Beth Toussaint | Through the Shattered Lens

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing Monsters, which aired in syndication from 1988 to 1991. The entire show is streaming on Tubi.

This week, the lizard are leaping!

Episode 1.8 “Sleeping Dragon”

(Dir by Mark Rezyka, originally aired on December 10th, 1988)

Outside of Reno, Nevada, a stone capsule is found. Professor Merrick (Kin Shriner) believes that the capsule is from the prehistoric era and that it might prove his theory that there was a highly-developed society on Earth before the rise of human beings. Merrick brings the capsule to a lab that is located high in the mountains.

While a snow storm rages outside, Merrick and his colleagues, Jeffrey (Russell Johnson) and Jeffrey’s daughter Lisa (Beth Toussaint), examine the capsule. Jeffrey is skeptical of Merrick’s theories while Lisa thinks that the rock could actually be some sort of time capsule that was buried centuries ago. When the three of them leave the lab to get a Geiger counter and some more tools to try to pry the capsule open, a humanoid lizard (Wayne Toth) emerges from the stone.

The Lizard is not a friendly visitor and soon, he’s attacking anyone foolish enough to get close to him. The surviving humans know that he have to find a way to stop the lizard but how do you stop something that you can’t understand? With the blizzard raging outside, no one is leaving the lab until the battle between lizard and human is resolved.

This episode of Monsters had potential but it suffered because of its short runtime. If the episode had a bit more time to emphasis the claustrophobia of the lab and to also allow a bit more suspense as the Lizard tracked down the scientists, it would have been far more effective. As it is, the whole thing felt a bit rushed.

There are two things that I did like about this episode.

First off, it’s a huge plot point that the lab’s phone is dead, which means that the scientists can’t call for help. The scientists assume that the phone is dead either because of the blizzard or because of the Lizard but, in reality, the phone isn’t dead at all. It’s just that Lisa, while stumbling around the office, accidentally unplugged the phone and no one noticed until they actually tried to make a call. That felt like a realistic mistake that one might make while under pressure and it also encouraged the viewer to question whether or not the humans were actually smart enough to survive their lizard encounter.

The second thing that worked about this episode is that lizard man really was frightening. It helped that he stayed in the shadows for most of the episode and, when he did appeared, he moved quickly enough that you really didn’t notice that he was essentially a guy in a rubber suit. He was an effective monster and, in the end, that’s what really matters when it comes to a show like this.

Next week, we’ve got another vampire story!

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Mondays, I will be reviewing Nightmare Cafe, which ran on NBC from January to April of 1992. The entire show is currently streaming on YouTube!

This week, Frank and Fay get involved in a case of ghost noir!

Episode 1.2 “Dying Well Is The Best Revenge”

(Dir by Armand Mastroianni, originally aired on March 6th, 1992)

This week’s episode of Nightmare Café begins with Frank and Fay feeling pretty comfortable in their new roles of working at the café under the watchful eye of Blackie. I guess some time has passed since the pilot, as both Frank and Fay seem to be totally okay with the fact that they’re both dead and destined to spend the rest of their existence working as, respectively, a cook and a waitress.

Don’t get me wrong, of course. There’s nothing wrong with being a cook or a waitress. If I was a waitress, I would definitely want to work for Robert Englund and get to wear a cute uniform like Fay does. I think what is throwing me is that Fay and Frank seem to be so comfortable with the idea of being dead. It would take me a bit longer to accept that.

As for tonight’s episode, the action starts when a sultry woman named Angela (Beth Toussaint) enters the café and asks for a cup of coffee. Frank immediately starts flirting with her and Angela flirts back in typical film noir fashion. All of the flirting ends, though, when Angela’s husband, Edward (Justin Deas), stumbles into the café, his face bloodied from apparently being attacked outside while he was waiting for Angela. Angela and Edward leave but Angela later returns so that she can talk to Frank.

Angela claims that Edward is abusive. Frank leaves the café so that he can visit Angela at home and eventually sleep with her. (Fay and Blackie watch on the television.) Fay doesn’t trust Angela, especially after her previous lover — a country club tennis pro (Andrew Airlie) — is mysteriously run over by a hit-and-run-driver. As Fay puts it, she thinks that Frank could be putting his life at risk. But, the thing with that is that Frank and Fay are already dead. That was established in the pilot. So, if Frank is already dead, how is he putting his life at risk? For that matter, if Frank and Fay are dead and the Nightmare Café is basically a dimensional portal, how are they both able to casually leave the café and walk around town? I mean, are they dead and in purgatory or not? Seriously, what are the rules of the Nightmare Café?

Eventually, Edward confronts Frank and Angela and Frank …. SHOOTS HIM! Well, I guess since Frank is dead, he can be a murderer. Except, in a clever twist, it turns out that Edward was already dead and the Nightmare Café gave him a second chance to prove that Angela was the one who set up his murder. When Angela tries to put Edward in the trunk of her car, Edward suddenly gets out of the trunk and Angela shoots him several times. Edward pretends to die once again, allowing the police to arrest Angela for murder. The episode ends with Angela in prison, with Edward as her ghostly companion.

So, as I said earlier, I’m still not sure what the rules of the Nightmare Café are supposed to be and, in this episode, it felt like Frank and Fay could basically just do whatever was convenient to the plot. That’s a bit of a problem because, when there are no rules, there aren’t any stakes either. That said, this episode was helped immensely by the friendly charm of Robert Englund. Blackie didn’t really get involved in the storyline but he did break the fourth wall and talk directly to the audience a few times and Englund delivered the lines with just the right amount of cheery sarcasm. Robert Englund definitely kept things entertaining!