Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing the original Fantasy Island, which ran on ABC from 1977 to 1984.  Almost the entire show is currently streaming on Daily Motion.

This week, we get a bad fantasy and a good fantasy.  Smiles, everyone!

Episode 4.14 “The Chateau/White Lightning”

(Dir by Leslie H. Martinson, originally aired on February 7th, 1981)

The first of this week’s fantasies involves the McAllister clan and the Scroggins clan, two feuding families from Appalachia who both come to Fantasy Island with the same fantasy.  They want to find the formula for a legendary type of moonshine called White Lightning.  The McAllisters are led by Clora (Carolyn Jones) and include her children, Ruth Ann (Wendy Schaal), Amos (Ed Begley, Jr.), and Otis (Richard Lineback).  The Scroggins are led by Norris (George Lindsey) and include his sons, R.J. (Randy Powell) and Bobby Joe (Ernie Lively).

Since both families have the same fantasy and they both want the recipe for themselves….

What?  Yes, this the bad fantasy.

Anyway, Mr. Roarke gives them a map that will lead them to White Lightning still on Fantasy Island.  The two families race to be the first to reach the still, not realizing that the still is guarded by an old man with a rifle and that old man is Mr. Roarke in a fake beard.

You will probably not be surprised to learn that Mr. Roarke pretending to be a moonshiner is the best part of this fantasy.  Seriously, I hope everyone involved with this series appreciated the dedication that Ricardo Montalban brought to bringing even the most ridiculous of scenes to life.

This was a dumb fantasy and, from the minute the two families stepped off the plane, it was obvious that they’re going to end up setting aside their differences and working together.  The hillbilly stuff just felt out of place on Fantasy Island.  Let’s move on and let’s do so quickly.

The other fantasy is a bit more fun.  Vicky Lee (Pamela Franklin) is writing a book about her grandmother, a silent screen actress who died under mysterious circumstances.  Her fantasy is to interview her grandmother’s former co-star, Claude Duncan, who lives in seclusion in a Fantasy Island chateau.  Mr. Roarke tries to dissuade her from entering the chateau and warns her that her fantasy might be dangerous in ways that she could never imagine.  Vicky says that she can take care of herself.

In the chateau, she meets Karl Dixon (David Hedison), who looks exactly like Claude Duncan!  She assumes that Karl must be Claude’s grandson but the audience knows better.  For one thing, we’ve noticed the statue of Pan in the chateau’s courtyard and we’ve also noticed that its eyes glow whenever something strange happens.  It turns out that Claude Duncan and Karl Dixon are one in the same!  Claude has remained young by offering up sacrifices to Pan.  And it appears that he’s planning on making Vicky his latest sacrifice.

Vickey Lee’s fantasy was silly but entertaining, in the way that the best episodes of Fantasy Island often are.  I always prefer the fantasies that have an element of the supernatural and that’s certainly the case with this one.  At one point, Duncan even claims that Mr. Roarke has no power in the Chateau, which leads me to once again wonder about who truly rules Fantasy Island.  If Mr. Roarke was truly in control of Fantasy Island, why would he allow Claude Duncan to live there?  In an interview, Ricardo Montalban suggested that Fantasy Island was a form of Purgatory and that Mr. Roarke was more of a caretaker than a ruler.  This fantasy would certainly suggest that to be true.

(The fantasy also features a charmingly weird scene where Mr. Roarke suddenly appears on a television screen in the chateau so he can tell Vicky that she’s in danger.  Strange Mr. Roarke is the best Mr. Roarke.)

So, this week gave us one bad fantasy and one good fantasy.  Fortunately, the good fantasy was really, really good.