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 Café, which ran on NBC from January to April of 1992.  The entire show is currently streaming on YouTube!

This week, the café goes country!

Episode 1.5 “Sanctuary For A Child”

(Dir by Armand Mastroianni, originally aired on March 27th, 1992)

On tonight’s episode of Nightmare Café, we learn a few things about the café.  Apparently, the café is not just located in Los Angeles.  It can materialize anywhere on the planet but it apparently does so on its own.  Though Blackie (played by Robert Englund) claims to be the proprietor of the café, this episode suggests that he actually has no control over it.  While Blackie apparently does know why the Nightmare Café does the things that it does, it would appear that the café still has a mind of its own.  It decides where it is going and it decides when it is time to leave.

This episode, for instance, begins with the Nightmare Café materializing on a street in a small, country town.  Soon after it materializes, both Frank and Fay also materialize inside the café.  I’ve often wondered where Frank and Fay go whenever the café is closed for business.  Frank and Fay, after all, are essentially ghosts.  Do they need to eat or sleep?  This episode suggests that they do, as Fay complains about having to get up early because “the café” has decided to open up the crack of dawn.

Soon enough, a young boy named Luke Wall (Brandon Quintin Adams) comes walking into the café.  He and Frank immediately bond, with Frank realizing that Luke is trying to run away from home.  What Frank discovers upon following Luke out of the café is that Luke’s home is in a hospital.  Luke is in a coma and has been for quite some time.  Frank also discovers that the café has materialized in his home town, the place that he left when he joined the Navy and to which he thought he would never return.  Luke is the son of Frank’s former best friend, Tom (Vondie Curtis-Hall), and his ex-girlfriend, Evelyn (Angela Bassett).  Frank explains to Fay that Evelyn was the love of his life but his racist father demanded that they break up.  That was one of the main reasons why Frank left town and has never returned.

So, the Nightmare Cafe wants two things to happen.  It wants Tom and Evelyn to make peace with Luke’s impending death and also with each other.  And it wants Frank to deal with his past and his feelings towards his late father.

And that’s exactly what happens.  It’s a sweet episode, even if it’s a bit predictable and heavy-handed enough to end with “The Living Years” playing on the soundtrack.  In many ways, this felt more like an episode of Highway to Heaven than an episode of Nightmare Café but, as was so often the case with this show, the strong performances of the cast carried the narrative over any rough spots.  In the end, Frank made his peace with the past, Luke moved on to the afterlife, and the Nightmare Café moved on to a new town.

Next week: the final episode of Nightmare Café!