Longtime fans of Dark Shadows tend to resent when the show is denigrated as being, merely, the “vampire soap”. They love to point out (correctly) that the show did a great many other things in its five year run. Vampires weren’t the only supernatural creatures to come to Collinsport, oh no. There were witches and werewolves and ghosts and all manner of other, more arcane, harder to specifically define things. The show played with concepts of time and space, blending the sci-fi obsession of the late 60s with the tried and true format of the daytime serial. There are so many eras of Dark Shadows to admire and appreciate, that it is, in fact, insulting to reduce the show to something as paltry as “the vampire soap”.
And yet, at the same time, I have a hard time imagining anybody’s out there ready to stan the Suppository Caper.
This is Dark Shadows’s first proper storyline. It began 13 episodes ago, at the end of the show’s third week. Roger Collins crashes his car while driving down Widow’s Hill to attend a meeting with his rival Burke Devlin. We learn, not immediately after, but immediately before that Burke, who is seized by the entire canvas as the prime suspect, is innocent and the true culprit is Roger’s disturbed son David, who resents Roger’s attempts to “send him away” like his mother.
David attempted this vehicular homicide by removing a valve from the “master brake cylinder”. In order to preserve my own sanity as I write these things, I have called the valve a “suppository” because I felt like it.
David hid the suppository in his room, following a fruitless attempt to plant it among the belongings of our heroine Victoria Winters. All of this occurred in Episodes 14 and 15.
The entirety of the fourth week of the series run was dedicated to exploring the fallout from the ‘accident’ as various characters learned it was anything but. What should have been the pulse-pounding search for an attempted murderer was turned into a five episode slog (including an episode with only three characters, in which David all but admits to being responsible and everyone must act like he hasn’t said anything strange) to an admittedly entertaining, if unrevealing confrontation between Burke and Roger in Episode 20.
The fifth week of the series run promised us some more momentum by introducing a policeman with a constantly shifting title and moral ethos. Constable-cum-Sheriff Carter arrived on the scene and promptly began to listen to characters repeat things they had already told us many times before. He witnessed David tampering with a significant piece of evidence and did nothing. Afterward, he questioned Burke and learned nothing.
It was not until Episode 25, ten episodes after Roger’s car crash where the character with the least investment in the whole thing (not counting bit players in the story like Joe and, oh, Maggie I guess) found the suppository in David’s room, despite not even trying to look for it.
Eager audiences would’ve waited over the weekend to enter the sixth week of the series run…
Only to see Victoria and David grapple for control of the suppository, whereupon the rest of the episode is spent with Vicky telling Liz about the suppository, but not showing her so that David can steal it and run away.
We are now three episodes into the sixth week of a 13-week series order. Perhaps it is becoming evident to you that this isn’t the kind of thing you’d race home to see every afternoon. This is by no means the longest running storyline on the show. In fact, among the three major pre-Barnabas stories on Dark Shadows, this one is the shortest, and the only one not to make 70 episodes.
And yet it stands distinct from those other stories by virtue of one simple thing: nothing happens. And when it does, it is a miniscule nugget buried amidst recapping of the same inane details and a stunning obliviousness in characters far too charismatic to be this stupid.
Why this long preamble?
Why, my dear reader, because this episode is the best one in the entire suppository saga.
Why is this so?
Why, because it has forward momentum and is full of characters we love and love to hate, that’s
Why.
Take Burke Devlin, that lovable scoundrel. Always one step ahead of everyone, and yet now he’s gotten his feathers ruffled because our man Consteriff Carter…
Sure, he doesn’t seem to know the name of the man whose right to privacy he violated on the whim of a foppish aristocrat, but that’s why he’s so fun! This guy’s only been on the show one week and in all of his appearances, he has managed to delight and baffle us in new ways, be it the dignity of his badge, almost tripping over the camera, and lest we forget his peculiar affinity for mustard. It’s these many quirks, as well as his utter inability to stand up for himself against the likes of heavyweights like Roger and Burke, that make him fun.
See? Burke is all-but asking God what he’s done to have to engage seriously with this idiot.
Does Burke have something to hide in his room? Is there something there entirely unconnected to the car crash that may incriminate him? No! That’s not the point. On any other episode of this storyline, I’d be spitting mad at this blatant attempt to manufacture drama for the sake of act breaks, but this is the best episode in the suppository saga and I just can’t be mad at it!
Burke is asking for a search warrant!
We already know about the search warrant. All this scene does is inform Burke about the search warrant, something that could have been done between scenes and entirely off-screen. But, but look! Michael Currie is rummaging through papers on his desk to look for it. Was it in the script? Why? Isn’t it easier to believe he can’t find the prop?
It is impossible to be aggravated at the Greatest Suppository Episode (GSE) when it’s right here, heavily implying Carter thinks Burke’s wardrobe is hot and maybe he tried on some of his underwear when he was searching the room, just to see what it felt like.
Who was on the phone? What did they want? Why are they so eager to waste 10 seconds on a phone call with nobody about nothing? WHO CARES?
We stan an incompetent lying craven! GSE! GSE! GSE!
Even Burke proclaiming his innocence for the umpteenth time is fresh and exciting!
But it won’t! And that’s fine, because these two aren’t the only gifts the GSE is ready to give us.
We’ve got the red herring suspect, the cop, and the real perp all in the same episode! Art Wallace must’ve had his V8!
BUT THAT ISN’T EVEN ALL…
MAGGIE EFFING EVANS!
It’s the freshest, most natural performer on the show! The rising star they still haven’t figured out how to utilize! The nine-year-old criminal runaway was caught trying to break into the red herring’s room and this otherwise uninvolved waitress caught him! Three different characters tied together by the contrivance of the story! It’s almost like I’m watching some kind of soap opera!
It’s the first time someone’s interacted with David like an actual human being and not some sort of insect, animal, monster, or simpleton (looking at you, Madame Narrator). David seems visibly taken aback and responds to this 23-year-old burger flipper like an actual kid caught breaking the rules.
Only on the GSE, guys. This is game changing shit.
Why the hell not?
Maggie actually makes him a sundae! And she speaks to him intelligently! And nobody recaps anything because Maggie knows better than to pry for answers and, hell, even if he did give answers, they’d be to questions we don’t already know the answer to! Like what he was doing in Burke’s room and did he succeed in his mission, and did he really just walk all the way here from Collinwood?
And I wish all my heroines were like you! She hasn’t asked a single shallow, self-serving question or tried to make an attempted murder about herself!
She asks careful, delicate questions aimed at learning how David got to town and whether Roger knows where he is, you know like a responsible, intelligent person. And by God…
She has disarmed and maybe even earned David’s trust. Miracle of miracles, the GSE keeps on giving and we’re still in Act 1!
Like heaven, Maggie Evans. Like pure, delightful, suppository-free heaven.
Even in its slower moments, the GSE continues to find new and delightful ways to entertain us. Take Carter finding Burke studying wanted posters…
See? That was funny! He was being funny and it wasn’t an accident!
We even get a follow-up on that NYPD Detective Carter wanted to speak to five episodes ago! Sure, it doesn’t come to anything, but you can’t put something out of its misery if it’s determined to stay swinging in the wind.
Burke is visibly upset about Carter speaking to New York! He knows the cop’s onto him! We’re getting somewhere!
He is! He is! Somebody’s finally noticed! If the stupidest man on canvas is figuring things out, imagine what may soon become of the others!
Even when the suppository is mentioned, it’s as Mitch Ryan theatrically gesticulates and does a stage turn! Even a scene that basically exists to take up space is full of little wond…
This…it’s things like this that make the GSE the Greatest Suppository Episode, which is what the acronym means, I’m just making sure we’re all on the same page here.
We see Maggie peering out the window. We know she made a phone call to somebody. Given her measured, intelligent and surprisingly compassionate strategy of keeping David occupied, we can infer she’s likely waiting for the arrival of whoever she called. And who do you call when you have a missing child? Why, its parents!
And as we can see…David’s Dad has come early.
There, barely visible beyond the frosted glass of the door, is the figure of Louis Edmonds shaking out his wrists and hopping up and down as if on the balls of his feet, like a high schooler about to take the stage for Little Shop of Horrors.
“Your father’s doing a chorus line in the parking lot.”
This isn’t the first time Louis Edmonds has found ways to enliven us, but there’s only so many times something as perfect as an actor hyping himself up actually makes it to the screen. On this show, no blooper ever harms the experience, and if nothing else the Louis Edmonds Hop heals all who behold it. I feel like a better human being simply for glimpsing his innocent moment of self-exploration.
Only if Leaping Louie Edmonds is invited.
This episode is a study in new ground. Maggie is the first person to approach David like a real child, and David responds in kind. Even when she wonders why he was trying to break into Burke’s room, he doesn’t end up running away, but responds to her kindness and attention. Maybe there is hope for him after all. Maybe the little monster is a human indeed. Maybe Burke Devlin, in his sudden fear and vulnerability, his shaky anger, is not as immortal as we fear him to be.
And maybe the joyful humanity of Louis Edmonds may yet save the character of Roger Collins and, by extension, the show he inhabits.
…these things take time.
Naturally, David isn’t there.
But even the mystery of the missing David isn’t a lame cop out! Because on the GSE, every single thing, no matter how cheap, leads somewhere. It doesn’t seem like much, and it shouldn’t be, but it is.
And that’s the magic.
Roger could not care less about his kid running away from home. He legit expects him to just walk back and, likely, doesn’t care if David can’t figure it out. Is this cruelty appalling and disgusting? No! Because Louis Edmonds is doing it, so it comes off as funny and charming and, hell, half-justified, because after all, hasn’t Roger suffered enough?
This causes Roger to change his tune immediately.
Even Louis Edmonds repeatedly fumbling the line makes sense because Roger is supposed to be flustered! As flustered as we all must feel now that things seem at last to be coming to a head on multiple fronts in a saga that has gone on for two and a half weeks!
Maggie tries to ask Roger about her father, who you might remember as that slovenly pervert we last saw six episodes ago. This is Maggie’s latest attempt to find out just what’s gotten Sam so rattled lately and how much Roger knows about it.
And where this might just be another rehash of the same worries Maggie has had to relitigate since the first week, here Roger actually learns something from the recapping! Burke came to the Evans house! That’s bad, because Burke doesn’t know that Sam’s part of all this, and Roger wants it to stay that way, and Sam is a loose cannon.
So Maggie tells Roger about Burke’s big nefarious stupid plan to have Sam paint his portrait, but even that doesn’t feel like a monotonous waste of time because…
It’s always a party when these two hook up. Burke indulges in his own standby of getting rid of Maggie so they can tussle as boys do.
Why, that’s exactly what’s happened! And Roger is being confronted about it! And Carter is in this episode! This confrontation may actually mean something…
Burke insists he isn’t heading back to prison.
And that’s where the confrontation ends. But it’s fine! Not every Burke and Roger scene has to be fireworks! We had fun! Stages were set. Burke is onto Roger and Roger knows this. And somewhere, somewhere, is David, and he’s got a hot potato the size of the president’s hemorrhoids on him!
Another sign we’re getting somewhere? Maggie recaps to Burke about David during the act break, sparing us from a giant recap! Burke wonders if the kid he was told tried to sneak into his room was really David…
Maggie knows what she saw, and she’d appreciate if you treated her like someone with a brain beneath that actual human hair.
Burke wonders what David wanted from his room.
There is no reason why Burke should “know kids”. As a matter of fact, everything we know about him to this point suggests it’s probably best that he know no kids, ever.
BUT WHAT IF I TOLD YOU THE SHOW WAS A STEP AHEAD OF YOU ON THAT AND READY TO BLOW YOUR MINDS WITH THAT ONE TOO, AND THAT ISN’T EVEN THIS EPISODE?
Have we reached the reckoning? Is this the beginning of the rest of our Dark, Shadowy lives?
But because Burke can’t ever be too un-creepy, he insists Maggie sit with him over her gentle protests that she has a job to do.
See? That scene was important, because now Burke knows Roger’s got some kinda complex about Burke being around Sam, which means Burke knows Sam might be caught up in all this! We’ve been fed breadcrumbs about this since the seventh episode, and now it seems they’re finally getting somewhere!
They aren’t! Not for a while! But it feels like they are, by God!
So Maggie tells Burke that Roger was looking for Sam the moment he knew Burke was back in town! Have you forgotten that? It’s no surprise if you have, lost in the mires of suppository hell! But now things from before are important! Maybe it’ll stick! Maybe this will all pay off!
Well, that is generally what one does with a suppository, but Roger’s more displeased that Burke hasn’t yet been arrested and can “talk to people”.
Carter, continuing on a stunning streak of situational awareness, notes.
And it does! And that’s painfully obvious! But better late than never, right?
Roger actively worried to the policeman’s face that Burke might “dig up something” if he was allowed to roam around town free and, whereas in another episode Carter may have just acted like this was run of the mill conversation, he notes that is not the sort of expression used by an innocent man!
When you really think about it, it’s kind of strange that Roger went to see Carter in Monday’s episode, and now in his next appearance, he is also going to see Carter, but it’s probably because seeing Burke spooked him so much.
The saga of NYPD Homicide Lieutenant Frank Palmer finally concludes (a loose end they bothered to tie up? I’ll be a monkey’s uncle!), and Carter informs Roger that there’s nothing illegal about Burke’s work (we finally learn he’s in charge of an investment company, which in and of itself might be illegal, but even so) and, while this is kind of a bummer for those of us expecting fabulous revenge, it’s nice to have one less question dangling in the ether for no reason.
Here, Carter also finally confirms for the benefit of the Collins family that Burke was the one who hired Wilbur Strake to dig into the Collinses two weeks before he arrived. The Collinses learned about Strake last week thanks to Victoria’s letter from Mrs. Hopewell, but they were forced to speculate, only assuming Burke was the one who hired the detective.
Now, at last, another dead horse put to rest.
And he does! Sure, it won’t come out that he does for a while, but let’s not mind that, because there’s still a little bit of magic in the GSE, oh yes.
Burke gives Maggie what appears to be a generous tip, which is likely the nicest thing he’s ever done for a woman.
Cautioning Maggie not to worry…
He departs.
So, it’s admittedly odd that Maggie never checked the phone booth when she was looking for David, but you know what?
I don’t care. David may have evaded capture, but that certainly doesn’t mean we’ve been wasting our time! Carter is beginning to suspect Roger has something to hide and will benefit from putting Burke away, regardless of his guilt in the crash. Roger is growing increasingly desperate to see Burke put away, and he has all the more reason to fear Sam coming clean about their history, given his impending dealings with Burke. Burke himself is on guard against threats from the Collinses, the police, and even a man he’d once considered his friend. Maggie finds herself caught up in an increasingly toxic web of intrigue in which her only stake is to see her father protected from a danger she still doesn’t understand and…above all…
We still don’t know what David’s done with the suppository. For something that’s dominated the discourse for this many episodes, this is the first time there really is a mystery about it, where it is, who will find it…
And what that person will do when that time comes.
Sure, it isn’t perfect. In many ways, it was only the bare minimum. But it was the greatest point in a long, exhausting slog that this show never should’ve spent this much time on to begin with.
And get this? No episode after this one is as bad as the ones before it.
Stay hyped, my friends.
This Day in History- Wednesday, August 3, 1966
So, it turns out the daily news of the late 60s was very depressing. Go figure.
Chinese Prime Minister Zhou Enlai calls on the people of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region to support the party’s Cultural Revolution. The Sunni Muslim Uyghur minority quickly became a persecuted “other” and…er…yeah, that’s still going on, and the news hasn’t much been talking about it. But, yeah, it’s pretty serious ethnic cleansing type stuff, which I’m sure is not why you read a Dark Shadows blog, but there it is.
In somewhat cheerier news, American comedian Lenny Bruce died of a morphine overdose the day after receiving a foreclosure notice on his house.
But, hey, Dylan and Petty did a song about him.
Kooks of Collinwood 