I assumed the lifeforce transfer would work as it had with Barnabas and Adam; that is, Angelique would be free of the curse while Eve would live as a separate entity.  The downside being, of course, that whatever happened to Eve would effect Angelique, and vice versa.  Still not a fantastic plan, though.

That would have provided a great deal of humor.  Imagine Angelique trying to control and drag Marie Wallace's Eve everywhere with her on the basis that their fates are tied.  I think she pretty soon would have regretted that choice.

I love the 1897 elements, this looks hilarious.  Hope I can see it someday.

I thought it was hilarious how Maggie called up Joe in the middle of the night to came stay with her, and then had him sleep on the couch!  In one instance, he burst into the bedroom in a fury of passion, [spoiler]only it was Jeff Clark's bedroom, and the two sexually repressed young men wrestled around together before talking about their "dreams." [/spoiler] Strangely, even when Jeff had moved out and supposedly there was thus a spare bedroom, Joe still slept on the couch. 
[spoiler]
Perhaps Joe and Angelique or Barnabas and Charity didn't actually have traditional sex, but they took their vampiric laison to such an erotic place that it might as well have been.  [/spoiler]

On a few occasions, residents of the Great House talk about going down to the gates, so there must be a fence somewhere, probably one of those very tall metal ones like rows of spears with pointy spikes on the top.

[spoiler]And in 1840PT, the Stokeses live in the gatehouse.[/spoiler]

But it doesn't seem to work, since [spoiler] Aristede, gypsy-assasins, and a whole host of other people just walk onto the estate through the woods all the time.  As I recall, there didn't seem to a proper bordering gate to the property in 1897 when Tim and Rachel escaped, they walked very easily on and off the Collins property to the underground crypt just beyond it.    [/spoiler]  If there is a fence, it probably just extends out by the roadside and then ends, so people can just walk around it.

Logo recently committed themselves to air less gay programming in favor of attracting a mainstream audience, and so will have lots of cheap reruns instead of bothering with continuing it's original gay series.  They used to air six episodes of 'Buffy the vampire slayer' per day, so I imagine they wouldn't mind airing Dark Shadows, but it will not have anything to do with the size of the gay following.

Killing [spoiler]Carl was one of the most despicable, pointless, and stupid acts that OS Barnabas committed.  However, unlike when DP Barnabas killed a dozen young people who had just been really kind to him, it wasn't played up for laughs, and there were real consequences to killing Carl.[/spoiler] There are only cartoonish and unrealistic threats of consequences in this film.  We also had a long history of OS Barnabas displaying somewhat better behavior, we don't really have that here, it's just cruelty with zero magnetism and poetry. 

I find it very disappointing that this one of those discs which netflix offers (both dvd and bluray) with no special features included.  It doesn't motivate me to buy the retail version so much as to just not bother with netflix.  Which is why (aside from living on a remote island with no movie theatre nearby) I saw the film for the first time ever last night.

Anyway, my first impression of the film was very favorable--I was taken aback by the visuals, and seeing...someone arrive on the train was awesome.  It was also problematic--I understand that she would have a need to change her name, but on such a shallow and last-minute pretext, with no emotion whatsoever?  I liked the pumpkin patch in front of the house, but I didn't like that over manicured lawn that apparently takes the place of the Collins forest that so much of the OS took place in.  I wish there was more of 1770, particularly a scene with Angelique and Josette together, and the hint that there were other Collins's alive back then.   I found the beginning of the film rather funny too, but it just didn't really go anywhere.  The characters were not developed enough--Viki/Maggie was hardly even in the film at all, I don't know when she fell in love with Barnabas, but it was off-camera.  The supposedly big dramatic scenes all felt a little stilted, awkward, like the actors didn't really know what their motivations were or perhaps were advised to keep things on a 'light' note no matter what?  I also didn't like Barnabas very much--his ability to control himself in other situations tells me that he didn't really have to kill that entire group of young hippies and Julia.  I didn't find either instance funny. 

I think if Elizabeth had been standing in the background while Barnabas caught Roger trying to enter the vault, it could have provided an opportunity for a verbal showdown between the siblings like the many compelling ones we saw between Bennet and Edmonds, and could have told us more about who these characters are, their histories, their relationship with each other.  Having Barnabas manhandle Roger and almost take over running the family in the process doesn't really do anything for me.  The actual storytelling is so clumsy, filled with little by-the-way hints (like instead of talking about who Liz's husband was, they have Carolyn open for Alice Coppers song referring to her father with Elizabeth looking stern in response) while so much time is dedicated to horror movie clichés that it's really a waste.  They could have done so much more in two hours.  Would people in the age range of the OS series actors really come to this party/Alice Cooper concert and enjoy themselves back in the 70's?   

Years ago I remember reading an interview in which Burton stated that when he was trying to shop Beetlejuice (his second ever film) to producers they made him change the script, insisting that "there needed to be some action, some romance in the third act..."  He took their advice and has used this as a formula to end almost all of his films since then, with a big chase scene, often a kidnapping and huge dramatic battle with a kiss at the end.  He used it again here; the ending was just terrible.  It almost reminded me of the X-men more then Dark Shadows, a very comic book display of "superpowers" in which I also recognized derivative elements from many other horror films.  Just an excuse for a bunch of CGI.   

So, Angelique killed Laura; why?  What was their relationship?  What kind of person was Laura?  If the film was written differently, these big reveals might have actually meant something, I might care.   I'm not really sure if Josette's ghost actually inhabited her body in the end, or if this was just another one of Maggie's spur-of-the-moment name changes.  I guess the potential sequel will involve Julia rising and forming a rival clan of vampires to fight Barnabas, and Elizabeth will turn against him once she finds out he betrayed her by killing Julia.   I'm sure the rebuilding of the house, recovery of Barnabas treasure and the Collins company will all be given a very easy explanation if there is a next film, which makes it all difficult to actually care about.  Instead of story, it's mostly just trivia, and therefore trivial.