Saturday, March 28, 2020

The Dark Shadows Daybook: March 28


Taped on this day in 1969: Episode 725

A lugubrious luau breaks out at Collinwood! When Quentin’s a zombie, Jamison is Quentin, and Trask is back, will Barnabas say aloha? Gregory Trask: Jerry Lacy. (Repeat; 30 min.)

As Quentin continues to both inhabit Jamison’s body and writhe around in a graveyard, Gregory Trask arrives to recruit Jamison. He sets about conducting an excruciating exorcism as Barnabas looks on, helpless to stop the craven clergyman.

Enter Gregory Trask.

This is where the 1897 storyline kind of runs off the rails... now and then. Like the 1795 storyline, 1897 contains more filler upon actual viewings than in memory. Yes, Trask's a great villain, and there are volumes to say about Clan Trask, but that's counterbalanced by long patches of episodes that take up so much time, it makes me wonder if the character had dirt on Dan Curtis.

But I'm obligated to like the Trasks in their steadfastness as Collins antagonists. I'm about a decade behind on my Big Finish listening, but have they done much with the Trask family per se? That's the parallel story to the Collins chronicles. It's interesting to ponder the DS story from their perspective. A Lovecraftian hotbed of aristocratic menace!

"Yeah, Greg, you gotta go see what's happening at that house they walled up your gramps in. You know, where your dad disappeared. Well, okay, the OTHER house on the estate. You know, they have a vampire up there. And a witch. That's fine, but around kids? Quentin's back. Carl's still dating showgirls. They're hiring all of your ex-employees. Oh, and Quentin's now in the kid's body. No, not like that. Well, after he had the boy almost desecrate the corpse of Gabriel's old widow, all bets were off. Where's Quentin? He's a zombie. Maybe it has to do with all the gypsies they're harboring. Yeah, it's a real normal house up there. You know, your dad built a mortuary out of nothing and did pro bono work as an attorney. Your granddad came to this godforsaken town when the Collins family was keeping occultists on the payroll. Maybe it was to help the syphilitic sailor they thought was a dandy marriage prospect. He was married, but did that matter to them? No. Hell, they were marrying off their sons to island girls that the uncle would sleep with on his own. Now Greg, you're an educator and a pastor. They have two kids up there, looked after by some trampy maid. Kids, Greg. Yeah, they're half gypsy, but let's let that go. Their mom? They locked her up in a tower because that's how they treat the sick. She's running around with a knife, and do they call the cops? Of course not. I say it's self-defense. You have to help that poor woman. Help the kids, too."

Inaccurate, but the truth usually is.

Meanwhile, back in reality, Barnabas is having a hell of a night. Judith, the voice of reason, has Jamison locked up in the drawing room and screaming. She thinks nothing odd about him being alone in the room with a grown man who keeps sticking his head out and saying, "Not yet. Give me just a few more minutes," before ducking back in for more terrified cries of fear and pain.

Fortunately, Barnabas comes from an age of advanced and sophisticated corporal child rearing. If any character in literature is capable of dealing with the middle ground between modern common sense and old school, birch branch pedagogy, it's the man who did wonders with Willie Loomis by way of his instructive cane.

This is what makes Quentin look civilized.

It's the fourth anniversary of the Daybook, written as my third week in corona captivity begins. I got into all of this eight years ago due to nearly two months of self-imposed isolation as I watched all of Dark Shadows in just a few weeks. If anything, this all feels strangely familiar. My only advice, since you insisted, is to keep Dark Shadows on at all times. I mean it. They are the much-needed set of extra voices, rooms, and locations desperately required right now.

They are home. And their home is ours. Be well.

This episode hit the airwaves on April 4, 1969.

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