Wednesday 14 May 2008

Dark Fantasy

The Official Blurb

Every since Lights Out went out several years ago, fans of the fiendish have been clamoring for more good old goose-pimple horror drama on the air. Now they have it. One of the programs that currently freezes the airwaves with its chilling stories is Dark Fantasy comparatively new to the networks. In the late hours of Friday nights these shivery, shocking stories go out over NBC - right straight from Oklahoma City, which you might not have thought of as headquarters for haunts. Station WKY is the home of the Dark Fantasy plays, and the writer is Scott Bishop, who lives in the midst of mystery and the supernatural, represented by the innurnerable volumes of thriller fiction, fantasy lore and all kinds of horror literature that fill his home andhis office. Bishop has long contributed to network broadcasting and to magazines. He says, "Give the listener enough material to let his imagination go to work, and he'll supply his own goose-pimples." Dark Fantasy has been furnishing plenty of such material since last November. And judging from enthusiastic comment, the horror fans are responding with goose-pimples galore! Tune in every Friday on Station WKY Oklahoma City.

My Review

This review is not of a book! Instead I'm reviewing an entire radio series from the early 1940's. Each episode of Dark Fantasy is a seperate story and they all have different subjects. The writer has a nice talent for leaving the story just at a point where you want more, but the meat of the story has been told. It's an odd situation I guess, but still satisfying.

As with any series some episodes are better than others and I can especially rec' "The Demon Tree" and "W is for Werewolf".

With this being an Old Time Radio show, it suffers in the sound quality, with many episodes having lost the higher quarter of the audio spectrum, making some difficult to follow. I've found that these episodes are easier to listen to when using headphones. To reflect this I've lowered the "Reading" score.

Reading 1/3
Production 3/3
Story 2/3

Total Score 6/9

Available from Archive.org