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Sleepy Hollow: For the Triumph of Evil

Jenny: "My conscience is clear. Ask Abbie if she can say the same."

Exploding eyeballs. That was new and strange.

This episode was about a demon Sandman thingy forcing Abbie to relive her deepest regret, which was lying to protect herself at the cost of her sister's freedom. But she was a kid! Kids do things like that. Good casting of the Mills girls in the flashbacks, and I really liked Nicole Beharie's Abbie in this one. I liked Lyndie Greenwood as Abbie's sister Jenny, too. Too bad Jenny escaped before Abbie could make it up with her.

The monster whose name I can't spell was actually pretty shuddery, with the black hollow eye sockets dripping sand. (Maybe the Sandman folk tale really is barbaric.) I particularly liked the sequence where its finger went through the glass. Lots of mirrors in this one, which of course made sense because it was reflecting sins back on the sinner. Abbie needed to relive the experience and this time, tell the truth and back up her sister, no matter the consequences — and she did.


The best part of the episode was the growing relationship between our two witnesses, Abbie Mills and Ichabod Crane. He's taking his commitment to Abbie very seriously, to the point of rushing into danger to save her, voluntarily following her into a terrifying dream world, and even letting himself getting stung by a scorpion. It's so endearing. And then they laughed together, and there was even banter. As much as I love Tom Mison, and I love him so very much already, Nicole Beharie is really wonderful, too. They're good apart, but better together.

Irving is becoming nicer and a lot more reasonable. He actually didn't blow his top (pun intended) when Morales left that headless horseman sign in his office. And he allowed Abbie and Crane to set up shop in that storeroom full of strange antiques and artifacts. Very Buffy. I like it.

This week's "man out of time" stuff was again great fun but didn't go over the top. I loved Tom Mison's face when he tasted the Red Bull. Ichabod was absolutely crushed when he heard what happened to the Native Americans after the American Revolution, and who could blame him? There was also a double reference to Back to the Future (the mention of the DeLorean to the tune of "Mr. Sandman").

In all, even though it was again a monster of the week, it was better than last week's. And that's a good sign.

Bits:

-- The shaman was a hoot. Geronimotors. :)

-- I liked the red door in the middle of the forest.

-- There was a Supernatural episode with a similar sequence where the brothers drank a potion and went into a dream world together. In fact, so far, Sleepy Hollow could be taking place in the Supernatural universe, couldn't it?

Quotes:

Crane: "What is the cause of the rift between you and Miss Jenny?"
Abbie: "I told you, it's complicated."
Crane: "I was born more than two centuries ago and my wife is a prisoner in some otherworldly realm. I'm not stranger to complications."

Irving: "The last thing they need around here is another episode of The Twilight Zone."

Crane: "Fear causes inaction, inaction causes pain, Q.E.D., fear causes pain."
And he's never even seen Star Wars.

Abbie: "She told the cops that she needed it because she was preparing for the End of Days."
Crane: "Well, she's perfectly sane then."

Jenny: "Are you Abbie's new boyfriend?"
Crane: "We are amicable, and yes, I am male, but I suspect you're implying something else."
Jenny: "What's your name, tall, dark and British?"
Crane: "My name is Ichabod Crane."
Jenny: "Huh. What do your friends call you? Icky?"
Crane: "Not if they wish to remain my friends."

Crane: "I requested coffee from the charwoman in the entrance hall, but she said you're particular to this beverage."
Abbie: "She's called a receptionist. Or Wendy."

Crane: "The shaman sells motorized carriages."

Seamus: "You guys into time travel? I got a tricked-out DeLorean in mint condition."

Seamus: "I don't know where you came from, but you can drop your 'friend of the tribe' shtick. No one's a chief, no one lives in teepees, and no one has powwows. Got it?"
Crane: "You stopped having powwows? I rather enjoyed those."

Crane: "No more scorpions. Ever."

Two and a half out of four Red Bulls,

Billie
---
Billie Doux loves good television and spends way too much time writing about it.

2 comments:

  1. I was so proud when Abbie did the right thing. She is a wonderful character.

    The partnership between these two gets better every week. I simply love the way they behave towards each other.

    ReplyDelete
  2. The Sandman was an incredibly creepy MOTW. "Shuddery," indeed.

    Although there were certainly a few good exchanges --- the "charwoman" one cracked me up --- I thought this one was a little lighter on the fun vibe compared to the first two episodes. However, that was probably appropriate given the very painful personal history they were tapping into with Abbie. And the generally more serious tone definitely helped to deepen the partnership between the two leads.

    I love the font they use for the subtitles. Very Buffy-esque and demon-y.

    ReplyDelete

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