Sleepy Hollow: The Golem

Good episode, but – wow, the overarching plot of this show (and its mythology) really is getting convoluted, isn’t it. There’s just so much stuff going on, elements getting introduced and then dropped, only to be picked up several episodes later, so many new characters that are both important and yet dispensable at the same time, so many balls in the air that are (so far) getting juggled reasonably well, though I fear it’s only a matter of time before a couple are dropped. But still, good episode.

Following on from last week’s revelation that Katrina gave birth to a son, we get some more details on the chronology of his birth. Apparently it was after Ichabod’s death that she realized she was pregnant (though I was under the false impression that she was scoping out Frederick Manor as a place of sanctuary because she already knew) and transported herself there after her coven turned on her, angry that she cast the spell to preserve Ichabod’s life. More of the puzzle pieces are put into place: that she gave up her son Jeremy to Abbie’s ancestors, that he was a witch just like her, that it was her coven that sent her into Purgatory, and that she never saw him after that.

We also get explanations for some of the visions Abbie saw in the old Crane house, namely the creepy doll in the baby pram and the four veiled women chanting around the table, for these two elements come into play later on. To get more answers Abbie suggests the Historical Society Library, only to find that one of the librarians is very close-lipped about the information they seek – and before they can confront her, they discover her dead body out in the car-park, still inside her mangled car.

"Surprise, bitch. Bet you thought you'd seen the last of me."

Turns out that the doll Katrina gave her son while he was just a baby had its own powers, and the mingling of her promise to protect him with Jeremy’s anger and blood makes a golem, who follows Ichabod back from Purgatory and continues its mission to protect Jeremy by killing the descendants of the remaining coven. That was a fairly nice conceit, one that managed to be quite touching in the golem’s tenderness toward Jeremy compared with its violence at his oppressors (though you really have to question why Katrina would give her newborn son such a terrifying-looking doll. Seriously, that thing looked like a Satanic Patrick from Spongebob).

This baby's face says it all.

Still, it was lovely when Ichabod held its hand while it died, and that it reverted back into its
doll-form by the end. Sniffle.

In a subplot that was interesting, yet a bit disjointed from the main action, Captain Irving is doing his own digging whilst spending Thanksgiving in New York with his ex-wife and daughter. There we get another creepy run-in with the powers of darkness. After establishing that the First Witnesses are destined to die, and that their allies will probably end up as martyrs too, an ice-cream vender threatens Macey.

Only the audience is privy to the change that comes over his eyes, and its presence shifts from one person to another when physical contact is made (hey, wasn’t there a Denzel Washington movie about a demon that did this?) Threats to children is a near-triggering experience for me, so this scene was suitably horrifying, though I was intrigued by his words: “how strong is your daughter; strong enough to fight for her soul?” So was this a threat directed at Irving, or is something planned specifically for Macey? They’ve already established her as something of a fighter given her post-accident attitude, so I’m wondering if she has her own significance in the events to come.

And it was nice to see John Noble as the Sin Eater again, though his role was pretty much over after he helped Ichabod communicate with Katrina. However, the writers compensated nicely by giving him some interesting exposition in the library (I liked that he could smell the lie of the librarian and feel the pain of the book in the box) and a very sweet interlude with Ichabod on the subject of fathers. Let’s hope he’ll be back again soon.

Miscellaneous Observations:

Why did the coven want to punish Katrina for saving Ichabod’s life? Was it forbidden magic? Did they know what affect it would have on the Horseman? Are they not the “good” coven after all? Since the very beginning I’ve seen intrigued by this talk of two covens at work in Sleepy Hollow, yet it’s a plot-point that has been somewhat lost along the way. I hope we learn more about them in episodes to come (they’re more interesting to me than, say, the Hessian sleepers).

Tease us with the mistletoe, why don’t you.

Washington’s Bible returns! I laughed when Parrish’s gentle fatherly advice to Ichabod ended with him yelling: “Washington’s Bible!” That came the heck out of nowhere.

This is the second time in as many weeks that Abbie has had to stay behind while Ichabod goes off because he “has to do this alone.” Last week I suppose it was okay, but here? There was nothing to stop Abbie from going with him into the tent, and there was nothing in the scene that would have been lost if Abbie had been with him. Irritating. They’re meant to be a team, people!

Fantastic character design for the Four Who Speak as One: the dark veils, the pointed teeth, the blue eyes, the synchronised voices: all compelling, evocative stuff. It’s just annoying that they’ve apparently been killed off so quickly. I do wonder if they were inspired by Miranda Richardson’s performance as the Witch of the Western Woods in Tim Burton’s Sleepy Hollow: she had the same dark veil and scratchy voice. Hey, and didn’t Christopher Walken’s Horseman have teeth that were filed into points? Nice touch with the hookah that was inhaled by one and exhaled by another.

And yet I don’t think Jeremy is dead. The words of the Four were specifically worded as “we stopped his heart”, which doesn’t necessarily translate as “dead and never coming back”. That, and I find it hard to believe that this much set-up would lead to a dead-end so quickly. Perhaps he’s under the same sort of spell that Katrina put Ichabod under. If so, can we expect his reunion with his father at a later point?

If Ichabod and Abbie are Witnesses, then why were the Four in One saying that Katrina disrupted fate and broke the rules, and so on? Surely if Ichabod is mentioned in the Bible, then she was doing the right thing in preserving his life. I mean, the man technically works for God.

“You embroidered my name on some oversized hosiery.” HAH! The delivery on that one was perfect: utterly bewildered yet immensely pleased. You could tell that he knew the sentiment it had significance even though he couldn’t fathom it.

Not sure what to make of that final scene, particularly since I find it difficult to understand what Moloch was even saying, but by the sound of it, war is coming (presumably the Horseman of War) followed by Ichabod somehow bringing Abbie’s soul to Moloch. I love the way he uses mirrors to communicate, and that the four white trees made another reappearance. And what did Moloch mean when he said: “I touched her soul once”? I’m more than ready to find out what happened to Abbie and Jenny in those missing hours. And how interesting that the Headless Horseman is after Ichabod, whilst Moloch seems far more interested in Abbie. Come to think of it, it’s been that way since the beginning.

So I really liked this episode, despite the glurge of exposition. This show runs the risk of becoming Mythology Bound, but for now it’s keeping its myriad of plot-lines flowing at a break-neck speed to compensate. I understand that we’re heading into a hiatus now, but let’s hope they can sustain this level of suspense for the final stretch. And hopefully the final scene suggests we're heading back toward an Abbie arc. The show is infinitely stronger when she's the focus.

In Hindsight:

Along with The Sin Eater, this was the episode I was most looking forward to re-watching, especially in regards to Henry Parrish’s true identity. And the second time around, it’s pretty clear that the writers were quietly tee-heeing to themselves the whole time. So many snippets of dialogue and reaction shots are given extra depth when watched with foreknowledge of Jeremy Crane’s fate.

There’s poignancy to be had when Ichabod says: “My head is swimming with questions – what was he like? What did he know of me? How did he live?”; not to mention the excruciating irony of him reaching out to Henry for answers to his son’s life, never knowing that Jeremy is right in front of him the whole time.

And John Noble knew. He had to know. Just check out some of these expressions:

"Hee hee."

"Ho ho."

"Hah hah."

"GONNA KILL YOU ALL."

It all illustrates just how insidious Moloch’s plan really was. Whatever the heck really went down with Arthur Baynard in The Sin Eater (and honestly, I think the whole thing was just smoke and mirrors), what remains is that Ichabod believes he can reach Katrina through Henry. It puts Henry in a position of trust and expertise that he uses to exploit the Witnesses effortlessly in the season finale, and that barest trace of amusement lingering in Noble’s eyes subtly telegraphs what’s to come.

Consider Henry’s line: “We never bury the dead, son. We take them with us” in light of his true identity. Chilling. Or this little gem: “It is a father’s task to impart wisdom. Mine told me not to fear my power.” HE’S TALKING ABOUT MOLOCH!!

Then there’s the scene in which Abbie appeals for Henry’s help on familial grounds, citing his (obviously fabricated) files that record a dead mother and a sick father, telling him that none of them have much family. Henry lets himself be convinced, but it's all just a set-up to make the Witnesses believe they’re in charge.

By the time Moloch shows up to announce: “I offer this warning. The saint’s name is a sign. When you know my meaning, war will take form,” it’s obvious that the bad guys are just screwing with them.

There are a few pieces that don’t quite fit. Henry explicitly tells Ichabod: “[Leaving your son] was not a choice you were given, my friend,” making his seething resentment in the finale a bit bewildering, and he has a strangely non-emotional reaction to the Golem’s death considering it was his only companion and protector for so many years (he even tells Ichabod how to defeat it).

And perhaps it’s because the Golem simply didn’t see him, but it seems a missed opportunity that it didn’t recognise and react to Henry in some way (or perhaps the writers thought that would give the game away too soon).

There’s more Katrina backstory which I understood a little better this time around. She’s back in witch mode for this episode and again we’re told that her coven attempted to punish her after she performs the spell on Ichabod, that she didn’t know she was pregnant when she did so, and that she fled to Europe afterwards to find an answer to how to separate Ichabod from the Horseman, only for her coven to hunt her down. THEN she went to Frederick’s manor to give birth.

Whew. I mean, it all hangs together, but damn it’s convoluted.

And Ichabod rather randomly remarks that it was Katrina’s coven that put her in Purgatory. I don’t know how he stumbles to this conclusion, but since Katrina doesn’t contradict it, I suppose we’ll have to accept that’s what happened.

These covens interest me though. There’s still virtually nothing on the evil coven, and it’s difficult to imagine what they’re like if these guys are the “good” ones. Yet in saying that, the Sisterhood of the Radiant Heart is the only morally ambiguous organization we've seen on the show. All the others are either wholly good or wholly bad, yet these women (despite their creepy teeth) essentially contained a threat and punished someone who made a decision that endangered the world.

And sure, the way they went about doing those things hardly makes them nice people, but it once more feeds into my intense interest in these women: what they do, whose side they’re on, and how they relate to the supposed evil coven - which may in turn make Katrina more than just a plot device.

Likewise, the Golem is our first monster that we’re expected to feel pity for when it meets its unhappy end. There are shades of grey (damn E.L. James for ruining that phrase) that I didn’t appreciate the first time around. More of this, please!

Other stuff can only be inferred at this point. I like the idea that Moloch targeted Katrina and Jeremy because he was pissed at Ichabod killing his Horseman and Katrina for binding them together – thus making Death unusable for several hundred years. I mean, that motivation makes perfect sense, right? It would be remiss if the writers didn’t make this explicit.

And I still feel mildly annoyed that Abbie didn’t accompany Ichabod into the tent of the Four Who Speak as One. Doylistically, it was perhaps to allow Ichabod to repeat the exposition on how to defeat the Golem (thus reminding the audience how to do it), but they could have just as easily mentioned it out loud to Henry – and it would have been a nice little clue to see him refuse to enter the tent, knowing that the witches might well have recognised them.

Ooh, but I've just realized - there may well be another appearance of the Golem in season two. After all, he didn't actually "die", he just reverted back into his doll-form. And since it was blood and magic that brought him to life the first time, there's nothing to stop Henry/Jeremy from calling it back up when most convenient.