Dark Shadows Episode 211 - Revisit for Halloween Month

 

There is a Dark Shadows Channel on Pluto TV that is 24 hours a day, so you just never know what season you will come across at any given moment. But just past Midnight, episode 211 was on, and I couldn't have been happier. I just turned it to this as I was about to go to sleep and the episode in question concerns Barnabas "official" return to the Collinwood manor to meet Elizabeth, introducing himself as her cousin from England, the last of his line. This is when Willie was missing and Jason McGuire was worriedly trying to locate him. Barnabas standing next to his portrait is always such a neat visual to me. You could see all the past refreshed as he took his surroundings in. Elizabeth was excited to meet someone she didn't even know was "out there" related to her. Eventually Barnabas meets Victoria, who is stunned by how much he looks like the Collins in the portrait. Barnabas' familiarity with the area comes out in how he talks, so he has to cover himself by mentioning how generation after generation kept Collinwood alive through stories and continued shared history. When he goes to The Old House, he meets David, who has talked to the ghost of Josette. Barnabas sees her portrait and those aching memories return. It was just great to see Barnabas meeting these characters that, before his emergence as a major villain for the show -- a real shot in the arm for Dark Shadows -- were in dire need of someone exciting to stir things up. And how Frid just overpowers his scenes, it is just a reminder of what he brought to a soap in need of that extra bit of supernatural punch. He sure provided that.

***Episode 214, where Barnabas and Victoria are in the Old House and talk about its history, Frid once again shows how his vampire goes back in time and relives his past anew. Great stuff. This is why he was such a compelling character. When Frid was at his best, and the lines weren't difficult to remember, his work could be so damn good. And Vicky telling him that the difference in the Old House and the Pyramids is the latter were designed to be a tomb, he turns away telling her she's right, though, if anyone knows what being entombed feels like it is him***