with that - but never say die!
I was writing elsewhere yesterday that the biggest mystery really is who the father is - as most of fandom and lore take it for granted that Liz is the mother.

[Gothick]

There's a DS wiki that might have a topic about the Innovation Comics for the 1991 series.  They might offer synopses there.  I didn't read every issue but I vaguely recall a panel where Liz was reflecting that Vicki was really her own daughter.

Despite all that's been said, I feel the need to repeat that in the original 1960s series, the idea that Liz was Vicki's daughter was most likely a red herring (as we used to say).  I personally prefer thinking of Vicki as being the child of Liz because of the chemistry onscreen between the two and some of the dialogue that the scripts gave them. Also, Vicki was much more solicitous of Liz during the first two years than Liz's own acknowledged daughter, Carolyn.

There are various theories of who Vicki's parents were but the most likely are that she was Paul's child by another woman (I personally suspect Betty Hanscombe, but another fan firmly ruled that out; can't recall why).  There's no doubt that Alex posed for the portrait of Betty displayed in some 1966 episodes.  Amusingly, the portrait shows up later on in a 1967 or '68 episode in Sam's studio.

G.

[Gerard]

There was an interview with Joan Bennett in which she did admit that, if the character of Vicki had hung around (it appears "Icky Vicki" killed that), it was to be revealed that Elizabeth was, indeed, Victoria's mother.  I once found the recorded interview on-line; maybe google-search it. 

Not to bring it up again, but in my version of what-if-DS-had-continued, accepting what Miss Bennett had said, I had a storyline where Vicki returns (again, I took liberties and had, after several years, Alexandra Moltke return to the series).  In my WIDSHC, Elizabeth fesses up.  Using flashback scenes, she reveals that as a 15-year-old in 1932, she and her younger brother sail to Europe with their father Jamison (and their governess with whom Jamison was having an affair - what a cad).  On the ocean liner, she meets a dashing 17-year-old with whom she begins a shipboard romance.  But once they dock in Le Havre, she doesn't see him again.  Well, she does, in 1944 when she serves as a WAC in New York City.  Their romance reignites and in Spring of 1944, she discovers that he is to be shipped out.  They consummate their love before he goes.  He is killed in the Normandy Invasion.  She is pregnant.  When her parents find out, to prevent a scandal, they have her kept in NYC.  She wants to keep the baby, but they will have none of it.  But the Collins', always wanting to do the upright thing, decide to support the baby.  Elizabeth gives birth in the cold, winter days of 1945.  She's allowed to hold her baby once.  To demonstrate her resilience to her uptight parents, she names the baby Victoria - "victory."  The woman hired by the Collins', having a moment of compassion before she deposits the baby by the doors of the foundling home,  includes the note written by Elizabeth:  "Her name is Victoria..."  Because of the winter of 1945, Victoria is given by the orphanage the last name of "Winters."

Gerard

[MagnusTrask]

Since the clear implication of most of what we we hear in 1966 is that ECS is her mother, I imagine the answer would have been something else.  Look at how most of us expect that to be the answer... so how much of a surprise would it have been?

[Gothick]

Gerard, I love your story.  Beautiful concept.

Thinking about the character of Vicki I sort of feel that the character never really existed in the DS Universe after 1968. In both the 1991 and 2004 Shadows iterations, she's the actual reincarnation of Josette (this is certainly heavily implied in the scene MB is showing us now from 2004).  In the Burton/Depp film, Vicki truly doesn't exist; the name is only an alias.

There was something very special about the character of Vicki during the first year of the series.  I'm very grateful that we now have the episodes from that period to enjoy and contemplate the true beginnings of our beloved story.

G.

[MagnusTrask]

Before I saw 1966, when my viewing started up again in 2002, Vicki seemed to me to be someone with intelligence and sense with the capacity to figure out things, which for some reason had been switched off.  A smart, centered person who nonetheless hasn't got a clue.  Contradiction like these are irritant factors.  As a child, I just disliked Vicki.  She was little miss sensible who was out of the loop, as most "very sensible" people have always seemed to me.  Stodgy.

From 2002 on, after getting my tapes of DS, Vicki seemed very likeable, but always missing the point.  It did seem as if there was a clueful Vicki out there somewherre, probably in the dim, misty, mysterious early days of DS that I hadn't seen.  That turned out to be true, after I finally saw 1966-7 in 2011.

[DarkLady]

Gerard, thank you so much for sharing the details of your story. It's just lovely, besides fitting all the facts. I can see it all happening in my mind's eye. Jamison is a cad, but I guess with Quentin as a role model.....

Just on a personal note, my mother was a WAC also during WWII--but not in NYC.

[BangsnFangs]

In response to Gothick's question regarding Betty Hanscombe, I've been re-watching the early episodes recently, and, if I recall correctly, Sam Evans said that she died about 25 years before 1966.  So based on Vicki's age, which is about 20 at that time, she couldn't possibly be Vicki's mother.

[DarkLady]

WHAT IF Elizabeth's parents started a Collins-face-saving rumor that Betty Hanscombe was Vicky's mother? They could have exploited a passing similarity between Elizabeth and Betty (a nickname for Elizabeth). They could have paid Betty to go away and not return. And nobody outside the family (such as Sam Evans) would know the truth.

[Joeytrom]

The former butler, B. Hanscombe (Betty's brother) could have been Vicky's father and Elizabeth Vicky's mother.