Wow, I don't even remember the scene shown in today's shot, though I do remember at least part of the episode.
Here's the screen capture for anyone who might have missed it:
Back when AOL was an actual thriving entity and not a mere repository for e-mail, DS had a whole community there. I remember that back in September of 2002 there was a lengthy discussion on its message board about the cliffhanger of Ep #641, the previous ep to the one above, with the majority of posters screaming "Jump, Vicki, Jump!!" Let's just say there weren't many Betsy Durkin fans on AOL.
Honestly, I've never disliked her, I've been neutral. True, Durkin's Vicki can't approach Moltke's, but she's not awful. And I do wish that it had been Carolyn Groves who'd been cast as Moltke's first replacement instead of coming in as Vicki #3 during a later 1796 flashback - I really had no trouble completely accepting her in the role. (And who knows, maybe with Grooves in the part, the audience would have accepted her Vicki and Vicki would have continued to be an ongoing character on the show - but we'll never know.) But my circumstances are different from most original fans when it comes to Durkin because I never saw any of her eps during their original run because they took place while DS had been banished to 8:30am and 2:30pm in my area. I didn't see her until I saw her eps in syndication in 1987, and by then I'd heard nothing but terrible things about her. And maybe if I'd seen Durkin in 1968, without having already heard such negativity, I would have had a more critical reaction to her, too, but in 1987 I didn't think she was anywhere near as bad as I'd been led to believe. So, I think that could explain why I'm neutral toward her Vicki...
All the fun I'm going to have that day I start watching DS from episode one again...
Half the fun of watching DS over again is seeing all the things you've completely forgotten about. I'm sure most of us remember basic things about each ep, but with 1225 eps, unless one has a photographic memory, maybe, it's impossible to remember everything...