Episode Title: “Blood Moon”
Writers: Roberto Orci & Alex Kurtzman & Mark Goffman
Director: Ken Olin
Previously on “Sleepy Hollow”
I think I’ve figured out what “Sleepy Hollow” is: it’s the love child of “Supernatural” and “Grimm”… and it must be destroyed!
I’ve certainly seen worse shows than “Sleepy Hollow.” But I’ve seen so many better shows that it’s disheartening that “Sleepy Hollow” doesn’t seem to be trying very hard to elevate its game.
The only reason that “Sleepy Hollow” works at all is because Tom Mison is very amusing as Ichabod Crane, especially when he’s adjusting to the modern world or ranting about the taxation of baked goods. When the script calls for Ichabod to be funny, Mison is up to the task. Nicole Beharie’s best moments come when Abbie is playing off of Ichabod. She’s a good foil for him, but as soon as Abbie is paired with another character she becomes a lot less compelling.
There are full spoilers ahead for “Blood Moon,” so if you happen to have missed last night’s episode of “Sleepy Hollow” then you should probably skip this review or else Andy will have one hell of a crick in his neck.
Exposition is an important part of almost any television series because the audience has to get up to speed with what the characters already know. However, “Sleepy Hollow” is unusually lazy about the way it gets that information across. In this episode, it goes something like this…
Ichabod: “Abbie, you must tell me everything so I can understand.”
Abbie: “Okay, here’s my whole backstory with Sheriff August. Hope you like flashbacks!”
Even the resolution of this episode made it seem like no effort was made to kill the newly resurrected witch, Serilda of Abaddon, as played by the director’s daughter, Roxy Olin… because why not? The writers set up the gunpowder in the caverns earlier in the episode and Serida basically stayed in place several seconds longer than she needed to so she could blow up and die again like a good witch.
The problem is that there’s no tension in that ending, nor was Serilda a particularly interesting or frightening adversary. It’s telling just how unthreatening Serilda was even when she was only vaguely corporeal. When she killed her lone victim of the episode, Serilda was still less than impressive.
Thus far, the only creature that leaves an impression is the weird shimmer demon (Satan?) that both killed and resurrected former police officer Andy Dunn (John Cho), But even in death, Andy lacks a personality and his ominous words to Serilda’s victims were unintentionally funny. Whoever surgically removed John Cho’s charisma needs to give it back. The skin folds in Andy’s formerly broken neck resonate more than deeply than he does!
Ordinarily I’d welcome back the great Clancy Brown with open arms, but Sheriff August’s scenes with Abbie in the past and in her vision were oddly flat. There was more warmth between them in that brief diner scene in the pilot than in either of their moments together here. In this case, I blame the writers for not successfully making us care about their relationship.
Weirdly, the beginning of this episode seemed like a reset of the pilot. The two officers who corroborated Abbie’s story about the Headless Horsemen have recanted, leaving her as the only person who can back up Ichabod’s account. After showing unearned faith in Ichabod during the previous episode, Captain Frank Irving (Orlando Jones) is back to theorizing that Ichabod is just deluded and only slightly useful. Then Irving is written out of the entire episode! Why is Orlando Jones on this show if he’s not going to be utilized? So far, the Captain is one note… in the rare moments that he’s actually around.
Another wasted character is Ichabod’s wife, Katrina Crane (Katia Winter); who is only onscreen long enough to give Ichabod pointlessly cryptic hints about the next threat. I was hoping he’d shout after her “that was spectacularly unhelpful!” Serilda mentioned that Katrina is trapped between worlds, so we’ll probably see her in the flesh at some point.
“Sleepy Hollow” awkwardly introduced a new character, Luke (Nicholas Gonzalez); who was apparently Abbie’s boyfriend before she broke things off to join the FBI. Luke’s brief screentime with Ichabod wasn’t bad, as he mistakenly assumed that Ichabod was British. But once Abbie showed up, that introduction took a sharp turn into cliched territory. It’s going to take a lot of work to convince us that Abbie and Luke mean anything to each other, as there was not even a hint of chemistry between them.
Again, “Sleepy Hollow” never fully crosses the threshold into mediocrity, but this feels like a step backwards after the pilot. There may be a good series in here somewhere, but how many trees are we going to have to dig up to find it?
