EPISODES 431-450
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-It turns out the cliffhanger of episode #430 was sort of a fake out. Barnabas, scared shitless of Josette’s unexpected transformation into Jocelyn Wildenstein, immediately sent the poor girl back to her grave between episodes. Personally if someone has me rise from my grave and doesn’t even gimme a hug, I’d be royally pissed.
-It also turns out the counterpart of David, named Daniel in this timeline, arrived with his sister Millicent and has been around since then..they just forgot to mention him at all, that’s all. Nonetheless we buy this not so subtle retconning. So, what’s there to say about Daniel? He’s basically David without the obvious sneakiness. Tsk tsk. I seriously expect better and more original characterizations in the future time travel stories.
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| Went with a whimper! |
-Abigail’s curiosity leads her to her doom when she finds Barnabas’ coffin in the Old House cellar. Face to face with her “dead” nephew, she is told the truth about Angelique being the witch but still manages to deny it. Sigh. Some folks just don’t give up. And before Barnabas could kill her to keep his secret a secret, she dies of fright with an unintentionally hilarious expression on her face. She had it coming you know.
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| Gravely testimony |
-Reverend Trask uses every friggin’ force in and out his hands (including Abigail’s “mysterious death”) to have Vicki convicted and hung. Even Angelique rises from her grave to testify in the court. Accusations and objection-your-honors fly back and forth. That son of a bitch Nathan Forbes changes his testimony at the last minute. To save her own ass Vicki even tells the amazing story of her time-travel in full detail. But at the end the court finds her….wait for it….guilty! She’s been waiting for her punishment in her cell since then. Oh and she and Peter have been actively smooching every now and then. Is that evanescence of Burke Devlin’s memory I’m hearing?
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| A fate worse than death |
-Barnabas, being a perfect gentleman even as a vampire, supernaturally taunts Rev. Trask for the pain he’s caused to Vicki. Eventually he lures Trask to his cellar where he gets him to sign a confession about Vicki’s innocence right before trapping him behind a brick wall where he eventually dies. I’d rather prefer he went for a more brutal method of offing Trask that involves some guts and maybe a castration or two but this will have to do. At least we had the pleasure of seeing Mr Trask beg like a little girl. 50 bucks says he even wet himself.
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| Maude tells all |
-Between Abigail and Trask’s deaths, Barnabas attacks yet another prostitute named Maude (I can’t actually tell if they are prostitutes but for some reason the local women that he goes for are extra flirty) but fails to feed on her the first time ‘round. I dunno maybe it’s the performance anxiety. So anyway, he eventually finishes the girl off but all the racket he causes leads Nathan Forbes to uncover Barnabas and his secret which he uses to—
-Marry Millicent Collins! Nathan hires a random guy named Noah to collect information about Barnabas and he eventually finds out that he is neither in England nor quite dead but actually hanging around at the Old House playing bridge with Ben. OK not really. So he takes this piece of valuable information to Collins patriarch in exhange for his consent to the marriage. Gotta hand it to the SOB, he knows how to play it dirty.
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| Barnabas out of |
-Upon this, Joshua goes to the Old House and witnesses Barnabas rise from his coffin. That’s where the dramatic “BECAUSE I AM A VAMPIRE!!” line comes in. Barnabas even threw himself towards the wall during that scene, it was that dramatic. Shocked to discover his son as the reason behind the recent tragedies, Joshua's first reaction is to shoot him. When it doesn’t work and the message behind “BECAUSE I AM A VAMPIRE” finally reaches across, Joshua decides to keep Barnabas locked up under his supervision. So I’m gonna go and say what we’re all thinking: Yes, Barnabas the legendary vampire is grounded. I’m just glad he didn’t go “But daaad!”. Anyway, he gets locked up at the Tower Room at Collinwood. And no video games young man!
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| Nathan learns where the money went |
-What used to be a comic relief couple is now getting on my nerves. I’m talking about Nathan & Millicent of course. To prove to the other members of the Collins family that he loves her not for her money but for who she really is(!), Millicent transfers all her fortune to her brother Daniel’s account. She does it, of course, without letting Nathan know but since this is a soap opera, he learns about it from Daniel anyway. After the initial eruption, he pretends not to care while putting his new plans in motion and since this is also a gothic show (or least it used to be), they involve driving Millicent insane so he can inherit the money. She makes the poor gullible girl think she’s hearing voices and seeing things: namely, the light and sounds coming from the Tower Room caused by our very Barnabas. When he forces the girl to go up there and look, she gets attacked by Barnabas. Now supporting a pair of cutesy lil bite marks on her neck, Millicent it seems has totally lost it this time.
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| Once bitten~ |
-Joshua is looking for a way to reverse the curse on Barnabas and runs to Natalie du Pres for help (can someone explain to me again why the hell is she hanging around like a big loser now that her niece is dead and gone and her brother Andre left so long ago?). He must have assumed since she was into tarot cards, she should also be an expert on black arts. Who’d blame him though, she’s the only one around that looks like an actual witch. And it turns out, she does have a trick or two up her 18th century dress' sleeve. The unlikely pair hold a secret seance thingie and send out a “psychic message”. Right on cue, an old witch named Bathia Mapes shows up at Collinwood (when the door blew open for a sec there I thought it was Laura Collins from the Phoenix storyline and boy wouldn’t that have made a great twist).
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| The Somewhat Good witch |
Anyways, that creepy Gandalf of a woman does a spell to summon Barnabas (who’d fled the scene after the incident with Millicent) just in time to save yet another floozy that Barnabas was about to bite. When Barnabas enters the Tower Room under her influence, Bathia gets in contact with Angelique via Barnabas’ body, who shouts threats, then breaks the bind and attacks the woman.
So, that is the current cliffhanger. I have a feeling that we’re coming to an end concerning the 1795 story, though I don’t really wanna know which episode it will be. I want to be surprised.
Isn’t it sad though nobody really cares for Vicki at the moment? Barnabas, Joshua, Natalie and Ben all know by now that she is innocent and Angelique is/was the real witch but they aren’t doing much. Where is the confession that Barnabas made Trask sign? Why isn’t Joshua keeping his promise that he’ll see that she gets freed? Move it dammit, she could be hung any minute now. I have pictured her return to the 1960’s like this: Just when Vicki is about to be hung and the chair is pulled under her feet, she wakes up back in her timeline. But then, probably not. Let’s wait and see.
My favorite moment from this 20 episode cycle was Naomi Collins slapping Reverand Trask. Girl power at it’s best.
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| Crack the whip |
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