I was thrilled to find the first season of Tales From The Darkside on DVD, and this time, it was for more than just the mental wellness that seems to come from buying new DVDs. I really love this show.
Debuting in 1983 and lasting for most of the '80s, TFTD was sort of a less clever but much creepier version of The Twilight Zone. From its eerie opening credits sequence (which makes a simple farm town seem like a portal to Hell) to its almost universal use of "twist" endings, the show was and remains a perfect mood-setter for anyone looking to spend their evening feeling somewhat cautious about open windows and errant creaking sounds.
What I hadn't realized until watching several episodes in one sitting is just how...strange some of the stories were. Mind you, I'm using "strange" interchangeably with "inane," because I refuse to call Tales From The Darkside "inane." While rotating writers and directors guaranteed that the quality would rise and fall depending on who was in charge, some of the endings (the whole point of a TFTD episode was to see the last minute) were so outright bizarre that they went straight past being annoying and became affecting, despite how stupid they were.
Weird for weirdness's sake is usually ugly, but here, the weirdosity is so top notch that I've no choice but to sacrifice birds in this show's honor.
Here's an example: I watched a bunch of episodes last night -- let's say six. All but one of them ended with Satan revealing himself as the cause of the whatever bullshit had been going on. And keep in mind, it wasn't the same Satan each time. In one episode, Satan manifested as a smooth talking doctor who convinced his suffering patients to murder people in order to attain relief. In another, Satan was a flamboyantly gay Dracula, complete with red lipstick, nylon cape, and one of those two-dollar "vampire cross" pendants that Party City sells around Halloween.
Satan even appeared, loosely, during the very first episode of the series. Titled "Trick or Treat," I don't know if the debut episode could be considered on the TFTD's best, but it certainly had all of the elements that made the series so memorable: Screwball characters, pointless subplots, a creepy ambiance and an ending that was so absurd, you had no choice but to like it. Worthy of a mini-recap? You bet:
NOTE: My computer chose right this instant to stop playing DVDs, so I made these images from screencapping YouTube videos. Actual footage on actual DVDs does not look like shit.
Okay, so, "Trick or Treat" stars Blossom's grandpa as Gideon Hackles, an old man who runs some kind of weird dime store, and who keeps everyone in town at his mercy by loaning them money that they can never pay back. Instead of pressuring his neighbors to make good on their monthly payments, Gideon is happy to let them slide...so long as they send their children to his house on Halloween night.
Gideon's sort of nuts and mean, and though we don't know what he does to kids on Halloween, we can be sure that it isn't good. And yet, the town's many backwoods parents are compelled to make their children go to his house, for two reasons. One, because Gideon will demand payment in full on all moneys owed if they don't, and two, because Gideon tempts the adults with a little contest. Hidden somewhere in his home is a stack of IOU's, and if a child is able to find them while visiting on Halloween night, their family's debt will be wiped clean.
So, the kids are forced to go to Gideon's home, and one by one, they fall prey to his spooky sight gags, pop-out electronics and scary sound effects. Orchestrating the mayhem from a hidden room, Gideon pulls levers and pushes buttons to set off his many traps, and no matter how brave the children try to be, they all end up fleeing his home in terror, screaming for their mothers.
While at first it might have only seemed that Gideon was a little too passionate about Halloween, these scenes firmly identify him as a cold, sick bastard in need of a lesson. After several scenes of kids entering his home and crying over plastic bats and artificial wind, the tables are finally turned...
His house fills up with ghosts and monsters! Not the kinds of ghosts and monsters that Gideon was using to scare the children -- real ones! After a schmooz with a freaky witch and some other creatures, Gideon zips into his bedroom to find...Hell! As Satan (rendered here as an amazing 30' red dude) and his scorched minions beckon Gideon to come closer, one of the regular kids (who was determined to find those IOUs and save his family) makes off with the papers and a big smile on his face. The end.
Wait..."the end?" Really? Guy scares little kids with fake monsters...real monsters drag him to Hell...that's it? I will refute any claims that there was a moral to this story, because "don't scare kids or monsters will take you to Hell" is pretty bleh as far as moral analogies go. But then, I didn't put Tales From The Darkside on for the chance to think. I put it on because it was really dark and kind of chilly out.
There were a lot of TFTD episodes that had endings like this. Visually powerful, creepy endings that left an impact, even if they made no sense at all. It might be a stretch to call it part of the show's charm, but at least you knew that if you survived all of the commercial breaks, you'd be treated to memorably spooky shenanigans.
Whether it was a well-written and perfectly executed episode, or just one that made good use of gnarly women in witch costumes, Tales From The Darkside never failed to make late night TV viewing feel all ghastly and cool. Grab the DVD set, if you dare. With a breezy night and a couple of dimmed lights, you'll have October in March.
PS: Long ago, I reviewed another episode of TFTD. A better one! I also reviewed the movie!
PPS: Happy SNT.
Posted by Matt on 03/07/2009. E-mail me!
Chestnuts roasted by 
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All of those 80s horror shows (TFTDS, Amazing Stories, the Hitcher) all kind of run together for me. I remember one in particular (not sure which show though) that scared the hell out of me as a kid. A boy was staying with his sick, bedridden grandmother and for some reason, he was alone in the house with her. He was particularly afraid of the old battleaxe, and in one horriying scene (horrifying for me as a kid, anyway), he tiptoed up to her bed to hold a mirror under her nose to see if she’s still breathing, and naturally, she springs back to life. My description doesn’t really do it justice, since it was expertly directed and paced to get the maximum amount of dread and suspense.