Ebenezer Morloch

My Review

After 5 years “Fame” finally celebrates Christmas, which I was really pleased about. However that pleasure quickly turned to dismay when I discovered that like so many other season 5 episodes the writers and producers decide to rip off a classic Christmas story rather than come up with something more original, which I always felt was rather a shame.

There are many elements of the episode that I really like as it’s quite a fun episode with lots of great Christmas music but the story itself is very heavy handed. Just in case the audience don’t realize what the episode is about we have Sherwood’s English Class discuss Charles Dickens’ original book "A Christmas Carol" and we are pretty much told in the first few minutes exactly why Morloch is acting like he is.

This is where I have a huge problem with the story (in addition to it being a rip off that is), Morloch to me has moved on a little bit since we first meet him in Season 3. If we had to do the “Scrooge” storyline then Christmas of 1983 (Season 3) when Morloch had only been at the school for a few episodes would have been ideal as it would have given us a good insight into the new Vice Principal’s character and it could have been that first step for changing his character. However, in Season 5 it feels like the character has had to take a few steps backwards to fit into this story and I don’t like that.

In the last few years we’ve seen Morloch mellow a little and come to care about the school and its students, so to suddenly have forgotten all of that is a little hard to swallow, especially as the story really lays it on thick with a quick succession of scenes to show how mean and uncaring Morloch is supposed to be. This means the end of the episode, where Morloch realises how much he cares for the school, although quite touching, loses some of its impact because we’ve already seen it happen before in other episodes.

We suddenly learn Morloch is allergic to Christmas Tress and doesn’t like Christmas because he never got what he wanted as a kid and didn’t get the girl of his dreams. All of this seems to be new information to the other characters. Now although we didn’t have episodes about Christmas in seasons 3 & 4 for our characters to seem real we have to believe that certain events like Christmas, birthdays etc.. took place even if we don’t see them. So wouldn’t the characters have learnt about Morloch’s allergies and dislike of Christmas in the past 2 years he’s been at the school?

He doesn’t like the huge tree, didn’t they have a tree last year or the year before? Where did the money come from to buy this tree? Wouldn’t Morloch have to have authorised the payment if it was coming out of the school budget? He complains that they have name brand potato chips at the party as though the school is footing the bill so how did they get that past him? I just feel the writers don’t really care how heavy handed the script is or how it may not fit into what we have seen before they just wanted to do this story and hoped the audience didn’t notice any other issues.

Also how come School is still in session on Christmas Eve? Danny mentions they have 2 weeks off at Christmas but in the U.K. schools have always broken up for the holidays before Christmas Eve, sometimes as much as a week before. Here offices and businesses that are open will all tend to close early so the Christmas celebrations can start.

However, here none of our characters seem to be in a rush to get off home or have anything do like spend time with their families or do that last minute Christmas shopping or food preparations. Lydia even stays behind late just to sing a song to herself! (It's a great scene but makes no sense!)

Then all the kids spend the evening together (perhaps not that unusual) but all the students and teachers can drop everything at the last minute to rush to school for a party on Christmas morning. Doesn’t anyone spend any time with their families at Christmas? I know we are to believe that everyone sees everyone else at the school as family but this is pushing credibility a little too much. Again, I believe this makes our characters seem 2 dimensional and no one has anything else going on in their lives.

I also have an issue with Morloch’s first love, Francine. In 2 episodes of season 4 we are told that Morloch’s first love was Deedee Callaghan but everyone seems to have forgotten this and now we are led to believe its Francine. It would have been great continuity had they simply just used the same character that was established in season 4 and the scene set in the past would have given us a great explanation as to why Deedee went off with Bob when Morloch introduced them which was the story established in “Danny De Bergerac”.

Anyway despite all the episodes faults it’s quite a fun episode and I love Debbie Allen singing “Have Yourself A Merry Christmas” it’s my favourite version of that song. The scene is so effective with Lydia sat at the piano in the dark with the Christmas tree and lights. Lydia has no story in this episode and this song is all we see of her but it works really well. I also love all the kids singing “Holiday Around The World” as far as I know that was an original song which suited the show well. Often in Christmas episodes we hear the same old songs again and again so something new is great. It's just a shame that Morloch and Mrs Berg talk over the beginning. The scene with all the kids singing “Silent Night” and just hanging out is really sweet too, as is the end where Sherwodd kisses Morloch under the mistletoe.

Ken Swofford gives a great performance in this episode and has some really funny dialogue. It’s a shame this was the last we will see of Morloch. I always thought it was odd that a character who had just realised (again) how much he loves the School would suddenly leave and find another job! It was only in 2010 when I read Michael Hoey’s “Behind the Scenes History” that I became aware of the behind the scenes events that led to Ken Swofford leaving the show. Ken had apparently felt a lot of resentment towards executive producers Donald Reiker and Patricia Jones and the direction they were taking the show in. The Christmas episode was the last straw and after the last scene was filmed Ken ordered the camera to keep rolling where he proceeded to strongly voice his less than favourable opinion of the producers. Apart from the cast and crew present and the film editor no one saw this footage as it was handed over to MGM’s lawyers and Ken was immediately released from his contract, which was a huge shame.

Episode Pictures