Starring: Alec Newman, Stephanie Ellyne, Georgina Strawson, David Selby, Susan Sullivan, Alexandra Donnachie, Lachele Carl, Scott Haran, Walles Hamonde, Michael Shon, Jamison Selby, Marie Wallace, Andrew Collins, Jerry Lacy, John Karlen, Kelly Burke, Tom Michael Blyth, Jake Wardle, Nico Diodoro, Adam Hall, Sarah Pitard, Daniel Collard and Julie Newmar

Written by: Alan Flanagan

Directed by: Ursula Burton, David Darlington and Joseph Lidster

In which David Collins (Newman) and Amy Jennings (Ellyne) prepare for their upcoming wedding as returning family and friends make Collinwood even more of “a house full of noise” and an enigmatic Englishwoman (Strawson) arrives in Collinsport to pursue her agenda…

And so, at long last, we have Bloodline, the eagerly-awaited follow-up to Big Finish’s 2015 mini-series Bloodlust, which firmly pulled Dark Shadows into the 1980s. While it’s a bit too soon yet to say with absolute certainty that Bloodline is worth the wait, it’s certainly off to a very promising start.

(A word of warning, though – I strongly recommend listening to Bloodlust before listening to Bloodline; Bloodlust serves as a newcomer-friendly jumping-on point to the sprawling Dark Shadows narrative, and Bloodline picks up the pieces [quite literally at times!] from where Bloodlust left off. Listeners unfamiliar with the many new characters that Bloodlust introduced, will probably be lost and bewildered by the start of Bloodline.)

As ever, the story begins with a character arriving by train to Collinsport, Maine – “the beginning and the end of the world,” as Jackie Tate (Donnachie) describes the town. She’s been checking out colleges to attend in New York City, and she soon finds out that life in Collinsport has moved on during her absence – and not necessarily for the better. (Yes, I’m being deliberately vague here – spoilers, sweeties!) Also on the train is the aforementioned Englishwoman, whose cavalier attitude towards paying for train tickets is undoubtedly just the tip of her wickedness iceberg. All in all, it’s a highly effective setup for whatever horrors the writers have in store for the characters (and us) as Jackie catches up on everything.

But without a doubt, this episode’s highlight is the much-vaunted return of the formidable Dr. Julia Hoffman – so much so that when Jackie hears the news of Julia’s return, she comments that she can’t wait to meet the legendary Dr. Hoffman! The Big Finish Dark Shadows production team has always admitted that the late Grayson Hall (who brought Julia to life so memorably on the original show) left behind some enormous shoes to fill, and it would take precisely the right actress to step into those shoes and inhabit the role that Hall did. Well, they went and found that actress: Julie Newmar. That’s right – the original Catwoman now plays Julia Hoffman. How freakin’ cool is that?!

Although Newmar makes no attempt to replicate Hall’s distinctively raspy voice, her husky tones uncannily capture Hall’s memorable cadences and inflections. There are veiled references that Julia now looks different than how people remember her, so undoubtedly this will be addressed at some point – as will the contents of the huge rectangular crate that she and Barnabas have had shipped to Collinwood…

Verdict: While the introduction of so many characters (23 speaking parts!) in so short a time span can be occasionally overwhelming, episode one of Bloodline leaves me with a sanguine hope that the next twelve episodes will be just as good – if not better. 8/10

John S. Hall