DARK SHADOWS 587

KLS. 6 months ago Adam didn’t know his own name, now he’s giving orders. Different (?) reprise. It is different but it’s slightly different. It’s a near match. No new material before theme.

Barnabas: I’ve considered the question of who is to be the life force very carefully, and I’ve finally decided on Maggie Evans. For one reason, she lives alone, and no one would miss her if she were gone for several days. But most importantly, she can be controlled.

As Barnabas patiently explains, “Dr. Hoffman has hypnotized her before. She can do it again, and Maggie will have no memory. Now, to me that seems vital.”

Barnabas tells Adam his reasons for using Maggie including that Dr. Hoffman has hypnotized her before. He also tells him about how the experiment was supposed to go. Barnabas would have lived in Adam. No one told him that before. Mike. “I find that hard to believe. I can’t even understand you now.”

Adam asks, “How could you hate yourself so much?” Barnabas tells him there is no need for that talk now: Adam never seems to know that Barnabas was a vampire.

If Julia forgets one move during the experiment it spells danger for Carolyn but Adam insists that using Carolyn will make them more careful. Barnabas wants him to go to her and talk her out of it but Adam says he cannot change it now. Barnabas says IDU.

Adam tells him he remembers the day when “you controlled both me and Willie…”

Willie voice over. Willie goes out and Maggie wakes up and hides while the door is still open. Willie is checking out the area. Willie vs Maggie when he comes back. Mike. Maggie cries or perhaps it is Willie who cries. She remembers the mausoleum and declares she hates Willie.

She will get the police the moment she is out of here. Willie wants to tell her what happened back then and perhaps one day he will or he will tell her part of it. She will never forgive Willie. He has to chloroform her again.

Uhm, question: Adam is a wanted man. All Barnabas has to do is make up some story to the police and have them wait for him, setting up an ambush of some kind.

At the garden, Adam comes to Blair. Adam wonders why he is not like Barnabas. He also expresses concern for Carolyn when Blair insists he will get Carolyn to provide the life force.

He must not use violence, Adam insists. Blair says, “Of course, I won’t.” Adam grabs Blair harshly and won’t seem to let go despite Blair’s insistence to.

Willie comes along and tells Blair that he has to run an errand for Barnabas in Collinwood (at first I thought this was a mistake or a flub and he must have meant Collinsport, but no, Willie is lying and the line is as he said it; of note Karlen rarely if ever flubs). Adam has hidden.

Blair controls Willie who says, “Hey, you know just about everything doncha?”

Blair says, “I am much too modest to admit that.”

He tells Willie to let Maggie go now and to forget their meeting, “Understand, Willie?” Willie: “I don’t know.” Blair says, “But you do know what you are to do.”

When Adam asks about how he did that, Nicholas Blair says, “I have a way with people, Adam.”

Maggie has a dream. It is dark and it seems to be the Old House drawing room (or is it?). It’s clear it is supposed to be. It is not really a flashback but it is Maggie’s memory and/or dream of something that happened. She starts to withdraw but realizes that she’s not Josette. Willie is there, too. Barnabas is watching her.

The fireplace is on (I don’t recall the Old House fireplace ever being on before ever!). Maggie has an annoying scream here and it lasts forever and almost doesn’t sound like KLS at all. “Everything that happened that night, it actually happened.” Maggie wakes up, calling Barnabas’s name, “Why am I afraid of Barnabas?” What does it mean? She’s starting to remember.

Review: What can I say? More awesomeness. Blair seems a plot device now rather than a character but that’s okay. He’s being used in the plot in a cool way and driving it along. The Adam/Barnabas talks are getting more and more tense and emotional as well as interesting; Maggie and Willie? Just terrific and the relationship seems to have changed quite a bit. Well played.

One blog made this list:

Here’s a quick list of the mind-controlled characters that we’ve seen over the last five months, since Vicki came back from the 1795 time travel story:

#1. Barnabas bit Vicki, and got her to agree to run away with him and get married.

#2. Angelique posed as Cassandra, and hypnotized Roger into marrying her — first through her portrait, and then by drugging his sherry.

#3. The entire Dream Curse story depended on practically every character on the show telling each other about their dreams, against their will.

#4. Julia hypnotized Jeff to make him forget that Dr. Lang tried to cut off his head.

#5. Cassandra hypnotized Tony so that he would steal things from Dr. Lang.

#6. Cassandra cast a spell on Elizabeth, first making her believe that she was Naomi Collins, and then making her obsess about being buried alive.

#7. Professor Stokes hypnotized Carolyn, so that he could insert himself into her Dream Curse experience.

#8. Nicholas hypnotized Vicki to get her to show him the tree where Reverend Trask performed her exorcism.

#9. Nicholas hypnotized Vicki into forgetting that Adam kidnapped her.

#10. As a vampire, Angelique has bitten Joe and Jeff, and has hypnotic control over both of them.

#11. Sexy vampire Tom bit Julia, and had her under control for several days.

ark Shadows bloopers to watch out for:

Near the beginning of act 1, after Barnabas tells Adam, “I’m afraid you’ve over-estimated your influence,” he walks around the armchair that Adam’s sitting in. You can follow the boom mic shadow on the wall as the guy holding the mic tries desperately to keep up. He doesn’t quite make it; there’s a moment when the mic slips into the top of the frame.

When Nicholas asks Willie to approach him, Willie says, “I can’t do that, Mr. Blair, I gotta run an errand for Barnabas and Collinwood, quick, you know?”

In act 4, as we zoom in on Maggie sleeping in the mausoleum, you can hear a whistle, and then a snap.

Behind the Scenes:

Maggie’s flashback in this episode is sort of a composite impression of her abduction, so it’s not quite a remake, as the first flashback was in last Thursday’s episode. The closest fit is probably episode 239, which aired in May 1967.