Home Featured TV Shows All TV Shows Movie Reviews Book Reviews Articles Frequently Asked Questions About Us

Sleepy Hollow: Awakening

Abbie: "You cracked the Liberty Bell?"
Ichabod: "A little."

Last week's wanton destruction of valuable tomes and a very special hologram was aggravating, so I was happy that they addressed the issue in the opening scene in the rare book store.
It even made me think that the mention of the Traveler spell in "Spellcaster" was set-up for the Witnesses to go back in time and retrieve the Fenestella archive. (Not to mention the Jefferson hologram.)

I did not expect them to travel back to 1781 and reset the freaking series, much less kill off a main character.

There was a lot of good set-up for the battle of the Witnesses against Katrina and Henry. Ichabod and Abbie again discussed that their relationship had to come first over everything, and they meant it — Ichabod fired a gun directly at Henry with intent to kill, although Abbie was the one who actually killed him in the end. I also liked the use of the Liberty Bell and bells in general because of their connection with witchcraft.

Henry's death was a shocker. I just wasn't expecting it. John Noble has been woefully underutilized this season; is this really the end of Henry? Because it's interesting that we were immediately moved to a time when Katrina was pregnant with him. Will he be reborn and raised by Katrina as Jeremy this time and turn out okay? I have absolutely no idea where they're going with this, and hey, we still haven't heard whether or not Sleepy Hollow will return for a third season. But at least the Cranes finally broke up and Katrina turned evil, as they've hinted she would many, many times. And way past time.

Abbie's "telephone call" in 1781 prison was to Captain Ichabod Crane. I am already looking forward to her explaining to him who she is and who the two of them are. Katrina won't send them back to 2015, so they're going to need a powerful witch. Grace Dixon, of course.

But whatever happens in 1781, it will change everything. Will Abbie and Ichabod have to start their relationship over? Will Abbie break up the Crane marriage again? Will that marvelous trip to the home improvement store have never happened? Seriously, Tom Mison with a power drill and a garden gnome, and the delicious Ichabbie banter. Sometimes I think that if that were all this show had to offer, it would still be worth watching.


The secondary action was all Jenny and Frank, as it should have been. The two of them have bonded on such a deep level that ending it alone together was fitting. I'm sure the real Frank would have approved of Jenny's Gorgon plan, and I honestly thought she would go through with it even after Frank was freed from Henry's spell.

But the way they left it made me think someone was going to turn to stone in the next episode. The only question is, who?

Bits and pieces:

-- "Hartley's Old Books" had a cat. I liked that little detail, since the owner was a possible witch.

-- Ichabod was right that the Liberty Bell had been cracked before 1846.

-- Oddly, I liked Henry and Katrina together. It was sort of sweet to see them showing genuine affection for each other. Although at a couple of points, it felt uncomfortably romantic.

-- The population of Sleepy Hollow in 1781 was 1,400. Very similar number to the 144,000 listed in the pilot episode. Actually, we probably saw the 1,400 in the pilot episode, too. Never mind.

-- Cynthia and Macey are descended from witches? They just threw that out there. I'm sure it will mean something. Come to think of it, Abbie and Jenny are descended from witches, too.

-- Henry had already started a little greenhouse when he redecorated Fredericks Manor. I liked that little touch.

-- Ichabod and Abbie tied to a stake awaiting flames fell under one of my ten rules of television. Except that it didn't begin with them tied to stakes. Maybe I should amend my rule. Or maybe not, since this episode most certainly did not suck.

-- When Abbie arrived in 1781, she was almost run over by a carriage. Nice little callback to what happened to Ichabod in the pilot episode.

Quotes (mostly Ichabod and Abbie, as it should be):

Ichabod: "I had no idea that a man out of time was itself such a timeworn literary trope."
Abbie: "Oh, sure. Doctor Who, Connecticut Yankee, Marty McFly, the list goes on."
Ichabod: "Here I thought I was rather unique."
Abbie: "Don't worry. You're the only one in the nonfiction section."

Ichabod: "It seems, absent any definitive guidelines to our role as Witnesses, we must continue to define the rules as we see fit."
Abbie: "We can get more specific. Like a Witness always tips the bartender, we never fight a land war in Asia…"
Ichabod: "We must refrain from spoiling the end of motion pictures. Thank you, 'Rosebud'."
Abbie: "Hey, forgive and forget."

Abbie: "It's stashed in the Masonic cell, in the container we used for the Horseman's head."
Jenny: "Right. Because everyone just has a head-storage jar laying around."

Henry: (to Katrina) "Your dark side becomes you."
Okay, a little creepy.

Ichabod: "What, pray tell, are seasonal items?"
Abbie: "It's a thing. People decorate their lawns for different holidays: flashing hearts for Valentine's, animatronic ghosts for Halloween, and Christmas is like the Superbowl of lawn deco."
Ichabod: "Which holiday requires monopedal pink birds and a band of barbate pygmies?"
Abbie: "Arbor Day."

Ichabod: "My good man, could you direct me to the store quadrant where I might find flint and steel?"
Store clerk: "Is that a CD or a cologne? 'Cause we don't carry either."
I loved that the lighter didn't work.

Four out of four monopedal pink birds, and I'm very much looking forward to the finale. Which I'm hoping isn't the series finale.

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

6 comments:

  1. I'm pretty sure Katrina arrived back in her already existing body. That must have been what she had planned.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I believe Katrina's future mind jumped into her past body, much like Desmond did in a couple episodes of LOST.

    ReplyDelete
  3. If Katrina's spell put her back in her old body, Abby shouldn't be able to exist in 1781 since she has never existed in that time period.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Or you get what apparently did happen, namely that Katrina jumped into her old body and Abby (not having a body in the time period) just appeared in her 2015 body. I'm not saying it necessarily makes sense, but that appears to be what happened.

    (I think it would have been really cool if Abby had occupied the body of an ancestor - played by the same actress, of course - or conversely if there were two Katrinas running around trying to accomplish opposing goals. But it doesn't look like it went down that way.)

    ReplyDelete
  5. Yes, that's how I took it, too. Katrina looked a bit surprised when she arrived to discover she was in her 1781 body, pregnant with Jeremy, so maybe it wasn't what she thought would happen. Abbie had no body to jump into, so her own went with her.

    I'm wondering if we're going to end up with two Ichabods.

    ReplyDelete

We love comments! We moderate because of spam and trolls, but don't let that stop you! It’s never too late to comment on an old show, but please don’t spoil future episodes for newbies.