Dream projects: Dark Shadows

I have mentioned on my blog having the desire to do an issue or two of Dynamite Entertainment's DARK SHADOWS series. But I also have a dream of doing a proper television revival of the series DARK SHADOWS. 

I am well aware how the recent film version(which I admit I like) has probably soured many people in doing anything further with the program. But that has not deterred me.

On a recent day trip to Rockport Massachusetts, I thought to myself how it would make a great location shot for the fictional town of Collinsport.

The feel of the streets and the buildings just had the feel of Collinsport for me.

Also, my choice for the role of 200 year old vampire Barnabas Collins would be British born actor Paul McGann.

I think the casting would be ideal since Paul was born in Liverpool. The city which Barnabas is said to have been from.

If anything else, to hear him make this speech. Which I think is one of Jonathan Frid's best in the series.

I also would want someone like Kathryn Leigh Scott, Nancy Barrett or Lara Parker as Elizabeth Stoddard-Collins. Just to have that connection with the old series.

I'd also like to bring back the Carey Mansion as Collinwood again.

If it's unavailable, I'd also want to use Lyndhurst Mansion in Tarrytown New York which was the basis for Collinwood in HOUSE OF DARK SHADOWS.

I think my biggest problem with the Dark Shadows movie is that it kind of missed a great number of the great characters and story-lines from the show. A lot of that I'm sure due to time restraint.

Also, there was a helluva lot of plot twists and story-lines even before Jonathan Frid joined the cast. Many of them too good to simply just forgot. I feel as though I would try my best to incorporate them all into a new series as well as re-introduce characters like Burke Devlin, Jason MacGuire, Nicolas Blair and Professor Stokes.

I would probably also introduce characters such as Barnabas, Angelique and Quentin a lot quicker than in the series since all of them were introduced over time. With Quentin and Angelique it would be over the course of the first series.

I wouldn't do  the series for laughs. But at the same time, I wouldn't try to make it super dark. The one thing I've learned from Doctor Who's return in 2005 is try and maintain something that made the series popular with the fans. With Doctor Who, it's that level of camp that people enjoyed in the classic series. Despite the silly monsters and dodgy sets, it was always about the cleverness of the writing.

And the same goes for Dark Shadows.

Lara Parker, who has done so much at keeping the series alive with her books would be someone I would immediately contact to write episodes. It only seems right since she has written so much original fiction.

I know so many great writers who I  know to be fans of the show that I would also contact for a potential series.

But Dark Shadows is definitely high up on my list of pet projects I'd love to get my fangs into.

Looking at the new Dark Shadows movie from the right perspective

Okay, Ladies and Gentlement. Boys and Girls. If you go into Dark Shadows either comparing it to the original series or expecting this to be up there with Tim Burton films like Pee-Wee's Big Adventure or Nightmare Before Christmas you're just setting yourself up for disappointment.

I went in with neither expectation and I enjoyed myself. Don't let the trailer for the movie fool you. The movie is actually pretty creepy and not as goofy as the trailer might suggest.

I'm getting a little sick of reading some critics reviews of this film and suggesting Tim Burton has only made five good films in his career. Which I think is ridiculous. And it makes me wonder if some of these reviews were written by bitter little toads who are just upset because Tim Burton rejected their screenplay.

 I especially enjoyed the cameo by Lara Parker, David Selby, Kathryn Leigh Scott and Jonathan Frid during a party scene at Collinwood. And not just one of those blink and you miss it type of cameo's. They even gave them a nice line too.

True this may not be one of his best of all time. But it's far from being his worst. That section in cinematic hell is reserved for Mars Attacks and Planet of the Apes in my opinon.

I didn't look at this movie as better or worse than the original series. Nothing ever beats the original. I look at the big screen treatment as a tribute to the original series as well as Tim Burton's version of it.

I suppose if I'm going to complain about anything as far as Tim Burton's current crop of films is I really miss the stop-motion special effects he used in some of his earlier films like Pee-Wee and Beetlejuice. But we live in a supply and demand age and I suppose it's easier to get a picture out there faster put together effects on the computer than to toil countless months trying to get the stop-motion effects right.

But with that said, I still have a soft spot for stop-motion creatures.

Go into Dark Shadows with an opened mind and you won't be disappointed. And if I listened to every movie critic out there, I wouldn't enjoy half the movies I'm into.

Dark Shadows: The Salem Branch by Lara Parker

As Syd and I prepare to go see Tim Burton's big screen treatment of the cult classic Dark Shadows, I am currently in the process of reading The Salem Branch. An original novel based on the series written by Angélique herself Lara Parker.

Who is going to be making a cameo in the upcoming film in a party sequence along with several of her Dark Shadows co-stars including the late Jonathan Frid.

I'm finding her continuation of the series to be really enjoyable. And I always appreciate the fact when someone who has been a part of a long running series cares about the show so much that their involvement with the series continues long after the series ends. What I enjoy about this story in particular is the connection with the Salem Witch Hunt. Which she has the Collins Family somehow connected with that horrible period of history.

Given the show's time-travel aspect in later episodes, I could almost imagine Jonathan Frid and other members of the cast as the Salem branch of the Collins Family.

In the present we find Barnabas Collins, cured of his vampire curse and set to marry Dr. Julia Hoffman. The woman who cured him. But life is less  than tranquil in Collinwood when a flower child by the name of Antoinette, who bears a shocking resemblance to the witch Angélique, has rebuilt the Old House. Which (as in real life) was destroyed in a fire.

All the Collins family are present and you can almost hear their voices as you read the books.

A British company Big Finish that specializes in creating audio plays actually did a dramatic reading of Lara Parker's previous Dark Shadows book Angélique's Descent that is worth checking out.

They had also produced one called The Night Whispers which featured Jonathan Frid reprising the role of Barnabas Collins for the very last time. Also worth giving a listen to.

But I would definitely give The Salem Branch a definite look as well.

Just to see how the Collins family are keeping nowadays.