Sleepy Hollow Episode 2.5: Never Fall in Love With a Handsome Englishman When Death is on the Line!!!

Nevermind all his women!  I'm shipping Ichabod and Shaft-the-Crow.

Dear M. Raven Metzner and All Sleepy Hollow Writers,

Thank you for your recent love letter to Sleepy Hollow fans, aka Episode 2.5, “The Weeping Lady.” Missive received, and on behalf of fangirls everywhere, back-at-cha, in triplicate.

Which is not, of course, to say that I'm not going to complain here and there. Hey, it's me; of course I'm going to find something to criticize. But mostly I just need to wax as-poetic-as-I-can about how marvelous, what a treat this episode was.

Since he first wandered onto that bit of 21^st century pavement in his tall, black boots, wide sapphire eyes bewildered, long hair flowing, Ichabod Crane has been a sex-symbol/dashingly romantic figure to many of us. With rare exception, though, you writers have bought into this only very cautiously, a bow to Abbie here, a bit of naked-time-traveler-in-the-shower comedy there. And good on you for it, as that restraint has paid off handsomely in character development and a large, dedicated, breathless fan base.

Gently, tenderly, you have begun to literally let Crane's hair down this season, and as long as you don't overplay it, it will remain a welcome indulgence. In “The Weeping Lady,” bless you, the man finally gets to play Dashing Romantic Figure par excellence across the board, an inadvertent ladykiller in every sense of the word, mostly without ever straying from the proper, chivalrous, cantakerous and hilarious Ichabod we know and love. (And when he does stray, it has nothing to do with him playing Dashing Romantic Figure, but more on that below).

The first of Crane's victims of love to be introduced and, unfortunately, promptly dispatched is none other than the lovely Miss Caroline, aka, Ichabod's Outlet Mall, his one non-apocalypse-fighting friend in Sleepy Hollow. We met Caroline in last season's finale at a revolutionary war reenactment when, ironically, Crane mistook her for Katrina. The entire Ichabod and Caroline opening scene is brilliantly hilarious, although I do think my best friend was right: it strained credulity that so handsome a man has had so little experience with female infatuation he couldn't recognize it smacking him in the breeches.

Alas, sweet Caroline, we hardly knew ye.

Meanwhile, Crane's ever-present worry for Katrina takes us to the lovely witch finally doing something!And using magic to do it! Even if Shaft-the-Crow did bite her three times, by God, she sneaked a letter out to her husband. Of course, as many have already complained, while Katrina may be a thoughtful and brave wife, she's not proving herself much of a spy—her supposed job these days--as the letter provides no intel whatsoever as to Team Moloch's plans for the apocalypse. But then who cares, really, because—this bears repeating—Katrina finally did something! And to our shock, delight, and ultimately, horror, she keeps doing things throughout the episode!

Thank you, so much, costume designers, for finally putting Katia Winter in a dress that doesn't force her boobs up into her nose. Talk about overkill; Katia Winter is so unbelievably gorgeous she could wear sackcloth and ashes and still be sexy as hell. Mind you, it's not a particularly plain, Quakerly new dress you gave her, but then if Abraham's shopping for her, what can we expect?

Speaking of Abraham, the best description of the scene which follows between him and Katrina also came from my best friend who described Abraham as “creepy as fuck,” and felt she needed to “boil her eyeballs after watching that.” Poor Abraham...he was starting to seem almost human, and then he had to go and confess himself a patient would-be rapist/murderer. Nice.

I'm kind of loving Henry's and Abraham's phone system through mirrors. It's such a gloriously campy, Disney mode of communication, but then, so is Katrina and Crane's Hogwarts derivative. More important, it's kind of hilarious and totally works. One thing pestered me, though. In one of the earlier episodes the season, the director used a mirror to show us that, while Katrina-with-the-enchanted-necklace can see Abraham as human, Henry still sees him as the Headless Horseman. But in their bewitched Skype call, Henry see Abraham exactly as Katrina does. Wonder how that is....

The second scene between Crane and Caroline, and the scene in Abbie's SUV which preceded it, are absolute perfection. Caroline was utterly charming and totally believable, and Crane--as written, acted, and directed--proved himself in every way the chivalrous, honorable English gentleman entirely deserving of Caroline's (and our) swoons. The bow was executed far more stiffly and clumsily than Ichabod's charming bow to Abbie in Season 1, but I suppose that's appropriate as Abbie is far more dear to Crane than Caroline.

But, naturally you guys—being YOU GUYS—follow this heartfelt, adorable scene by promptly murdering the unsuspecting Caroline with an unknown spectre. Honestly, how could you make us like Caroline so much and then immediately kill her off? Who do you think you are, Tim Minear? George R.R. Martin? I'm officially starting the Bring Caroline Back petition here and now. As we all know, death of one's character is no barrier to an acting job on Sleepy Hollow. It shouldn't be only the evil spirits who can wander around the Hudson Valley Undead; why not the benevolent ones too? Plus, Caroline's hilarious, and at some point, Ichabod will need some more new clothes.

Thank you for making space for Ichabod to grieve his new, lost friend a little before rushing headlong into the next set of catastrophes. Tom Mison makes Ichabod's grief and shock palpable, but not overplayed—perfect for a man who has buried too many friends and comrades, but wasn't really expecting to bury this one this morning. Likewise the tender professionalism of Beharie's Abbie keeps the scene grounded.

As our detectives begin their search for Caroline's killer at a spot under a bridge where high school kids go to make out, we are treated to an absolutely adorable Man Out of Time moment. Crane informs Abbie he knows perfectly well what a “lovers' lane” is, and whilst remaining true to his grief, he still manages to make us laugh describing a betrothed couple holding hands, followed by their parents to stave off any impropriety. Because of the potential for tonal whiplash, the scene couldn't have worked had Mison and Beharie not nailed it.

They nailed it.

The trip to the high school for intel kept blessedly brief (what the hell was Crane's comment re: half-dressed teen girls, “I'm duly impressed with their...spirit,” supposed to mean?), we move on to the Sleepy Hollow library, which proves one of the more exciting places in this little burg. Flirting, gunshots, near drownings, CPR, enchanted avian mail deliveries, and the best collection of historical fiction in the area—all in one building!

Everything that happens in the library is awesome, even the bits that makes no sense or ring wildly untrue. As our heroes “divide and conquer” to research the ghost story told them by the teen lovers (I do not think that phrase means what you think it means), Abbie runs into Hawley, and Crane runs into a crow. The crow delivers to Crane Katrina's pointless letter, in a scene worth everything Mison and the crow-wrangler went through to get it. I may the only person shipping Crane and Shaft, but I am most sincere.

Meanwhile, Abbie's so over yellow-bellied Hawley, she moves on to shooting at ghosts, specifically one very weepy lady who—HELLO?!?!--perfectly fits the description of the spirit they're trying to find.

Not to be outdone, the Weeping Lady promptly creates a very wet hole in the floor and pulls Abbie down into it. Turns out that through some kind of groovy magic, the hole goes straight to the river, and Abbie sees this when she briefly surfaces during her resistance to Weepy's determination to drown her. Crane frets uselessly for a while, while patrons seemingly flee what has quite suddenly become a very bizarre crime scene, before FINALLY reaching his arm just-a-little-ways-under-the water to grab Abbie.

By the time he finally succeeds in grabbing her, Weepy is happy to surrender Abbie because the latter is no longer breathing. Crane's terror and anguish as he concludes Abbie is dead are magnificent, as is Hawley's pushing him out of the way to do CPR (Yea! Hawley did something useful! Boy, everybody's just starting to represent here in Sleepy Hollow, aren't they?). In a season notable for its effort to ground the crazy in the sane reactions of ordinary people, you can't help wondering how the hell Abbie explained nearly drowning in a library to the paramedics.

Hawley departs without fanfare. His “gotta go see a guy about a thing,” works completely because a) that's pretty much what Hawley's always doing, and b) unless it involves Henry, nobody cares. Crane, meanwhile informs the speedily recovered Abbie that, while the “mobile doctors” tended to her, he did some more research on their perp. Sure he did. Yeah. That happened. Like Ichabod would leave her side for a nano-second after something like that? Uh-uh. Nope.

Once we're back in the Bat Cave, I have to twiddle my thumbs for a very long time waiting for Abbie and Crane to figure out that the Weeping Lady is, in fact, Crane's jilted ex-fiancee, Mary Wells. So, this is why you showed us Crane all flustered and taken aback by Caroline's advances; so that when all the signs were spelled out for him in plain English, and the Smartest Man In The Room still couldn't read them, we'd find that believable?

Sorry, guys. Good idea, didn't work. I just found myself gnashing my teeth in frustration at how long it took Abbie to figure it out, let alone Ichabod This-Couldn't-Possibly-Be-About-Me Crane (just because most of the villains and all currently known Horsemen of the Apocalypse became Horsemen of the Apocalypse because they were heart-broken by you, Handsome)!

For the Smartest Man In The Room to suddenly stop being the smartest man in the room because a woman is involved can make perfect sense, provided you set it up a hell of a lot more explicitly. We all know Crane makes some pretty piss-poor decisions where Katrina's involved, but in those instances he's blinded by passion and pride, not ignorance of his own capacity to captivate. For now, it felt quite off. And it makes absolutely no sense whatsoever that Abbie would be that slow.

The flashback scene was absolutely gorgeous, although trying to convince us that the guy who thinks Versailles is quaint is going to live with his new bride in that small house and become a farmer is pushing your demands for willful suspension of our disbelief a bit far. Enter Mary Wells, the ex-fiancee Crane thought he had left behind in England for good. Even though she's a little bit totally crazy, to paraphrase Abbie, you got to admit Mary kinda nails what's happening between flowing-haired, romantically-open-shirted-Ichabod and gorgeous, equally-flowing-locked Katrina.

I honestly don't know if I feel more sorry for Mary because Ichabod seems not to have told her he only cared for her as a brother does a sister when they ended the engagement, when it would have been most appropriate and helpful, or because wardrobe put her in that hideous dress.

Nicole Beharie and Tom Mison are perfect throughout these scenes, with one exception I can't even believe I'm going to make. As someone who has complained mightily of Stage Crane, about the last thing you'd expect to hear from me is frustration with Mison underplaying his character. Yet, I really wanted to see the fear and horror dawning on Crane as he realizes that a) Caroline died, and b) Abbie nearly died, at the hands of a spectre whose heart he broke, and that c) Katrina is next.

Upon this realization our heroes race to save Katrina (something the Scooby Gang spends far too much time doing) only to find that, naturally, she's already been taken, and Headless is searching for her too. It probably didn't help that first they had to stop off to see Hawley for no reason whatsoever. The weapon they “acquire” from Hawley proves useless; the only valuable thing in this scene is Beharie's Abbie finally asking the men to stop their pissing contest.

Once they realize Katrina's been taken and head for the river, the story takes a turn for the epically interesting.

Katrina, the witch—finally freed of the wards Henry's placed around Abraham's lair to weaken her powers--manages to save herself from The Weeping Lady. Can I get an “amen” on that, my sisters? (Mega-props to actress Katia Winter for doing her stunts on that one, too). Not only that, but once Abbie and Crane arrive, Katrina (not Crane nor Abbie) deduces that Henry has made this previously benevolent spirit corporeal and deadly, a deduction which in turn gives her the knowledge needed to send Mary's spirit on “to a better place” (presumably one that isn't managed by a guy with rams horns sticking out of his head). Of course, she can't tell us this without intoning that her very soul may not survive the use of such dark magic, at which point Abbie, who simply doesn't do drama where stopping the Apocalypse is concerned, immediately volunteers to help keep Katrina's spirit safely on this side of the grave.

Katrina and Abbie say the necessary incantations as Crane tries to ward off the enraged Mary, but it turns out that while the “sending-you-on-to-a-better-place” incantations can immediately rob a murderous spirit of her murderous thoughts, you have to wait a little while for them to take full effect, sort of like a Miracle Max pill. Mary, therefore, gets a brief respite of life again, this time dying in her beloved Ichabod's arms, but not before pointing to Katrina as the cause of her suffering.

Crane asks Katrina why Mary pointed at her. Katrina gives him a plausible answer, but not the real one: big mistake. Huge. Because Crane FINALLY figures out that Mary, a woman of incredible tenacity, would never have given up on him that easily. So Crane, who has had it up to here with Katrina keeping secrets from him, demands an explanation—now, in the middle of the night, in the middle of the woods, with a dead body on his lap and the Horseman on the hunt. Katrina eventually spills all, or at least most, of the beans.

In flashback we come to learn that Mary demanded a meeting with Katrina after Ichabod had rejected the former's suit. In that meeting she accuses Katrina of all sorts of not very nice things that make one's hair stand on end the same way Abraham's description of Ichabod in Episode 2.02 did. Are these hints? Will we look back on this scene after the finale and realize Mary was right? We don't yet know.

What we do know is that Mary comes at Katrina, as though to attack her, and goes over a cliff. You Sleepy Peeps were very clever and very coy about how you showed us that. We see Mary running towards Katrina, and then, from the bottom of the cliff, we see Mary fall. But we have no idea what happened in the interim. Did Mary trip on a branch as Katrina told Ichabod? Did Mary attack Katrina, and in fear and self-defense, Katrina pushed back hard enough to send the unfortunately-clad woman over the cliff.

Or, as has been wildly speculated on the net, did Katrina commit cold-blooded murder to keep Mary from taking Ichabod from her?

We don't know. And I love that we don't know. What I don't love and don't buy is Ichabod going all ape-shit on Katrina about all the things she's kept from him. Okay, sure, some of them are huge. The fact that his childhood friend and former fiancee died in front of Katrina--whatever her involvement in said death--and that Katrina not only got rid of the body but mimicked Mary's handwriting in order to convince Ichabod she had returned to England is maybe the kind of thing she shouldn't have kept from her husband. I get him being angry about that. It's kind of a biggie.

But he's angry at and suspicious of Katrina before that. Before he has any idea what happened to Mary, he's already more willing to trust the corpse who five minutes ago was trying to kill every woman close to him than his wife who spent 231 years in purgatory and lost her only son in order to save him?!?!?

Let's look at Katrina's supposed list of crimes against Ichabod. Her keeping from him that she's a witch, in colonial New England? How exactly does one bring that up in conversation? Her keeping from him the fact that she was a spy for Washington? Isn't keeping what you do from your loved ones part of the job description? And as for her keeping from him her pregnancy, if we could all just step back to Season 1 for a moment we'll remember both that Katrina claimed she didn't know she was pregnant until after Ichabod “died,” and they hadn't exactly had much time for catching up on the others' news in the present before Ichabod learned it himself.

As for her not telling him he's a Witness, actually she tells him he's Neo, aka The Chosen One, almost as soon as she meets him. If he didn't bother to ask her what that meant, well...okay, maybe that's kind of a biggie.

But here's what I think is unfair. Crane rips Katrina a new one about all her “deceptions,” yet his BFF Gdubs also kept from Crane that he was a witness, that Katrina was a spy, and I suspect, that Katrina was a witch (after all, Franklin knew). Yet in our very next episode there's lovely Ichabod, toasting George Washington and comparing him to the Biblical Joshua. No censure, no anger, no resentment for his old pal.

Either this is showing us a side of Crane that I like not at all—in which case, cool, interesting, looking forward to seeing where it goes—or I am a complete nutjob for thinking that a woman who alienated her coven and the masons, was forced to give up her son to protect him (whoops), and spent more than 200 years alone in purgatory in service both to the cause and the love of her husband, the woman who now remains a voluntary prisoner of the Horseman of Death, liable to be raped and beheaded, not necessarily in that order, by him at any time, all to serve the cause and protect her husband, deserves to be cut the tiniest little bit of slack.

Man, no wonder Moloch wants Katrina on his side! Talk about a warrior with a serious commitment to the cause, and an extraordinary willingness to sacrifice for what she believes in. Katrina would be an incredible ally for Team Apocalypse; I just hope Team Stop the Apocalypse gets their shit sufficiently together that they don't lose her to Abraham's, ahem, sincere, ahem, concern, ahem, and charm, cough, cough, cough.

If there was anything I found more disturbing than the noble, self-sacrificing, secretive, Constantly-Captured-Katrina turning into Possibly-Murderous, and Certainly-Confoundingly-Complicated-Quaker Katrina, it was Ichabod's Borderline Personality Disorder rearing its ugly head in Act 6.

One of the defining character traits of a person with BPD is the tendency to put someone on a pedestal and then kick the damned thing out from under them the first time they fail to live up to your idealized expectations. One minute he's telling us that Katrina walks on water and the next he's bemoaning to Abbie that marriage is difficult on its best days.

Whoa! Who are you and what have you done with the Ichabod who made Yolanda cry with tales of a perfect fairytale love? Thank you, writers, for finally bringing Ichabod out of the clouds and letting us see him as a real married man who apparently just discovered that he's married to a real flesh-and-blood woman. But to switch so quickly from Mr. Utterly Besotted to “well, I can't trust her, so I guess, Abbie, I'd better stay loyal to you” gave me total, absolute emotional whiplash.

And Abbie. God I just love Abbie, how she's so over it--“This is another Katrina thing, isn't it?”--how she's way too smart to get drawn into this soap opera. She's figured out she can't trust which Ichabod's going to show up on This Week at the Apocalypse: devoted fellow-witness? Distracted, desperate, overwrought husband? Devastated and heart-broken father? Furious warrior? God bless our tough-as-nails Abbie, she just rolls with it, week after wacky week.

I'm not a ladykiller.  I just play one on TV. 

At this point, I'm really not convinced that Our Dashing, Romantic Leading Man deserves Katrina or Abbie. I'm even thinking of bringing my personal S.S. Ichabbie into port and torpedoing that baby, because if The Weeping Lady has taught me nothing else, it's given me the second most important lesson in international relations. The first, of course, is never get involved in a land war in Asia. But the second has got to be never fall in love with a handsome Englishman when Death is on the line!

Sleepy Hollow Episode 2.6: No More 'Dances with Wendigos' Guys, Please!

Writers, Sleepy Hollow is a great show, but it can, and must, be better.

The chihuahua is by far the best thing about this scene.

Episode 2.6 had so much to commend it, from a story perspective, the performances in particular of Nicole Beharie, Zach Appelman, and Orlando Jones, the editing, lighting, and special effects. Thematically, you went to both a good and interesting place. I want to spend this critique telling you how wonderful I thought that all was.

I can't.

In the beginning, namely Episode 1.02 last season, you sowed the seeds for a potentially appalling or potentially liberating relationship between Sleepy Hollow and the American Genocide by having Ichabod Crane, a Revolutionary War soldier working under George Washington, be surprised by Euro-America's devastation of Indigenous America. Tom Mison's extremely touching, well-acted-- albeit wholly unbelievable--shock and horror that entire nations Ichabod considered his friends are all but gone laid the groundwork for some compelling story lines and storytelling. But then you had Abbie sum up the post-Revolutionary invasion of Indian Country with, “after the war, the new government and the Native Americans fought over land,” effectively heading Sleepy's relationship to the invasion and ethnic cleansing of this continent right to the edge of a cliff. Last Monday night, with “And the Abyss Gazes Back,” you dove right off of it.

We need to start with the roots of this problem, because they produced the tree that brought forth this unfortunate fruit, and will continue to do so if left unaddressed.

Root #1: Making Ichabod Crane ignorant of the genocide of Indigenous Americans.

The genocide executed by the American armies, government and people was well, well under way by the time Ichabod Crane came to the colonies. It was not something that started as a response to “battles” between the colonists and native nations after the war. Crane, as an intimate of Washington, would have been well aware of both the assaults on Native communities and the efficacy of some indigenous resistance resulting in massacres of American settlers.

Root #2: Ichabod Crane, as a soldier in the American army, fought beside the Mohawks, becoming what Seamus Duncan caustically referred to as a “friend of the tribe,” or as we're seeing this season, multiple Native nations.

The Mohawks, along with the majority of the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois confederacy), sided with the British in the Revolutionary War, believing that their chances of survival were stronger under Crown rule than colonial. As it happened the War proved devastating for the Iroquois.

As for friendships with members of other Native nations, while it's far from impossible, the level of intimacy Crane would have had to have to become fluent in as many languages, spiritual beliefs, and hunting techniques as Sleepy Hollow suggests requires far more from this audience member than willing suspension of disbelief. It requires a lobotomy.

Root #3: Ichabod Crane's BFF, George Washington, has consistently been portrayed as a veritable saint in the War of the Sons of Light against the Sons of Darkness, yet both during the Revolution and after, Washington was personally responsible for ordering horrific acts of ethnic cleansing and scorched earth policies which devastated Native nations. (I still can't believe you haven't addressed the fact that Washington manumitted his slaves only upon his death).

Root #4: Abbie's reduction of genocide to “the new government and the Native Americans fought over land” was only tolerable if it was going to be revisited. While it's completely believable that a young police officer reared and educated in Sleepy Hollow, NY could have been so inadequately educated as to consider this an accurate reflection of what transpired, it is inconceivable that showrunner Mark Goffman, a graduate of Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, could come to this script that ignorant of American history.

As for plot exploitation of Native peoples, things started getting ridiculous in Episode 1.02 with Crane and Abbie drinking a supposed Mohawk potion that included plants not indigenous to North America, and then being stung by a scorpion, an animal that could not possibly ever have lived in that bioregion. This is one of those things that's more irritating than offensive, and I'm happy to throw it in the cabinet of Totally Absurd Sleepy Hollow Phelebotinum, the things I put up with as long as the heart of the story is there.

Something I can't throw into that cabinet is your playing the first Native person we meet in Sleepy Hollow as an environmental villain for laughs. Of course there are Native people who pollute as badly as non-Natives, but without any context or understanding of how that came to be, this is wildly inappropriate; attributing such behavior to a medicine man borders on idiocy.

This season, so far, we've been told that Crane was trained to hunt by the Abenaki. Hawley questions Crane's sanity given that the Abenaki have been gone from New York State for 200 years. I'm still wondering how much time the Abenaki have spent in New York State period.  Doesn't Abenaki mean “People of the Land of the dawn,” or “Eastern people,” as in, the first folks to see the sunrise?

More to the point, the Abenaki are simply used and exploited by the writers to give Crane forest cred. No discussion of the impact of the colonies or the War on the Abenaki is even attempted.

This brings us to Episode 2.6, wherein we learn the mind-boggling “facts” that Ichabod Crane was close friends with Daniel Boone, lifetime enemy of the Shawnee, and close friends with the Shawnee, so much so that he is fluent in both the Shawnee language and spiritual customs.

Really, Sleepy Writers?

First off, why would Crane have known Boone or the Shawnee? While Boone fought in some battles, largely far from the center of Crane's activity, his primary purpose as a Revolutionary militiaman was facilitating the settlement by Euro-Amercans of the Shawnees' land, through force and terror if necessary. The vast majority of this land was west of the original colonies at the time Crane was active on the Revolutionary scene.

For Crane to have become fluent in Shawnee language and customs he would have had to have lived with the people for a substantial period of time and earned their trust. There's no way that could have happened and he remain a friend of Daniel, or Squire Boone, Jr. There's no way that could have happened and he be surprised, ala Episode 1.02, to learn that the majority of Native Americans are dead.

The Schoolhouse Rock version of American history you guys settle for and twist beyond recognition usually doesn't bother me, because a) it pertains to the “victors” in both the Revolutionary War and imperial expansion, and because b) the actual history of the events you're perverting is well-established in the American consciousness.

This doesn't work when we're talking about victims of genocide, particularly a genocide which continues to benefit the political and biological descendants of those who perpetrated it. Particularly when the genocide is still going on.

One can only conclude that you're either completely unaware of American history, or you're literally trying to whitewash it, painting the Boones and the Shawnees as pals after the fact (after, for example, the Shawnee killed 2 of Daniel Boone's children in battle, captured him and captured his daughter—sounds like a Crane family reunion). It's bad enough that you're exploiting Native people for storytelling purposes while giving absolutely no airtime to the injustices Euro-America continues to perpetrate against them, but this is way, way too much.

I should not have to give you props for hiring an indigenous actor--Sicangu Lakota Eddie Spears--to play Big Ash, but props nonetheless since last year you brought in (excellent but not indigenous) Australian actor Michael Teh to play a Mohawk medicine man despite the fact that there are hundreds, if not thousands, of talented, skilled, and unemployed indigenous actors in this country.

Spears gave a fine performance (though the Chihuahua is still my favorite character in that scene), given what he had to work with. I'm right up there with Genevieve Valentine: if we need to have new recurring characters, I'll take Big Ash over Hawley any time. But how is it Hawley managed to make friends with not one but FOUR Shawnees in upper New York State? Granted, Shawnees can be found anywhere these days, but I lived in Denver—the unofficial “capital” of Indian Country—and in 15 years I only met 3 Shawnees, two of whom were related to each other, and the other of whom was just passing through.

How did Ichabod know that Frank was the medicine man (for the love of God, please stop using the word “shaman.” There's no way a man who lived so closely with Native people would use that word)? Is it because he's the elder? That's not a requisite for being a medicine person. Never mind the more obvious phlebotinum leap, his calling this group of men a “Shawnee hunting party.”

Please, Sleepy Writers. You are so much better than this. Be better. How?

The show Longmire was recently cancelled, much to my dismay. While fans and producers are working hard to get it a new home, the show's indigenous consultant, who did a phenomenal job, Marcus Red Thunder, may be in need of a job.  Perhaps you could give him a call? 

http://alldigitocracy.org/how-aes-longmire-gets-it-right-when-portraying-american-indians/

Or, better still, hire a Native consultant who is actually from the Sleepy Hollow area. And then find yourself an excellent Native writer to join the writing staff and be with you in the room 24-7. This is not only good business, it's necessary reparation.

As for what worked in the episode, both the story and the themes of the episode were just marvelous. Every scene between Beharie and Appelman rang true, the theme of a soldier/warrior being cursed with both “nostalgia,” aka PTSD, and a “monster within,” by War was gorgeous, and largely well-executed. Thank you for giving at least a tiny bit of Frank Irving as a man who manages to fight the monster within and remain true, in the end, to himself, Henry Parish be damned.

However, speaking of people of color in Sleepy Hollow, enough with the White Guys already. Last year, you gave us three magnificent characters in Abbie Mills, Jenny Mills and Frank Irving. With the exception of Abbie, you've all but deleted those characters from the story, in favor of Nick Hawley, Abraham van Brunt, now Joe Corbin, and even Henry Parrish. Don't get me wrong—I love all four actors, and with the exception of Hawley, all four characters. But I don't want them in my show at the expense of Jenny and Irving. Even Reyes I'd be more interested in spending time with—she's proven herself a powerful, strong, brave woman, and one of these days I have a feeling she may also prove interesting.

I mentioned in my critique of Episode 2.4 that I was waiting for Hawley to go Full Han Solo on us and redeem himself. Not only has he yet to do so, but his character in 2.6 proved even more reprehensible, selling a “sacred mask” the Shawnee inexplicably and unbelievably sold to him. If you want us to accept Hawley even slightly as a suitor for Abbie, you have got to give Matt Barr beauty in something other than his biceps.

As for Crane in this episode, Mison did a largely credible job, at times very moving. But the scene in which Joe Corbin asks him if he loves his son did not land. Mison's subtlety in response to the question was spot-on, but tonally did not work at all because you preceded that exchange with the running joke of Henry going through “a rebellious phase.” I like both of these—Ichabod's pained love for his son, him treating Henry like a poorly-reared 3-year-old—but not together. As a result, I absolutely did not believe Ichabod when he said he loved his son. And I need to believe him; that's important. What happened to that passionate, angst-ridden father of “The Golem”? Has Henry's burying him alive gotten rid of all of that sense of protectiveness and guilt?

As for the scenes in which Crane is introduced to more aspects of the modern world, while I absolutely adore you for putting Tom Mison in long wig and yoga clothes and having him flash us his belly in a handstand, it's completely unbelievable that Abbie hasn't noticed yet that the man needs no help whatsoever in the abs or “double jug” department (no one could execute a handstand that well if he did). As for Ichabod playing video games, no, guys. Just. No. It's believable that Joe Corbin, a war vet who grew up with video games, would find himself playing them for relaxation upon his return from Afghanistan. It's completely unbelievable that a man as sensitive and empathetic as Crane, who fought a war in which more often than not he felt the breath of the man he killed on his face as he died, would find such a thing anything but deeply disturbing (see, for example, his reaction to the reenactors in last season's finale).

Finally, we're only six episodes in, and already you've used “bitch” twice in scripts. Please stop. I know it's the hip thing that all the cool kids are doing these days, but a large percentage of your audience comes from a demographic that deeply resents that word being used ever, in any context.

Sleepy Hollow Episode 2.4: Ichabod Enchants Abbie, and the Rest is History

You know, Sara, some of us would gladly spend a night in
the Pied Piper's lair if it meant we got to be carried around
in Ichabod Crane's arms afterwards. 

 Thank you writer Damian Kindler and director Doug Aarniokoski for giving us Sleepyheads another reason to get out of bed in the evening. "Go Where I Send Thee," the fourth installment of Sleepy Hollow's Season 2, while at times uneven, was an overall delight, and many times absolutely wonderful.


Following on the heels of last week's exceptional "Root of All Evil," Episode  2.4 had a lot to live up to, and it largely delivered. As ever, the heart of Sleepy Hollow is the relationship between Ichabod Crane (played by the insanely talented and even more insanely handsome Tom Mison) and police Lt. Abbie Mills (played by the equally talented and drop-dead,-forget-how-to-speak-English gorgeous Nicole Beharie). Both Kindler and Aarniokoski, Sleepy vets from Season 1, understand this and understand that Sleepy fans will tolerate pretty much any dumbass plot, any ludicrous phlebotinum you throw at us, as long as that heart beats steadily, passionately, and with a healthy dose of laughter throughout the episode. Balancing serious and tender moments of mutual defense and concern with the hilarious and near-perfectly executed bookend scenes of "Ichabod drives" and "Ichabod discovers cappuccino," the episode played like a love letter to the fans, while still serving the needs of story arc, season arc, and character development admirably.

"Go Where I Send Thee," which might have been more aptly titled, "Come Where I Lure Thee," opens with a young girl we've not met before being lured by a haunting flute melody down the stairs, out the door, and across the lawn of her gargantuan colonial-era house, to a creature standing in the woods. Before we can meet this creature, cut to Ichabod Crane passionately reminding us of his most pertinent recent history concerning encounters with dangerous creatures on horseback from behind the wheel of Abbie's 300-horsepower SUV.
As the camera moves to include Abbie, we see that she is finally teaching her two-hundred-and-sumpen-sumpen year-old partner to drive. Crane seems fearful, then defensive when she informs him she knows he's been taking lessons secretly from her sister, Jenny ("Jenny teaches Crane to drive" on the DVD, please!). But, as he seductively starts quoting Japanese proverbs to Abbie—in Japanese—we get our first hint that, like many things in Sleepy Hollow, the situation is not what it seems.
Ichabod, it turns out, has not only been practicing with "Miss Jenny," he's become something of an amazing driver. Combining humor, action, major unresolved sexual tension and fabulous word-free insight into Crane's character, Mison and Beharie take a wild, flirtatious-glance-and-laughter-filled ride through a parking lot, ending with Abbie deducing she's been played and ordering Crane out of her car.
What follows, continuing the secondary purpose served by Mison's horsey pre-drive soliloquy, is an impressively decent version of what I have come to call The Irritating Recap for Those of You Who Just Tuned In (or The Irritating Recap, for short). This is the scene, in every episode's first act, in which we are re-introduced to Ichabod, Abbie, their relationship as the two Witnesses foretold in the Book of Revelation, and the plight they face in trying to defeat the demon Moloch. In the same way that Tom Mison is waiting to see which writer will finally break him elocution-wise with the tongue-twisting speeches they write for Ichabod, I wait anxiously each week to see which writer is finally broken by the network's need to service its new viewers in this annoying manner.
Damian Kindler did not break.
Neither did Mison and Beharie, executing the tender scene which combined luscious Ichabbie feels ("it is not our fate for one of us to bury the other") with the (supposedly required) exposition. These two deserve an entire mantle of Emmys for managing to make this tiresome ritual sound almost-fresh each week.
The Irritating Recap blessedly concluded, they got back to flirting, which Mison and Beharie do so very well. Abbie: "That's not driving. That's unsafe operation of a motor vehicle without a license. I should arrest your ass for it." Ichabod: "Perhaps. If you could catch me." As my husband said, oh just get a room already, you two!
That said, I do take issue with one thing in that scene, namely its first transition, from humorous driving scene, to serious, heavy-emotion-filled scene. Scene transitions are, as I wrote last week, usually one of Sleepy's strengths. This one was not. Out of seemingly nowhere, Ichabod informs Abbie that she can "drop the facade," that he knows she is teaching him skills like driving to increase his independence, so that if anything happens to her, he can continue the struggle alone.
Using the word "independence" in this scene was a mistake, in my opinion, because it immediately harkens back to Episode 2.3, wherein Ichabod complains, fairly--lacking both cash and a government-issued ID--about having fought a war for independence but having none himself. That episode ended, sweetly, with Nick Hawley giving Crane a fake passport so that he can at least have a beer in a pub now and again (something Hawley rightly intuited that Englishmen consider their birthright).
Now, here we are, with Abbie giving her partner yet another tool of independence, and his response is to accuse her of trying to empower him to fight without her. That didn't work for me, Sleepy writers. But then, I tuned in last week. And the week before that.
More gorgeous flirtation between our heroes, then we transition back to our A story, also known as the plot. The little girl we met in the first scene, Sara Lancaster, has been declared missing, and Abbie (naturally) knows the girl's family. Our dynamic duo rushes to the scene to try to help (because apparently they're doing regular police work now as well as the supernatural kind?). While Abbie does some actually believable detective work questioning the girl's parents, Ichabod is relegated (by the new sheriff's orders against his involvement in same) to lurking in the bushes. Literally. But before we can hilariously reunite an irritated Ichabod with an even more irritated Abbie, we learn An Important Fact which, thankfully, pretends to be Unimportant: that the little girl's mother "forgot" to set their security alarm the night before.

We're also treated to more of Abbie's backstory as we learn that the elder Ms. Lancaster, the missing girl's mother, is Abbie's former case worker, from when she and her sister were placed in foster care. The two actors work together beautifully, and the scene is given the time it needs to land, and no more, thank God, because, despite their fine performances and the excellent direction, it's boring and we already knew Abbie must have had a caseworker. One can only conclude that this information, or this character, will be heard from again and prove most pertinent in an episode down the road. At least I hope so.

Soon enough we are back with our heroes blissfully bickering through a closed window. Abbie: "What are you doing?!" Crane (still in the bushes): "Helping!" Off they trudge together into the woods in search of missing "Miss Sara." Alas, the field trip into the woods also re-introduces us to the character I'll call "Stage Crane," whom we first encountered in the Season 2 premiere. Our heroes easily pick up Sara's trail, and then Crane goes all Prince Humperdinck on us and starts describing everything that happened based on a few broken twigs and some blood spatter. Abbie shows us that she learned all that stuff at police detective school too, thanks, and takes the lead back from him before finding a bone.

"That's no bone," Crane tells her ominously. "It's a space station."

Sorry. Wrong Episode IV. I meant a flute, an ancient Chinese flute to be precise, which this week's supernatural criminal mastermind thoughtfully dropped where it could be easily found by our heroes. Crane, who earlier showed off his knowledge of Japanese in relation to horseback riding, now shows off his knowledge of Chinese in relation to ancient instrumentation, before beginning to play the flute like he's had that specific instrument in his back pocket for years. (As someone who actually played the flute at one time, and knows how hard it is to get a decent sound out of one's own instrument, let alone an instrument one just picked up off the ground, I would resent this if I didn't so enjoy watching Tom Mison play, his execution of perfect omberture, and the gorgeous poetry of the flute-related scenes that follow).

The scene which follows is both haunting, as our beloved leftenant becomes hypnotized and wanders into a bog, and hilarious as Crane is so absorbed in his new toy he fails, at first, to notice her predicament. But below the surface there is another story being told, which becomes more apparent on their second adventure in the woods.

In the kind of swift stroke of genius that only Sleepy writers can get away with, Crane declares he knows exactly how the missing girl went missing. The act ends with Stage Crane making Big, Worried Eyes at Abbie, after announcing the flute belonged to a pied piper.

Let me explain about Stage Crane. Stage Crane is TV Crane's alter ego, who does and says everything bigger than is appropriate for the small screen, but in a manner which would work marvelously well on stage. I don't know if Stage Crane is the product of Stage Tom Mison, desperately missing that particular expression of his talent, or the Sleepy Hollow directors occasionally forgetting that while the show can get the joke, the characters never, ever can. Directors, writers, beloved Mr. Mison—please rein in the hand-porn and the blazing sapphire blues. I know we're meant to see a sharp contrast between Mills and Crane, with Abbie being our Sensible, Grounded Witness, and Crane being Reckless, Impassioned Witness. But between the differences in accent and language use, clothing, height, and gender, not to mention Mison's ethereal posture, the contrast between these two is ever-present to the watchful eye. I find nothing more attractive than a passionate man, but the expression of emotion in a character requires restraint to be effective; an American should not have to explain this to a Brit. Mison is most believable and most affecting when playing his part more naturally, especially in scenes of humorous flirtation or tender concern for Beharie. Yes, we know Ichabod is supposed to be the comic relief, but he's not a cartoon. He's a real person.

We begin the second act with lovely teasing between our two leads, but why is our Ichy suddenly so cold regarding his former flame, Betsy Ross? I so hope we find out in a later episode.

Given how exposition-heavy this entire episode is, the conflict between Crane's quick deduction that the Piper who lured an entire garrison of British soldiers to their deaths in his day must be the fellow who abducted Sara, and Abbie's "not-so-fast-Sherlock," "the modus operandi does not fit" is a welcome breath of fresh air. Nevertheless, it's their best lead. And so they concoct a plan for locating the Piper, and, presumably, Sara. Crane will record himself playing a short, haunting melody on the bone flute. Abbie will put it on a "30-second-loop" on her phone, and, as before, she will be drawn in her enchantment to the Piper, taking Ichabod with her.
Ichabod's chivalry takes a turn for the weird in this scene. When Abbie offered to stay behind in purgatory, Ichabod's pain was palpable when he vowed, "that is out of the question." But Mison plays this scene like the director told him Ichabod really does want to use Abbie as bait, and he's just supposed to give lip service to resisting the idea. This didn't ring true to me at all, given that the one thing Ichabod Crane is in his bones is chivalrous.
And now a question for the make-up department. Is the color on Tom Mison's face his natural tan, or does he have an unfortunate amount of foundation on? Because, especially in this scene—given the lighting--the color of his face doesn't remotely match the color of his neck and chest, and yes, we fangirls notice these things, thank you.
Back in the woods, we move into the most gorgeously poetic scene of the season thus far. But not before finally addressing the height difference between our leads in a charming manner. Abbie worries that Ichabod might lose sight of her in the woods. "A gillygaupus like me?" he responds with adorable self-deprecation. "I can see for miles at my height."


"And I suggest you retire that nickname right here and now," replies Abbie without missing a beat.


Perfection, Beharie, Mison, Kindler and Aarniokoski. That would be what it looks like.


Crane does a much better job of balancing his respect for Abbie's strength and capacity, the need to endanger her in order to find Sara, and his bone-deep need to protect her in this scene. He promises Abbie that, during her enchantment from the recording, "I will be with you at every moment." We see the woods from her point of view, as though enchanted. Then we pull out from her point of view to see Crane determined to protect her from the spell he—with her consent—put her under.

Let's just sit with this for a moment, shall we? In this season's second episode, Abbie worries aloud that her greatest weakness is her faith in Crane. In this scene, Abbie literally puts her life in Crane's hands. And he does not let her down. Crane walks with Abbie, wherever she leads, his primary responsibility throughout to protect her from how he has enchanted her. And her only comment on all this, as she comes under the spell of his music, is "so beautiful." It's really a sensually, gorgeously executed metaphor for the emotional aspect of their relationship, I think.


Unfortunately, in his effort to convey fear and concern for Beharie's Abbie, Mison again goes a bit over-the-top in his expressions. This gets worse when they encounter Nick Hawley, just spending the day hanging out in the woods, despite having been seriously injured by the Piper the night before. Stage Crane's exasperated "unbelievable" is just that. His Big Eyes in response to Hawley's claim that there's still time to save the girl also smacks unfortunately of melodrama.


After the second act break, we are treated to another round of one of the all-time great trios in story-telling: the brave, honorable hero, handy with a sword and willing to sacrifice himself for the good of all; the equally brave, strong, powerful (but short) woman with a big gun; the handsome, roguish privateer who's only in it for the money, but eventually becomes swayed by the cause. I loved this trio in 1977, when they were trying to save a galaxy far, far away, and I love them now, because they work.


So, we'll just pretend that it makes sense that experienced soldier of fortune Hawley hasn't bandaged up his knifed-up thigh yet, despite the fact that such an injury could be fatal, because it gives Abbie something to do while Hawley reveals, conveniently, almost all the answers our heroes seek. What he doesn't know, Crane easily deduces because he is always The Smartest Guy in the Forest. It seems that during the war, Ancestor Lancaster was forced to quarter an entire British garrison at his vast estate (where Sara now lives). The soldiers, not surprisingly, were lewd, rude and damned inappropriate to his daughters. Lancaster sought revenge on them by hiring the Piper, an assassin legendary for his speed, who proceeded to enchant and then dispatch the garrison in short order. Of course, to have such speed, Crane deduces, he must have been a demon, a man who sold his soul to Moloch, and therefore won't die (at least not until the Witnesses have at him). Crane also deduces that Lancaster must have tried to kill the assassin, betraying him after he'd completed his contracted work, and Hawley concludes that, in retribution, the demon takes one Lancaster daughter per year, at the age of ten, because at that age her bones are the perfect size to make his instruments of torture and mind-control.


The writers, director and actors make a valiant effort to transform this expository scene into an action scene via flashback, with slow-mo Guy Ritchie-esque sequences, as much violence and blood as they can get away with on network TV, and moves to make V from V for Vendetta jealous. As information dumps go, it's not the worst I've seen, but it's just way too long. At least it's followable, though, and sorta, kinda makes sense.


After we're all caught up on the history of our present conflict, Abbie tries to persuade Hawley to help them, much to Crane's chagrin, using the flute, as bait. She'll give it to Hawley, to sell to whomever, presumably, after they rescue Sara. If this doesn't sound like the Abbie you know, you've been paying attention. Crane's nervous, but trusts her. Smart lad.


Cut to Irving reading the Bible at Tarrytown Psych and we get this episode's second gorgeous piece of visual poetry, namely, a terrifying vision of who Irving might become as a servant of the Horseman of War: a demon/killer as skilled and vicious as the piper we just witnessed murder a British garrison a few scenes before.

Back in the forest, after using his smarts to complement Abbie's enchanted-homing-beacon technique and locate the entrance to the Piper's home, Crane's chivalry goes on holiday again. He and Hawley stare in terror at the entrance, as Abbie gamely leads them into the demon's lair, a cellar beneath a long-destroyed house. But this actually works, because it is entirely believable that fear would get the better of both Crane and Hawley in that moment, and it is entirely believable for the writers, and Crane, to let Abbie take the lead.


The lighting in the Piper's lair is very well done. It can't be easy balancing "terrifying" with "visible." Similarly, the sound work is very powerful. Walking with Abbie, we hear only her anxious breathing, which works wonderfully to build suspense. Once inside the cellar, we see the Piper's got a pretty macabre decorating sense, his walls covered in bones and dead, bloody animal carcasses. While the boys are busy checking out the Piper's instruments, Abbie stays on point and finds the girl chained in a chamber that resembles a well with a very helpful amount of sunshine coming in. She immediately sets to work picking the lock on Sara's foot, which looks like it's from Ichabod's era, because she's a Mills sister and apparently the lock hasn't been invented yet that they can't pick. (I guess we no longer have to imagine what delinquency she and Crane could perpetrate if they really set their minds to it).

Watching Matt Barr's Hawley come to grips with the existence of a very real monster, both in the moment and after the fact, is worth the price of admission itself. His and Crane's collaboration in and after the fight scene with the Piper gives their relationship a necessary fraternal beat, and Crane figuring out how to work a digitally timed explosive by just watching Hawley for a moment was--inexplicably--completely believable.

Crane's grabbing of the young Sara, then jumping to his feet to carry her away, is one of the most potent moments in the entire episode. So much is conveyed in his urgency, the manner in which he carries her, his primal need to protect her. Mison executes the scene absolutely perfectly. His performance took me back to "The Golem," and the passionate pain he felt for his son Jeremy, not knowing what had become of him, not having been able to protect him.


In the aftermath of Sara's rescue, Abbie and Crane confirm that they are mutually down with returning to the cellar to kill off the Piper, but Hawley's having none of it. He wants his payment for tactical support on Sara's rescue—the flute—and he wants a drink, not necessarily in that order. Abbie and Crane, apparently never having seen Episode IV: A New Hope, are shocked. They try to persuade the "privateer" to help them using silly arguments like the necessity of protecting the world from the apocalypse. Naturally, this goes nowhere. As Hawley's dramatic grandfather, Han Solo, once said, "What good is a reward if you ain't around to use it? Attacking that [fill in the blank with big, scary thing of your choice] ain't my idea of courage. It's more like suicide."

Barr is perfectly cast as Hawley. His terror is palpable but played with a healthy undercurrent of humor, his realization that the monster is real and likely to haunt him indefinitely rings true, as does his determination to remain consistent with the man he thinks himself to be. The contrast and juxtaposition between passionate Crane and reserved Abbie in this scene is also played to perfection.
Crane's proud, adoring smile in response to Abbie breaking the flute before letting Hawley have it will go down as a priceless moment/GIF in Ichabbie history. Fortunately, Hawley doesn't appear to hold Abbie's actions against Crane. His "good luck in the next round," to Crane seems as sincere as Grandpa Han's "may the Force be with you" to Luke, as the latter readied to confront the Death Star.
I wanted more, or at least better of Hawley this episode, but "he has to follow his own path; no one can choose it for him," as ole Princess Bagelhead used to say. More to the point, he has to redeem himself and earn our affection. For this trio to work as a story-telling tool, we can't dislike him indefinitely; I give Hawley one episode, two tops, before he flies the Millennium Falcon back to save Ichy's ass. (Just out of curiosity, how many synonyms does Ichabod know for "privateer" and can he express them with more sneering contempt?)

Abbie and Crane return Sara to her mother in a tender, dramatic slow-motion reunion scene, which suggested I should care about the Lancasters a great deal more than I do. The only one I really had any sympathy for in that scene was the young actress playing Sara, forced to release her grasp on Tom Mison's neck as she is pried from her cozy perch in his arms.

Lacking Hawley's support, but none of their determination, the Witnesses burst back into the Bat Cave (both through the front door this time, thank you; Sheriff Reyes' approbation be damned), to arm themselves for Round 2 with the Piper. And here at last we are treated to a scene in which Mison's Big Eyes not only work, but serve the scene beautifully. Abbie introduces Crane to noise-canceling earbuds, something she thinks will help protect them both since the Piper uses sound as a weapon. Crane's shift from skepticism to childlike wonder as he tries on the earbuds is gorgeous. Crane must be so focused and stressed out so much of the time that when he gets to discover something like this from the modern era, and react with marvel, it marks an ideal counterpoint to the rest of the show's tension. Mison again proves himself a wonder of the modern world.

Crane notices that something wasn't quite right about Sara's reunion with her mother. Apparently Sara's parents are either modern Quakers or hippies (redundant) since she has her mother's last name, Lancaster, rather than her father's. But that's not what bothers Crane. He notes and Abbie concurs that Sara's mom wasn't overjoyed to see her daughter. It's a painful, poignant moment—landed but not labored—when Crane says, "if someone rescued my child I'd be overjoyed, exuberant." Would you, now? Well, Ich, one could argue that's exactly what Moloch did when he resurrected Henry (ne Jeremy Crane, see also The Horseman of War). It's particularly pointed given that immediately after Crane says this, Abbie says--referring of course to the Piper--"our focus right now is to kill that thing before it comes looking for its prey." Nice subliminal nod to the season-long arc, Regarding Henry.

The importance of their object is underscored when Abbie and Crane realize through some computer digging--after Crane asks Abbie to "perform the log-in ceremony," the kind of thing that never fails to charm my socks off--the Lancasters really are cursed. Every generation a ten-year old girl is abducted by the Piper, and if one happens to get rescued, all the other children in her family die. What looks like the lower half of a noose comes foreground, out of focus, into the shot, as Abbie and Crane realize the Sophie's Choice that Sara's mom has had to make—sacrifice her daughter, or lose all three of her sons. After their deduction, we need nothing more than Sara's mom looking at her sleeping, recently-returned daughter with tears in her eyes to know what's coming.

Abbie and Crane race to the Lancasters' home just in time to see their three boys being taken to the hospital with fever. Crane inexplicably deduces that they will be dead by nightfall unless he and Abbie succeed in breaking the curse. Sara and her mom, of course, are MIA, no doubt headed back to Piperville. This means Crane will need a good weapon for taking on the Piper, and happily, the Lancasters have what may be the best fighting cutlass ever made hanging on a wall in their house (the walls of Sleepy Hollow homes are literally littered with ancient, yet very sharp, swords).

The scene in which Crane busts the glass on the sword case and takes the sword is one of the sexiest thus far in the entire series. Mison exudes a confidence in his physical grace that is nothing short of breathtaking.

Abbie lets Crane drive so she can safely telephone Sara's mother, and Crane has a blast playing Niki Lauda again for about 20 seconds. Near the Piper's lair, Abbie and Crane find Sarah and her mom, and mom pulls a gun on Abbie. Beharie and the actress playing Sara's mother are both wondrous in this scene, and beautifully directed by Aarniokoski. Beharie in particular just goes all in and gives the scene a rich, emotional grounding. She continues to just sparkle and shine as Abbie, but I do hope she gets to do something other than talk down murderous women in the climax some day.


Despite all of Abbie's empathy and reasonable arguments, it takes Crane's tenderness and hand gestures to finally succeed in persuading Sara's mom to put down the gun. Enter the Piper, and Crane begins dueling with him immediately, but, again, balancing the Witnesses' contributions, it takes Abbie's gunshots to scare him off. As we already noted, Abbie has nothing if not faith in her fellow Witness. When she basically orders Crane to man-up, follow and kill the Piper, shouting"finish it!" it's an awfully sexy expression of her confidence in, and need for, him.


To show Crane's entrance into the Piper's lair from his auditory perspective, i.e., hearing only what he would hear with the noise-canceling earbuds--his breathing and the muffled sounds of his clash with the piper--was brave and brilliant. However, the constantly-moving camera in relation to the constantly-moving combatants really annoyed me. Remember the days of The Princess Bride and The Lord of the Rings, when the camera held (relatively) still and we actually got to see the fencing? Mison and his co-star and/or the stuntmen who play their characters in this scene appear to do a masterful job during their brief exchange, with Crane's swordplay even bringing to mind Ewan McGregor's climactic battle with Darth Maul (about the only decent thing in the first three so-called Star Wars' films). In fact, if that was Mison fencing and not a stunt man, I'd put this scene on the actor's audition reel for Episodes VIII and IX. But it would have been so much better if we could have watched it all without getting seasick.

Thank you for letting Ichabod do an excellent job of recovering and trying to defend himself, cutting off the Piper's hand, before Abbie comes to the rescue. That was beautifully directed and edited, although one of these days, I'd really like to see Ichabod actually win a duel. Mison's "I had him," Abbie's smile, and his smile in response, are perfect. Would that we could have seen the aftermath of Abbie and Ichabod in that moment, before cutting immediately to Tarrytown Psychiatric, but perhaps anything further would have undermined that beautiful moment.

It is a testament to the skill and power of both Orlando Jones' and John Noble's acting—as well as the writing and direction--that, though both actors were in this episode only a brief time, their impact is heavily felt. When Irving confronts Henry Parrish about being the Biblical Horseman of War, Henry shrugs it off with "the signs were all there." Really? Like, what? Him being a lawyer?


Noble is glorious in this scene. He's so confident he can afford to be understated, and he's so much more compelling for it. His take on War is a slow-burn that builds and builds and builds. And the casual way in which Henry tells Irving, "the question is what can I do for you," since, after all, you've already given me your soul, is absolutely chilling. Jones matches him, beat for dramatic beat. The understatement with which Orlando Jones' Irving realizes he has inadvertently sold his soul is both weird and right, right, right.

As has been waxed poetically elsewhere, the cappuccino scene between Abbie and Crane is a delight, even with Mison hamming up his unexpected infatuation with the drink. Abbie reaching over to wipe the foam from his mustache is another priceless Ichabbie moment. But I have a bone to pick with the effects department. The green screen work and lighting in this scene do not work. Since Sleepy is filmed in Wilmington, NC, where there is a lovely oceanfront but no Hudson River, the producers and director got creative in combining an exterior shot of what I assume is the actual Hudson River front with a scene filmed indoors, lit for outdoors, and with green screen action behind it. But when we cut from the long view of Mison and Beharie to the close-up, the border between Mison's outline and the action behind him is so jarring it actually detracts from what is otherwise a very charming scene.

I love how in the final scene with Henry we're led to believe that he's angry about the flute being broken, and then we see it was the flute broken down into powder he wanted all along. Why do I have the terrible feeling Irving will be drinking Flute-on-the-Rocks some time very soon?

Now, about the season as a whole...I was talking to a dear friend last night, and she had just watched the entirety of Season 1 in a single sitting. She said the season reminded of her Beethoven's 9^{th symphony, which is composed of seemingly unconnected movements which all come together in the end. I thought that a very apt comparison, and it brought another to mind.}

To me, the finale of the last season was operatic in nature. In contrast, the premiere of this season crossed the line from opera into cartoon. It's a tough, tough boundary to navigate. But the episodes since then have shown the same potential for symphonic composing, for building to an ecstatic finale which brings everything together in a manner which works.

There are pieces of the puzzle introduced, and left hanging, but in a believable way: Franklinstein's monster, the Judas coin, and now the powdered flute. We are given hints and foreshadowing in conversations, themes, and entire scenes, of the season's direction. And yet, I still can't tell you what will happen, who will prove true and who will prove false on Team Apocalypse, and I LOVE THAT!
I wish the writers and the entire Sleepy Team the best of luck with landing both their mid-season semi-finale, and the finale itself. So far, things look very, very promising indeed.

Sleepy Hollow Episode 2.3: Actually, Team Apocalypse is Doing Just Fine

Most dysfunctional paternal-filial relationship
since Vader & Son?

Okay, perhaps Frank Irving being locked up in Tarrytown psych with the Horseman of War as his attorney, Jenny Mills nearly offing the new sheriff whilst in possession of an evil coin, and Katrina Crane still only one pissed-off broad-axe swipe away from becoming Mrs Headless Horseman could be described with more accurate words than “fine.” But what matters to this viewer is that the hands in which I trust Team Apocalypse—the show's makers—have proven not once, but twice now that the premiere was an aberration.

Thank you Melissa Blake, Donald Todd, and all of the Sleepy Hollow writers/producers who contributed to composing this episode, the director, actors, editors, and all the crew, from the bottom of my heart for reminding me why I wanted to write for Sleepy Hollow/Television in general.

“The Kindred” was an excellent and very powerful follow-up up to the season 2 premiere, and I hope soon to sing its praises elsewhere. “Root of All Evil” on its own, however, made up for the premiere and then-some. With a well-paced plot, rich themes, outstanding performances across the board, and a masterful balance of tone, the episode bears and warrants multiple viewings, losing none of its heft or entertainment value in the process.

The episode begins with a sufficiently creepy introduction to Henremy's new habit of whittling miniatures of Sleepy Hollow buildings, then shifts from miniature Tarrytown Psychiatric to full-sized, our heroes Abbie and Crane approaching to visit Irving. What could have been a simple scene expositing Henry's reappearance is made poignant by Abbie's noting that she's memorized the hospitals visiting hours, and hilarious by the receptionist's assumption that Abbie is admitting Crane for treatment. Lightly-delivered lawyer jokes from Crane lead us gently into the emotional meat of the episode: mothers sacrificing themselves, being forced to abandon their children, in order to save them, a theme we will visit with both Katrina and Mama Mills this week. We, and Ichabod, are also introduced to Abbie's unspoken distrust of Katrina-as-Mole, given her relationship to Jeremy. Not only is that conflict with Crane sorely needed, it's handled with the maturity, dignity, and, by the episode's climax, unflinching honesty we've come to expect from Abbie; well-played.

Early on we are reintroduced to the new, toughlove sheriff, Leena Reyes, who continues to endear herself to the audience with a rather insulting attempt at mothering Jenny. Many fans complain about Reyes because she's acting like an actual sheriff instead of a fan of Team Apocalypse. She's mean, they complain. She's rude to our beloved Ichabod and jailed our beloved Jenny. My husband even asked if she's going to end up being one of the Four Horsemen. C'mon, people, get a grip. First of all, the Four Horsemen, so far, are all people who have mega-fucked-up history/seriously unresolved anger at Crane (this does leave the way open for a horsewo/man or two with such issues with Abbie, but so far, Reyes doesn't fit the bill). Second, doesn't anyone remember Irving's skepticism before he saw Headless for himself? Third, and perhaps most important, of course Reyes is going to end up being on the side of good, because the writers are making us dislike her intensely now!!

Personally, I adore Sakina Jaffrey as Reyes, if for no other reason than she makes Sleepy Hollow so much more believable and powerful by grounding our heroes' adventures in something approximating reality. I think she's going to prove a fascinating character and vital piece of the puzzle.

While Reyes is bullying Jenny, Crane and Abbie arrive at Sleepy Hollow Savings & Loan in pursuit of Henry, and we learn still more about our 18th Century hero's liberated 21st Century mores. When Ichabod gets upset by the sight of two men, one wearing a baseball cap, holding hands in a restaurant. Abbie assumes she has to explain gay romance. With the same gorgeously appalled, “I'm not a bigot” tone of voice he used to inform Abbie of his abolition advocacy, he retorts that he couldn't care less about the men's sexual orientation. He's offended that one of them is wearing a hat indoors.  Granted, the Glee line was overkill and unnecessary, but hey, it's a Fox show.

At its best, Sleepy regularly moves seamlessly from humor to tension, even horror, and back again. This episode is full of Sleepy at its best.

It's also full of Women Kicking Ass and Working Things Out, whilst the heroic men largely wait on the sidelines. Shortly after Crane and Abbie spy Henry leaving the bank, a shot is fired and Abbie Mills becomes only the second cop in TV history (after Sleepy Hollow Police Chief Frank Irving) to call for backup before heading into a potentially violent confrontation.

Meanwhile, rather than keeping his son within sight as he'd vowed to do only a moment before, Crane rushes towards the bank with his fellow Witness. When Abbie reminds him he's been ordered by Madame Sheriff to stand down from police work pending another call from someone with a British accent authenticating his cover (are you ever going to explain that season one mystery Sleepy writers?), he commences pacing.

Pace. Pace. Fret about Abbie's safety. Pace. Like Eowyn sent to the caves with the women and children, denied her heart's desire to fight at Aragorn's side at Helms' Deep, Ichabod is sidelined to prayer, worry, and waiting for his warrior to return. Sucks, doesn't it, fellas? Now imagine how we've felt for the last 10,000 years.

If last week's episode was all about father issues, this week is clearly dedicated to mama, in a variety of incarnations. Before back-up can arrive, Abbie bravely faces down bank teller/former-model- citizen-turned-armed-robber, Lydia Galway, trying to negotiate the release of her hostages. You read that right: armed woman confronts other armed woman, no armed men in sight. When back-up arrives, it's not in the form of any of Sleepy Hollow's male black-and-whites, but rather the female police chief, Leena Reyes, who naturally has nothing better to do with her time but take 911 calls. A badass former border patrol agent herself, Reyes wastes no time wasting Ms. Galway when she sees darkness overcoming the bank teller, protecting her work-daughter, Abbie.

Brief but adequate conversation among our heroes and judicious use of camera shots and images tell us Henry did this, using some kind of coin, and he's already picked out his next victim. God, I love exposition that doesn't assume the audience is made up of morons.

Back to Crane, Revolutionary War hero and top-billed star, still pacing. But that's okay! Our male hero can pace while three women with guns rock the house because in the next scene Crane is once again proven to be not only the Smartest Guy in the Room by several furlongs, but a brave soldier himself in the fight against evil (albeit in flashback).

Sneaking into the archives under Reyes' radar, while charmingly channeling Alan Rickman in several of his film roles, Crane scathingly inquires of Abbie “is the proverbial coast clear?” When he asks Abbie to “unspool” the video from the bank, I'm as delighted as Abbie (seriously, it takes so little to make me happy, writers).

Ichabod and the beautifully directed flashback then explain this episode's phlebotinum, and redeem Benedict Arnold in the process (redemption of Judas Iscariot to follow presently).

Thus begins the episode's deft, gorgeous homages to The Lord of The Rings, as we see victims slipping an evil coin into their pockets all “ring of power”-like. With just this simple image resonating gently in our unconsciousness, we come to understand exactly what Team Apocalypse is up against.

Act 2 begins with an ill-explained bit of fraternal infighting between the two Horsemen (perhaps fraternal is a poor choice of words since right now Abraham's on track to become Henremy's stepfather). We'll let that one go because the masterfully handled heart of the scene is Katrina's and Henremy's brief and pointed exchange. Katrina's determined to reach her son; Henry's equally determined she won't seduce Abraham into betraying Team Moloch, but his mother nonetheless affects him, deeply. It is to the director's and both Katia Winter and John Noble's enormous credit that this dialogue-light scene packs a huge emotional wallop (not to mention gorgeous story-advancement-teasing through character development). “Jeremy, my son” - in three words, Katrina says so much. And kudos to the wardrobe department for finally getting Kat a new dress. Still hoping to see her in jeans soon, but this is a lovely step forward. Hopefully Abraham also let her bathe.  Or do witches not get body odor, even after 200+ years in purgatory?

Given community service instead of a jail term, Jenny returns to Team Apocalypse with her all snark thankfully intact (“You two go ahead and stop the Apocalypse. I'll be hosing graffiti off a wall).” Then--exposit, exposit, exposit--our heroes bring Jenny and any audience members just tuning in up to speed on the plot while Jenny surreptitiously breaks into the Sheriff Reyes files using Abbie's login. As Jenny studies Reyes' file, our oblivious heroes are lightly introduced to New Member of the Sleepy Hollow Love Hectogram, Nick Hawley. Then BAM! Jenny's childhood rage at abandonment and adult rage at the system culminate in a shout of “that bitch!,” meaning Reyes, followed quickly by all the trust issues between Jenny and Abbie coming to the fore (a strained but ultimately believable set-up for what comes later). (Yes, there was an awful lot of expositing going on in Jenny's little trantrum, but honestly, I will happily listen to Lyndie Greenwood exposit all day when it's right for the context and gorgeously delivered, and it was). Contrast Jenny's impassioned expression of betrayal and rage with the infinitely restrained, tender, short-hand check-in between Crane and Abbie, and I can only sigh with wonder at how beautifully you're balancing this episode tonally, director and writers, how perfectly you're grounding the madness in the veracity of human relationships.

Meanwhile, Moloch and War's evil plan is playing out magnificently, and our guest stars--unlike the premiere's disposable Hessians--get to do interesting things like blow-up their parents (still more filial rage to echo Heremy and Ichabod's relationship). And with roses no less!!

Down at the river, we meet Nick Hawley, rogue entrepreneur and entirely too beautiful for Ichabod to trust.  Hawley speaks for the entirety of Sleepy Hollow, NY, when he gestures to Crane and asks Abbie, “why is he talking like that?” Ichabod's ready to leave his handsome competition on the docks when Hawley wisely shares enough intel to prove his value to the case. Abbie and Crane emote us so believably through their next round of exposition we're happy to come along for the ride, and tell ourselves it's completely plausible that the turning of Benedict Arnold and Judas Iscariot can all be traced to one set of imperial Roman coins (never mind that the Roman Empire never minted shekels).

(UPDATE, MEA CULPA, JAN 8:  Turns out I'm not the expert on First Century history I thought I was.  Should have trusted Mr. Todd and Ms. Blake.  The Roman Empire DID mint shekels, in Tyre).

We next encounter Henry planting flags on his diorama of Sleepy Hollow (what is the crest of Moloch?), and Sheriff Reyes appropriately confronting Abbie about the inappropriate search of her personnel files. This gives Abbie a chance to explain to the audience why she defended Reyes so vehemently to Jenny (“If you were 'just doing your job,' [Mama Mills] would have gone to prison for kidnapping.”) Clearly Abbie is not convinced Reyes is the villain the fandom think she is, and Abbie's one smart cookie. She's already figured out Katrina's a weak link.

The exposition in the scene between Abbie and Reyes is provided magnificently, in large part thanks to the depth and heart of both actors' restrained performances (and the outstanding direction). But what I continue to be amazed by in Sleepy Hollow is the ease and strength of transitions between scenes. “Our flower shop perp lawyered up,” and...

Cue the Horseman of War! (Flashing neon sign to the audience: This is going to be FUN!)

When Abbie and Crane spy Henremy in the hallway (awkward!), Abbie tells Ichabod he was right at the bank, and they should have “taken [War] out when they had the chance.” Excuse me, but when did you have a chance to “take out” War? Talk to, sure. Expose, perhaps. Take out? Yeah, good luck with that. Katrina's coven couldn't even manage it, and we've all seen how impressed the Horseman of Death is by bullets.

In the two awesome back-to-back confrontation scenes, first between Ichabod and Henremy (heavy), then between Reyes and Ichabod (light), an interesting sub-theme about identity and identification develops. The fact of Henremy/War's having multiple identities around town, even within and among his relationships with Team Apocalypse, makes infinitely more sense on a poetic level when the brilliant John Noble shows us with such subtlety the pain, sorrow and longing beneath his rage. Equally unafraid to also show us War's sense of humor, Henremy deadpans to Crane: “your son's a lawyer; you must be very proud” without a trace of hamminess.

I just have to say it again: John Noble's capacity to move in and out of PTSD-induced madness and pure evil with only a glance is astonishing.

Meanwhile, Papa Ichabod, who is mostly clear on his identity, though admittedly still a bit at a loss as to his paternal role vis-a-vis the Horseman of War (Crane: “Let us agree that I was not the most involved father.” Henremy/War: “Oh, dear. Is this to be an attempt to start over? Are you going to take me down to the fishing hole?”), can neither hang out in a public building, despite an astoundingly well-delivered discourse on his civil rights, nor enjoy a beer in a pub, for lack of state-sanctioned proof of his age (has anyone, ever, been MORE over 21?).

Henry's not only several steps ahead of his father in his understanding of what Ichabod's up against trying to heal their relationship, he also remains, fabulously, a step ahead of Team Apocalypse in recovering the evil coin, which he promptly puts back into circulation at the feet of none other than our furious Ms. BAMF, Jennifer Mills.

This leads our heroes back to Nick Hawley, and one of those pubs that won't serve Ichabod. Now, if I were Nicole Beharie, I think I'd probably get tired of playing straight woman to Crane's (numerous and hilarious) moments of humor (the Sam Adams diatribe being particularly inspired), but her attempts to ground Ichabod are so believable, in their tired, tender patience, that with a word, Beharie's performance equals Mison's in every way.

Matt Barr's Nick Hawley is a marvelous breath of fresh air, if for no other reason than, plot and script-wise, he can get away with things our heroes never could. Because he has the audacity to ask how a bit of glass could possibly neutralize our McGuffin, Hawley not only gives Ichabod the floor to explain this contrivance, he allows the writers to gently acknowledge the solution's absurdity ad infinitum. Bless you, writers, for just yielding the field on this one and letting Hawley voice our collective incredulity. With a wee but of witty self-deprecation on your part, you render the most ludicrous plot devices easily forgiven.

Once our heroes have figured out it's Reyes and not Abbie Jenny's going to try to kill, but before all hell breaks loose in the last act, we're given a chance to catch our breath and return to the other mother-child heart of the story, the season-long as opposed to episode-driven conflict, of Katrina and Henremy. Abbie nails Ichabod both humorously and with deadly seriousness, first by pointing out that he couldn't have stopped Katrina from staying with Abraham if he'd tried because “1) She's a grown woman, 2) she's a witch, and 3) she's a redhead”, then by leveling him with the Crux of Their Dilemma. “You're asking me to bet my life on whether, when it counts, a mother will turn against her son?” For the umpteenth delightful time this episode, our dauntless hero is stopped in his tracks.

If we had any cause to doubt Abbie's reasoning (and we don't), Katrina herself reassures us in the most interesting scene between her and Abraham thus far (interesting because both Neil Jackson AND Katia Winter are given leave to act, and Katia in particular is allowed to finally show [rather than tell us about] some of Katrina's non-weepy iron).

In the final act, we find ourselves in a tense, heartfelt confrontation between two powerful women, regarding their mother, and a mother-figure whose intentions are ambiguous at best. This time, Abbie is saving Reyes' life (though one could argue it's really Jenny's life she's concerned with, since hosing graffiti off walls is most definitely not going to pay back the debt to society of murdering a sheriff). Nicole Beharie is a marvel in these scenes. What we learn of Abbie Mills' consistent tamping down of her emotions, the reason for her distrust of anything crazy, is wonderful, but Beharie's slow burn into profound revelation is a tremendous gift. And Greenwood matches her beat for powerfully moving beat. Without two such gifted actors, and excellent direction, the scene could have been a disaster; instead, it worked on every level.

Including—and this may be your biggest achievement in this episode, writers--the demographics of our story's climactic confrontation.  Once again we find ourselves in a life-threatening exchange among three women, two with guns. Our two very capable male heroes hold their ground, whilst letting the women handle it (Crane literally says to Hawley, of Abbie's efforts to talk Jenny down from murder, “Let her handle it.”).

Did I mention the three women are women of color, and the men are white? And that this show is on Fox?

The men still prove invaluable to the cause, tracking Jenny, informing each other and the audience how dangerous her weapon is, and then ultimately tackling Jenny, getting her gun, and protecting Abbie-as-Frodo from the coin's evil with a goal kick on Ichabod's part to make David Beckham jealous.

Crane continues earning his hero credit by using his Celtic charm and those ridiculous cornflower blues to break into Tarrytown Psych.  He does a less impressive job summarizing last season's insane finale in a manner Irving could possibly understand let alone believe, but at least he does grant that Irving might need a moment to digest what he's about to tell him. 

Madame Sheriff immediately pays off Abbie's faith in her by handing over Mama Mills' file from Tarrytown Psychiatric. Of surprise to no one (but Abbie, inexplicably) it turns out Mama Mills was also on Moloch's hit list, not mente insana, but a victim of demon torment. Of Mama Mills's suicide, Crane observes tenderly, “She paid the ultimate price to protect you.” This sounds suspiciously like foreshadowing? As well as backshadowing? Katrina's-fate-shadowing in some form?

(On the subject of Mama Mills' suicide...my money's on Henry Parrish as the guilty party in that death. Either he killed her, or he drove her to take her own life. Why? Because can you imagine the fabulousness of the drama between Abbie and Crane when it comes out that Ichabod and Katrina's son killed Abbie and Jenny's mom? I shiver at the deliciousness of what I think and sincerely hope is coming).

The return of Nick Hawley (which you knew was coming because we were back in the pub, a place we've never seen the inside of before Mr. Hawley appeared in the script), gives our Sleepy heroes and fans two gifts: a fake British passport for Crane (Hawley may grudgingly respect him, but he's still going to keep him vulnerable to deportation), and a gorgeous, tender moment of Ichabbie feels about how they must above all else remain true to the other, with Ichabod quietly, indirectly conceding that even Katrina's loyalty to Team Apocalypse can no longer be assumed.

The quantity and depth of emotion conveyed by Henremy in the episode's last scene, so brief yet so pregnant with meaning, is a testament to the perfection of John Noble's casting.

Extremely well-done, Team Sleepy Hollow. I'm so grateful I'm not even going to ask how even though it was only ten years between the time Jenny and Abbie saw Moloch in the forest and were subsequently separated from each other, and the fateful day when Henry revealed himself to be War, Jenny keeps complaining that Abbie abandoned her for thirteen years.  I'm clear, by this point, that math works differently in Sleepy Hollow.

Hell, I'm so happy I'll even save my questions about how Henry got his high school transcripts from the class of 1799 in order to attend college, law school and pass the bar.

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