3: Lights Out At Whit's End

As was the case with “When a Stranger Calls,” “Lights Out” begins with a sequence designed to replicate the original short. Taking place in a factory after hours, instead of an anonymous apartment, it begins as an employee (Lotta Losten, who starred in the short) sees a mysterious female figure in the dark that disappears whenever the lights come back on, and who suddenly gets a lot closer when they go back out again. This time around, however, she survives, while the factory owner (Billy Burke) winds up meeting a gruesome end. Just before his demise, however, he was on the phone with his young son, Martin (Gabriel Bateman), talking about how mentally disturbed mom Sophie (Maria Bello) has apparently gone off her meds and seems to be talking to an imaginary friend named Diana. A few months pass and we learn that Sophie has gotten worse, and her conversations with Diana are so unnerving to Martin, not to mention all the attendant weird noises and scratches, that he can no longer sleep through the night and has been conking out in the middle of the school day.

When the school nurse cannot reach Sophie, she contacts his stepsister Rebecca (Teresa Palmer)—whose own dad disappeared mysteriously years before and who has been estranged from Sophie since abruptly moving out a few years earlier. When Martin mentions Diana, she recognizes the name from her own traumatic childhood years and tries to have Martin stay with her. That doesn’t fly with Sophie, and after she reclaims Martin, Rebecca tries to get to the bottom of who or what Diana might be and what it has to do with her family. Without getting into too much detail, she is now a creature who can only attack in darkness and who cannot be around any sort of light. After a couple of Diana attacks, Rebecca, with the help of amiably dopey boyfriend Bret (Alexander DiPersia) and Martin, decide to hole up in Sophia’s house, lighting up the entire place in the process, in order to get her to start taking her medication again and seek treatment for her instability. Alas, Diana thrives when Sophia is at her most disoriented and begins knocking out the lights in order to get rid of the interlopers once and for all.

See: a battle of wits an ounce of discretion is worth a pound of wit at (one's) wits' end at one's wit's end at one's wits' end, to be at wit's end at wits' end at your wits' end Attic wit be at (one's) wits' end be at your wits' end be frightened out of (one's) wits be frightened out of your wits brevity is the soul of wit by (one's) wits by one's wits.

3: Lights Out At Whit's End Salon

Although Sandberg is the director, the big behind-the-scenes name on display here is co-producer James Wan. His genre bonafides include the “Conjuring” and “Insidious” franchises, films that have largely eschewed the gory excesses of his breakthrough hit “Saw” in order to provide low-fi thrills more reliant on atmosphere, small-scale effects (like door slams) and things suddenly appearing from out of nowhere. When done properly, as was the case with the original “Conjuring” and “Insidious,” the results can be sensationally effective, like the best haunted house ride every created. Done wrong, however, and the results can be more like the sequels to “The Conjuring” and “Insidious”—increasingly tiresome efforts that continually try to wring additional screams out of material too familiar for its own good.

Notes:
Whit has another opening monologue with the audience on this episode; he introduces some of the families. George Poindexter is introduced, played by Chuck Bolte, who also played George Barclay. He says the newspaper is the Odyssey Chronicle. It tells some of Whit's history, including his ties to Universal Encyclopedia and that he has lived here 17 years. It also says that Jenny died nine years ago and that they were married for thirty-three years. Later it mentions information about Whit's birth, mother dying, and raising in Scotland. It talks about the library at Whit's End.

Larry Walker is played by Jim Cummings, who also plays Monterey Jack in Chip 'N Dale's Rescue Rangers, Winnie the Pooh and Tigger on The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, among others.

Colleen Walker is played by the voice of Mary Barclay.

Maybe the final 1-3 days you give darkness to induce stress for more thc production, but to put the lights out for 24 hours over a week before chop is retarded, IMHO. Everybody says light will degrade thc, but light also provides energy for photosynthesis, which produces thc, ironic huh??
But Lights Out at Whit’s End breaks from that formula. It decides not to present a kid-focused story, but a story driven by its adult characters. And as a result it’s a stronger episode. It also pushes aside the normal straightforward way of telling a story to instead present a series of fun skits for the audience to enjoy.

Whit's End Menu

The episode presents a person named Bob working at Whit's End.

The ending has Dr. Dobson and Mike Trout talking about the episode and they once again mention that Family Portraits is set in Ohio. They also call the main character Dr. Whit. James Drury notes that it might be Mike Trout called Dr. Dobson by his title, as in: 'That's right, Doctor. Whit is...'

Lights Out At Whit's End

3: Lights Out At Whit's End Restaurant

GOOF ALERT: Shawn says that she could see all the way to the bottom of Crater Lake. Crater Lake is the deepest lake in the United States and its bottom cannot be seen.