Dark Shadows - Mothers and Daughters

 I so enjoyed this one because this episode (#252) brought out those grandiose Soap Opera family drama cliches so ripe with camp. Elizabeth is marrying Jason no matter how Caroline appeals to her about how rotten he is. Elizabeth, of course, knows all too well Jason is a money-hunting scoundrel and blackmailer but that damned secret she's long held onto for 18 years (a long trial that has kept her practically confined to Collinwood) won't allow her to just tell her daughter the truth. Because the truth would be Elizabeth telling her daughter about the murder of her father. So you have the merry-go-round of drama that results from one lie just spawning a perhaps even worse reaction. That chain reaction includes Elizabeth noising her complaint against her family always trying to live her life for her and retorts to Caroline--who was sincerely and compassionately pleading with her mom to talk to her--about what she has done with her own life lately. Uh oh...that sparks a defiant Caroline to call up the wild leather jacket, lock-chain motorcycle bad boy, Buzz (Michael Hadge) and go riding and drinking. While Vicky and Joe are getting a drink at the Blue Whale, soon arrives Buzz and Caroline, quite tight and looking to drink some more. Joe tells Vicky that Buzz' motorcycle loudly passes by the docks where he works for the fishing fleet, while Vicky worries about Caroline's behavior and descent. To think that just hours before, Caroline was acting rationally and out of a heart of concern for her mom. Well, a badly timed line to her daughter and Elizabeth awakens in her nightgown to find Caroline and Buzz having a loud bit of fun in the living area while guzzling some brandy. Caroline, slurring but still quite pointed, wants her mom to get used to MRS. MCGUIRE. Buzz just takes it all in, mainly because Caroline loves to plant big, long smooches on him. All Elizabeth can do is be defiant herself...despite her daughter's self-destruction, that woman will go right back upstairs and to bed, carrying that continued secret with her and plans to marry Jason. Damn the family, that secret is not to be admitted regardless of consequences. 

There is a conversation upstairs as Roger opines about David's history grades (special mention to a character we barely see anymore), with Caroline still grappling with her mother's plans to marry such an obvious piece of shit. Roger and Vicky are just as puzzled but neither can really butt their nose into a grown woman's freedom to remarry if she so chooses. Roger, whose own marriage went historically bust, can't really take Liz to task too much. But Caroline deciding to get some revenge on her mommy creates a brand new problem that Liz sure doesn't need. 5/5 (rating for Buzz and Caroline; well, mainly Buzz and his caricature from Brando's The Wild Ones or Corman biker films of the time)