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Sleepy Hollow: This Red Lady From Caribee

Abbie: "And look at me, profiling a bug."

Can you say, anticlimactic? You can?

Pandora has finished terrorizing the town of Sleepy Hollow with her six buds of evil, that Ichabod just realized were actually depicted on the back of the Sumerian witness tablet (oops), and now she's walked into the Treevil. Near the end, Ichabod said, "Trees are often associated with the entrance to the underworld." Are we talking about a Hellmouth here? Yes, everything reminds me of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I admit it. Want to make something of it?

Moving on to Pandora's final campaign of bugs as this week's fear, "Fear Itself," which was supposed to attack only people in authority, can I say how much I hate episodes about evil bugs? Even though it was somewhat comical when they formed into the bug lady with her huge bug eyes. And I did love Abbie and her do-it-yourself blowtorch.

But why on earth didn't Abbie get stung? She was surrounded by swarms of those Jack Spaniards repeatedly. If you're going to have your two heroes finally confronting the Big Bad in her secret lair, it should have been more exciting than the two of them running around in swarms of bugs, and not getting stung. This episode could have been a lot more interesting if Abbie or Ichabod had indeed been stung and had spouted some fun paranoia, or perhaps a romantic interest in each other. Much as Danny Reynolds just did about how he and Abbie had a very interesting vacation together in a shack on the Outer Banks, and he's still stuck on her.

Sigh. I've already mentioned that the Betsy Ross flashbacks aren't working for me. I think it was a clever decision on the part of the producers to add an ongoing character in flashback, an agent like Ichabod once was, but the casting was a mistake. Yes, Nikki Reed is beautiful, and I like the idea of a Colonial spy who was a woman from history, but... I don't know. Let your casting imagination fly free. Whom should they have cast other than Nikki Reed that could have made it work?

Sleepy Hollow still has Tom Mison, which means I'll most likely watch it until the end. (Although if they don't pull it together soon, I'm betting this will be their last season.) I enjoyed his first date with Zoe Corinth in front of the knife-wielding Benihana chef, the zingers about tipping and the internet, and their little constitutional later on in the meadow. It still seems like they're working up to Zoe being either evil or cannon fodder, but so far, it's fun. Maybe the outcome won't be so predictable, after all.

While Ichabod is pursuing his new love interest, he seems to want Abbie to pursue one of her own — and he keeps hinting that it's Danny Reynolds, who clearly has a problem with the fact that Abbie has a "roommate." Danny will probably be in the know and part of our supernatural crimefighting team before the end of the season, even though he doesn't do much for me yet. At least I like him more than Betsy Ross, which is damning with faint praise.

Oddly, most the real action in this episode took place in the completely separate Jenny and Joe plot, where the two of them confronted the evil Atticus Nevins, and Jenny ended up absorbing the red shard of Anubis into her hand, with not so pleasant consequences. The Obeah white-eyes guy, Azzaca, told Jenny, "A shadow older than time falls over your soul. You shall be claimed." What's older than time? Was that just demon hyperbole?

The constant references to August Corbin continued. We still don't know whether August was trying to stop Atticus Nevins or was partnering with him. I thought Nevins was suggesting that something supernatural had hold of both himself and August, and it wasn't their fault. ("You're drawn to the darkness, and you can't look away.") Hopefully, Clancy Brown will show up soon in flashback so we'll know.

Bits:

-- The six buds of the Treevil were secrets, chaos, loneliness, innocence lost, death, and fear itself.

-- This week's flashbacks were to a youthful looking George Washington in December, 1776. Nice to see Grace Dixon again. Maybe they should have centered the flashbacks around Grace instead of Betsy Ross.

-- How much money did August hide in those secret bank accounts? Maybe our team could all quit their jobs and focus on supernatural crime-fighting?

-- Pandora has way too many gorgeous outfits. Where is she getting her clothes? Okay, they're all conjured. Maybe my comment should be that Pandora's imagination has great fashion sense.


Quotes:

Zoe: "Twenty questions to ask on a first date?"
Ichabod: "I see we both walk the same internet paths."

Abbie: "Another victim. Housewife, mid-thirties, chairwoman of the PTA..."
Ichabod: "Don't acronym, lieutenant."

Joe: "What happened to him, anyway?"
Abbie: "He was stung by a Trinidadian paranoia monster."
Joe: "Welcome to Sleepy Hollow."

Nevins: "In this game, son, the debts collect you."

Abbie: "The hive?"
Ichabod: "Middle of the lair, above the pool."
Abbie: "We start with that, then the bitch with the box."

Reading over what I've written, it must be obvious that I'm disenchanted with Sleepy Hollow this season. I understand that they've been trying to establish Shannon Sossamyn's character and story in the past six episodes, too, and I like Shannon Sossamyn, but I'm ready for the whole thing to take off now.

Two out of four gorgeous earrings,

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

13 comments:

  1. Applaud your talent and commitment Billie, but the latter seems to go a little too far. Why is this show still getting live coverage when better shows are on offer?

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  2. Well, I am still watching because of Tom Mison. The rest is just meh.... I don't like Abbie anymore, there's something with her face, lately the only expression is boredom... I don't know, the dynamic seems to have been broken.

    As far as Nikki Reed, boy! she simply can not act. Like at all. I think literally anyone would have been a better choice... Nina for example, he he

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  3. Anon2, I'm still watching because of Tom Mison, too. Nina Dobrev. That's hilarious.

    Anon1, I'm also reviewing The Walking Dead and Supernatural, as well as rotating episodes of The 100. And Rectify, which I'll be getting back to when the fall season calms down. If I decided not to do Sleepy Hollow any more, I probably wouldn't pick up anything else. If I wanted to review another show, what do you think I should be covering instead?

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  4. Gillian Jacobs could have been Betsy Ross.

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  5. I give up. This show is on the fast road to cancellation. The reviews are lovely, and I thank you for doing them. But bugs..ew. I can't with bug episodes. Betsy should have been anybody but Nikki Reed. Megan Ohry? I'd rather have Grace Dixon too.

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  6. How about Killjoys? I wish there were some decent reviews about this show. Its one problem is that it reminds too much one beloved series with young Nathan Fillion starring, while the girl playing the lead role in Killjoys, good-looking as she is, will hardly ever be his match. But the story is exciting, and the characters are intriguing. Mysterious past...

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  7. I saw the pilot of Killjoys, but that was it; it didn't grab me. However, I did review the entire run of Firefly, including the movie. Will that do? :)

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  8. "I think literally anyone would have been a better choice... Nina for example..."

    I hate to sound mean, but all I've been thinking during the Betsy Ross flashbacks is that Ian really settled after he blew it with Nina.

    Which isn't fair, since Nikki Reed is a perfectly nice-looking woman and (probably) a sweet person. She just seems to lack something that an actress needs to be an exciting screen presence. Charisma, maybe? Presence? Magnetism? The "It" factor? Anyway, whatever it is, she doesn't have it.

    Now I do feel mean... :(

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  9. Don't feel mean, TheShadowKnows. I was thinking the same thing. Unless I'm being mean, too. I have nothing against Nikki Reed personally, but she most certainly isn't what this series needed.

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  10. "Charisma, maybe? Presence? Magnetism?"

    I think you are right, TheShadowKnows. I think it is all of the above. Take Tom, for example - he steals every single scene! Nikki just either trying to hard, or not enough.

    Now, I'm being mean too.

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  11. Fox is moving Sleepy Hollow to the Friday death slot, starting in February. Not good news for this show but also, not a surprise.

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  12. Oops, forgot the link:

    http://tvline.com/2015/11/10/sleepy-hollow-friday-schedule-fox/

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  13. Ah if only Nina Dobrev had been Betsy. She would have been fun and sexy.
    Ouch friday night..it's getting cancelled isn't it? Boo hiss, bad writers.

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