¶ Intro / Opening
Weary Way said in.
Sad Welcome back to Midnight Viewing, the horror anthology podcast,
¶ Strange Love
where this season we're taking a look at Georgia Averramerow's nineteen eighties series Tales from the Dark Side. Sharing the midnight view with me are the projection booths, Mike White It's nineteen thirty five, Everybody out of Nowhere, and the culture cast Chris Statue, Yes, I wow.
I Sometimes even I am left with very little to say other than I've heard Taco is putting.
On the risk Doo Doo. Strange Love and The Unhappy Medium. Those are the two episodes from season two that we're looking at tonight. Strange Love, Season two, episode twenty one. This originally aired on May eleventh, nineteen eighty six, Written by Edith Swinson, directed by Theodore Gershuni, and starring hars Nier, Marshall Cross and Patrick Kilpatrick. This is an episode that asked the question, how do you treat an ailing vampire?
The answer is love or This is the finest example of the f l R lifestyle ever to show up on broadcast television. What do you think of this one, Chris f l R. That's the female lead.
Oh, Okay, what.
A bunch of non up with the times, folks. We are as we sit.
Here, n M C F right naked naked male clothes female.
You always talk about that.
What is that?
You don't know?
Category on like pornhub and stuff.
It's like a dude being jerked off by women, huh?
Or just wait, what is the category again?
Clothed male naked female c n FF. I had to look it up because I was just like, what the fuck is it? Like? D D LG. You guys know that one no daddy dom little girl.
I know d d l J.
Yeah, of course.
I know.
I know that. I don't know d dp VD, DVD AV, dv DA. Jesus Christ we call it. Yeah. Well, you know what they say. Overachievers are always out there there,
they live amongst them. What were we watching? This is not a great episode of Tales from the Dark Side, and we are now banging into what feels like clunker after clunker at the bottom of the season here, and I do not understand it, because this is a show that was, I would like to say, almost consistently good, to the point of us going on, wow, there's nothing bad about this question mark, Because now We're at the end of the season and really feels like the show's kind of hit a wall.
It's like a dumping ground.
Would you say, like a season seven of Tails from the Crib?
No, no, no, no, But you.
Said dumping ground. That's all I'm saying. Dumping grounds are dumping grounds, regardless of whether or not there's cement over them. And it's an atari e t.
You could say season three of Twilight's on eighty five like.
It, I would, and I think I would. I would. I'm not disagreeing with you. This is these episodes broadly, these two are not great, and this one. I just don't understand what possessed them to tell this story on this show, because this doesn't seem like this kind of show's story. This seems like Night Gallery, to be honest with you, shockingly, night Gallery in a way that this show doesn't and hasn't really felt like in my opinion.
How about you, Mike, Yeah, I was waiting for Chris to say those two magic words, but he didn't. It might be three, but I think the first one's a compound word lockout skit. That's what this one is. But yet it's stretched out to a full episode.
Especially after DVDA, What.
The hell is going on in this thing? First off, she heals because she's a vampire, so she really didn't need a doctor because he's just like, oh wow, look at how fast you're healing. Okay, maybe a cast, maybe something like an ace bandage doesn't require twelve feet a change for this guy. Yeah, I don't. I was so confused. And like I said at the beginning, why nineteen thirty five? They weren't in period costumes.
They weren't putting on the smile. Is that?
What's going on? Are they affected by? Like here we are in between World War one and World War two? Teta what?
It's a choice. It's a choice, As they say to me, they made choices, and you know what, sometimes you make choices that don't work.
Just amit the line It doesn't even need to be there because it plays nothing into this episode. Yeah wow, this was just it was big old nothing Burger. Don't know. I'm waiting for you, father Malone, to tell us how much you love this one?
Yeah, tell us how much you love Marsha cross from such great shows as Desperate housew was.
And now I do love Marsha Across she's one at.
Piece A Yeah, I want to hear a word said again her marshacross from Melrose Place.
Yeah, but she's not good in this episode.
I actually think she is. Guess what, guys, I fucking this episode? How about wow?
Oh boy?
How about that? Okay, listen, let me take it apart like you guys were taking it apart because I agree with you, Mike. When they said this is nineteen thirty five, I was like, it is what what?
It's the bow tie for me?
Okay. Other ridiculous things. This woman breaks her leg while dancing by herself. She's a vampire? Are they uncoordinated vampires? Also, from shot to shot, the episode goes from cinematic descent bound. I don't understand why because some shots look beautiful and other shots just look like we're standing on a fucking community theater. Sat.
No, it's very minimalist. It's very minimalist. That's you're missing how minimalist it is. It's like that episode of Night Gallery, but done shitty. That's the problem. I'm with you, But I just don't understand how you liked the episode, I guess.
Is the problem You're with me criticizing it Okay, no, I got that. I got that.
I'm with I'm but I like I guess I don't understand what is the part that appeals to you about the episode.
I liked it because because maybe for the reason I mentioned a little, the bit of kink at the beginning, the fact that this wasn't ultimately which if this was Tails from the Crypt, this was a Tales from the Crypt episode. By the way, this is a Night Gallery, this is vampires. This would be un This would be a Crypt episode and.
Poorly interpreted vampires too, just like Tails from the Crypt.
Yeah, in that case, it would be one or other of these male vampires resting control from the other. And instead what we have here is more of a noir thing where we have the girl. But what I would have expected from Night Gallery or Tales from the Crypt would be that in the end she kills the guy too and haha, there's a third guy, or she goes off on her own or something like that, and it ended up not being that. It ended up being this, like they wanted to be together. Sometimes guys, that fucking
does it for me. Sometimes just two people finding themselves finding each other in an episode like just emmeliately. The other problems, Yeah, that we've seen this story one million times, not a vampire who takes a doctor and makes him heal his wife and then chains him to the wall. But nevertheless, there was so much character and dialogue, and I enjoyed all of the character and dialogue in it, so I was rating it that way. I do agree, like, why do you need a fucking doctor at all? It's
a vampire. Just pop her leg back into place and off we go. Bob's your uncle. Unless they were just planning this from the beginning, I don't know. So anyway, overall, I enjoyed it. I think others might drop some enjoyment from it. I know if you're a fan of physical effects, like the physical effects guy on Teessima Dark SyES having a fucking field day this season. We had that one with I'm forgetting her name right now, Carol Cain and
Budcore where it was all popping balloons and everything. Here now we have harsh Ny are doing all these physical effects as a as a vampire. I thought those were all disappears. It's hardcore effects there, and the chain fight is totally ridiculous.
Oh my god, especially pulling apart those links. I don't even know how they had the strength to.
Do that, my God, So listen. Ultimately, gentlemen, I agree with you. This is a bad episode, but I love it.
I just I can't forgive Harshneier for killing Gandhi. Ever since then, it's just been like, sorry, dude, Wow, you're
¶ The Unhappy Medium
a bad.
Guy, all right.
Our next episode is The Unhappy Medium. This is season two, episode twenty, air originally on May the eighteenth, nineteen eighty six. Written by Edith Swinson, directed my Dusty Nelson. This one stars Connie Stevens, Carolyn Clark or, Richard Coleman, and Peter Miller. This is about the children of the family of a recently deceased televangelist who have gathered to divide his fortune though their benefactor and might not be done with this world. What do you think of this one, Mike.
Oh boy, Yeah. Chris said, we're betting a thousand here, and I tend to agree. We're in a room and then we're in hell, and we're possessed. Sometimes the devil's coming for you. We've seen this play out, not this whole devil thing, but like the greedy relatives at the will reading, and then something bad is supposed to happen to the worst of the bad relatives, but does anything happen to Connie Stevens. At the end of this one, she freeze pray.
Oh, I think the implication is that she's about to be dragged off to hell as well. Oh, okay, dragged.
Me to hell. Yeah, but it took a long time to get there. It took a long time. Yeah, I couldn't. I also had trouble just understanding some of the relationships, like the family stuff. And then yeah, pass.
Circle takes the square. Yes, I like the idea. I like where they were going. I wish that to Mike's point, I wish that they're wes had been clear or defined, because I think that would have helped the episode. I do think also maybe casting a woman who's also not You've got blonde woman, brown headed guy. I don't know. The two blonde women are indistinguishable from one another at times in what they're both doing because neither one of
them seems great. All of these characters are all terrible, and so they're all getting their just desserts, which I like. I don't mind terrible people, terrible things happening to terrible people is not something I dislike. Go watch Game of Thrones, House of the Dragon, that's literally that show in a nutshell. Bad Things happening to bad people, that is that show.
And Tales from the Dark Side, Tales from the Crypt, Night Gallery, those are all shows that share that kind of DNA of being mean to people that deserve to be mean to. And I just I feel like this episode called its Punches a little bit. I feel like we just see the concept of hell we are hell watching them. We don't see anything, which is so fucking cheap. But that's because it's a cheapness thing, which is fine. Again, I'm not complaining about the cheapness of the show. I
understand having a budget. I'm just saying, don't make it so goddamn abvious because you did it like three times. But again, at the end of the day, I like the setup the executions a little flawed, But I like the setup of this episode a lot more than I like the setup and execution of the last episode. But you bought them alone.
I think it punked out. I think exactly what you're saying, pulling its punches, My god, this is a night Gallery episode. I wouldn't be surprised to see if Ron Serling wrote this episode. Nobody gets punished at the end of the it implies that Connie Stevens will get hers, but not even. And the fact is the antagonist of the episode, the televangelist, who has been sucked off to hell, is still making an appearance. So is he even being punished. I don't know.
Farley Farley Flavors. I will say that I thought of that the.
Whole goddamn Sorry.
Flavors, Baby fabulous fast food. Peter Miller, who plays Farley in the episode, when he becomes a disembodied voice, he sounded uncannily like John asked.
I guess I can hear that it was.
I know because I've had I had to watch this episode any number of times, and there were a couple of times where I couldn't bear to watch it and it was just on and I swear to god, it sounded like Gomes. Maybe that's cementing the night gallery of it all. This is an episode about three relatives of televangelists.
Now I will applaud that in nineteen eighty five eighty six that they were taking on televangelism like the people hadn't really started taking them down yet, but this was the one of the first salvos I thought, so Tammy fabe good for them about that. There was a movie came out around the same time called Past the MMO with Bill Paxton when Tim Curry is televangelists. Great anyway, I liked the idea of taking that organization down. But
the three lead characters are fucking dunes man. We've got the basically the Tammy Fay character, who is the lead character's sister and her daughter. Her daughter is a liberal who has she's so left leaning she wants to get all the money and just donate it to charity. And then we have the guy's Farley's protege, who is who wants to take over the ministry like that's his thing, but then come to find out that he and the
daughter had a relationship beforehand. This is a very complicated episode for twenty two.
Fuck it is, yes, it sure is.
Hey, it had a relationship beforehand which didn't work out. But it turns out he only got into the ministry to make money so he could impress her. So we're supposed to buy this fucking bullshit romance, right, because that's where we're going to end up, because this is somehow
not a Towns from the fucking dark Side episode. Nevertheless, this guy has been swindling people out of their fucking money for this organization this whole time, and she's like the liberal peacenick running around with the missions and stuff. Fuck both of them. She's a I don't know. I love that, by the way, that this guy, who is as bad as Farley's far as I'm concerned, like moralizes to Connie Stevens, you just want the money. You just
here for the money. It's like you just gave us a speech where you said you only took this job for the money. Anyway, I know, I'm like, I'm picking apart things that I shouldn't just because it's a fucking terrible episode overall. But I had to watch the seven times. So here's my thing.
Edith Swinson wrote three of the last four episodes of this season, and she sure did.
There may be a reason they're all at the back end of the season. Carolyn Clark very monotone as an actress. Right after she gets possessed A Farley was here. I can feel him.
Not a single not a single Edith Swinson episode Outside of the Chess.
So y'all know I told you before. Season three contains my favorite episode of Telles of the Dark Sides.
Oh, I'm talking about just season two. I can't speak to season one or season three. I'm just saying season two, why do we need a third if they're all going to be terrible? Why not just have two? And then you've made simpler. Why have the Tammy Fay character. Just have these two going back and forth. They're diametrically opposed enough. You don't need a third person in there to just add into the pile of asshole.
It was not good. I thought that the actress did a good job when it came to lip syncing, but yeah, the rest of her performance, I was like, okay, yeah, it was just it was frustrating. It was just frustrating.
I thought the sound designed for Hell was really good if we weren't going to get to see hell. But I thought it sounded really Then she goes to another door and opens it. It's all laughter, and that's meant to represent Heaven. So we discover that our characters are three characters now trapped in this limbo literally between Heaven and hell, one door to one and one door to another. Go to heaven?
Yes, yeah, what the fuck are you doing? This is a binary fucking choice, yo, yo's what are you stupid? Come on?
No, I want to wait around and hope I go back to Earth, or I could step into literal heaven.
Just go Dante's Dante says no. Dante says, before one goes up, one must go down. That's what Virgil said.
This episode almost made me hate creep show lighting with their very clumsy red and blue light on something good.
What a stylistic choice, huh, echoing such better things.
It basically made her look shiny and purple instead of this duality within her.
And I loved Connie Stevens and was super happy when she showed up in here. I was like, oh, cool, great, And when she starts to get unhinged, I was like, okay, yeah, go for it, but just did not pay off.
I like that when we meet her, they're showing us a bit of the program, the television program that the ministry has been putting on, and they do her in close up and she says, I have the power, just like a home. The last line that both our hero or heroin and the villain both throw at Connie or ain't it wondrous? As if that's like her catchphrase or something, And that was the first I heard of it. What was that about? They bothered to put the third character in.
They gave her a scene where she gets to freak out in all, but they don't even lay her in like that. Maybe that's her catchphrase, that's her tammy fay whatever. I don't know this episode, man, oh boy.
They like I said, I think their heart was in the right place, but I'm not sure that they I don't think they're competent enough to land this plane because they worked themselves right into a corner and then they were just like, it's fine, it's fine, we just worked ourselves and look, Hell, Hell got all of them. It's like, oh, well, why what if they had a choice, why did they
choose anything other than heaven? You've made this quite possibly the stupidest episode of this fucking show that I can't understand why you unless there was a trick involved, which they never even said, no one in the right mind would be like I'm going to Hell just because I can. It makes no fucking sense zero.
To be fair, they do go back to Earth. The two lead characters walk off to Earth. But I hate them and I don't want them to have that money, and I don't want them to give it a charity. I want Connie Stevens to have it, and I wanted to get that ministry fifteen percent of nothing. She says, what are you talking about? That ministry? We must be raking in the bucks. Everyone wants to take it over fifteen percent? Yeah, fucking good, go retire. What are you talking about?
She just wants to go to hell on the med that choice, and she's freeze framed.
Like a seventies. On the next episode of Midnight Viewing, we'll be taking a look at the last two episodes of season two. Those are Fears Floating and The Cassavin Curse.
¶ Final Thoughts and Wrap-Up
Midnight Viewing the Horror Anthology podcast is a proud member of Weirdingway Media Group and the theme song was composed by HP with an assist Mike Donald Rubinstein. Until next time? What are you doing? Where can people find it? In such and such?
Mike White, Well, you can find just about everything I do over at wheredoemedia dot com, except for the one show that we do that's a Patreon exclusive which you can find at patreon dot com slash Projection Booth or patreon dot com slash Culture Cast, which is ranking on Bond where every month we talk about a different James Bond film, and we recently have Father Malone on talking about Live and Let Die, which was a lot of fun back when I still was okay with Roger Moore
as James Bond. But the bloom is off the rose. Let's just put that out there now, how about you, Chris.
I have also heard that every rose has its thorn.
It's like every cowboy.
A sad, sad song.
Well, if you want to hear more of the things that I work on, you can find it at weirding Way Media. Like these fine gentlemen have already mentioned, that's where all of the assorted audio diversions can be found, including this and so many other great audio programming that has very little, if anything to do with me.
Yeah, you all know where you can find me. Listen. If you want to support, if you want to support the midnight viewing, go over to Patreon dot com slash and Father them alone. There you're gonna get episodes early in commercial free and some bonus content starting pretty much well by the time this airs will have already started. If money's tight and do you want to just help out anyway, give us a five star review, subscribe, like share, tell someone else to listen. Thank you all for joining
us here at midnight viewing. Until next time, go ahead and try try to enjoy the daylight as