Okay so: Dark Shadows. The 1966-1971 gothic soap opera. Maybe you are thinking about watching it.
Here’s some stuff you need to know.
You have two options:
1. Start at the very beginning. NOT RECOMMENDED UNLESS YOU ARE INTO 1960s SOAP OPERAS IN THE FIRST PLACE. OR unless you are not used to scary/supernatural stories in the first place. If you are not used to scary/supernatural stories, then yeah, maybe you di want to start with episode 1. (But if either of those don’t sound like you, then come back and watch the first 209 episodes later, after you’re totally hooked.)
2. RECOMMENDED for some people : You might want to consider starting with the vampire. The vampire is where practically everyone, at the time, started paying attention.
CHARACTERS TO WATCH FOR (spoiler alerts):
–Barnabas Collins, the vampire
–Dr. Julia Hoffman, super-awesome red-headed psychiatrist and blood specialist
–Angelique, a beautiful blonde witch
–Quentin Collins… we’ll get to him a little later.
ERAS OF THE SHOW:
–THE BEGINNING EPISODES. Frustration level: 6
–BARNABAS THE VAMPIRE SHOWS UP: Awesome level: 8
–1795: Awesome level: 10
–ANGELIQUE RETURNS AND BRINGS HER “BROTHER,” NICHOLAS (WARNING! CONTAINS THE DREAM CURSE AND ADAM! SEE BELOW!): Frustration/Awesome level: varies widely, see below.
–QUENTIN AND THE WEREWOLF: Awesome level: starts at 6ish, builds to 9ish
–1897: Awesome level: 10
–THE LEVIATHAN STORYLINE: Awesome level: 5-ish?
–1970 PARALLEL TIME: Frustration level: 8
–1995: “Wow, this is disturbing”-level: 8-ish
–THE ROSE COTTAGE EPISODES: Frustration level: 9
–1840: Frustration/Awesome level: varies, see below.
–1841 PARALLEL TIME: Frustration level: 10

HOW TO WATCH: I recommend streaming it. At this time of writing, Tubi streams the whole darn thing. The start of the famous “Barnabas the vampire” storyline era begins with episode 210. You don’t see the vampire’s face in that episode, but there’s another guy, who is looking for the legendary Collins family jewels, and he finds a secret room in the back of the Collins family mausoleum, and in there, he finds a coffin that’s been chained-up, and he opens it, and guess what: in episode 211, there’s a new character with an oddly not-exactly-current hairstyle.
Then watch the next episode, and the next, and all of them until you get to 1795. Because the show will go back to the year 1795, and will give you the secret origin of the vampire, as in how he became a vampire, and how he ended up in that chained coffin. And it’s awesome.
But when you FIRST HIT 1795, stop, and watch the movie they made called HOUSE OF DARK SHADOWS.
We recommend that you should do this because this is the way that that movie makes sense– because the vampire is the big villain for everything you’ve just watched, and this is true of him in the movie, too. (It’s how Barb watched it, basically.) The movie says “What if, instead of everything we’ve tried to do to fight the vampire and keep him from doing whatever he wanted, almost everything went wrong and we totally failed to stop him or even slow him down much?” After the movie– which is to say, the episodes set in 1795– we work on making Barnabas, both pre-and-post-being-a-vampire, much nicer and more sympathetic. So it would be a dreadful mistake to watch 1795, and then watch some more stuff, and THEN to watch HOUSE OF DARK SHADOWS. …So it’s too bad that’s exactly what everyone alive at the time actually did. It left a very bad taste in their mouths, because by that time they liked Barnabas as an anti-hero, and H.O.D.S. dragged him back into being just a stone-cold killer. So… don’t do it that way.
When you’ve finished the movie, THEN go watch the 1795 episodes, because, again, they are AWESOME.
And I’ve tried not to spoil things, but I’m just gonna tell you that there are some spoilers coming in the rest of this post…
When we come back from 1795, there are many very good and important episodes in the next part, but I have two warnings.
It’s important to pay attention until we get to a thing called THE DREAM CURSE. When you see or hear anyone mention THE DREAM CURSE, I personally recommend you skip ahead, because THE DREAM CURSE is very repetitive and boring.
The other warning is: Adam. Adam is basically a Frankenstein monster who gets made for reasons that don’t matter right now. Some people like Adam and everything to do with him. I do NOT. Barb and I feel that practically everything to do with Adam is pointless, frustrating, and boring. Feel free to skip ahead just a little when you hit what feels like a Dream-Curse-heavy or Adam-heavy episode. (If you accidentally get really into Adam’s storyline and you are fascinated, then great! We’re happy for you! Liking Adam and his storyline is more likely than finding the patience to put up with The Dream Curse! But I warn you that liking Adam and his storyline might not be your experience!)
But otherwise do keep watching, because next we get into The Quentin Storyline.
A ghost named Quentin starts doing things a lot like the classic ghost story The Turn of the Screw— trying to control and manipulate the two kids who live in the Collins house, and trying more and more to increase his control over the kids and the house. And here’s another spoiler alert: he pretty much succeeds, because for a long time, the adults are too busy trying to deal with a werewolf running around town, so they don’t realize the danger the children are in until it’s practically too late.
So then– since we already sent a character back in time to 1795– we go back in time to 1897 to ask Quentin the still-alive-and-not-yet-a-ghost guy what the HECK his deal is, because there’s just no reasoning with him as a ghost, darn it.
1897 IS ALSO AWESOME. Quentin, as a ghost, is a very spooky ghost who doesn’t talk. Quentin, before he’s a ghost, is SUPER AWESOME because once he opens his mouth it turns out he is a 100% sexy troublemaking charisma machine. Also we find out what was up with that werewolf, and it is definitely worth finding out about.
Eventually we all get back from 1897 (which was and is a long and mostly-awesome ride), and we start The Leviathan Storyline, which is the Lovecraftian one I mentioned last time. Some people don’t like it. I am one of those who like it. I understand the frustrations that people have with it– the ancient Leviathan cult is weird and freaky and have weird rules and brainwash people and they do all this SLOWLY and it’s not always that interesting, and some of their brainwashed agents are a seriously boring pain. But Carolyn Collins meets up with her long-lost father again, and all that’s great, and there’s some important (and sometimes even good) Barnabas stuff in it, and practically everyone we like comes back to be in it sooner or later, so I like it. It’s weird and creative and freaky and has multiple monsters of multiple types (at war with one another)!
Buuut all arguably-good things have to come to an end, so then we get Parallel Time.
The first Parallel Time storyline is something that happened because we had to split up the cast. We decided to the H.O.D.S. movie at that point, so we sent Barnabas to another timeline where people have made slightly different choices and we basically remake the movie Rebecca and there’s also a Jekyll-and-Hyde guy and a murder mystery. But except for Barnabas, almost no one is acting like their usual selves, so it’s weird and harder to like. And Barnabas isn’t on screen for long stretches of time, because he’s often on location making the movie.
So BEFORE you decide if you want to watch Parallel Time, you should watch the second movie, NIGHT OF DARK SHADOWS.
(Note: Barb and Park totally riffed this whole movie one time! You know, like MST3K, but written down! https://wickermanstudios.com/2022/11/01/park-and-barb-riff-the-film-night-of-dark-shadows/ )
The reason you might want to watch it first is because in Parallel Time, they have a Quentin, but he’s kind of a jerk. N.O.D.S. is kind of a last chance to still see him somewhat sympathetically.
Some people don’t like the first movie, because they like Barnabas already and they don’t want him to be a killer. Some people REALLY don’t like the SECOND movie, because the studio decided it was too long and made them cut a lot of footage, and the result is… weird. And harder to watch than if they hadn’t done that. It helps a lot if you’ve read the script (like Barb and I have), and/so I like N.O.D.S. anyway. But maybe you won’t. It, like the first movie, has a kinda downbeat ending (arguably even more so, I’d say)!
Okay, so then either watch Parallel Time, or skip it. Either way, then it’s time for 1995. 1995 isn’t very long, but Barnabas and Julia (see above) get thrown forward in time (as a result of escaping Parallel Time) to the dark and dystopian year of 1995, and it turns out the Collins mansion (which is named Collinwood, by the way) is half-ruined, and half the cast is dead (or about to be) and the other half has gone mad, due to more ghost trouble. So Barnabas and super-awesome Julia have to go back home to the very early 1970s and try to stop it before it happens. And then they fail, and then they have to go to 1840 to try again.
The period between 1995 and 1840 is very slow and maddeningly boring. I call these episodes The Rose Cottage Episodes, because there’s so much talk about a missing guest house called Rose Cottage which not to belabor the point is BORING. It’s ALL so boring and Quentin is brainwashed by a girl who will one day be one of Charlie’s Angels (the little shy one).
Then we get to 1840 which has Barnabas and Julia acting a little smarter but things still take forever and are not as interesting as they should be in my opinion BUT they really wrap up some important stuff left over from 1795. So when you see a certain blonde (whose name is Angelique, you’ll remember I mentioned her earlier) on screen, watch those scenes that have her in them, and skip the rest, is my advice. That’s what I did last time I watched 1840.
Eventually we return from 1840, and we wrap up the whole show in one episode, and it’s very important, and then everyone goes back to their lives, and I hope Barnabas and Julia live happily ever after.
But then we have 1841 Parallel Time, where all the actors are playing completely different characters and it’s SO BORING. There’s a ghost, but he’s one of our weakest and least-interesting ghosts. It’s got Barnabas’ actor and Angelique’s actress, but it’s still SO BORING AND THEN THE SHOW GOT CANCELLED. So I forgive you if you can’t handle 1841 Parallel Time. Feel free to watch the episode right before we shift forever to 1841 Parallel Time, and then loudly say: “And so they all lived happily ever after,” because boy do they deserve it at that point.
Then you can go back and watch the very beginning of the show, the first 200-and-9-or-10 episodes, where you can see the first ghosts that were ever on the show, and you can see David’s mother (you’ll recognize her character from other appearances in time), and stuff like that—just be aware that it’ll be slow going (but not as slow and boring as 1841 Parallel Time—nor quite as bad as the first Parallel Time, nor the Rose Cottage episodes, honestly. There’s some good stuff in there)!