Months before becoming known as the vampire soap opera, Dark Shadows was a show about ghosts and goblins, or at least the frequent mention thereof. But on the Friday of the second week, the show produced a monster, one that proved especially unnerving because it was so real and true to life and therefore possible – a nine-year-old boy named David.
In less than twenty-four hours, the return to Collinsport of a driven and vengeful man has had its intended provocative effect on those tied in with the Collins estate and business interests. Fishing fleet and cannery plant manager Bill Malloy is actively concerned, Collins family matriarch Elizabeth Stoddard is stoically unfazed, while restless and venturesome daughter Carolyn Stoddard is recklessly intrigued. It’s a combination that can only hold potentially life-altering consequences for all those involved.
If there’s one aspect of Dark Shadows that comes across as comedy, it’s the notion of romance. Naturally, because this is Detergent Land Drama, one shouldn’t expect to begrudge the characters with any happiness in that area, at least not for the long term, but when it comes to even finding a suitable mate the folks at Collinwood, and anyone who chances to come into even remote contact with them, are positively doomed!
For Dark Shadows fans who view the series beginning with episode 210, Sam Evans is likely perceived as a sympathetic character. At the very least, he seems innocuous, and for the most part you feel for him because his daughter Maggie, a character who is universally well liked, is soon to be kidnapped and you understand the tortured anguish of a loving father who only wants for his daughter to be returned home safely. Even Roger Collins at one point manages to almost express a measure of sympathy for Sam’s plight – almost, that is.
But taking the series from the beginning, it’s a different story – and not just because the first actor who plays him, Mark Allen, doesn’t seem to find as much favor with Dark Shadows fans the way his successor to the role does, David Ford. Perhaps it’s the company he keeps.
One of the big, lingering disappointments for many Dark Shadows fans is the lack of a story resolution for Victoria Winters.
This question is the basis for the very beginnings of Dark Shadows, the meaning of which is spelled out in the opening narrative that launches the first episode: Who am I? And now, in her first full day at Collinwood, the hope that she may be able to find out something about herself – her past, her origin – is enough to convince her to stay on at her new job, despite having just endured what she later recounts to Carolyn Stoddard as “the most frightening night of my life.” Because if she goes, all she will have is the ten words written about her on a piece of paper when she was left at the foundling home: “Her name is Victoria. I cannot take care of her.” So she has decided to keep searching, hoping, waiting.
Dark Shadows from the Beginning 