Jencyclopedia

A man pulls a Meryl Streep in Kramer vs. Kramer and winds up in “Hawaiian Hillbilly Honeymoon”.
A woman plays a holodeck program in the style of her favourite mystery novelist and winds up in “Monkee See, Monkee Die”.

Tattoo: He looks very nervous.
Roarke: Oh really? Well, he wasn’t too nervous to send us his certified cheque for ten thousand dollars.
Tattoo: Oh, I love nervous people. They have a lot of energy.

Tattoo: What’s his fantasy?
Roarke: One shared by millions of put-upon fed-up males the world over, Tattoo–

Oh, he just wants to leave his wife and kid… it coulda been much worse.

I can never concentrate during beach scenes because I’m always trying to figure what beach it is. I hope this is Leo Carillo, because if it is, then I will have figured it out from just a shot of a rock in the water.

Hey, I thought it never rained on Fantasy Island! Must be terrorists messing with the weather grid again.

There’s a shot of the island girls running down the porch stairs, just like they do in the intro, but this time, they’re covering their ears because Tattoo’s playing the trumpet. That’s the kind of payoff I like in my TV shows; this shot would mean nothing to a casual viewer, but to someone like me who has invested way too much time in this show, that shot is hilarious.

The recurring cast is growing: Aki and Pepper and now Chester the monkey.

I wouldn’t have recognized Mickey Morton if I hadn’t seen him listed on the IMDb page first. Actual picture from this episode:

Mabel Jarvis: Oh, well, that dear Mr. Roarke would never put me into any real danger. Would he?
Evelyn Wallace: …he would.

“I’ve been looking for this secret room for years!” Yeah, that’s a pretty big secret room; it would be pretty easy to figure out approximately where the secret room was in that house.

“Whodunnit” is so “Monkee See, Monkee Die”: three suspects, one is the butler, poisoned drinks, giant birds.

I think this is the first occurrence of Roarke and Tattoo dining in the middle of the jungle for no reason. Didn’t think that was gonna be a thing outside season seven, but here we are.

Roarke and Mabel Jarvis have a conversation at the end of the episode, and she’s like “oh, I used a trick from Harlequin Homicide” and Roarke’s like “well, I just read Harlequin Homicide this morning, and you’re full of shit, Ms. Jarvis” so she’s like “oh, well, I’m sure Daphne would have thought of that trick”. I don’t quite understand the purpose of this exchange. I guess they just needed more words for them to say? It made no sense.

IMDb has Mockingbird Manor’s location listed as 1050 Arden Road, Pasadena. I thought Pasadena seemed a far way to go for filming, but the Queen Anne Cottage is also in Pasadena, so I guess not. Just following along that path, I’m guessing most of season seven was probably filmed at Huntington Gardens. Oh man, that’s gotta be it — the bridge, the statues! Aw, now why isn’t it that easy to find Monkees filming locations?

Also, it’s crazy seeing Google’s overhead maps from 2020/2021 — there are completely empty mall parking lots. So weird.

Gah, man, I wish I had just filmed our entire visit to Warner Brothers Studios back in 2016. Especially that prop room, geez — Mr. Roarke’s box and desk and lamp and all that stuff could be in there somewhere! Instead, I just took pictures of things that looked like they coulda been from The Monkees or Gilmore Girls. I shoulda considered my future self and realized that my future self might be into other shows in the future, because future events such as these will affect you in the future.

• Tattoo’s shenanigans: He’s learning to play the trumpet, and he’s going to form a marching band.
• Cost of the fantasy: Charles Preston sent a certified cheque for $10,000.
• Recurring phrases:
  • Tattoo: I read all her mystery book. They are very exciting, and very scary.
    Roarke: Scary indeed.
  • Roarke: Mr. Preston. You’re just in time to join us.
    Charles Preston: I can’t. Cops chasing me.
    Tattoo: Not any more.
    Roarke: Your fantasy is over, Mr. Preston.
• Ominous Roarke:
  • Roarke: The question Mrs. Jarvis may have to unravel is where the fictional terror ends and real terror begins.
• Locations: Mockingbird Manor
• Recurring characters: Pepper and Chester are wearing earplugs and headphones to block out the noise of Tattoo’s trumpet.