Tim Burton Confirms ‘Dark Shadows’

My name is Vic­to­ria Win­ters. My jour­ney is begin­ning. A jour­ney that I hope will open the doors of life to me and link my past with my future. A jour­ney that will bring me to a strange and dark place, to the edge of the sea high atop Wid­ows’ Hill — a house called Collinwood. A world I’ve never known, with peo­ple I’ve never met. Peo­ple who tonight are still only shad­ows in my mind, but who will soon fill the days and nights of my tomorrows.

These are the words of Vic­to­ria Win­ters, and the open­ing to Dark Shad­ows, one of the most mem­o­rable TV shows of all time.  Today, vam­pire mania has sunken its fangs deep into pop­u­lar cul­ture.  Shows like True Blood dom­i­nate tele­vi­sion, while The Twi­light Saga is one of the best­selling book series.  But the Bill Comp­tons and Edward Cul­lens of the world owe their exis­tence to a vam­pire named Barn­abas Collins.

Dark Shad­ows is one of those old shows that makes you feel uncool if you’re unable to remem­ber it when it was on TV.  That’s totally me.  I was born in 1981, 10 years after the last episode of Dark Shad­ows aired.  Being drawn to all things hor­ror, cult, and vin­tage, I dis­cov­ered Dark Shad­ows some years ago dur­ing one of those casual “have you seen any­thing good lately?” con­ver­sa­tions with my par­ents, whom I am grate­ful for hav­ing passed down their good taste in movies and TV shows to me.  If there’s one true thing I can say about myself, it’s that I am never bored, because I always have a nev­erend­ing list of inter­est­ing things to watch, read, or play—and never enough time to do it all.  So some­how or another, through the fond sec­ond­hand rec­ol­lec­tions of my par­ents and at the rec­om­men­da­tions of oth­ers, Dark Shad­ows found its way onto my list.

And a few months ago I begun the long and ardu­ous (but highly enjoy­able) task of watch­ing all 1,225 episodes of Dark Shad­ows.  Yeah, you read that correctly—ONE THOUSDAND TWO HUNDRED AND TWENTY FIVE!  For any­one else crazy enough to do the same, Net­flix has the entire Dark Shad­ows col­lec­tion on DVD.  I think I’m some­where in the early 300’s, but I can’t be sure.  And I am lov­ing every dark, shad­owy, and weird moment of it!

So I am absolutely THRILLED to learn that Tim Bur­ton has just con­firmed to MTV News that he will begin shoot­ing Dark Shad­ows next year, a fea­ture film based on the TV series.  And, shock­ing to no one, Johnny Depp will star as self-loathing vam­pire Barn­abas Collins, con­firm­ing rumors that have been cir­cu­lat­ing amongst Dark Shad­ows & Bur­ton fans for a long time now.  Both Bur­ton and Depp are known to be huge fans of the show, hav­ing grown up with the gothic soap opera.  I think Johnny Depp will be amaz­ing as Barn­abas Collins, and Burton’s campy, gothic style is per­fectly suited for the beloved TV show that was so deli­ciously strange.  Now if we can just get Danny Elf­man to score, I will be one happy (newly-initiated) Dark Shad­ows fangirl!