¶ Intro / Opening
Way wait.
A welcome back to Midnight Viewing, the Horror Anthology font
¶ Everybody Needs a Little Love
the Horror Anthology podcast where we're this season, we're talking about George A. Romero's nineteen eighties television series Tales from the Dark Side. I'm Father Malone sharing the Midnight of you with me? Are the projection Boots, Mike White.
I say good riddance to them, the Dames, We're better off without them.
And the culture cast Chris Statue.
Do you guys tried the gray stuff? It's delicious? Tone ask the dishes?
Oh my god, no, that's true. Tonight we are taking a look at two episodes from season three. Those are Everybody Needs a Little Love and Old con Old Acquaintances, Old Acquaintances. Everybody Needs a Little Love Season three, episode number seventeen. This originally aired on February the twenty second, nineteen eighty seven. Clearly they intended it as there a
Valentine's episode. They missed the mark. This one is written by John Harrison, credited to John Sutherland, from a story by Robert Block and directed by John Harrison, credited to John Sutherland, again starring Jerry Orbach, Richard Port now Phil and Kowski and as estelle Teresa Jones. This is a film noir account of a lonely divorced man who's a millionaire today as the creator of the real Doll. What did you think of this one?
Mike, Oh, boy, mannequin's coming to life, but not really but kind of but yes, but no, but I'm talking to the camera. Feels very what was that? Just crazy as a soup sandwich? Yeah, my god, I love Jerry Orbach. I really like Richard Port. Now what the fuck are they doing in this episode? This was? This was something. This felt like a very old tale, maybe because of Block's influence. Block's original short story just felt very old, obviously setting it in film noir times. I don't know why.
I honestly don't know why than maybe the show guys wearing socks and suspenders.
This was.
I was not happy with this episode whatsoever, especially because I could see everything coming a mile before it actually happened. And yeah, it just didn't do it for me. How about you, Chris, what'd you think of this one?
Has ever look at Jerry Orbach and think he just looks like an anthropomorphized candle.
On occasion?
On occasion, It's really hard for me to see Jerry Orbach now and not see his like half profile and not just be like that's the candle for Beauty and the Beast.
God damn it, it's been years and we're obsessed.
I think this episode is fine. I don't know, two dudes hanging out with the mannequin. Just what, Like, what the fucking what?
It? Just okay, reminder Sunday nights at seven, this is family hour.
Go ahead, great, Oh it's a family hour, all right if your family is fucked in the head. I just I don't know what the intention behind this episode was, because by the end of it, I'm just like, ah, yeah, all right, so she murdered him and he got framed for it, Like to what end? And who fucking cares? I don't know, Like it's for me. We've seen episodes like this before, in both this show and other shows going as far back as Tales from the Crypt, and
they haven't worked anytime they've done them. And this is yet another example of don't talk to the camera and don't try to mix tones in a way that just doesn't work. I also would like to point out how many of these goddamn noir episodes have we seen of these shows that have not worked. Also, and also, weirdly enough, we've not only had noir episodes, but we've had weird fiction and noir mixed together in some of these episodes. Because one of those things wasn't enough to fucking ruin,
they to ruin two or three things at once. This is It's a shame that this is Jerry Orbach's only time on the show, because he's a great actor. I can sing really well too, but I found this episode to be just meandering, even for twenty three minutes.
But they did mannequins wright in the after hours the old Twilight Zone episode because it was a twist we weren't expecting. Oh, she was a mannequin the whole time. Great, but this sorry didn't mean to interrupt your father alone.
No, no, not at all.
I know.
And look, we've seen mannequins in every anthology series we've covered. In fact, it's curious to me now that we're this far into the third season of Tails from the Dark Side, that in each of the series that we've covered up until now, by season three we've all seen the same couple of episodes. It seems by season three, you're now is when we're going to start really just hitting the same tropes as all of the other series. Because now we've got our mannequin episode. The next one is in
the next few episodes. Anyway, it's gonna, i think, become even more evident. This is set in the fifties because John Harrison wanted to do a noir episode, clearly, and it is shot well. He went to great pains to light this whole thing, and it's good. It feels like a nice little short film. However, you know what, I was with it for a while because it's so weird. It's so weird for these two guys meeting in a bar and hey, I want to go have a good time with a dame. Come with me. Now, I don't
feel like doing that. No, no, no, it's not like that. It's gonna be different. And then so Jerry Orbach is basically saying at the beginning of the episode, I don't want to go have a sex with a prostitute with you, and he's like, no, it's not gonna be like that. Instead, we're gonna go break into my store and we're gonna steal the Mannikin and go back to that and like at no point does he bail before they get to the apartment. In fact, he seems to have a really
good time in the apartment with the mannequin. I don't know. These two guys are interesting characters to begin with, but then where do we go from there? Yeah, it's like he comes back and the guy's weirder and he seems more are attached to the fucking thing and then eventually a thing kills him and runs away. Uh okay, yeah, I'm no fan of over explaining. But what did the mannequin want? Why is it even alive? Did he imbue it with life? We get zero here?
Well, and then isn't there a twist that? What's the twist at the end?
The twist is that she comes in is the witness basically that's going to frame him. But that's there is no twist. It's not like we understand something that some piece of a puzzle that hadn't revealed itself up until now. It's just like she's shadowy silhouette girl, she's the witness. Oh it's the mannequin that was supposed to be the twist.
I guess.
Wow, it's not a.
Bad twist, it's just completely unearned.
Yeah, because we don't know who she is or what she wants.
Exactly, and we're just meant to look at that those couple of shots at the end of the episode and be like, oh, that's the mannequin. Okay, we just had.
That mannequin episode. Wasn't a mannequin episode.
Where retelling of that Twilight Zone episode?
Yeah, it was like that thing. It was that really super said ending where the guy was like, dull, you remember which one I'm.
Talking about with the Medusa, Yes, thank you. It wasn't kind of was, Yeah, she's treated with the conventions of a mannequin.
We and recently we had a fucking noir episode. We had the guy who created that, John Hurd, creates the portal and pulls the girl through, but he's in prison on trial for murder. Look, they lost the showrunner this year. That's kind of evident because nobody's comparing the stories and going, aren't these the same? Is this not too close? In? Like, why are we having a second guy on trial recounting the events of that the strange events that led him
to this place? Like we shifted to a further season, right please?
It feels like we fell off a cliff between the last episode and this episode. I honestly thought that we were headed in a really good direction this season. I was pretty happy, and then it just feels like, whoa, somebody pulled the rug out.
It was you, Chris.
Oh what did I do?
You know what you did it?
Oh?
Your fault.
It's always my fault. I mean, at the end of the day, I was the one who got the ball rolling so long ago and wanting to watch Tales from the Crypt, So I'll take credit for me.
Yeah. Man, we saw a mannequin episode there. We saw a mannequin episode in the New Twilight'swe in fact, we saw a remake of The After Hours on New Twilight Zone written by Rock Neobannon, friend of the podcast.
Friend of the podcast. He's name dropping Folks.
Night Gallery that had a mannequin episode two. I had enough robots anyway that they qualified as mannequins, enough statuaries, I don't know. I did not enjoy this one, even though I love seeing Jerry Arbaka, I love seeing Richard Port now a man who was made to be in period pieces like he should just he should be chained up in those clothes because nobody does the nobody does, like fifties or six. He's better than him? Was that not him and Barton Fink? But you know with the head on.
Yeah, yeah, he's a killer. He's amazing and Orbach amazing. I love watching that guy. He's just so talented, Chris, you're talking about the Singney talent and everything. Yes, he's great. And when this started, like I was like, all right, craze is soup sandwich. I don't need this whole directly addressing the camera thing, But I'll go with it. I'll stick with it. Sure, why not? Yeah, you know, yeah, go ahead.
One thing that bugged me because they don't make it evident that it's a confession or an interview with the police that's going on.
No, not at all. It's him directly addressing the camera. I thought. I did not think at any point he was talking to anybody other.
Than me, right, And so maybe they thought that was gonna be the choice. But to that point, yes, I believe he was talking to me as well, because at one point he has a cup of coffee in the frame, and it's a ceramic cup of coffee. We might be in a diner, we're definitely in somebody's kid. Anyway, where we are not is in the interview room of a police station. So that's like.
They're not giving away at ceramic mugs in a police station.
¶ Auld Acquaintances
Just makes no sense at all. So that's dirty pool.
Yeah, is he is Portner Noy also the guy that says you want to see helicopters? Or am I mixing them up with a different guy from Goodfellas? I think I'm mixing them up with a different guy.
Maybe I know he's Howard Stone's dad in Private Parts.
Oh he's so good at that.
He ordered that guy back on the microphone.
Don't be stupid, the idiot.
Shut ups it up? Anything else on this one, guys.
No, I just wish it was better. He squandered all this talent and the mannequin effect was okay, I just kept getting vibes of Sean Young when I was looking at a Stell. But yeah, I just what a disappointment.
The mannequin did look a tremendous amount like a Stell, but then no mannequin would have looked like a Stell, so it didn't make any sense, all right. Our next episode is Old Acquaintances, and that's like old lang Zion Acquaintances.
Season three, episode number eighteen, aired originally on March the first, nineteen eighty seven, Written by Edith Swinson, directed by Richard Friedman, starring Sally Gracie and Linda Thorson, It's a witch fight to which his vie for control of a talisman over the century's taking turns, taking turns, wielding it a year at a time. What did you think of this one, Chris?
Is that what was going on? Yes, Jesus fucking Christ talk about unintelligible nonsense.
Oh they didn't say that fifty times sixty times for you to figure that one out.
Aw Yeah, when the episode wasn't getting in the way of itself reminding us of what was going on constantly, I appreciate that they were like, let's write a bottle episode. You have to go very far. They don't have to do much, they don't have to go anywhere. It's just the two of these women beating the shit out of each other for twenty three minutes. Okay, I'm on board
with that. It just not that entertaining unfortunately for me anyways, However, I'm curious where y'all come into this, because for me, I mean, it kind of lost Steve. About halfway through, I was like, all right, I don't know. I enjoyed it well enough. It's better than last episode, that's for sure.
I really didn't need it to do the flashback to the first time that they met and had all of their stuff. I've already figured all that stuff out through dialogue. And there's so much freaking dialogue in this episode. This felt like a radio drama, and I'm like, I don't need to see the live action of this. I just need to hear these ladies' voices because all they're doing is talking at each other. I will tell you that Linda Thorson very easy on the eyes, but Sally Gracie's
voice reminded me a lot of Maureene's Stapleton. I think definitely a little bit of sand in the voice there. But I thought it was really good, especially for a Witch character. Kind of gave Witch's bad name. So, you know, this whole thing. I think this is a very anti Witch episode, and I would like to file a report with the FCC.
Please you can take it up with the old Man himself, the.
Old old Scratch, Old Scratch.
There we are, Mike, Hey, Oh, you owe me a Coke Old scratch himself.
Baby Linda Thorson not her first time on Telson Dark sent She showed up in season one and she got strangled by a telephone. That's right, Yeah, yeah, it's good. Good to see her back. She was good there, she's good here. Both actors are good. This is obviously a New York episode, just like the last one, drawn on that talent of New York. I'm trying to think of some good things to say about this particular segment. It's a little stage play. Two witches fighting over a fucking ambulant.
One is worse than the other. I guess, I don't know.
I didn't really care who one, not at all.
No, I wasn't invested in one one or the other. They were both equally fucked and they both were enthrall to satan. They both get what they want. I will here's the one thing I will point out, and I'll point this out just because on the over on the other show, I was talking to HP and we were talking about Massachusetts colloquialism. So one of my favorites is Light Dawns on marble Head, which is Marblehead as a
town and messages. One of my best friends. Gretchen lives there, and at the end of this episode, as she hefts the cat up, she says, I think you're going to like it at Marblehead, and I thought, wow, that's coincidental and weird, and obviously Edith Swinton has spent some time in the northeast. Marblehead butts up against Salem, Massachusets, which is probably the connection because they're supposed to be from
Salem when the flashback. When we go to the flashback, by the way, oh my god, the effects in this episode are so good, with the snap in cuffs and then the twist and talisman and all the best that that fishing line can buy.
About to say you you, I feel like if our audience could see you, they would realize you were lying because you're a very convincing liar.
Sir. Yes, yes, if this was a radio drama, you would have just everybody have been like really good special effect.
Oh okay, they're terrible, I'm sorry effects, very special yeah.
And very special end being cheap.
They were special, really needed that much.
This is I don't even I don't really know what this was.
This was.
Look, we maybe we didn't need a flashback if we could have just started in Salem and then ended up here at the museum, it could have been something. And ultimately, don't fucking I guess the last thing is, don't try and take an ambulant two weeks early, because Satan will fuck you up.
I guess. So yeah, yeah, again, I was having a good time at this season. What happened? I don't know. And even these Edith Swinson episodes, some of them have been particularly good, and I'm just like, what happened again?
They're overtaxing poor Edith Swinson. She's always given so much to this season and now now and to your point, Chris, yeah, this is probably we need a bottle episode. And we've spent this much on a budget. We've only got this much left. Can we recycle some of our locations here and maybe one location redress it.
Redress it four different times?
Trying to be nice.
Yeah, we're careening towards the end of the season, so it feels like they're just like, yeah, whatever, is anybody even paying attention anymore? Is anybody watching? Who cares? We'll just throw some bullshit at the long and see what sticks. And yeah, boy, these two episodes are just prime examples of bullshit being thrown at the wall that not only does it stick, leaves a stinky residue. It's like Mike said, what the fuck are you doing taking away all this
good will that you fostered with us show? Like I would say, in a lot of ways, this might be the best show we've watched in terms of consistent quality over like time over quality or quality over time. It feels rather consistent, But all of a sudden it's is like, Nah, third season of the show just a fucking bath.
Yeah, it's cratering, but keep in mind we do have another season coming off, so it might redeem itself. That's usually what happens, right, Is it limps along or no?
No, no, no.
Lies that has not been our experience.
No. Sometimes it's twice as fucking long, and it's like the night season is where it limbs through?
How dare you shoot it in Canada? Yeah?
I was to say, where was this shot? Fucking Tangiers? No.
Mercifully, this show remains in New York and Los Angeles for the entirety of its runs, so they don't cut those corners at least if it dips in quality, it's because talented people are fleeing for higher paying jobs and other areas of the entertainment industry.
Well, they're fleeing, all right, a fucking top speed. They can't run enough, fucking fast enough away from the show. These anthology shows. I don't understand why they outstay their welcome so hard.
Everyone loves money, Yeah, I I like money too. We should be friends, all right. On the next episode of Midnight Viewing, we'll be taking a look at the next two episodes of season three. Those are The Social Climber and The Swap. Midnight Viewing is a proud member of a weirding way media group. Our theme song was composed by HP with an assist by Donald Rubinstein. Until next time? Where are you? Where can people find you?
And what are you working on?
And all that shit?
Mike, I wish I knew where I was. I feel I feel lost. It feels like I'm in a void, like I walk through a wall and them in some sort of other dimension. Yeah, kind of like you Waitingwaymedia dot Com. I wish I had other stuff that I could plug, but yeah, Waitingwaymedia dot Com. That's the thing other than the one show that Chris and I do
with Richard had them and occasionally father them alone. We're having him back for you darn soon here and that is ranking on Bond, which is our Patreon exclusive at the ten dollars level. End up. Come on over to patreon dot com slash Projection booth or patreon dot com slash Culturecast. That's Culturecast with a K and sign on up and you can listen to quite a bit of us talking about James Bond films. It came in handy
last night, Chris. I was at trivia and they had a whole bunch of anagrams, and I'm horrible at anagrams. They were all James Bond titles. So I just sat down and I wrote down every single James Bond title that we have covered so far and was able to provide that to some smarter people who were able to do those anagrams. But I played my part, so I felt pretty happy about that.
Tom Hanks Autumn Shank. That's all I could think of with the anagrams.
Rhyme with.
Your ass or a hole in the ground.
How about you, Chris.
You can find me in all of what I do over weirding Way Media as well. Then Patreon and going over to Father Malone's Patreon because he's posting two episodes a week. Jesus putting the rest of us to shame. What happened? What happened? Man? You used to have free time, don't anymore?
I would love some free time. It's all speaking of Speaking of which, mondays here you can hear Father Malone's weekly round up or I take a look at all the new releases in streaming episodes and every Friday, if it's not going to be from the Dark Side, it's most likely going to be Fusco Fest HP and I are taking look at the works of John Fusco, screenwriter or his list of films. So by the time you hear this one, our next one is going to be
probably lockedness off to Scotland we go. All right, let's see you guys already covered all the Patreon and all that shit. So everybody subscribe and like and give us five stars, and thank you for joining us here at midnight viewing. Until next time, try to enjoy the daylight