Well, between this and the last episode of Game of Thrones, it's been a good week for getting emotionally wrecked by television. And I mean wrecked in the best possible way, not through cheap deaths or shock value, but by satisfying payoff to carefully sown plot-points, development that sheds insight into what makes characters tick, and unexpected turns that still make sense within the context of the story.
This week's episode of Penny Dreadful was the Bottle Episode. I knew it would turn up sooner or later (putting Eva Green in a single room and letting her do her stuff was too juicy to resist), but taking place as it does entirely within the white room of the mental asylum, it's also merged with the seasonal traditional of a Whole Episode Flashback.
It initially left me a little confused as to its relationship with the other flashback episodes, Closer Than Sisters and The Nightcomers especially as there were some lines of dialogue here and there that (deliberately?) muddied the waters.
Looking at this episode in the context of the entire show, it takes place about three-quarters of the way through Closer Than Sisters. It was there we first saw some of Vanessa's stint in Doctor Banning's care, up until her trepanning operation. After that, the devil visits her at home in the guise of Sir Malcolm, a visitation that ends with her mother dying of shock when she walks in on the two of them in flagrante delicto.
The episode also takes place well before The Nightcomers, since Vanessa went to Joan Clayton as part of her quest to find Mina.
However, there were some interesting comments made by Vanessa over the course of this episode that mess up this chronology. Mostly obviously, she speaks the Verbis Diablo in order to rid her cell of Dracula and Lucifer – even though she doesn't learn this language until she meets the Cut Wife, well after her stay in the asylum.
Furthermore, Vanessa says: "I have been touched by Satan. My weakness allowed it, my faith was not strong enough. When Lucifer came to me, I didn't fight him strongly enough. I don't know that I fought him at all." Although vague, this seems to refer to her encounter with Lucifer when he appeared to her as Malcolm – again, something that hasn't happened yet. In the same scene the orderly appears to her with black eyes, which is (to the audience at least) a call-back to what we've seen Lucifer do as Malcolm and Ethan. Vanessa seems frightened but not surprised – she recognizes the trick, even though it's the first time it's happened chronologically.
So what's actually going on here? Is it bad continuity or is John Logan making the most of his setup (which is that this is not a flashback, but rather a memory relived by Vanessa while under hypnosis)? Who's to say that what we saw here was an accurate depiction of the past? It's more likely to be Vanessa re-experiencing the events in her head, as evidenced by Doctor Seward's sporadic presence. Perhaps Vanessa was even able to change events as she remembered them in order to elicit information; a subtle form of time-travel in which she could delve into her own memories and change the outcome of what really happened in that room (such as using the Verbis Diablo before she had technically learnt it).
Or maybe I've still got Hodor on my mind.
Did Lucifer/Dracula shapeshift into the orderly to unsettle her, or did Vanessa just project them onto his form? And were some of the orderly's scenes with Vanessa genuine (like the one where he brought the wooden spoon from home) or was Lucifer impersonating him the entire time? Unlike the similar scenario in season one's Possession, in which Lucifer was clearly taking Ethan's form while the real Ethan slept downstairs (with a panning shot to prove it) the relationship between Lucifer/the orderly was a bit more unclear.
For instance, the scene in which Vanessa confronts Lucifer/Dracula begins when the orderly asks: "why would the devil be interested in you?" (right before transforming into him) but ends with him repeating the question and Vanessa snapping out of her dream/vision/imagining of chanting the Verbis Diablo. The orderly is still sitting next to her, waiting to hear her answer the question.
So unlike Vanessa's season one encounter with Ethan in her bedroom, I think scenes like the orderly feeding Vanessa with the wooden spoon were genuine, but also muddled with her prior/later experiences with demonic activity (because how would Lucifer know or care about the orderly's son and the fact that a metal spoon hurt his mouth?) The entire episode takes place in Vanessa's head, which means we're meant to question everything we see here.
I think Logan deliberately mixed in some ambiguity, and because this show has always favoured character and atmosphere over plot, I don't really mind if we never get a clear idea of what exactly happened in this room.
***
All that considered, it was quite interesting to see the reception this episode garnered: mostly positive, but with two frequent complaints. Firstly that it was too Vanessa-centric to the detriment of the rest of the cast, and secondly that nothing of importance actually happened. The first is a matter of opinion (if you're not a Vanessa fan, then sure, this would have been a drag – but the show has made no bones about the fact this is her show) but I can understand why people felt this episode was too self-contained for its own good.
However, I have a rebuttal!
The episode provided three things to the overarching narrative: clarity on the two forces circling Vanessa (something that stymied me throughout season one), the ability for Vanessa to name her enemy (Dracula!) and a prequel to the life of the man currently known as John Clare.
Sure, it's slim pickings. Yet this show is all about the journey. If you can't sit back and watch a character study of two people connecting in a Victorian madhouse then why on earth are you watching Penny Dreadful?
I also think that a lot of people are forgetting that The Nightcomers also didn't provide a heck of a lot of plot or momentum at first, only for certain threads to be picked up later on. I expect the same thing will happen here.
Miscellaneous Observations:
Along with John Clare appearing as Lucifer and Dracula, we also have the dual identities of Joan Clayton and Doctor Seward to contend with. Are they the same woman, is it a family resemblance or is something else entirely going on?
Unlike the deliberate ambiguity inherent in Rory Kinnear's multiple roles, I'm not as convinced Logan knows what he's doing when it comes to Clayton/Seward, beyond the fact that he really wanted Patti Lupone back. The last episode had Vanessa introduce the possibility of reincarnation, but that makes no sense since Joan and Doctor Seward were (up until very recently) alive at the same time.
One thing I didn't like at first, but now am totally on board with, is that Dracula appears more powerful than Lucifer, asking him: "if they cease to believe in you, do you even exist?" and being told he's: "more beast than spirit." It makes a certain amount of sense – that at this particular point in time, Dracula's physicality makes him more influential than his ephemeral brother. It's also a nice nod to Bram Stoker's novel, which is all about the character making the most of modernism.
Of course, it's also contrary to what Stoker says about his backstory. As I recall, at one point book!Mina gets a throwaway line detailing how Dracula was once a mortal man who dabbled in forces he couldn't control and ended up turning himself into a vampire (the recent trend of conflating him with Vlad the Impaler came much later).
But in Penny Dreadful he's a fallen angel and the brother of Lucifer, and I'm a little disappointed they didn't keep Stoker's version. It would have worked just as well in this context: that Dracula is much younger than Lucifer, but has more power in the material world (I like that his arrival caused the flickering of the electric lights).
From what was suggested here, Lucifer needs Vanessa to give up her soul willingly, while Dracula just wants her to. He could quite easily attack her in the street and turn her into a vampire, but it's his choice to try and win her over. So hats off to Rory Kinnear: he embodied three characters in this episode, and none of them were the one he usually plays.
As impressive as it was to see how he differentiated between Lucifer and Dracula in both voice and movement, it was the orderly that gleans the most insight into his current post-resurrected condition. He was a kind man, who initially tries to bring Vanessa back to health with a mix of tough love (making her get up to fetch her food, threatening her with details of further treatments) and kindness (bringing her a blanket and the wooden spoon from home).
The similarities between his past and present self were interesting, such as the fact that the orderly was already something of an atheist before his resurrection (though he offers to pray for Vanessa's sake), as were the differences: this man does not like poetry, and it was presumably Vanessa (not Victor, as we would have otherwise assumed) that instilled an appreciation for it within him.
His story is one that's infused with irony: that he tells his son no one lives in the Arctic North, only to journey there himself; that he come to reject the science that tortures Vanessa, only to end up an experiment in Frankenstein's hands; that his actions in brushing Vanessa's hair/putting on her makeup/showing her reflection are what (poetically speaking) kept her identity intact after trepanation, though he eventually loses his identity entirely.
There are other contrasts to be made: like how the orderly gently shuts down Vanessa's overtures toward him, whereas Victor took advantage of Lily when she crept into his bed during the thunderstorm. What a difference between creator and creation! Now both Ethan and Vanessa have reason to be very ticked off at Victor when they find out what he's done to two people they loved.
One surprise was that Vanessa wasn’t the cause of the orderly's death – at least not directly. And yet it's she that leaves him disillusioned with his work, leading him to seek out employment elsewhere. Wherever he goes next (and I suspect it'll be a factory considering he was staring at one a couple of episodes ago) it'll eventually lead to his death. His compassion to Vanessa ends up killing him.
***
So has Vanessa realized that John Clare and the orderly are the same man? I'd like to say yes, but this is the same woman who didn't recognize Lily. And will John Clare at some point remember her?
This episode also saw the return of Vanessa's I Just Want To Be Special theme.
That was a great effect with Lucifer/Dracula's shadows turning into a snake and bat respectively.
Again on the subject of names: it's ironic that Vanessa went back into her memories to learn Dracula's name, though it's the orderly's name that goes unsaid – and to the audience, that's the one we really want to find out! It also brings to mind the way Alexander Sweet deliberately "forgot" Vanessa's name – in hindsight, it feels like another layer to his elaborate mind-games. Or perhaps he's just pissy that she forgot his name.
It may be significant, or it may just be sentimental, but even after Vanessa learns Dracula's name, she stays in her fugue state in order to re-witness her final encounter with John Clare, in which he promises to stay for her surgery. I wonder if that last kindness will come into play later, or if it was simply a last kindness for its own sake.
One other thing I realized this episode, which makes me want to facepalm for having taken so long to realize it, is that the demon residing inside Vanessa is (we can safely assume) Amon-Net. I'm not sure how I never made that connection, but it's clear that this ancient entity has been on earth before (Lucifer says as much: "let us be as we were, before there was time, there was thee and me") only to be somehow reborn within Vanessa. Not only that, but she is clearly more powerful than Lucifer and Dracula put together.
Granted, this hasn't been spelled out in so many words by the narrative, but that does seem to be the logical conclusion to draw. This Amon-Net was (somehow) reincarnated inside Vanessa, leading to a three-way struggle between Lucifer/Dracula trying to reclaim her, and Vanessa fighting both them and the spirit within.
And as we saw here, fighting off the masculine Lucifer/Dracula requires Vanessa to call upon the feminine Amon-Net. Suddenly the gender politics of the show have gotten more interesting.
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