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| ← 897 → | |
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| Number |
885 |
| Timeline | |
| Narrator | |
| Writer | |
| Director | |
| Broadcast |
December 3, 1969 |
| Recorded |
November 13, 1969 |
| Video | |
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| We have 26 images of Dark Shadows 897 | |
The ghost of Jenny Collins warns Chris that he must find Quentin.
Synopsis[]
Teaser
- The night around Collinwood is filled with an unknown, unseen terror. The events that occur this night will be strange and mystifying. Even to those who take part in them. For there are supernatural forces at work. Forces that threaten the very existence of Collinwood itself.
David climbs down into the Leviathan Altar. He approaches a fountain and says the dialogue that was written on the scroll from the Leviathan Box. He then collapses.
Act I
Chris is walking around his cottage when he hears a knock on the door. It's Carolyn, who has come to tell him about Sabrina. Carolyn says not everything she says makes sense, and asks if they ever meant anything to each other at one time. He says they did, but not anymore. Carolyn believes she is trying to protect Chris from something. He asks what she said, and she tells him that he will try to kill her. Chris confesses that she is right, and she should leave the cottage immediately and to leave him alone. Carolyn is heartbroken over what he has said and leaves. Once she is gone, he pulls out a pistol from his desk.
Act II
Carolyn goes to the Old House to see Barnabas, but he is nowhere to be found. Instead she hears voices coming from behind the bookcase saying "there is no margin for error, punishment is necessary." Barnabas then appears from the opposite end of the room, surprising Carolyn. She is very distraught over Chris. Carolyn wants to know why he acts the way he does, but Barnabas tells her she should try not to worry about it anymore. Barnabas tries to console her, saying that someday she will find true love, one greater than she would have ever had with Chris. He sends her away. Barnabas returns to the bookcase, where Philip is being held captive and apparently being brainwashed. He tells Philip he knows what he has to do, and lets him leave.
Back at Chris' cottage, Chris is writing a suicide note for Carolyn. He finishes it and leaves it on the fireplace. As he picks up the gun, he hears sounds of a woman sobbing. He turns around and sees the ghost of Jenny Collins. She tells Chris there is still hope for him, and he must find "him". When asking who, Jenny tells Chris he must find Quentin. She then disappears.
Act III
David awakens inside the Leviathan Altar. He pulls some leaves out of the fountain and leaves.
Philip finally returns to the antique shop, much to Megan's delight. He says he has been out looking at houses full of antiques the entire time. She tells him that she had felt as if someone was coming to kill her. Philip deduces it as another one of her premonitions, but says he will never let anything bad happen to her. He asks her about the baby, but he is still running a high fever. Philip, in a change of attitude, then tells Megan it is her fault that the Leviathan Book was stolen. Megan begins to panic once again, and Philip tells her he is going to run to the drug store and will return in a few minutes. While by herself in the antique shop, she hears several strange noises and becomes extremely paranoid. A door slams upstairs. She grabs the phone and calls the drug store, who informs her that Philip never went there. Megan then notices someone trying to open the front door, which is locked.
Memorable quotes[]
- Chris: I'm a monster. Why don't you get out of my life?!
- Barnabas: Try to turn your mind to the future.
- Barnabas: You'll find a truer love than you ever knew with Chris Jennings... a love that will make your present feeling for him seem like the merest infatuation.
- Carolyn: Barnabas, are you saying this just to make me feel better?
- Barnabas: No. I feel it, well, that it is written somewhere. I feel that it is your destiny.
- Barnabas (repeated endlessly on tape): There is no margin for error. Punishment is necessary.
Dramatis personae[]
- Jonathan Frid as Barnabas Collins
- Nancy Barrett as Carolyn Stoddard
- Don Briscoe as Chris Jennings
- Marie Wallace as Megan Todd / Jenny Collins
- David Henesy as David Collins
- Christopher Bernau as Philip Todd
Background information and notes[]
Production[]
- This episode was recorded out of broadcast sequence. The previous episode to be recorded was 894.
- Final appearance of character Jenny Collins. Marie Wallace would later reprise this character in the Big Finish audio drama The Doll House.
Story[]
- The secret lair beneath the Leviathan altar parallels the one in H. P. Lovecraft's The Case of Charles Dexter Ward, except on a Dark Shadows budget.
- There's a drug store down the street from the antique shop, named the Lowell Apothecary.
- Carolyn should be suspicious when Barnabas says he was "experimenting with electronics" when he shuns all 19th and 20th century technologies; it has been established that he refuses to allow electric lights or telephones at the Old House.
- GHOSTWATCH: The ghost of Jenny Collins appears to Chris, warning that he must find Quentin Collins.
- TIMELINE: It was the other evening when Barnabas warned Carolyn to stay away from Chris. 8:50pm: Philip returns. Philip has been gone all night. It was yesterday when Megan thought someone was coming to kill her. 9pm: Megan alone in the antique shop.
Bloopers and continuity errors[]
- When Chris hears a knock at the door and goes to open it to let Carolyn in, he struggles with the door, which seems to be locked from the outside; when the door finally opens, a hand can be seen moving away from the outside door knob.
- When Barnabas opens the creaky bookshelf to reveal the concealed room, the sound effect sounds suspiciously like his coffin opening.
- When Chris puts the note to Carolyn on the fireplace mantel and reaches for the gun, the set wall shakes. There is also a clattering sound in the studio.
- The previous ghostly appearance of Jenny (episodes 810 & 811) manifested as 'normal'; hair neatly groomed, and her sanity restored. Why is she Crazy Jenny again when she shows herself to Chris?
- The telephone Megan uses to call the police and the drug store is black. In the previous episode, the phone Carolyn was using in the shop was tan.
- Barnabas' return to 1969 was explicitly identified in the show as occurring on November 18. Now, some time later, Phillip walks out into the November/December Maine night weather to get cigarettes with no coat on.
- Toward the end of Megan's rocking in the rocking chair, the creaking sound effects no longer match her rocking motion, and there are also a couple of creaks after she gets out of the chair.
- In the final scene, after Megan puts the picture that fell off the staircase back up, as the camera follows her, on the left side of the screen we can see the edge of the set, revealing a tree and a stage light.
- During the credits, a crew member can be seen pouring a bucket of water into the cauldron inside the Leviathan altar.