Mockingbird Lane - It didn't suck!

[sojourner]

Yeah, with Marilyn returning home from college, you wonder if she left behind a string of unsolved murders there. If the show had continued she may have turned out to be the most "evil" character on it.

[Temis the Vorta]

I'm on board with the "Marilyn should be the biggest monster" twist, too. So much potential in this show, it would be sad to see NBC waste it.

[Psion]

My Name Is Legion wrote:

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On rewatching I think Marilyn is my second-favorite character - mainly for her scenes with Grandpa. Her false front of normality makes her creepier than most of the rest of the family.

Herman and Lily are the real "normal" couple, emotionally - mainly expressed through their concern for Eddie's well-being and a little frisson of domestic angst. Grandpa is a monster who views humanity as prey. Marilyn is conflicted, like everyone but Grandpa, but hers is that she's a monster who empathizes with the prey.

Her delivery of "then they've found a home at last" is one of the most delightfully weird character moments in the show, and very much Bryan Fuller.

Completely agree. Out of all the characters, Marilyn's is most like the original physically, but within ... ? Grandpa is fun to watch, but Marilyn is the most intriguing.

[Galileo7]

Temis the Friendly Ghost wrote:

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I'm on board with the "Marilyn should be the biggest monster" twist, too. So much potential in this show, it would be sad to see NBC waste it.

Agree.

[the G-man]

sojourner wrote:

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Yeah, with Marilyn returning home from college, you wonder if she left behind a string of unsolved murders there. If the show had continued she may have turned out to be the most "evil" character on it.

I think Fuller hinted she was exactly that in some of the interviews.

In fact, if you think about it, that's actually a very logical conclusion. The rest of the family can't help what they are. They're monsters. One could argue they have to engage in at least some "monstrous" behavior to survive. Not so, Marilyn, however. She chooses to live among them, even after Grandpa suggested she might want to move away.

When you consider her role as the human face of the group, who finds them a home, takes Grandpa around the neighborhood, etc., she's basically a pretty Renfield.

[sojourner]

Yeah, I could see her being set apart from the family by her "normalness" resulting in her becoming a serial killer so that in her mind she would fit in.

[Admiral Buzzkill]

There's also something "off," not to dwell on it too much, in her lack of personal embarrassment at Grandpa's habit of materializing in the altogether. She finds all of the weirdness alternately amusing and mildly vexing, and seems to float a little above it all...too detached.

I loved the running joke - trivial and sitcom-ish though it may be - of "and this is Eddy's Grandpa...'Grandpa.'"

[Dark Gilligan]

"Call me Dee."

I wonder to what extent the name Dracula is known in the Munsters' world. Is he a folk legend, a serial killer spanning the centuries, or has the average Joe never heard of him at all? The family's avoidance of the name suggests that Dracula is known at least to a degree. Interesting also that in this version, Munster is Grandpa's assumed family name. An alias, certainly. To Herman: "Eddie was born a Munster. You weren't a Munster until I made you one." In the original series, Herman was the Munster.

[Set Harth]

CANON VIOLATION

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Dark Gilligan wrote:

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I wonder to what extent the name Dracula is known in the Munsters' world.

Enough that Grandpa doesn't want to use it.

The Munsters' world seems, until otherwise indicated, to be the same as ours. I'm sure everyone know Dracula and Frankenstein.

[Nerys Myk]

Dark Gilligan wrote:

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"Call me Dee."

I wonder to what extent the name Dracula is known in the Munsters' world. Is he a folk legend, a serial killer spanning the centuries, or has the average Joe never heard of him at all? The family's avoidance of the name suggests that Dracula is known at least to a degree. Interesting also that in this version, Munster is Grandpa's assumed family name. An alias, certainly. To Herman: "Eddie was born a Munster. You weren't a Munster until I made you one." In the original series, Herman was the Munster.

True, but which part of him?

[Mr. Adventure]

I liked it but it felt more like a pastiche of Addams Family and Dark Shadows (films and TV) built on the most skeletal bones of The Munsters. It was very stylish and cool but I wonder if its current limbo status stems from not shaking expectations that this was going to be closer to the source. Guess we'll know if we see another project emerge with Brad Garrett in Frankenstein makeup.

[JD]

I'm board with the whole Marilyn is evil concept. I don't think there is anyway a true "normal" person could live with a bunch of monsters and not end up messed up in someway. Is the whole thing with her mother wanting to eat her from the original, or was that something new that Fuller came up with?

[Nerys Myk]

Pretty sure it's a new idea. The old show didn't do that sort of thing.

[Mister Fandango]

I'm pretty sure the point the pilot was making was that while the rest of the family are monsters on the outside, Marilyn was a monster on the inside. In fact, it wasn't really a very subtle point at all. She came right out and admitted it with her response to Grandpa's desire for a moat. "The best moats are made of good manners and congeniality."