David’s Choice

Ready for my close up?

Victoria Winters sounds pretty bored in today’s opener, as though she realizes this story is stubbornly refusing to move forward.

With the underlying implication that why the hell should we care if it was, I guess.

Anyway, this episode has the second instance of the “Roger going to work” location footage.

Naturally, of course, Roger isn’t actually working, but finding creative ways to get other people to do work.

I like that Dark Shadows has running jokes now. This is funnier than people insulting Maggie’s coffee. Mostly because we see Roger being shit at his job.

Carolyn arrives, as we were informed she’d be.

Maybe she’ll even believe it.

So Carolyn comes clean about her visit.

You know it’s serious because Roger took off his glasses.

Carolyn has this moment approaching self-awareness where she rues defending Burke all this time and trusted Burke simply because he was always nice to her.

‘Experienced’ can, of course, mean many things, but given that Burke is, again, courting the affections of a teenager, I think we can make an inference what is being spoken about here.

So the money here is Carolyn finally admitting that Burke has it out for Roger. It only took 13 and a half weeks.

Carolyn tells Roger about Burke accusing Roger of murder. Roger, oddly, acts as if he doesn’t know Burke has been going around saying these things. I don’t know why he’s doing this, because Carolyn already knows Burke came to Collinwood to accuse him last night, and that fact shouldn’t change Roger’s denial that he had anything to do with…anything.

You could tell Carolyn that you fart peppermint dust and she’d ask if she could bottle some for her boudoir.

I guess.

There’s always time.

Going out on a limb to say that Roger probably meant “tortured by his conscience”, rather than implying Burke is tortured with conscience, which makes it sound like Burke is being punished for having moral judgment.

Projection, maybe.

Roger describes the ordeal of testifying against Burke.

*adds to ‘Gay Evidence’ folder’*

In a striking parallel to Maggie last episode, Carolyn offers to provide Roger an alibi, something which he pooh-poohs because he already has one thanks to Victoria.

Our latest out of left field development: Carolyn suggests Unca Roger become the babysitter’s friend.

There is no way on earth anybody could’ve seen this coming and that makes it the best thing the show has yet given us. I am not exaggerating. Roger trying to “charm” Victoria is what ends up saving this character from what would’ve been certain doom.

Carolyn goes on her merry way, intending to nab Joe from work for a lunch date, because that’s just what they do.

Meanwhile, remember the ghost book?

It’s been 16 episodes since we saw the book open, as if touched by an invisible hand, to the page bearing the name of Josette Collins. At this point, nobody knows about this and nothing else in the way of ghostliness has occurred, allowing the show to continue doing whatever the hell it thinks makes compelling television.

Anyway, David is perusing the book today when Victoria comes looking for him and he hides.

So between finding the book on the floor and seeing the curtain rustling where David is hiding, this whole bit must remind Victoria of that tense instant two nights previous when she and Carolyn came into the drawing room to investigate a mysterious noise, mere moments before the actual ghost thing happened.

If it does, though, she doesn’t show it, and David reveals himself pretty promptly.

I can buy it.

Victoria attempts to entice him back to their history lesson. Giving all the bouncing around they’ve been doing in that course, I can only imagine what they’re talking about today. The Indus River Valley, perhaps.

This is, believe it or not, the first mention we have of David attending ordinary school before he came with his father to Collinwood.

That makes Elizabeth’s insistence to hire something as outmoded as a governess even weirder. Are there just no schools in Collinsport? There don’t seem to be any children, and all the residents are teenagers and graying late adults with no in between, so it’s highly possible there just isn’t a school.

Which almost explains this governess stuff.

Vicky wonders if David liked living in Augusta very much. He didn’t.

This isn’t the first time David has told Victoria about his father being an abusive asshole. This is just the first time he mentions his mother being a similar victim.

And, just as she has those other times, Victoria doesn’t believe him.

Vicky doesn’t know. Why is she so determined to convince David that his father is some kind of upstanding citizen? It’s honestly kind of upsetting on a visceral level. David has been abused and has witnessed abuse and nobody believes him.

Jesus.

So we get this anecdote from when David was six, so around three years ago. He heard Burke and Laura fighting about Burke.

This is actually ripped wholesale from Art Wallace’s series Bible, in yet another example of Francis Swann taking this the other guy wrote and actually, you know, using them in the show.

Back at the cannery, Roger is informed that the sheriff is here to see him and immediately sets about pretending to look busy.

Patterson intends to ask Roger about that thing from last night.

Gotta love the word ‘fracas’, especially the way Dana Elcar says it.

And this time Roger isn’t bluffing. Nobody has told him about Matthew almost killing Burke. Not even Burke mentioned it last night, even though he seemed pretty convinced Roger was the one that sent Matthew to do it.

Now he’s calling it a murder. Could be Dana Elcar forgetting they’re all supposed to be playing dumb about this.

So Roger insists that he didn’t kill Malloy, and didn’t sic Matthew on anybody.

Patterson, for reasons best left to himself, decides this clears Roger of any suspicion and declares that the statement “impresses him” before walking out of the episode.

So back at Collinwood, Victoria continues to Not Get It.

Is the Roger/Laura/Burke thing that hard to figure out? Sam told her just last night that Laura and Burke had been an item before she married Roger. There are very clearly defined reasons Roger and Laura would fight about (or, er, over) Burke.

Maybe she’s playing dumb for the sake of the kid? I don’t see what the point of that is, since he seems to have made up his mind.

This is pretty true to how real world traumatic memories resurface. Something even tangentially connected to them happens and all of a sudden, you remember so clearly it seems ridiculous you ever forgot.

We haven’t said much about Burke and David’s friendship in a while, but David is more than happy to overcompensate, repeating that Burke is his best friend (they’ve met once, which is very sad) and wondering if Vicky is fond of him as well, which she is, though she admits…

Reminding us that Burke has decided to turn on her because she lukewarmly defended a readily observable fact that threw his little pet theory into question.

David, having no context as to any of that, immediately defends Burke regardless, proving that he may, in fact, be Burke’s son after all.

Oh for God’s sake.

David then accuses her of being nothing more than “a stranger” trying to make trouble for David and Burke.

Victoria insists she’s only been trying to help David.

So…incel David I guess.

He points out Burke helped him out of a lot of trouble, referring to how he bailed him out of the suppository affair. Weirdly, he then accuses Victoria of wrongfully accusing him of trying to kill Roger.

So, basically, he admits Burke saved him from going down for attempted murder, but then insists he never did any attempted murder. Okay.

NOW LET’S BREAK SOME SHIT

He actually broke part of that chair off. I hope David Henesy wasn’t penalized for adhering to this ridiculous script.

Anyway, Roger shows up and David goes back into the classic playbook, insisting Vicky was trying to hurt him.

I like how he defends Victoria with patrician condescension.

So…David was bullied? I don’t know, that isn’t really a thing they follow through on.

David runs off and Roger moves to his true target: Miss Winters herself.

Is that what we’re calling it now?

Victoria immediately points out that she “hasn’t complained”, which implies she assumes he’s been forced to apologize by Elizabeth or whoever, which is just hilarious.

It’s remarkable how neatly he lays it on, but also how skeptical Victoria still is. This guy only last night tried to convince her to move to Florida. She has no evidence he’s sincere and he must know that.

That’s probably not a lie. I think it’s non-controversial that all of Roger’s major decisions are the result of feeling in some way emasculated.

All these strange older men trying to take Vick out to dinner. It’s a sight to see.

She seems sufficiently convinced and agrees, probably because saying no to a thing like this would feel uncomfortably awkward. Then, presumably still feeling very comfortable, Vicky tells Roger the thing she told David he shouldn’t repeat to anybody because it would certainly make trouble for Burke.

This may be unintentional, but I want to imagine Victoria really wants to make trouble for Burke.

As to David’s allegation of domestic abuse, Roger looks off into the distance as if to hide his expression and says:

Roger then claims he didn’t know David remembers this, which is a continuity error because David alluded to…something like this way back in the pre-suppository days. Then again, it’s as likely Roger is playing dumb to rob the accusation of credibility.

And, just like that, Roger becomes the second member of the household to promote “Miss Winters” to “Vicky”. Carolyn was the first, but then it’s not like she ever really called her “Miss Winters” to begin with.

Victoria goes off to find David, who is in the same hiding place.

David goes in to see his father and we get one of my favorite scenes with these two. David wonders why Roger is being so nice to Victoria, who he is supposed to greatly dislike.

Well, the expression is “more flies with honey than with vinegar”, but same thing I guess. Roger then frames his olive branch to Vicky as an olive branch to David.

This doesn’t really track, of course, but Roger knows that David believes Victoria doesn’t like him and clearly sees no problem reasserting that to further his own ends.

I doubt this would have happened if Carolyn hadn’t suggested Roger stop being a dick, so great job screwing it all up, Kitten.

David then claims he never said anything about Roger and Laura fighting to Victoria and Roger claims to believe him. It’s this really interesting dynamic between these two nasty (in different ways, mind) people. Roger is essentially manipulating his child, but it’s fun rather than creepy because Louis Edmonds is just having such a good time.

Sure seems that way.

David wonders why Roger doesn’t just fire Victoria and he points out that Aunt Elizabeth would surely not approve of such a thing and, anyway, Vicky hasn’t done anything wrong.

Just as confidently as if it were his own idea. If nothing else, Roger can at least get one over on a small child.

Carolyn returns to Collinwood in low spirits for, you guessed it, stupid reasons. She tells Vicky she went to see Joe at work to go to lunch BUT HE WAS OUT DOING HIS JOB.

I honest to God don’t understand what they’re trying to do here. Carolyn’s bitchiness is a joke now, and we’re meant to understand she’s upset with Joe for silly and superficial reasons.

That’s the 60s-est slang we’ve gotten in 68 episodes. Also, now that somebody has finally said what we’re all thinking, you will never be able to get away from me talking about how Joe Haskell is a Square and we love him for that.

Joe calls on the phone, having gotten the message Carolyn left. Vicky picks up and Carolyn signals she doesn’t want to speak to Joe, but immediately changes her mind and runs to get the phone and it turns out Joe wants to do dinner tonight and Carolyn was freaking out for nothing and maybe she should marry Joe Haskell after all, because after all this time, we’re still not sure how to resolve this story.

So if you want a preview of how Swann will continue to write the womens and how he’s different from Wallace, note that with Wallace Carolyn’s thing was “I love Joe, but I don’t want to get married, but I don’t want to be a prisoner of Collinwood, but I’m not sure if I’m ready to be an adult”, but with Swann Carolyn’s thing is “Gurlz not rational like menz are; alwayz change mind; hurr durr durr”.

Back to Full House.

So Roger claims that all the recent stresses of moving back to Collinwood and taking the new job and all of that have caused him to be unpleasant, and that after things settle down, he’ll be a much nicer father.

David has lived with Roger his entire life. Regardless, Roger positions David with a choice, and it proves, weird as it is, to be the most actively insidious thing he has yet done.

Wherever could this go?

Wouldn’t you like to know?

This Day in History- Wednesday, September 28, 1966

The hijacking of Aerolíneas Argentinas Flight 648 by members of the extremist group “Operativo Cóndor” in Argentina. The place is diverted to a racetrack in the Falkland Islands where several islanders were taken hostage. Members of the group would go on to denounce British administration of the island. After 36 hours, the hijackers free the hostages and surrender to a Catholic priest.

Connected to these, gunmen in Argentina fire at the British ambassador’s residence, intending to kidnap Prince Philip, with the ransom being the restoration of the Falkland Islands from Britain to Argentina. This doesn’t work out.

Not connected to this, but in keeping with the theme of South America, Eric Fleming, known for starring in the Western television series Rawhide, drowns over his canoe is overturned on Peru’s Huallaga River. His body would be recovered five days later, partially consumed by piranhas.