[AYAOTD? Recap with Erin Callahan] S05E13 "The Tale of the Night Shift"

RECAP

Gary’s gone all sadboi because he expressed his true feelings to Sam and she “doesn’t have time for a relationship.” Sam then tells a story about how illusions can hide something beautiful...or something evil.

It’s the night shift at the hospital -- Felix is there to work, Amanda is there to volunteer, and Colin is there to flirt with Amanda and get his tonsils out. While trying to find a missing water pump, Felix is tempted by a pretty girl who suddenly transforms into a vampire and attacks him. Using his shapeshifting abilities, the vampire picks his way through all the staff and patients, finally leaving only Amanda and Colin. Amanda suspects something strange is going on, but agrees to help Colin look for his missing roommate. When they check the morgue, there’s no sign of Colin’s roommate, but they find Felix’s body under a sheet. Just a few minutes later, Felix--now with fangs!--accosts them on the stairs and reveals that the vampire took too much blood from him and he’s transforming. Still partially human, Felix helps Colin and Amanda by showing them the vampire’s coffin in the basement and explaining that it must be destroyed to rid the hospital of the vampire. Since Amanda isn’t strong enough to lift the coffin and put it in the incinerator, she agrees to distract the vampire. She draws him to the roof, where he dangles her off the edge. Just as he’s about to bite her, Colin and Felix destroy the coffin. The vampire is instantly engulfed in flames and the staff and patients return to normal. The only victim who remembers the ordeal is Felix, who thanks Amanda and Colin for their help.

Sam pulls Gary aside and reveals that the story was about her -- someone who’s so busy she misses out on a lot of possibilities. Instead of putting the fire out, the two sit down to enjoy some alone time.  

REVIEW

T: Oh how I love this opening to the Midnight Society. They FINALLY have Gary and Sam’s relationship taking center stage AND it sets up the romantic subplot of the story. I love all this Midnight Society material.

E: Sometimes the opening either seems too convenient or barely relates to the episode’s story. But this is one that makes perfect sense, since Gary and Sam’s awkward “what are we?” convo directly inspires her story. And Gary’s reaction is just so Gary. Gah, I’m going to miss him!

T: They got mad extras! You’d expect them to set this during a night shift to avoid needing a large cast, but not here. It’s another D.J. episode and kind of like “Guardian’s Curse,” he handles some of the more cinematic, larger scale (from a production standpoint) episodes.

E: D.J. and the entire crew obviously went all out for this one, from the extras to the sets to the vampire makeup. And this is such an interesting take on a night shift. We normally think about the eerie quietness and isolation that may come with a nighttime shift. But here the night shift is chaos and it works surprisingly well.

T: I’m going to say it right here: I flipping love this episode so much. It’s a straight up vampire slasher movie. You really need a large cast for a slasher movie, and this juggles them so well.

E: So much happens in twenty minutes and almost none of it feels rushed or crammed in. Totes impressive.

T: Felix’ boss calls him a “Zeebo!” This is the last time the name is checked in the series.

E: Gah! I’m going to miss those references.

T: I love when AYOATD? uses after-school jobs as a way to work the characters into a more adult setting. Great convention and really grounds Amanda. You know immediately who she is in one minute of screen time.

E: Yes! And they don’t even rely on voiceover narration to establish her. It’s done with a single, clever dialogue exchange in an elevator. Pay attention, aspiring writers! This is a perfect example of how to work exposition organically into your storytelling.

T: We somewhat addressed that season five has the least diversity so far in the series. So it’s nice that they end with this episode being told by a Latinx character and featuring these characters. Felix is Latinx, the manager is Black, Amanda is Moroccan-Canadian-Jewish, and Colin is Jewish.

E: Though the decrease is unfortunate, I’m glad we got to end on a diverse note.

T: Which brings us to Emmanuelle Chriqui as Amanda. She’s not exactly a household name, but she’s done a lot of projects, and some high-profile ones at that. I’ve never seen Entourage, but I do know her from the original Wrong Turn. And she’s great here. It’s similar to having Neve Campbell right before she hit it big, you can tell this young actress has a real talent.

E: She absolutely looked familiar and she’s got a very natural presence.

T: The pretty girl turning into the creepy-ass green vampire and biting toward the camera is so good! I was like, “Oh, I know horror conventions, she’s the baddie.” Then BAM and I was surprised even knowing.

E: Ha! Isn’t it great when jump scares are still scary even though you know they’re coming? Also, is she supposed to look like someone Felix knows, or is he just tempted by a random teenage girl who knows his name? Either way is believable, but the second one is funnier.

T: Lol I hadn’t thought that it was probably just some stranger. He’s not like, “um, do I know you?”

E: Fair point.

T: Colin gets to call joking around with Amanda a “goof.” Immediately makes me love him. Colin is super cute. Like his enthusiastic attitude and everything. There’s something to a guy being open and honest telling someone that he likes them that’s really endearing.

E: He is absolutely one of the most compelling love interests we’ve seen. Smart, quirky, funny, cute. He reminds me a bit of Ian from “Midnight Ride,” and not just because they both have floppy ’90s hair, only here the girl he’s trying to impress is the main character.

T: Why the flip is the vampire that terrifying? AND GREEN?

E: My boyfriend and I were talking about this while we watched this one. His theory is that D.J. was saving this one for a time when Cinar and Nickelodeon wouldn’t nix it for being seriously scary. And I don’t *love* the green skin but it kind of works here?

T: I love it. Partially for the simple fact that the series only does vampires a few times, but they’re all so different from each other. Consider Lex Braun, Nosferatu, and vampire Margot. Perhaps we’ll get one last vampire tale next season…

E: Ooooooh! ~intrigued~

T: Just to talk about how well paced this is, by the mid-way point, half the cast is dead, the romance subplot is woven without feeling clunky, and the main duo is put into peril. Compare that to something like “Silent Servant” where halfway through all that happened was Jared got a dugout.

E: Haaaaaaa! You and I have talked about this before, and I know we’re both of the opinion that pacing is one of the trickiest aspects of writing, no matter the medium, and doesn’t come naturally to many people. At this point, D.J. had clearly learned how to work within the twenty-minute time frame and he makes every second count here.

T: Felix is so over the top, but in a way that really works. I just love him skittering through the basement while Amanda and Colin are casually strolling behind. It’s like he’s their puppy.

E: I feel like you wanted to make a kink reference here but are afraid to because we’re talking about a kids’ show.

T: Maybe.

E: Hee hee.

T: Full disclosure: I forgot Margot was the vampire. So when she shows up in the basement, I was surprised, then really happy. She’s so good in this. You know when a story does “baddie has a sweet form and a scary form” I usually prefer one and wish they were always like that. Both Margot and the green-faced version are fantastic. Shout-out to Elisabeth Rosen, who’s one of those Canadian actresses who pops up here or there, but horror fans may recognize her from 2017’s Cult of Chucky in which she thinks the Chucky doll is her dead child.

E: I wasn’t one-hundred percent sure until the end that Margot was the vampire and we weren’t just seeing the vampire mimicking her form, so I’m glad that’s made clear at the resolution. And she is just sooooo creepy spouting off all her vampire knowledge and taunting the protags. The vampire really went in there with a plan, didn’t he?

T: I love split climaxes when they’re done right. Having Amanda go through the gauntlet of vampires and then face off with the master while Colin sneaks into the basement and deals with Felix and the coffin is so much fun.

E: Agreed! This worked really well in “Train Magic” and arguably works even better here, since Colin doesn’t just have a non-threatening task to perform -- he has to defuse Felix first. And the scene where the vampire dangles Amanda off the roof is just terrifying. I don’t love that she ends up as the damsel in distress here, but her near-paralysis is a pretty realistic reaction to that situation and she voluntarily puts herself in danger to save Colin and everyone in the hospital.

T: I found her conscious choice to confront the vampire brave/active so she didn’t read like a passive damsel in distress to me.

E: It’s a balance I can live with.

T: The fire effects on the rooftop are fantastic. Especially knowing this is TV in the ’90s, not a film.

E: You just know D.J.’s been dying for an excuse to throw a flaming body off a roof.

T: I love the last Midnight Society scene for so many reasons. Gary finally gets with Sam. They leave the fire going. It verifies that some story characters are ciphers for the Midnight Society, with Sam basing Amanda and Colin off her and Gary. And now that I think about it, does that mean candy corn represents Gary’s magic hobby?

E: LOL. I love the way Amanda and Colin use his candy corn addiction to flirt, but I can’t picture Sam eager to learn sleight-of-hand tricks from Gary. This scene really is perfect, though. And since we know this was meant to be the series finale, there’s something kind of beautiful about the fire still burning as the episode ends. This also feels a bit like Gary and Sam becoming more grown up and preparing to pass the torch to new members.

QUEER OR NOT?

T: I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – when a male character masquerades as a pretty female to catfish the dude, there’s a queer element there. Then he continues to masquerade as Margot? So yeah he’s a little campy in his creepiness, but it doesn’t read as “let’s queer code the villain” so I’m all for it.

E: Troy has an amazing piece about this exact topic -- Catfish on Elm Street -- please go read it if you haven’t already.

T: Thanks for the plug! And since we talk feminism here, I want to take a second to discuss a trope that I hate: when a dude “wears down” a girl until she agrees to date him. It was used humorously in “A Door Unlocked” with Ben. That was a campy comedy so it didn’t get under my skin that much (little bit still), but it doesn’t bother me here. I think just about any trope can be done right, and this is a fine example of that. Amanda is always in control of the relationship and it’s clear that she does like him. I mean, she says they’re friends from school, and he even knows her work schedule. Their families probably go to temple together (yeah, I know I headcanon backstories, but I stand by it). I know this is a trope that usually bugs you, so I’d love to hear your thoughts about it?

E: The interesting thing is I didn’t even read Amanda and Colin’s interactions as the “wear down” trope, even though it arguably dips into that territory, because…this is flirting, right? Remember flirting? But that’s the tricky thing about flirting in fiction. It can so easily slide into tricky territory and is so open to interpretation. ’Tis the season, and another great example of this is “Baby It’s Cold Outside.” Queer feminist writer Carmen Maria Machado just took to Twitter to defend the song as harmless flirting (https://twitter.com/carmenmmachado/status/1338545133902553105?s=21), but a lot of people read it as the male character wearing the female character down and pressuring her into sex. Personally, I don’t think either interpretation is wrong, because flirting and sexual/romantic pressure are such subjective things.

TRIVIA, USELESS TRIVIA

T: Felix is played by Jorge Vargas, Jr., who’s still working steadily today. He’s best known as the Navy Thunder Ranger in Power Rangers Ninja Storm.

E: Now I have the Power Rangers theme song stuck in my head -- thanks a lot, Felix.

T: The vampire’s little girl masquerade is Elisha Cuthbert’s first on screen appearance. She’s done a ton of stuff, like Netflix’s The Ranch recently, but we will discuss her more later, because she’s going to be in the next twenty-six episodes of the series.

E: Never in a million years would I have guessed that was Elisha Cuthbert. How old is she here? Nine?

T: I think she’s thirteen. Though made up to look even younger. When she shows up next season it’ll be about two and a half years later and she’s in full teenage mode. Kathleen Fee plays Nurse Hantin (the head nurse). She was married to Victor Knight, who was Will Friedle’s antique expert/best friend in “Long Ago Locket.” Both actors will reappear in the revival seasons.

E: Her half-British accent here is just bananas and I love it.

T: The green vampire is played by Andreas Apergis, who was also creepy as Joshua in “The Room for Rent,” which makes him one of the very few actors to play two different antagonists.

E: Omg what???? Good god, they make him totally unrecognizable.

T: Besides Amanda referencing pinballs (season one’s finale “Pinball Wizard”), the story gives a shout out to all sixty-five episodes of the series by ending with door 65 closing.

E: What a fun little Easter egg -- love it! And Amanda’s sarcastic line is one of my all time favorite bits of AYAOTD? snark. “Is that a body?” “No, it’s a pinball machine.” LOLOLOL.

MODERNIZE ’90s CANADIAN KIDS

T: I wouldn’t change one blessed thing.

E: LOL. I don’t blame you, though, as I said above, I don’t love the vampire’s green skin. The only other thing I can think of that might get side-eye from a modern audience is the patients who we see spending a night in the hospital. Colin is there for an entire night BEFORE he gets his tonsils out? No insurance company in the U.S. of A would pay for that and it’s probably not a thing that happens in Canada either. And if that kid with the broken leg is able to “escape” in his wheelchair, he most certainly would’ve been discharged by now. I get that a seriously ill protagonist is useless and we probably don’t want to see terminally ill children in this episode, but we need more plausible reasons than those given here.

JUST GIVE IT A NUMERICAL RATING ALREADY

T: I can’t say one single negative about this episode. I’m trying, but I can’t think of it. I mean, it’d be nice if the vampire had a name, but that is the most trivial non-complaint ever. I would love to read the script to this episode, they should teach it in writing classes. It is so tight, there isn’t a wasted scene or line or character. This really does make me feel like I’ve watched a vampire slasher movie in twenty minutes. If you were to remove the “everyone lives” happy ending, you could insert this in a horror anthology movie and it wouldn’t feel out of place. D.J. and the crew worked hard to knock it out of the park on what they thought would be their last episode, and it shows. 11 CAMPFIRES OUT OF 10!

E: Eleven??? Well, holy heck. Okay, green skin and minor plot holes aside, I really do love this one. The characters are fun, the acting is more than solid, and the pacing is fantastic. Had the series really ended here as was originally planned, it would’ve gone out with a bang. That said, I’m still not willing to break our rating conventions. 10 CAMPFIRES OUT OF 10.