[AYAOTD? Recap with Erin Callahan] 2.5 "The Tale of the Dream Machine"

RECAP

Kiki shows up to the Midnight Society meeting with laryngitis and a typewriter. She asks Gary to read aloud her typewritten story about stories. After some consternation (“We’ve never done that before”), he agrees.

Sean is a wannabe writer who’s got a serious crush on his classmate, Jennifer. After receiving an assignment to write a short story, Sean and his best friend Billy head to Sean’s house after school, where Billy crashes through the rotten stairs on the way to Sean’s room in the attic. Underneath the staircase, they discover a hidden nook with a typewriter and newspaper clippings about a writer who was murdered in the 1930s. Immediately smitten with the typewriter, Sean takes it up to his room and starts writing a story about his crush. Turns out the typewriter is a “dream machine,” and any story that’s written on it will be experienced as a dream by the main character. When the stories are read aloud, fiction becomes reality and the events take place in the waking world. Sean, Billy, and Jennifer realize this too late when their English teacher starts reading aloud one of Sean’s stories and Billy nearly gets buried alive. Sean and Jennifer save the day by typing a story about how the stories written on the typewriter never came true and then reading it aloud.

Gary finishes reading the story and Midnight Society realize that Kiki is gone. She’s left her typewriter behind with a single sheet of paper that reads, “The headless warrior chased down each one of the Midnight Society one by one, until they were too tired to run."

REVIEW

Troy: Kiki breaks the Kristen Tardiness Rule because of a verifiable medical condition, and Kristen gives her attitude about it? Okay… But hey, people, it’s another Kiki story! She only told one in season one and it was top tier, so this could be really good.

Erin: I was totes excited when I realized Kiki was telling the story. And I LOVE that she not only rocks the boat by challenging Gary to break Midnight Society Protocol with her typewritten story, but also builds her story around typewritten stories. Meta AF!

T: Last season, we reasoned that Dani stood in for Kiki, assuming Dani’s homelife is similar to Kiki’s. Here, she tells a story about a writer who bases all of his tales on himself and his friends. From now on, I’m just going to assume all Kiki tales are autobiographical. “Hey, Troy, you’re spending more time thinking about the lives of the Midnight Society than the writers did.” “Like yeah, I know, don’t be a zeeb.”

E: Isn’t that what writers live for though? To have fans thinking even more deeply about their fiction than they ever did? I mean, that’s like the whole point of fanfic.

T: I watched this series as a kid, I rewatched it once YouTube was a thing, and I’ve re-rewatched a few of the best-ofs, but I had no memory whatsoever of this episode. I don’t know how I missed it every time, which might suggest it’s a bad/forgettable episode, but it’s pretty good!

E: I don’t remember this one either and it’s great. Chock full of weird, hilarious, Kiki-details, like the teacher who chain-scarfs donuts every time she’s on screen.

T: Mrs. Dodds is now one of my favorite one-off adult characters. Being a snacker is such a weird character trait, and it’s not like they’re fat-shaming or making her gross. Eating a donut while you’re reading on an exercise bike is just nutty fun. And I love how she’s just as relieved as the kids are when the bells ends the school day.

E: Yes! I love that she’s not necessarily a bad teacher, but it’s also obvious she sometimes has other things she’d rather be doing. Like frosting more donuts.

T: I can’t help but laugh at Gary’s reluctance to read Kiki’s story because there’s no Midnight Society precedent for it. Don’t be such a stickler, Gary! Though I have to applaud him for being able to read at a campfire. I’d need a flashlight.

E: I know I should save this for the QUEER OR NOT section, but since we have this Grank theory, I couldn’t help but giggle when Frank tells Gary to “be a little crazy.” It’s so cute. And naughty. Hee hee.

T: You have to appreciate the series tackling the distinction between oral and written storytelling. They are vastly different beasts.

E: Yes! As a writer, I so loved this and the theme that when something’s written down and in someone else’s hands, it’s no longer entirely yours. Plus, I loved Sean’s classic “writer’s room” in the attic, complete with tapestries and a motorcycle phone!

T: I was so worried when I saw the title that Kristen’s Sandman (in the form of Bobcat Goldthwait) was going to pop up! What a relief that didn’t happen.

E: Ugh, that would’ve been totes unfortunate. But I also can’t imagine D.J. MacHale giving Bobcat a second chance.

T: Hey, it’s a Kiki story, so we get tons of diversity! This just makes me wish Kiki got to tell more than one or two stories a season. This episode serves an Asian protagonist with a black best friend, a black love interest, and a fat authority figure.

E: None of the three main characters are white. This was 1993, people!

T: Wow, Jennifer’s hat is serving Blossom realness. Speaking of fashion, Sean wears a necktie to school. So did the “hot boy” from “The Final Wish.” Was that in style somewhere in the early ’90s? It wasn’t in America.

E: I initially thought the same thing, though maybe this was kind of a carry-over from the ’80s? Also, I *do* remember ties being kind of popular for girls in the early ’90s, so maybe some boys wore them too.

T: I’m shocked this is a Halloween tie-in episode. I thought “Twisted Claw” was the only one. It works here, tying into high school dances.

E: Everyone loves a Halloween dance. Costumes are so much more fun than formal dresses and heels.

T: Billy decides the typewriter is in fact a dream machine, and his first instinct is, “We can terrorize everybody!” Wow, he’s a little psychopath.

E: LOL. He’s kinda just saying aloud the thought that’s in the back of everyone’s minds, right? Plus, his comment is a smart way of setting up stakes.

T: Is Sean writing the dreamer’s responses/thoughts/actions? Does he control their free will?

E: I thought the exact same thing, especially when the stories moved from dreams to “real life.” Though Jennifer appeared to be resisting the storyline of the Halloween Dance, right? Or at least trying? The actress does a good job of looking conflicted.

T: It’s a great turn of the screw when Sean and Jennifer are sucked into the story. I really didn’t know where this one was going.

E: Same. So does this mean the original owner of the typewriter wrote a story in which he was murdered and someone read it aloud?

T: The backstory just doesn’t make much sense. James Ellington, a thriller novelist from the early ’30s is murdered and his house sits in ruin for sixty years until Sean’s family moves in? Is the typewriter haunted by Ellington? Did it murder him? Maybe he wrote a thriller, then his publisher read it, he was killed, then they published it? So where’d the typewriter come from?

E: I suppose he could’ve had a loved one who sealed it away under the stairs after his murder, but you have a valid point. It’s creepy enough to establish some nice atmosphere, but doesn’t make a whole lot of sense without more explanation.

T: I love Billy’s reading and commenting mid-story. I want him to read me all the stories from now on. He’s a fun character. Period.

E: I hope the actor pops in another episode!

T: I was also confused about how the typewriter works. I thought it gives you dreams if you’re sleeping, but if you’re awake, it makes it reality. But I guess it gives you dreams as the story is written, but then when it’s read, it turns those dreams into reality. Initially, a story is just an author’s dream, but once it’s in the hands of an audience, the story becomes real. If that’s what they’re saying, I really dig it.

QUEER OR NOT?

T: Finally! This season has been pretty lacking in the queer sub-text, but at least we have Billy as Sean’s gay best friend. I can’t be the only one who reads Billy as gay, right?

E: I got more of a Jughead vibe but that’s still queer, so sure.

T: Heck yeah, Billy can be AYAOTD?’s first asexual representation!

TRIVIA, USELESS TRIVIA

T: Jennifer is played by Nicole Lyn. She would go on to co-star with Ross Hull (Gary) in Student Bodies, a teen sitcom about students working at a school newspaper that ran for sixty-five episodes.

E: This sounds like a Canadian version of Skins!

T: Yeah, and a solid decade earlier.

MODERNIZE ’90s CANADIAN KIDS

T: A teen writer finds an old, haunted/cursed typewriter? That could happen today. I really can’t find anything that sticks out as being too old-fashioned. Besides the fashion, as always, but some episodes are more eye-gouging than others.

E: Yes, the technology at the center of this episode is already dated, so it would still work in a modern context. Even Sean’s writer-quirks still work. Some shit never changes.

JUST GIVE IT A NUMERICAL RATING ALREADY

T: I’m a sucker for this kind of meta story about storytelling. Billy’s graveyard story is a little pointless, but then once it threatens to become real, the stakes are raised in a delightful way. The humor really works for me and the characters are endearing enough, but the free will question nags at me, there’s some confusion on how anything works, and Jennifer is a bit simplistic. There is a sense of threat but it comes in late and light. 8.5 CAMPFIRES OUT OF 10.

E: I agree that the free will plothole is a bit troubling, but this story is full of Kiki’s cheeky panache. And I love the little scare she throws at the Midnight Society at the end. I’m going with 9 CAMPFIRES OUT OF 10.