Category Archives: Gordon Russell

Episode 385: The End of History

December 1967, Gordon Russell, , , , , , , ,

“I adjure thee, thou serpent — by the Judge of the quick and the dead, by thy Maker and the Maker of the world, by Him who hath power to put thee into Hell — that thou depart in haste from the flesh of this woman. Go out, thou seducer! Go out, thou transgressor, full of deceit and wile! Enemy of virtue! Persecutor of innocence! In the name of the Lord, I command thee to cast thyself back into the darkness from whence thee came, and where thy everlasting destruction awaits thee!”

For the last four weeks, we’ve accompanied Victoria Winters on an uncertain and frightening journey into the past, back to the year 1795. Sort of.

Because it certainly hasn’t been the 1795 that we expected, has it? We thought we were going to visit the 1795 where Jeremiah married Josette when he was an old man. Or the one where Josette and Jeremiah were very much in love. Or the one where Barnabas would have destroyed Jeremiah if he’d had the time. Or even the one where Barnabas gave Josette a special music box. Whatever happened to that music box, anyway?

So there have been a lot of inconsistencies piling up, impossible little gaps in time and logical sequence. It’s almost as if a really stupid and annoying person had traveled through time, and then done a lot of idiotic things, screwing up the timeline so badly that history isn’t working properly anymore. I wonder who that could possibly have been?

Continue reading Episode 385: The End of History →

Episode 382: A Witch in Time

December 1967, Gordon Russell, , , ,

“If the Devil has blinded me, Abigail, I consider it curious that he lets you in on all his plans.”

You know, everybody likes to talk smack about Abigail Collins, but when you think about it, every single thing she says is exactly one hundred percent correct.

Let’s run through some of her pet theories.

Abigail believes that Phyllis Wick, Sarah’s real governess, was replaced by Victoria Winters in some unnatural way. This is true.

Abigail thinks that the clothes Vicki was wearing when she arrived were shockingly immodest. According to the standards of the 1790s, this is true.

Abigail thinks that Vicki’s lying when she claims that she doesn’t know where she came from, that Vicki has uncanny knowledge about the future, and that the world would be a better place with one less Victoria Winters in it — check, check and check.

She’s basically nailed it, all the way down the line. Is it too late to go back and make this a television show about Abigail?

Continue reading Episode 382: A Witch in Time →

Episode 381: Runaway Bride

December 1967, Gordon Russell, , , , , , , ,

“I believe you can do anything — and the meaner it is, the better you can do it.”

So there we were, all set up for the big royal wedding — Barnabas, the young prince of the wealthy and powerful Collins family, marrying Josette du Prés, the ravishing heiress of the Martinique sugar plantations. Young and beautiful and desperately in love, embarking together on their life’s journey.

And then, at the last moment, the bride runs off with the groom’s uncle, which is pretty much the exact reason why you need to hire a competent wedding planner. Have we learned nothing from reality TV?

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Episode 380: Something Borrowed

December 1967, Gordon Russell, ,

“I did not change Mr. Collins into a cat so that you could kill him!”

Dearly beloved, I have a question: Why do they even bother to send out Save the Date cards? It’s a soap opera wedding; they have to know that it’s not going to go as planned.

The bride calls the groom by the wrong name at the altar, and they call it off. Or the groom’s sister goes into labor during the ceremony.  Or the bride shows up two hours late. Or the groom doesn’t show up at all. Or the bride’s ex-boyfriend runs in and punches the groom in the face.

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Episode 376: Card Tricks

December 1967, Gordon Russell, , , , ,

“The tarot cards give us access to knowledge of the occult which cannot be transmitted either orally or in writing.”

On Friday, a vengeful Angelique cast a spell on Josette and Jeremiah, sending them like sleepwalkers to a forbidden tryst, outside in the moonlight. Josette was followed by her aunt, the Countess Natalie, who was an eyewitness as the spellbound couple embraced, and pledged their love.

Now it’s the next morning, and Natalie does the only sensible thing she can do — she brings Josette’s father, Andre, out to the spot where the lovers met, and tells him that they’re being menaced by an evil force.

That doesn’t necessarily sound like the logical next move, but soap operas are approximately 90% information management. If somebody does something, then the next day, everybody has to stand around and talk about it. And if it’s a secret, then there’s all kinds of extra information management activity, including eavesdropping, speculating and making up excuses. Frankly, we’re lucky anything ever happens at all.

Oh, and we’re still in the past, by the way. Remember how we were in the past? Well, we’re still there.

Continue reading Episode 376: Card Tricks →

Episode 371: Damn the Torpedoes

Gordon Russell, November 1967, , ,

“I do not understand any more than you do.”

Okay, here’s a health tip: If you ever have an overnight layover in Martinique, don’t make out with the crazy girl.

Seriously. The girl is out of her mind. At the moment, she’s got a handkerchief wrapped around the neck of Barnabas’ wooden toy soldier, and she’s choking the life out of it. This is apparently going to teach Barnabas a lesson about treating people with respect. It might also partly be about leaving a tip for the maid when you check out of a hotel. It’s kind of an abstract lesson.

Now, this was an unusual Friday cliffhanger, because we know that Barnabas became a vampire, so he couldn’t have died from action-figure-based asphyxiation. Or maybe he could have. There’s a serious question raised today, which is: How does time travel work?

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Episode 370: A Woman Scorned

Gordon Russell, November 1967, , , , , , ,

“You, and one handkerchief, are all I need to make him regret what he’s done to me.”

Vicki has traveled in time — she’s trapped in 1795, and so are we, for the foreseeable future. We’re here to learn the secret history of how Barnabas became a vampire, and how he lost Josette, the woman that he loved.

In the last episode, we met Angelique, a beautiful young maid who works for Josette’s family. She had a love affair with Barnabas in Martinique, before he knew that the wealthy Josette returned his affections. Josette is traveling to Collinsport for her wedding to Barnabas… but Angelique isn’t done with him yet.

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Episode 366: The Phantom Menace

Gordon Russell, November 1967, , , ,

“Something happened during the séance… something unnatural.”

A long time ago…

Vicki is confused. That’s not a particularly startling development, because she generally goes around in a state of ongoing bafflement, but this time she has a good reason.

The last thing she knew, she was sitting in the Collinwood drawing room, having a perfectly ordinary séance with her employers, just like anyone might at the end of an average day at work. Then a ghost started speaking through her mouth, and now she’s standing outside the Old House, and it’s a bright, sunny day.

As she approaches the house, Barnabas Collins opens the door, and he’s young and alive and engaged to Josette, and it’s the past.

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Episode 364: Boom Goes the Dynamite

Gordon Russell, November 1967, , ,

“I know there’s good, and there’s evil, because I learned it from you.”

It’s been five months since the ghost of Sarah Collins first appeared to Maggie, back when Barnabas was running a compulsory youth hostel in his basement for pretty girls who remind him of his dead girlfriend.

Since then, Sarah’s been spotted by pretty much everyone, and we’ve learned that she’s the spirit of Barnabas’ beloved little sister.

Barnabas’ memory of loving Sarah is the one completely unselfish human quality that he’s displayed during his lengthy reign of terror. Over the last five months, Sarah has provided aid and comfort to his victims, but she’s never appeared to him directly.

And now — just as he’s about to strangle Julia, just as this storyline appears to be stretched to its breaking point — here she comes.

The question for today: Is this incident big enough to spark the seismic change that this storyline needs, in order to stay relevant and interesting? The answer to that question: Hell, yes.

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Episode 363: Anyone But You

Gordon Russell, November 1967, , ,

“She’s lonely, very lonely. She’ll talk to anyone… anyone but you.”

The vampire, the doctor, the lawyer, the governess, the niece and the little boy who talks to dead people. For months, they’ve been scrambling around each other — a little chaos engine that chews its way through anybody who gets too close.

And now we’ve gotten to the point where it just can’t go on. Barnabas is the most popular character on the show, but he’s radioactive — every character that he touches ends up murdered, hypnotized, lost in the jungle, or packed off to an insane asylum.

So far, we’ve killed off Jason, Burke, Dr. Woodard and Willie. Pretty soon, we’re going to start losing members of the Collins family, and that gets expensive, story-wise. If you kill one of the kids, that’s a hard stop on any other plot development; the show just becomes one long funeral.

In fact, my estimate is that this storyline has about three more days left in it, and then they’re going to have to come up with a whole new idea.

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