If Sleepy Hollow doesn’t break out of this “monster of the week” mold that it’s set itself in, it’s going to wind up as another Grimm, and we don’t need another one of those, because the Grimm we have is already pretty fucking stupid. Luckily, the surprisingly funny “And the Abyss Gazes Back” has more impact than Sleepy Hollow‘s previous two episodes, because the stakes are much more personal for Abbie.
This show focuses on Ichabod Crane a lot, and understandably so. Tom Mison turns in a great performance week after week, and as a man displaced in time, he’s inherently more interesting than anyone else (even if his first-hand acquaintance of every notable personage in American history does somewhat beggar belief). But for all of that, Abbie is the audience surrogate, and the show needs to remind itself – and us – of that every now and then. “Abyss” does a decent job of it.
Joe Corbin, son of the late August Corbin, is back from war and acting like a total dick. But there’s a reason: he’s a Wendigo, which is basically like a werewolf, but the transformation is activated by human blood and not the full moon. As usual, the creature makeup and CG looks great, and so do the transformation sequences, which is one are where network TV can really shit the bed. (Another scene that makes this more of Abbie’s episode than Ichabod’s: when he’s being chased by the Wendigo, she’s the one who saves the day, not him, as it has been for the last few weeks.)
Naturally, because this is Sleepy Hollow, these events lead back to Ichabod somehow, as it turns out that Henry was the one who cursed Joe with the affliction of becoming an awesome, ass-kicking monster. While Joe was in Afghanistan, he received a letter from Henry coated in “some white powder,” which turns out to be the ground-up bone that the Pied Piper’s flute (from “Go Where I Send Thee…”) was made of. And that, boys and girls, is why I cut this show so much slack. Henry offers to break the curse if Joe will bring him a bottle of Chinese poison that August hid somewhere in the woods.
After a surprisingly affecting scene between Joe and Ichabod, whose tortured relationship with his son somewhat mirrors Joe’s with his dad, Henry bursts in to get the poison. Of course, he then betrays Joe, and instead of curing him, he slashes his arm, which will turn him into the Wendigo permanently. Look, this doesn’t really matter, because we all know that Joe will either die or get cured, and in cases like this it’s almost always the latter. Spoiler: he gets cured, but the poison has some pretty dire ramifications.
Guys, here’s what happens with the poison, which was so cool that it almost made me bump this score up half a star. Henry pours it out onto a tray, and the poison, made of the toxins of several dead venomous insects, starts clotting together until it forms an awesome little spider, which then crawls into Katrina’s mouth. There is a 0% chance that she isn’t pregnant with some kind of demonic entity. See, even in its monster of the week episodes, Sleepy Hollow is pretty damn good about tying everything back in to the main storyline (however tangentially it might do it), and this is the kind of show that has the ingenuity to have a spider made of poison crawl into a main character’s mouth, which is why it’s the most entertaining show on TV right now.
A Few Thoughts
- Frank’s subplot in Tarrytown is actually pretty interesting. The show is smart to only show us bits and pieces, because too much could be boring. Orlando Jones showed a surprisingly convincing dark side tonight
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Director Doug Aarniokoski is really finding his footing with Sleepy Hollow
– This exchange, between Joe and Ichabod:
“Do you love your son?”
“In spite of all that’s happened…yes.”
“No matter what happens, tell him.”
- Clancy Brown is always welcome on my TV (insert obligatory “bring back Carnivale” rant here)
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