Frankenstein's Baby

EPISODES 491-500

And I finally hit the number 500!!! What a glorious feeling..but more on that later~

Julia's one of many strangulations

*So Barnabas is still human and Adam aka Dr Lang's creation is aliiiivee! But boy if you've ever thought caring for a newborn is hard, try doing it with a newborn in a giant's body. Barnabas and Julia went through a painful first couple of days before they could get him to get used to them. During the week, when I was riding the bus or something I found myself chuckling just thinking about how Adam chased Julia around in the laboratory. When shit gets serious, Julia sure knows how to beat it. Barnabas has the major influence on Adam, since they're sharing Barnabas' life force and all. By the way, is it wrong to think Adam is one major-league hunk?

An odd family

*Barnabas and Julia bring Adam to the Old House, lock him up in the cellar so they could teach him tricks. Barnabas is the father figure whom Adam looks up to and yeah gets beaten by when he's a bad boy. Julia is responsible for many things like feeding, speaking and I bet there's an unmentioned changing the diapers thing assigned for her. Seriously though, why would a reanimated bundle of dead-meat need to eat? 

Willie is also told threatened into looking after Adam even though he's scared shitless (then of course when he gets used to him, he starts the taunting). There's an undeniable family formation here complete with a father, mother, big brother and the baby. Julia must be on cloud nine for playing house with Barnabas. However, let's give credit to the fact that this is the best portrayal of a somewhat functional family we've seen on the show so far.

Adam sightings/shootings

*Adam is big and strong and surely we didn't expect those chains on his feet to keep him bound forever. And if you have a runaway monster, surely people are bound to notice him just like when he got lost wandering around at the Collins family estate. He got told off by Mrs Johnson for trespassing; then tagged after Liz and got shot by Roger. David was the only who approached him friendly but remember we're talking about the boy who had ghosts for friends so it's pretty normal. The family doesn't know anything about Adam's connection with Barnabas, except for the fact that he's going around uttering his name (his first words, aww). Julia removes the bullet from his arm and all is well again in the cellar. Home Sweet Old House.

*I'm getting annoyed by the fact that Dr Lang's recorded message is missed by everybody. Has it been like 3 or 4 times already when people walked out of the room just when it started to play and Adam is the only one left to hear it? At this rate, he's gonna recite the whole thing before he can say "Mama".

Diamonds are Maggie's best friend

*Meanwhile for some crazy reason, Willie tries to entertain Adam with Josette's jewelry. And then he does a weirder thing by sneaking out a pair of ear rings and placing them in Maggie's purse. It turns out he's building a psycho-crush on the girl. When a surprised Maggie finds the ear rings and tries them on, she feels different. That is of course a reference to her days as Barnabas' captive which got erased from her memory thanks to Julia's hypno-medallion. Joe doesn't like that change in his girlfriend and they have their first fight over this. Well, there goes our dream couple. And also, Willie has a grudge against Joe which he shows by practicing with a rifle. I smell trouble and to be honest it excites me! Woo hoo @ Maggie exposure. (by the way, how funny was that when actress Kathryn Leigh Scott snapped off one of the ear rings during the scene and had to hide it dramatically)

Not moonlight sonata!

*Moving on to the other suspenseful events in show, David's short-time speechlessness got resolved when Cassandra lifted the curse after making him forget about the gazebo-kiss. He loves his new mother now cause she showers him with gifts. But as one member of the family forgets about the "affair", another one learns when Carolyn walks in on one of Cassandra and Tony Peterson's late-night gazebo rendezvouses. She threatens to tell her uncle Roger about it; Cassandra runs into the house like the slut she is (but mainly because she's recenty turned into a withering old woman which I'll get to later); Tony tries to reason with Carolyn but admits he's not the man he used to be hence is not worth falling in love with. All the soap opera cheese factor aside, this one was one of the best lit scenes ever since the show gone multicolor. Carolyn was especially stunning. You know, I always say she needs to be less whiny and more cool like that. Fuckin' A, Carolyn!

And the Oscar goes tooo...

*And of course The Dream Curse. Mrs. Johnson finally had the dream which she had dreaded so. But because the next victim would be David, she tried so hard to keep it to herself. Julia casually adviced her to leave Collinsport for David's sake which was actually pretty annoying considering she didn't make such a sacrifice so why should Mrs Johnson..who did actually get away albeit briefly but had to come back because the curse was driving her mad. That dramatic scene at the Old House with Julia was the best performance by Clarice Blackburn so far. So, kudos to her departed soul.

Anyway, Mrs Johnson had to get it off her chest and told David offscreen about the dream but she waited by his bedside at night to be there for him when he wakes up terrified. That was a heart-warming gesture. The curse then is passed on to Willie, who is yet to dream.

Here's the current sitch:

L to R: Maggie>Jeff>Lang>Julia>Mrs Johnson>David

Mrs Johnson's door opened to reveal a nest of bats which look like they're in the middle of an orgy. There's no question it points out Barnabas' vampirism.

David's door had a spider on a big web which he gets caught in. 

Some doors are skipped this time around, such as Dr. Lang's. Is it because he's dead and Adam's alive, we don't know.

Sam pays the price of
Dorian Graying Angelique

*And finally Barnabas' amazing plan against Angelique. Wanting to learn more about the connection between Cassandra and Angelique's portrait, he had Willie steal it from Collinwood and took it to Sam Evans. Then he asked Sam to age the portrait without asking questions. As Sam painted over it, Cassandra started to get older and older until she looked like a puffy old woman that is too funny to make fun of. Hiding under a cloak that covered her face (but showed her perfect looking legs for some reason), she located the Evans cottage and begged Sam to give her back the portrait. When he refused, she blinded him with magic and stole it. 

Later Julia examined the man and said the blindness may be permanent.

Will Sam be able to see again or will he go all emo and jump off Widow's Hill?

Will Barnabas be able to forgive himself for causing this?

Will Maggie be finally able to sneak Joe into her room now that her pap can't see and all?

*

So, number 500 huh? That means I'm almost half way there. I remember it like yesterday when I first started watching the show from the very 1st episode and three digit numbers seemed like one million episodes away. Right now , it doesn't seem that much really. My mouth still waters at the idea of hundreds of episodes and characters to come.

Now and then, I find myself missing the black & white and gothic times of the snow., when things were simple and the story was mainly focused on an orphan in search of her family. That story seems to be completely dropped now and I've found out it'll never be resolved within the show. But I'll address this issue more throughly later.

While watching the Beginning episodes, I was dying to get to the more complex supernatural episodes. Now that I'm here, I feel nostalgic when I see the old posts or come across to a clip from that era. What can I say, Barnabas totally stole the show and probably for better.

Cheers to #500!!! I'll make another dramatic speech on #1000, so a note to my future self: See you there!
And thanks to everyone who has been following this blog~

Science & Sorcery

EPISODES 476-490

Whoa! I think the show's never been this complicated in the sense of richness in mystery and intrigue; I'm wondering how the hell I'm gonna get out of reviewing them properly. So lemme try and divide these perky little sideplots.

THE DREAM CURSE 

Dream Curse unleashed!

Angelique Cassandra must have been feeling so lonely when nobody in Collinwood welcomed her unexpected arrival with hugs and kisses that she had to resort to her true love for comfort: witchcraft! Thinking "Hmm, it's been more than a century since I destroyed a Collins family" she unleashed a brand new and imo very creative curse on..well..pretty much everybody. All jokes aside, the actual purpose of this curse is of course to make Barnabas what he was again, a vampire, against Dr. Lang's "treatments".

So the curse works like this:

Darkness and fog..

In the dream, the victim is lead by someone they know (or will meet the next day) and they encounter unbearable terror and all that shit. The next day, they feel an unstopable urge to tell the dream to that person in the dream. They're safe once they do but the curse is passed on so that person goes through this process until the curse ends with a sudden dead, which we suppose will be Barnabas'.

When Cassandra first met Maggie Evans, she was struck by her resemblance to Josette -her arch nemesis- and used her as the starting point of the curse, thanks to her wicked sense of humour. 

I'm assuming the readers of this blog have watched these episodes already so I don't have to be reciting the dreams, which are pretty much the same anyway except for the lil additions at the end. I just wanna take note of the cryptic rhyme which will be important in the future I think:

..doors and terrors!

"Through sight and sound and faceless terror;

Through endless corridors by trial and error;

Ahead a blazing light does burn;

And one door leads to the point of return."

I'm lovin' the way the dreams start: as if part of reality with the victims standing up from wherever they were sleeping and literally stepping into the nightmare. I'm a sucker for and a huge fan of the Elm Street series so I welcome this storyline with open arms. I just wish there were diversity in the content of the dreams but the doors at the end have to do. I'm also trying to figure out whether there're specific meanings of the doors to the people which open them; I consider each new door that character's door.

This is the course of the curse so far:

L to R: Maggie>Jeff>Lang>Julia

Maggie's door had a skull behind it. Jeff's had guillotine. Dr. Lang saw his headless creation and Julia saw a skeleton in a wedding dress.

There's an obvious albeit out of order connection between a guillotine-a skull and a headless figure but where the skeletal bride stands in this I am not sure yet. We will need more open doors to make the ultimate connection and decide if each door has a specific meaning in connection with its opener. Boy, I have some far fetched theories but I'll let them brew for a while. There may even be a time where I'd do an in-depth analysis of the whole thing. But anyway,

Can Prof. Stokes be trusted?

It didn't take too long for people to realize they were under a curse. Julia though was the toughest of them all and went for a while without telling the dream to it's next victim: Mrs. Johnson (who by the way is too practical to have dreams according to herself. We'll see how you'll like this one missy!!). She also went to see Prof. Stokes since he's an expert on occult and all and he did diagnose it as a "curse". It seems he will play a capital part solving this mystery but there are some things about him that is not quite clear. Cassandra is said to be his ex student. Was it a spell (I mean yeah surely it's a spell, it's not like Angelique would crawl out of the grave and go to college while waiting for Barnabas) or are they in this together? Roger also met Cassandra at Prof. Stokes' place!! And Stokes totally freaked out and left when Barnabas told him the identity of the bitch witch! Let's not forget he is Ben Stokes' descendant!! You can take the man out of the servants' quarters but can you take the servants' quarters out of the man??? Guess, we'll wait and see..

Speaking of manbitches, Cassandra found herself another one: Tony Peterson aka the fiery lawyer that loves to dress like a dick (there must be a pun somewhere in there). She doesn't have the power over him like she did with Ben yet but he sure comes in handy. She used him to steal the anti-witchcraft medallion from Dr. Lang meanwhile letting him think he's falling in love with her!!! At the risk of sounding mean, I can actually see why she didn't use that last one on Ben.

I saw the smoochin'

To complicate things further as if they weren't already enough, David comes back from Boston right on cue. Cassandra is introduced as his new mommy but expectedly didn't recieve any hugs or marshmellows. Then right after that, he saw Cassandra and Tony kiss at the gazebo (don't you love saying the word "gazebo"?). When he threatened to tell on her, Cassandra gave him an itsy bitsy curse that prevented him from speaking and I think writing too. David is urgently taken to the doctor. All this happened in one episode where David came back. Writers sure aren't taking it slow, are they? But I'm more concerned about David, can you imagine the mommy issues the boy will have in the future? His biological mother tried to burn him alive, this one muted him the day they met? I'm thinking future Norman Bates.

DOCTOR LANG'S EXPERIMENT

Jeff's narrow escape

Ok so the last time we checked, Dr Lang was stitching a man together from dead body parts so he could pour Barnabas' precious essence into it. What it was lacking was a head and they were gonna go for Jeff Clark's handsomely features. And they did. They were this close to cut Jeff's pretty face up when Barnabas, realizing how upset Vicki would be without her Jeff, stopped Lang. They had to call in Julia to hypnotize Jeff, who on the side of doing the job found out about Lang's experiment.

Julia reacts!

Now, we all know and love Julia for a many reasons and among these reasons is her neurotic over reaction to things. Even simple things can find very expressive meanings on her expressive face. Now imagine her shock when she leaked into the lab and found the Frankenstein's monster lying on the table. Her scream (a mutant mix of a goat and a crow's cry) was heard from the Widow's Hill so the doc and the ex-vampire had to let her in on the whole thing. She opposed the whole ordeal but we all know deep down she's delighted that she's allowed to play doctor (although Lang mostly uses her as a nurse. Ouch).

The Return of Willie Loomis

Ahh, I almost forgot. After Jeff was hypnotized and sent on his way and before Julia became part of the team, they needed an assistant to help Lang with the experiment. Barnabas suggested someone, Julia pulled some strings and WILLIE LOOMIS WAS RELEASED FROM THE SANITARIUM! The last we saw of him was when he got shot while trying to warn Maggie about Barnabas. He was then thought to be the Collinsport Assailant and sent to the Windcliff Sanitarium. So anyway, he's back..not quite sane.. but was he ever? His return caused slight disturbance in town but Barnabas promised to keep him under his control (human Barnabas isn't as mean as the vampire Barnabas). But before Willie could work as the assistant, Julia got picked which renders Willie's return quite pointless actually. I expected it to be more grand, like him coming back as a badass to take revenge on Barnabas for treating him like a doormat. Oh well~

Willie's back and he does Barnabas' dirty deeds again.

Science vs Sorcery

Anyway, so another handsome face is found for the monster who/what is now named Adam, which must be a popular name for the reanimated monsters (see also Buffy's Adam). But Dr Lang is killed during the operation when Cassandra accidentally sticks the pin too deep into the clay voodoo figure (raise your hand if you think Mrs Johnson is partly responsible for startling Cassandra. Oh no Mrs Johnson, you have blood on your hands!!). Before he dies, he spends his last energy to record a warning for Julia and Barnabas to hear: In case both Barnabas and Adam come out of the operation alive, Adam has to be kept alive. If not, Barnabas will be a vampire again (which by the way, was totally missed by Julia and Barnabas). Well, it's been pointed far too much that a simpleton would know that is what's gonna happen at the end of the operation. So, Julia and Barnabas go through with it again and some electrical sounds and flickering lights later, the transfer fails. Barnabas is still inside his body, feeling gloomy that his last chance with Vicki flew out the chimney.

Rise and shine Adam!

Then, Adam opens his eyes on the operating table!!!!! Oh no!!

And instead of the classic line "It's Aliiiiveeee", Barnabas matter-of-factly goes "Your alive; We're both alive!" Gotta love the man for the originality.

So we got a dream curse on our hands, as well as a Frankenstein style monster.

Ex lunatic out of the hospital.

A mysterious man named Jeff Clark who may or may not be the time travelling Peter Bradford.

A professor of occult, who may be working with the witch.

And we have a witch, going round cutting tongues of little boys and making men fall in love with her.

Ain't that some drama!!!

*Yaay @ Maggie's reappearance. I've missed her so. As I've stated many times before, I especially love her scenes with Vicki. I wish there'd be many many more of them.

*Barnabas and Julia are finally and openly friends. Only a little time ago he was trying to strangle her with his bare hands. Aww, good ol' times.

*What's with the recent experimental, odd camera angles? And is it coincidence that they all have Julia in them?

*They finally sorted out Cassandra's wig. It doesn't look like a possum crawled and died in her hair anymore.

*I'm lovin' the soap aspects of the show. You know the little things such as Tony and Cassandra's kiss. Or Mrs Johnson's mystery son who by the way showed up in one episode and gone missing since. I'd be watching the silverware if I were them.

*

Old Faces, New Names

EPISODES 471-475

I wanted to do a quickie before I go on a short trip where I hope to -though not realistically- watch at least one episode per day. Now ain't that some determination!

It's all about the dum dum
 duh dee dum dum..

*It was about time Mrs Johnson got a bit of history established for her except that she is a mourning, meddling, gossiping spinster. It turns out she has a son that she's been keeping hidden from people and for good reason: He's just come out of prison!! Very cliche, very soap operish, very Burke Devlin. But unlike Devlin, the guy is hardly charismatic cause Vicki gave out a half arsed hoop the moment she saw him. Oh, he also happens to look exactly like Noah Gryffindor (seriously what was his last name again?), the guy she killed in the 1795. This guy's name is Harry Johnson and probably has no relation to Noah. He will also stay in Collinwood during his visit (aww @ Mrs Johnson asking Liz for this favour and Liz giving it right away) but the man has a weakness for money (extra cool points to Mrs Johnson for that finger gesture) and he couldn't have picked a worse place to rip off. We all remember what happened to the last two people, Jason McGuire and Willie Loomis, who tried to get some.

*So Roger and the mysterious painting was the center of attention and worry in Collinwood when he suddenly disappeared with it into the night. Vicki and Barnabas were certain it was Angelique's curse that made Roger act the way he did (attempting to kill Dr. Lang for instance) but the biggest shock came in flesh and bones, just as I wished in the previous post. Roger, now seemingly normal, returned with a new wife: Cassandra Collins aka Angelique in an awful wig!!!

Hair may be fake but the eyes
are unmistakable

I liked the way they played it for a whole episode. Since old faces from the past were returning as new characters, it could have easily have been that Mrs. Collins was an innocent, brand new person. Actually, I kinda hoped the revelation would come a bit later and we would be left doubting for a while if she was indeed Angelique. But at the end of the episode, she did that signature giggle and it was settled.
Barnabas and Vicki are certain that she is Angelique, though the former isn't so vocal about it in order to hide his own secret. I like how characters are now openly talking about supernatural things matter-of-factly; it'd have been boring if the characters were to pull a Scully whenever something unexplainable happened. I mean they are still initally skeptics but they also leave an open door to the alternative.

Angelique, Liz & Cassandra

*Liz and "Cassandra" have an honest talk, just like the way Liz likes 'em. There is some tension there and I hope they play it out well. It looks like Liz isn't very friendly with her sister-in-laws when the shit hits the fan. Speaking of which, I'm enjoying the fact that Laura is still acknowledged. Her and Roger are still legally married and her mysterious death is once again mentioned. Honestly, it was just an ordinary case of Fried Phoenix, why won't you just accept it, Liz?

*Just to clear any doubts, Cassandra/Angelique has Roger under a spell. There is no love. David, meanwhile, is in Boston right now and his reaction to his new mother is highly looked forward to. I'm also enjoying the more than subtle innuendos Barnabas throw at Cassandra when they talk. She is playing the innocent.

Barnabas receives the talisman

*Anyway so knowing that Angelique is bent on destroying him, Barnabas tries to take control of the matter and has Prof. Stokes, a scholarly expert on occult, lend him an anti witch-craft talisman. The thing seems to work when Cassandra pays Dr Lang a little visit and almost kills the man if it weren't for the talisman. The down side of it is that Angelique now knows about the existence of the thing. What action she will take against it remains to be seen.

*Aaaand finally, we get to learn a bit more about Lang's mystery project. It is not just a case of  Frankenstein complex but something a bit more extreme. He is making a man to transfer Barnabas' spirit/soul/essence/lifeforce/whatever into it. 

Not Dr. Frankenstein

He also asked Barnabas if he'd be interested in looking like Jeff Clark but whether that means the new creature will have Jeff's head or it's another project we don't know! What we know is the grossness of what Barnabas will do to Vicki if he does look like Jeff. I'm just sayin'.

The Comeback

EPISODES 461-470

Here is the thing. I can't quit this show. I've tried many times. 

Actually, it's not like I decide to quit it. What happens is that my desire to watch eventually diminishes when real life brings up something more important to focus on. But somewhere in my mind there's the echo of Collinwood (The widows let's call 'em) wailing in the distance, calling out to me. I've grown too fond of these characters to quit. The mysterious cloak that covers the future stories intrigue me. All the possible storylines and the new characters..what a juicy, uncharted territory. Am I cursed to keep coming back to Collinwood until I finish it? Has it become my own Manderley?

<<enter Dark Shadows theme song and the waves splashing against the rocks 'neath the Widow's Hill>>

Vicki's big comeback

*The last time we saw Vicki on the previous episode's cliffhangery ending, she was at the gallows waiting for her death, looking as sullen as Bella (ew, we're doing Twilight references now?). And then and there, she was hanged. After so long, finally we cut back to~

~Collinwood drawing room, back to present day. Phyllis Wick, the other nanny freaks out before she is pulled back into time and Vicki is back again!! It turns out Phyllis, in the original past, started to work as Sarah's governess and was hanged as a witch. That's why Barnabas recognised her during their brief encounter here in the present day ("What are you doing here?") and had no memory of Vicki. What Vicki lived was an alternative take on the past but when she came back, the other governess was sent back to her rightful place at the end of the rope. All thanks to that frigid Abigail. Bitch!

Julia shows off her new hair

*So woo hoo we're back! All the characters we've missed and haven't really missed (I'm looking at you Roger and Carolyn) are there. Julia is still supporting that hideous hair but that's to change shortly as she goes out for a haircut later on which grabs Barnabas' attention but Julia is too cool to care now. Vicki is suffering from PTTSD (Post Time Travel Stress Disorder) and having hard time differentiating two realities. 

*Barnabas suspects Vicki has learnt his secret (when in fact poor girl was locked in jail while the members of the old Collins family were dropping like flies; hence she is clueless) and wants to get rid off her. Even as a new vampire, he's always been a gentleman in the past. Now seeing him as a villain once again comes as a bit of shock but personally I'd have been a lot more crankier if I were to be locked in a coffin for more than 150 years, so it's understandable. Thankfully, Julia -no longer trembling with fear like a leaf on Widow's Hill- sticks with Vicki against Barnabas and swears to protect her. She's hardly the poster woman for the protector of the innocent but things work a bit different in Collinsport it seems. And seriously, her new hair is kinda cool. Oh, by the way she finally comes out as a doctor which nobody really cares.

*Speaking of Julia, I find her choice of words while hypnotizing someone ("Find the center of the light") quite interesting as usually and not surprisingly, the imagery of light is cinematically used to point out "enlightenment" and "bare truth". However, in a show where the truth is hidden in dark shadows, it is very fitting that Julia directs attention to the "light" to manipulate people's memories and make them forget certain elements of their lives, especially traumatically dark ones (see also Maggie). Here, Julia's "light" functions as false sense of security and hope, where darkness creates a space for the repressed truth to live in. It's all in consistency with the vampire mythology and how they're always in the dark as well.

At Peter Bradford's grave

*So anyways, people are confused whether Vicki was actually in the past or not, but she is still thinking about her cross-time&space lover Peter. Barnabas is annoyed by her obsession with a long dead individual which creates an unintentionally hilarious scene where Julia snaps at him "You loved Josette!!". It is funny because it is true and the tone in Julia's voice is tinted with envy. After some research and graveyard visits, Vicki finds out Peter was hanged for the murder of Noah Somethingthing, whom Vicki herself killed. Depression comes knocking on Vicki's doors.

Roger's new obsession

*Also from a local shop, she buys a portrait of Angelique without remembering who she really was (which makes me wonder where the heck Sam Evans is). Roger, being an easy target, falls in love with the painting..literally. He speaks and sings and dances to it (really embarrassing stuff to watch) but there is something sinister and supernatural going on. He starts to think he is Joshua Collins and orders Liz around, thinking she is Joshua's wife Naomi, which Liz answers with a slap on his face. Barnabas tries to get rid of the painting but it reappears. This is the second time the Collins family is terrorized by a portrait of a blond woman. Anyone remember Laura?

Prof. Stokes comes from good stock

*We also meet Ben Stokes the caretaker's descendant Profesor Timothy Stokes who apparently descended rather well seeing he's a scholar and all. He's doing a research on his family and thinking there's a connection with Ben Stokes and Angelique, he wants to buy the portrait which Roger won't just give away (man, just buy yourself a Playboy magazine). Barnabas fills him in on some details of the past and keeps an eye on the man, in case he gets too close to his own secret.

Pre-accident

*Barnabas finally sticks his fangs into Vicki's young, smooth neck and has her under his influence <<welcome back neck scarfs>> despite Julia's warnings. Even though Vicki's overwhelmed by Barnabas' power, she starts to remember some vivid details about her travel to the year 1795. But obviously, not so much free will is left in her as she agrees to leave Collinwood to get married. But on their way, Vicki loses control of the car and it crashes when she sees Peter Bradford come out of the woods and...friggin' wave at her??? I have no idea why..

*We now enter the realm of a medical drama with both of our dear characters are taken to the hospital. Vicki is alright and the Peter Bradford look-alike is actually named Jeff Clark. Vicki doesn't take it well and for some weird reason Jeff acts kinda over-reacty to be confused with Peter. I smell something fishy but I can't put my finger on it yet. Vicki's slutdom will be tested with this Jeff guy hanging around. Will she fall in love with the man who looks and talks like the love of her life (and death)? Surely we're familiar with the common fate of her previous lovers as they all seem to be forgotten for good.

Walking on sunshine

*We have a medical drama but the writers must have thought hey, why not have medical horror story instead and created a character named Dr. Eric Lang. This man is so bright that he quickly figures out Barnabas is a vampire. He also gives him a random treatment that immediately reverts Barnabas back to his human form. Barnabas is over the clouds (almost literally) yet cautious to turn into a withering old man again. Julia is clearly jealous. Things all in all are too good to be true~

~ That's when things start to happen. Roger, completely Angelique's bitch by now, performs a spell (or is it Angelique using Roger's body, I am not sure yet) that almost kills Dr. Lang. Barnabas is quick to realize that Angelique is working beyond the grave to keep her curse on him permanent. Barnabas begs Lang to stop treating him cause it'll cost him his life.

Some Assembly Required

*We also find out Jeff Clark works for Dr. Lang, although not willingly. Lang has a power over the man, which is not fully explained. We know so far that Jeff has difficulty remembering his past and he is told that he was criminally insane before he met Lang. He is also warned against harbouring feelings for Vicki, whom Lang has a secret agenda concerning.

Last but not least, as the cliffhanger of episode 470, we see Jeff bring Dr. Lang a box that has ice and a severed arm in it!!!!!

Now, I've seen too many horror films and shows to know what "collecting body parts" mean, especially if it's done by an unethical and experimental doctor. And I'm glad the show's going to that direction for a change.

Lil notes:

• Carolyn finally snaps out of Barnabas' influence when he becomes human again. Yaaay! I've personally missed seeing her normal again.. you know, as normal as she ever was. She's also having a love/hate relationship with  the rich-hatin' lawyer Tony Peterson. It may or may not turn into a romantic thing.

• Both Vicki and Carolyn's bite marks disappear once Barnabas is human again. However Vicki is still sort of having trouble telling Barnabas that they can't get married. Spell or not, she was always the nice one wasn't she?

• My theory about Jeff is that he actually is Peter who somehow managed to do a jump into the future which caused memory loss. Lang found the man and brainwashed him to do his dirty deeds.

• I hope to see Angelique in the flesh again, instead of on canvas or echoing laughters.

• As of now, there are 99 days til the movie which also happens to be my birthday as I've mentioned on various occasions. We're on two digit days now folks and I am not sure if I'll be able to finish watching the whole thing. Nevertheless, I think I will be alright considering they're basically doing the Josette and Barnabas story from what I made out of the news. Can someone tell me without spoilers if the series will address that story again?