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Echoes of Insanity Gallery
Echoes of Insanity
Number

8

Type

Dramatic Reading

Timeline

1968

Writer

D Lynn Smith

Director

Darren Gross

Music

Nigel Fairs

Sound Design

Nigel Fairs

Echoes of Insanity Gallery
We have 1 images of Dark Shadows Echoes of Insanity

Echoes of Insanity is an audiobook produced by Big Finish Productions. It was released in July 2009.

Back cover[]

"I discovered your mind in the darkness and I knew we could help each other."

After being shot outside Maggie Evans door, Willie Loomis is incarcerated at the Windcliff Institute. Fear and pain cloud his memory, until a golden angel appears and takes him on a journey through past exploits with his friend, Jason. With Jason now gone, Willie must face the evils of Collinwood alone, as he attempts to discover the truth about his old master, Barnabas Collins.

Synopsis[]

Willie Loomis mumbles about a pain in his back, a pain caused by gunshot wounds. He remembers going to Maggie Evans’ cottage. At the hospital he is told that he was going to kill her so that she couldn’t tell people that he’d kidnapped her. Each time he tries to remember what happened the fear comes back stronger. The first time the nurse gave him drugs the pain and fear disappeared and he could sink back into the darkness where he didn't have to feel or remember. It was when the golden haired angel arrived when all that changed.

[Opening Theme]

A voice calls out to Willie. The angel introduces herself as a friend; she says she’s here to help him remember who he is. She informs him he’s in Windcliff sanitarium. She tells him to open his eyes. The hospital has gone. Fog swirls around him. She discovered his mind in the darkness and knew they could help each other. She wants to know what he knows about the Collins family. She wants to know who he was before he came to Collinwood.

Willie hears familiar sounds of boats coming out of the fog. The smells of the place hit him, the salt of the seawater and exotic food. He’s in Singapore. The angel tells him that he brought them here in his memories. The last time he was here he was with Jason McGuire. She urges him to remember where Jason is now. Dogs howl in the distance. Singapore disappears, he finds himself back in the fog with the angel’s voice echoing inside his head.

Willie wakes up screaming. He’s back in the hospital. Two orderlies hold him down. The doctor enters and attempts to calm him. She gives him some medicine.

Days later, Willie continues to hear the howling of the dogs. He is taken to the doctor’s office. The doctor introduces herself as Dr. Hoffman. She asks him about the night he got shot. All he remembers is standing outside Maggie’s cottage and getting shot. Dr. Hoffman holds a medallion in her hand, she asks him about his life before he got shot, she wants to know if he remembers her, and his time at Collinwood. She lets the medallion fall to the end of its chain. It twirls in front of his eyes, unable to take his eyes off it. He feels himself falling back down into the darkness where the angel waits for him in the fog. She tells him that Dr. Hoffman is making him forget who he is, who he was. He feels the falling sensation again.

The fog clears and Willie finds himself aboard a ship staring out at the sea. The angel asks him where he wants to go. Again he feels the falling sensation. Willie recalls going to Jamaica with Jason, falling in love with one of the locals, and how Jason bribed his love to leave him. After leaving Jamaica things seemed to go wrong for them, scam after scam failed. Needing money fast they head to Collinsport so that Jason can blackmail Elizabeth Collins Stoddard into marriage.

Suddenly, Willie feels confused and finds himself back in the fog alone. He hears Dr. Hoffman’s voice telling him how he kidnapped Maggie and how when Maggie escaped he tried to kill her. The fog shifts and Willie finds himself standing outside Maggie’s bedroom door. He realizes he didn't want to hurt Maggie. He wanted to warn her. The angel encourages Willie to remember what he was going to warn her about. He can't remember. The fog moves around him and he finds himself in a graveyard standing in front of mausoleum. He feels scared. The angel tells him to confront his fear. He goes into the mausoleum and opens a hidden doorway.

Willie stares up into the face of a nurse. Without thinking he says:

The voice from the grave.

Orderlies wake Willie up and he is taken to see Dr. Hoffman. She wants to know what the voice from the grave is. She asks him to recall the night he was shot. He decides to pacify her by telling her what she wants to hear, that he went to Maggie’s because he didn’t want her to identify him as her kidnapper. Willie observes a sign of surprise in Dr. Hoffman body language. She pulls out the medallion. Willie remembers what the angel told him about how Dr. Hoffman is hypnotizing him to make him forget. He decides to fight it this time. She twirls the medallion in front of his eyes. Willie doesn't look at it directly. He pretends to get sleepy and closes his eyes. Thinking he’s under hypnotic control she tells him that he used to work for a nice benevolent man named Barnabas Collins. The name echoes in his head over and over. It scares him. Willie is taken back to his room.

Willie closes he eyes and calls out to the angel. She responds. He wants to know who she really is. He mentions Barnabas. She urges him to remember. He experiences the falling feeling again. Blackness spins around him. He finds himself in front of a portrait of a beautiful woman. He recognizes the woman as Josette DuPres. The fog swirls around him again.

Now back inside the mausoleum, the hidden doorway opens. Willie steps inside the room and sees a coffin. He lifts the lid and a hand springs out clutching his throat. The fog swirls again.

Willie now stands in front of the portrait of Barnabas Collins. He remembers everything. The terrible things Barnabas made him do. How Barnabas kidnapped Maggie and tried to brainwash her into thinking she was Josette. He realizes the angel is using him to get information on Barnabas for herself and decides to stop telling her anything more. The angel warns him not to play with her. The fog swirls around him again.

Willie finds himself in his bedroom at the Old House. Barnabas enters. Willie realizes Barnabas can’s see him. Willie observes Barnabas hide Maggie’s ring inside a candlestick. The angel tells Willie how Barnabas betrayed him. Willie realizes the angel is a witch. The witch tells him about her connection with Barnabas how she was betrayed by him. The witch causes Willie to relive the pain of getting shot outside Maggie’s cottage. She wants to know why Dr. Hoffman thinks she can control Barnabas. Willie tells the witch that Dr. Hoffman is attempting to cure Barnabas. Willie realizes that the witch made him a vampire. The witch declares that Barnabas needs to suffer for what he’s done. She instructs Willie to tell Dr. Hoffman that Barnabas was a benevolent master to him. She wants him to lie so that Dr. Hoffman might slip up and reveal something about her cure for Barnabas. She tells Willie that Barnabas will come for him again, and when he does Willie is to pretend that they are friends and that he wants to be Barnabas servant again. The witch declares that together they will come up with a way to end Dr. Hoffman’s cure. Together they will make Barnabas suffer for what he has done to them. Reluctantly Willie agrees.

A couple of days later, Willie sits in front of Dr. Hoffman. He tells her what the witch instructed him to say. Dr. Hoffman looks surprised. He asks her whether he’ll ever get to work for Barnabas again. She tells him if he continues to improve then she will recommend that he be released when the time comes. Willie senses she is lying. As the orderly wheels him from the room, Willie hums the tune of Josette’s music box, which shocks Dr. Hoffman further.

The witch appears to Willie wanting to know how Dr. Hoffman is curing Barnabas. Before Willie tells her he wants to know what her name is. The witch says her name is Angelique. Willie tells her that Dr. Hoffman has created a serum in order to cure Barnabas. Angelique is going to make it so that it is Barnabas idea for Willie to be released. She will visit him in his dreams and he will tell her everything about Barnabas and any plans to break her curse. Only when Willie dreams shall he remember her. She disappears. Willie muses over how he has fooled them all.

[Closing Theme]

Memorable quotes[]

Dramatis personae[]

Background information and notes[]

Bloopers and continuity errors[]

Official website[]

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