Sarah says:
A non-flash photo is always good. Moody. Dim the lights, man... Today was a Saturday as good as any other. Family time. Chores to do. Clean the garage out for the millionth time why don't we. But these things feel good. Hints at spring cleaning. Purge your outer soul and all and clean up your insides whilst at it why don't you. Cook dinner. Re-connect with family. Phone home. Where is home? One of those words... Stopped by Heidi's for a fast one. Returned home to watch Little House - heavy one about a girl called Sylvia who got raped and pregnant and whom 14-old Albert wnated to love and help and marry. Then the rapist showed up again in his eveil clown mask to get Sylvia alone and she fell off a ladder and eventully died - or so it was implied... I know Albert turns to drugs eventually. No wonder - that cigar he lit in the basement of the blind school burnt down the school killing Mary's baby and Mrs. Garvey and now his first love got raped and pregnant and then died. Sounds like good reasons to turn to drugs if you ask me. See - doesn't Little House sound as good and as rough as any modern day drama y'all are into? Makes me miss Michael Landon. I wonder what else he would have offered up if e hadn't died so soon... Anyway - the day is almost all done for me. Marv is out. Kid is asleep. I have some people to call and some sleep to be slept. I still feel worn out a bit from my five days away in Cannes. Next week will be bsuy as a mofo so sleep will be a needed thing tonight. Sleep well people. Sleep well...
This is a very true review of the Sylvia episode of Little House. I almost felt bad for subjecting my daughter to it. It kind of came out of nowhere in Little House world. All of a sudden there was sexuality in Little House. Weird. But my kid seemed to take it well and we got to speaking about her body is her body and nobody has the right to harm her and all. Interesting to say the least...
Below text taken from this link
By far, the most memorable episode of the seventh season - and one of the most memorable in the series - is the two-part prairie snuff film titled "Sylvia." Sylvia Webb (Olivia Barash) is the prettiest teenybopper in Walnut Grove. She is so pretty that all the boys in Hero Township try to peek in her windows for a fleeting glimpse of her budding, perky breasts. She is so pretty that Mrs. Oleson proclaims her "a wicked temptress." She is so pretty that her craggy father (Royal Dano) forces her to bind her chest, and growls "You're a wanton thing, Sylvie" at her. She is so pretty that Albert Ingalls falls in love with her. Oh, and she is so pretty that a psychopath in a terrifying clown mask follows her every movement, and ultimately drags her into the woods to rape her silly. As if that weren't bad enough, the wretchedly suffering Sylvia ends up pregnant with the rapist's child, and everyone thinks the baby is Albert's. Noble Albert, of course, steps up to the plate, proclaims his unyielding love to Sylvia, and declares that the two will run away and begin a new life together. Everything goes like clockwork, until the rapist learns Sylvia's whereabouts and tracks her down in an abandoned barn. The pregnant Sylvia, blubbering and in hysterics, struggles to escape the rapist by climbing a rickety ladder into the hayloft. Said ladder breaks, Pa shows up to kill the rapist, and Sylvia takes a nasty spill to the barn floor. She dies soon afterward, while a barely pubescent Albert keens over her lifeless body. The end.
Plainly and simply, there are not enough bad things to say about this episode. It is so wildly inappropriate it's almost hallucinatory. Imagine an episode of Friends where Phoebe discovers she has an inoperable brain tumor. Or an episode of Smallville where the dad reveals he's leaving the family because he's been having a secret, long-running affair with a drag queen. That's about how well this episode fits into the Little House canon. For a series that rarely - if ever - even hints at sex and sexuality, it's embarrassing and awkward to watch Pa questioning Albert about whether or not he impregnated Sylvia. You honestly feel queasy and dirty watching it - especially since both Albert and Sylvia come across more like children than teens. It's hard to accept Sylvia as the town siren, when she looks about fourteen and speaks with a lisp. Not only is the plot an aberration, though: "Sylvia" is filmed in a way that is completely foreign to Little House. Audiences are treated to extreme close-ups of the clown-rapist's tiny pupils staring at Sylvia's winsome form, disturbing POV shots from the rapist's perspective, and conventions that seem to be directly lifted from John Carpenter's Halloween. Even with Little House's penchant for melodrama and occasionally tackling of issues that would make the After School Special blush, "Sylvia" takes top honors for the episode most likely to be discussed on a therapist's couch. If Michael Landon's goal here was prove that the series was not the sugary-sweet family fare it was thought to be, he certainly succeeded. He also succeeded in creating an episode that nearly derails the heart and spirit of Little House.
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