Welcome to the Friday The 13th The Series rewatch. Each day throughout October, we’ll watch one episode of the seminal 1987 television series and tackle the highs, the lows and Micki’s hair (of course). Now step into Curious Goods and peruse our cursed antiques, won’t you?
https://youtu.be/vLyKVN7zTCY
S01E013: “The Baron’s Bride”
Wikipedia Plot Summary: Micki (Louise Robey) and Ryan (John D. LeMay) are thrown back in 19th-century London along with murderous, hypnotic vampire Frank (Tom McCamus) who has his eyes on Micki.
- Director: Bradford May — prolific director of many, many episodes of JAG
- Writer: Larry Gaynor had a very brief career circa 1985-1990 writing for Danger Bay and Seeing Things
- Famous Guest Star: McCamus, who would go on to guest on Mutant X and Orphan Black
Haunted cape + clasp
Cursed Antique of the Week: A magical cape that makes its wearer irresistible to women AND a clasp that allows time travel when activated by a drop of blood
Setting: London 1875
Best Death: Lead vampire Marie Simmons (Diana Barrington) is staked through the back with her own For Rent sign
Quirkiest Add-On: The switch to black and white to signify the jump into the past
Character Bits: Even fake-ass vampires can sense the incestual pull between the cousins
Corny Finish Line: Writer Abraham (Kevin Bundy) turns out to be Bram Stoker <insert wah wah noise>
80s Fashion Closet: I don’t know if it’s 80s fashion, but that the cowl on that cape looks cheap AF
Kissing Cousins Incest Watch: Not much, aside from the fact that everyone knows that they’re hot for each other
Poor Tom McCamus
What Works…
Umm, literally nothing. I’m not even being spiteful. This is easily the worst episode of the series (to date).
Louise Robey is saddled with the worst part of her career
What Doesn’t Work…
Everything. Like literally EVERYTHING.
“The Baron’s Bride” is the equivalent of Friday The 13th throwing everything at the wall and seeing what sticks (A: nothing). Vampires? Sure. Mind controlling cape? Why not! Time travel? Sweet Jebus — of course!
Look, this episode might have been fine with only one of these components. Maaaybe it could have managed two. But all three? No, this is a clusterf*ck.
Where to even begin? The vampire “effects” and cold open at the Simmons house set the tone and that tone is laughable. Everyone is overacting and being kind of ridiculous, like this is a repertory school for novice actors. Then suddenly we’re thrown into a black and white version of the show set in London, UK 1875 (because whaaaaa?) The rest of the episode includes: a) copious amounts of tedious slow-motion running b) a female character, Caitlin (Susannah Hoffmann) whose sole function is to profess her love for her husband and die and c) Louise Robey completely losing all ability to act. It. Is. Painful! Everyone deserves better and no one rises above this dreck.
Terrible. Terrible. Terrible.
I’ll allow this
Stream of Consciousness Musings
- Apparently putting on the cape also means putting on makeup? The minute that Frank puts the cape on, he’s suddenly wearing lipstick and eyeliner
- House letter Marie is both a vampire and she only speaks in rhymes? Ugh, this woman deserves to be staked
- Marie smacking them around is…not threatening. It just looks very silly
- I’m unsure how Micki’s blood gets on the clasp considering she’s nearly a foot away from Frank
- I love how Abraham and Caitlin mistake Micki and Ryan for theatre actors. Robey and LeMay probably wish they were after this episode
- Just in case you didn’t get enough bullshit Jack the Ripper nonsense from “Doctor Jack“, we’re now killing old-timey prostitutes in this episode
- Actual line from my notes: “Caitlin is a ‘proper’ lady”
- The slow motion running down the streets? I just can’t
- Do you think the production team spent their entire budget on smoke machines?
- I legitimately thought that we had stumbled onto the set of a John Woo movie when they open the door to that basement and a bunch of pigeons fly out
- Why does Frank age rapidly (a la The Hunger) when he takes off the cape considering Marie never did? Is it a sexist cape that only works for men?
- I usually appreciate the efforts to create some distinctive scores/music for each episode, but I don’t understand the need for a whistle each time Frank uses his vampire strength/powers
- My favourite moment of the episode is when Abraham rushes at Frank with a string of garlic
- Micki’s incessant screams as they drag her away from Frank are painful. I felt for Robey so much during the episode because it must have been humiliating for her to have to do this
- Favourite line of the episode: “We can’t lose – it’s two against one” Abraham tells Caitlin, like an idiot
- Blah blah blah – Caitlin is murdered, Abraham blames them for everything that’s happened in the less than 24 hours they’ve been in his life, Micki wants to face suck with Frank and Abraham rescues them at the last minute. It’s all soooo incredibly predictable (AND poorly executed to boot)
- The coda with the “Abraham wrote Dracula” bit? The rotten cherry on the top of this shit sundae, my friends. Good riddance to this episode!
Alright, let’s never speak of this again. See you back here tomorrow for Friday The 13th The Series episode fourteen: “Bedazzled”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ytkvCcBYN0k
