[AYAOTD? Recap with Erin Callahan] Episode 3.5 "The Tale of the Dollmaker"

RECAP

Tucker is psyched to hear his first Betty Ann story, but rolls his eyes when he hears that it’s about dolls.

Melissa has been looking forward to visiting her aunt and uncle, mostly because her best friend, Susan Henderson, lives next door to them. She runs next door to see Susan as soon as she arrives, but her aunt tells her that Susan’s family moved away. Melissa quickly gets bored and decides to explore Susan’s old house. She finds a detailed dollhouse in the attic that is a replica of Susan’s house, as well as a door that leads to nothing but a steep drop right into the yard. When Melissa’s aunt catches her snooping, she finally reveals that the Hendersons moved away because Susan disappeared. Melissa continues to snoop in the Hendersons’ house and eventually discovers that the mysterious door in the attic sometimes leads into the dollhouse. She finds Susan in the dollhouse, half turned into a doll. Melissa and Susan are able to escape by jumping out the dollhouse’s attic door.

Betty Ann reveals that Melissa’s uncle later burned the dollhouse and then one-ups Tucker by leaving a doll that looks just like him by the campfire.

REVIEW

T: Betty Ann’s reputation precedes her! I get where Tucker’s coming from though, I’d run to the meetings to hear what she’s got cooked up.

E: Her stories are very hit or miss for me, though I generally dig her unique brand of gross and weird. This story is definitely a hit. I love that Tucker expects a snoozefest when Betty Ann whips out the porcelain doll. What a little shit.

T: Very true about Betty Ann being hit or miss, but I’ll always choose an artist with ups and downs to consistently meh.

E: Agreed! Polarizing art is almost always more interesting than middle-of-the-road stuff.

T: Melissa’s aunt and uncle don’t bother to tell her that her best friend, who she must have been talking about on the long ride, has moved away? They wait until they get there and Melissa’s searching for her?

E: I mean, I get that they don’t have kids so we can’t expect them to be experts, but they handle this so badly. Never lie to kids. They will sniff out your lies and never trust you again. Personally, I don’t even like telling my kid that Santa is real. I’d probably feel better about embracing Krampus as our holiday hero. I mean, we don’t know Krampus isn’t real, do we?

T: I prefer to appease Frau Perchta, the Christmas Witch, so she doesn’t replace my organs with trash.

E: Betty Ann would approve!

T: Aunt Sally’s into bingo and Uncle Pete asks Melissa to help with the septic tank. Why is she bored and lonely with them?

E: But they have cable, Troyson! Seriously though, this whole visit seems like it’s much more for Aunt Sally and Uncle Pete than it is for Melissa.

T: Major props to the actors playing Melissa and Aunt Sally, as well as director David Winning and the crew for that forty-five second tracking shot of two characters talking while walking between the houses. Technically no easy feat, but well worth it as it establishes distance between the properties and gives a punch to Aunt Sally’s dialogue, even if she tells Melissa doll houses aren’t children’s playthings.

E: *slow clap for film nerdery* Props are also due to the art designers and location scouts for this ep. The Hendersons’ massive house is both pretty and pretty creepy, and the dollhouse adds a whole next level of creep.

T: We’ve talked about how the adults tend to be useless or terrible people, but Aunt Sally and Uncle Pete are pretty likeable and helpful. And I’m super jealous of Aunt Sally’s sweater. I’m a sweater guy, and I’d so rock that. It’s like a not quite as bold version of something David Rose would wear on Schitt’s Creek.

E: David has truly on point sweater game and, for ’90s TV, Aunt Sally is holding her own. And Sally and Pete are trying, I’ll give them that. They bungle the disclosure of Susan’s disappearance, but they mean well and I like that they get to play a somewhat active role in the mystery instead of just being oblivious or a pointless road block for Melissa.

T: Do we really know what’s going on? The house is doing it? Or it’s strictly the doll house? It’s symbiotic? Susan can barely move or see, but someone’s opening the attic door to get Melissa’s attention?

E: The lack of answers here probably makes this episode more creepy, but I have so many questions. Is the house itself the titular dollmaker, or were the house and dollhouse built by a human/supernatural dollmaker? As for your last question, I assumed that the house is trying to lure Melissa into the dollhouse so it has another doll.

T: That reveal of the door going nowhere is kind of freaky.

E: Yes! The moment when Uncle Pete grabs Melissa before she falls is both an excellent jump scare and a scene that’s packed with so many emotions and layers of fear.

T: Let’s talk about how kickass Melissa is. She discovers a problem and logically investigates the paranormal. She’s not all energetic, but she has energy. She’s a really likeable lead and the episode benefits quite a bit from that because there’s so much resting on her shoulders. That’s a lot for an experienced actor, let alone a child actor, and I think that’s part of the reason the majority of episodes feature two (or even three) co-leads.

E: Okay, yes, all good things. But Melissa also brings a ball of twine to keep herself from falling if the floor of the dollhouse turns out to be an illusion. A ball of twine. It’s absolutely hilarious so I wouldn’t change it, but damn girl. Get some freaking rope. Do you see mountain climbers carrying twine?? I’ll just be over here, holding tween-age protagonists to my adult standards.

T: In her defense, who has a cord of rope lying around? Melissa made do with what she could find in Aunt Sally’s craft room.

E: I don’t know. Uncle Pete looks like the kind of guy who has a boat. 🤷🏻‍♀️

T: The Jurassic Park-like shaking at footsteps is a nice touch, and then we get extra creepy Susan. Such good makeup on her.

E: Betty Ann clearly understands the inherent creepiness of dolls, but instead of employing the killer-doll trope here, she goes for body horror, and Susan’s makeup and costuming really sells it. Her hand falling off before the girls jump is freaking horrifying. Also, she doesn’t get as much screen time as Melissa, but the actress playing Susan does an excellent job of conveying emotion while also keeping her face and body creepily still.

T: I was kind of hoping there’d be an even smaller dollhouse inside the dollhouse. If this was a Gary story, it would end with that terrifying reveal of being stuck in a tiny loop.

E: Fuck yeah! Gary would’ve gone full M.C. Escher with this shit.

T: I just realized there’s four actors in the entire story. That has to set a record for the least amount of characters in a story, right? We’ve had four actors playing five characters (“Hungry Hounds”) and five actors playing four characters (“Captured Souls”) but this is four actors playing four characters. It’s just a great example of tight storytelling, and it makes me wonder if we’ll ever get down to a trio.

E: Excellent point. There are many questions left unanswered here, but the concise storytelling almost makes up for it. Don’t get me wrong, I love a good epic with a massive cast, but tight plots are a much better fit for this half-hour anthology format.

T: Usually the storyteller’s end narration is kind of fluff, but this one’s great. Aunt Sally and Uncle Pete believed the girls and burned an expensive dollhouse. And on top of that, Betty Ann throws out that it might not have even been the dollhouse, but the attic door that was to blame? Okay…

E: I love that the adults here embrace the weird instead of just ignoring it or being stubborn skeptics. And I’m kind of okay with Betty Ann’s open ended mystery? Logically the door would now just lead to nowhere aka a steep three-story drop. But maybe it’ll latch onto some more weirdness? Then again, who doesn’t love a good door to nowhere. I mean, the Winchester Mystery House has one and that’s basically the gold standard for creepy-ass houses. And speaking of creepy-ass houses, Uncle Pete shouldn’t have stopped at the dollhouse. I say torch the whole thing and let the Hendersons collect the insurance payout.

T: If that doll at the end was left by anyone other than Betty Ann, I’d think it was too lame that it’s an exact replica. You know she had to orchestrate some stage magic shenanigans with Gary and I love it.

E: I literally screamed “How did she know what Tucker was going to wear?” at the TV. But of course she knew. She’s Betty Ann.

QUEER OR NOT?

T: I’m going to go with not.

E: Yeah, nothing truly queer here, but let’s indulge in some feminist analysis, shall we? Melissa and Susan are tweens on the verge of puberty, and the body horror here speaks pretty deeply to the strangeness of your girl body changing and then being sexualized and put on display in a way that you have no control over. All women experience the “doll feeling” from time to time—that feeling that your body exists not to serve your own needs, but to look pretty for the pleasure of someone else. It can be quite paralyzing, and it’s particularly intense when you’re in the midst of puberty.

T: I love that reading of this episode! That’s how I’m going to view this from now on. Well said.

TRIVIA, USELESS TRIVIA

T: Melissa’s played by Maia Filar who voiced one of the kids alongside Daniel DeSanto (Tucker) in all fifty-two episodes of The Magic School Bus.

E: Ms. Frizzle would be so proud!

T: Susan is played by Amanda Walsh, who’s a stand-up comic/writer/actress to this day. Erin might recognize her from one episode of Veronica Mars? And I made that David sweater joke before I checked out her IMDb page and found out she’s a writer on Schitt’s Creek, so I’m kind of psychic.

E: OMG! Do you think she writes some of David’s one-liners? Because they’re almost as good as his sweaters.

MODERNIZE ’90s CANADIAN KIDS

T: I’d have Melissa keep in touch with Susan online when she’s back home so she’d know Susan went missing. Dollhouses still exist, and Creepshow’s first season just had an amazing episode with one, but I’d consider making it a smart house.

E: Ooooooh! So, would it be a Tron scenario? Like, Susan gets digitized and trapped in the smart house tech?

T: I struggle with whether or not I’d explain anything. I think it works as is, although a bizarre explanation wouldn’t hurt. The title “The Dollmaker” is active, as if the doll house is doing this purposefully, if that makes sense? It’s a good example of my problem with the Watcher from “Watcher’s Woods.” Just give us a weird phenomenon and leave it a little ambiguous. If they took a minute or two to shoe-horn in an evil Dollmaker who doesn’t even get defeated, it wouldn’t work. Now I want to do a fan edit of “Tale of the Sandman” and take out Bobcat Goldthwait.

E: I’m honestly surprised that doesn’t already exist.

JUST GIVE IT A NUMERICAL RATING ALREADY

T: What doesn’t work in this episode? Nothing springs to mind. Solid all around. There’s no lows, but it doesn’t quite hit the highs of the very few perfect ten episodes. That’s why I’m giving this one a strong 9 OUT OF 10 CAMPFIRES.

E: Hot damn, there’s a jump scare with feels! Not easy to pull off, especially in a story that’s less than twenty minutes. I’ll also go with a 9 OUT OF 10 CAMPFIRES.