Ichabod Crane is pushed to the edge in this week's Sleepy Hollow, reminding everyone that he is not only a scholar and a gentlemen, but a soldier who suffered devastating loss.

The return of the Horseman this week sets Ichabod on the war path.  He sheds his scholarly manner and reveals the hardened warrior beneath it, raging with a cold stare and steely resolve.  Crane gets the manic crazy eyes perfectly, as he insists that it's time for Death to gain comeuppance.  When the Horseman briefly outfoxes him and slaughters the Masons, Crane frantically tries to find the secret to defeating the Horseman, tossing books aside and ranting about how he died once, and never again (which trips the immortality warning alarm--remember Crane, death is inevitable, even for you).    

The Dynamic Duo of Abbie and Crane set off to confront Captain Irving and retrieve the Horseman's head, so they can destroy it and him.  It's something that won't necessarily stop the Horseman forever, but will keep him from summoning the other three compadres in his apocalyptic gang.  Well done to the writers for addressing that Crane and Co. can't completely kill the Horseman--that's just asking for awkward plotting, when they have to explain why no one is dying and the world is getting destroyed from overpopulation.  The fact that it's explained is a good moment for Crane to examine his motives, and pause as he realizes this is a stop-measure instead of a full-stop.  This victory, while beautiful and worthwhile, will not stop all the machinations in the works.  Thank goodness for our sake, as that means mayhem and mystery for the witnesses of the apocalypse will still be afoot.

Anyway, Captain Irving convincingly disputes rumors of his evil allegiances by kicking trash and taking names as he retrieves the skull and faces the Horseman head-on.  Pun most definitely intended.  His Matrix-moves and quick-thinking prove him more than ready to join the Witness Crew in their expedition to save the world.  After delivering the skull, their quest begins in a Mythbusters-like montage to destroy the unflappable skull.  Crane calms down enough to super-sleuth his way through a cipher, exhibiting some lovely handwriting and some lovelier discomfort with computers.  As he solves the riddle, and learns the mysterious way to defeat the Horseman, the gang is refreshed and ready for trickery.

Not the least among these tricks is the sudden assist from CHO-MBIE!  He returns!  And is still creepily obsessed with Abbie, threatening Morales and following her through the tunnel system.  At least his stalker tendencies lead him to step out of hiding and warn her of the Horseman's motives (leading in turn to a threatening Crane standing a full foot above Cho-mbie, brooding in full protector mode).  

In a heart-thumping race to destroy the skull through Hocus Pocus-esque use of modern technology, Abbie and Crane use Halloween decorations and demon traps to blast the Horseman with UV light.  We fade out with Crane, Abbie and Irving smiling triumphantly, but I can't help but believe that this is not the last of the Headless Beast.

Some Thoughts:

-I giggled all through Irving and Abbie's take-down of Thomas Jefferson.  The man was a genius and bless him for that, but he was in no way the spotless hero Crane was making him out to be.  Poor Ichabod, having one of his heroic companions denigrated in front of his eyes. The truth hurts.

-The hanging heads and spattered neck stumps of the Masons were a glorious return to the gore.  Gross and great.

-Crane's voicemail, emphasis on the mail, to Abbie was yet another example of how wonderful Crane is.

-Oh, Paul Revere is apocryphal Mr. Crane?  That's rich.  Accurate, but rich.

Sleepy Hollow thankfully returns after a two-week break, and pulls no punches with an episode that delves further into a series-wide mythology.  This week, it does that by focusing on choice, on how necessary sacrifice is to become whole, and how forgiveness can eradicate even the most grievous of sins.

The Spirit of Democracy is introduced from the very beginning, with baseball as a framing device to introduce the American way--tradition, teamwork, and tolerance.  Those are such worthy goals, and so clearly the ultimate ideal that was sought after when the founders wrote the Constitution.  And the fact that Sleepy Hollow says it so casually, so lightly, but so perfectly is a wonder to behold.  It's particularly wise that the ideal virtues of America were set up early, as they provide a unique lens through which to view the rest of the episode.

Tradition appears in the form of the Masons.  The modern day descendants of the Revolutionary chapter of the ancient order kidnap Ichabod, who uses some sudden and masterful sleuthing to decipher their identity.  He gives insight into his historical past as the Masons force him to prove he is who he claims to be.  Through flashbacks, Crane details his time in the British army, and the series of events that led him to defer to the Americans (and which introduced him to future wife Katrina).  In interrogating freeman Arthur Bernard--there's the tolerance, as Bernard adds the diversity to the hour--Ichabod discovers the inner workings of the Revolutionaries and the Masons, and is persuaded into joining their cause.

Meanwhile, bringing up the teamwork portion of America, Abbie discovers Ichabod's absence thanks to an ill-timed vision from Katrina.  Desperate to regain the only person that has given her a purpose and a meaning for life, Abbie teams up with Jenny to find a Sin Eater and free Ichabod from his cursed connection with the horseman of Death.  The Sin Eater, a creature of legend who devours a person's sins and leaves them sanctified in his wake, is the only one who can cleanse Crane's blood.  In the most delightful casting choice ever, the Sin Eater Abbie and Co. seek is none other than Mr. Walter Bishop himself, Mr. John Noble.  He performs his lonely work in a manner that is as subtle and tortured and gifted as Walter ever appeared.  If Sleepy Hollow somehow made his Sin Eater a permanent cast member, that would be alright.

And then, in a gorgeously spun morality tale of redemption, Ichabod and Abbie learn of the necessity of sacrifice, but that it doesn't always have to be the sacrifice of the body.  The Masons convince Ichabod that the only way to defeat the Horseman is to kill himself, as their blood connection will ensure the death of Death and the halting of the apocalypse.  But to say that this is the only way to victory is false.  It ignores the lesson Ichabod learned in flashback from Katrina: that "destiny is not a matter of chance, it's a choice."  To die would be wholly Ichabod's choice, and there is always another way.  In a blatant but wonderful bit of Christ imagery, Walter's Sin Eater appears at the most convenient last minute to pierce Ichabod's palm and eat of his sin, dipping the bread in the blood and absolving his guilt.  Still, it is not a one-way contract.  Ichabod must confront the recipient of his sin, the poor betrayed Arthur Bernard, and beg forgiveness.  

But as spectral Bernard points out, Crane is seeking redemption from the wrong person. He must forgive himself in order to purge himself of sin.  His wrongdoing was not delaying choice and allowing for Bernard to die, it was holding on to misplaced guilt.  "My death saved your soul," claims Bernard.  There can be no sin in that, only redemption.  But first comes Crane's sacrifice.  Not through death, but by sacrificing his pride, his guilt, and his sense of failure.  Only by placing that sin on the altar to be devoured by Walter can Crane be free.  He can now return to witnessing, only stronger than before, granted the strength of sanctification.

Some Thoughts:

-Orlando Jones as Captain Irving doesn't get much to do this episode, but what he gets is gold.  His line about wanting to preserve only two things, virginity and skepticism (and considering he's lost the first, he wants to hold on to that second thankyouverymuch), hits a funny bone in just the right way.

-Finally the irksome lack of clarity around Katrina's half-baked warning is confronted!  "Tell the witch to be specific."  PREACH, Jenny.

Aren't we all lost and disoriented, asks Crane?  Is this not true for him, just as much as it's true for the poor plagued child who runs through space and time and death itself, spurred by the horseman of Pestilence?  Isn't Abbie lost, torn between a world of order that she has clung to for sanity, and the world that requires more trust and faith than she thinks herself capable of?  Even poor, endlessly annoying Morales is lost, clued out of the system and wondering why the mysterious Crane is still here.

Sleepy Hollow masterfully uses the monster-of-the-weeks.  The evil our heroes face never feels superfluous, but always acts as a means for exploration.  We learn more about Abbie and Crane because of their interaction with the villain, which is how the best shows work.  Think Buffy or The X-Files.  The Big Bads were convincing because they reflected the protagonist's fears, hopes, and dreams.  They weren't just threatening the world--they were threatening our idea of peace, of harmony, of who we are at the core. You can't have conflict just for the sake of conflict, it has to resonate.  Sleepy Hollow does that with Abbie's confrontation with the Sandman, and in "John Doe" the horseman of Pestilence acts as a tool to underscore how lost these characters can feel. 

The disorientation ties into the slow build of revelation that Sleepy Hollow has been playing so marvelously.  They built up Crane's photographic memory, revealing it's use in last week's episode as he outlined a map from memory.  They've built up this idea of the Purgatory Katrina wanders, revealing it this week as a realm of Moloch, where he plays with the souls of the dead and bends them to his will.  And even the simple pleasure of seeing Crane flounder in the modern world pays off here, as those comic-relief difficulties come to a head when he is tempted to cleave to a place more familiar than not.  The lost city of Roanoke appears to be simply displaced in time, much like Crane, and he is drawn to it's comfort.

At that moment, the plot is almost too subtle.  Roanoke's temptation of Crane and Abbie's subsequent fretting is squeezed into a few spoken lines, but don't simmer over into actual stakes.  The audience doesn't really believe that Crane will defect to Roanoke, and it's hard to imagine that Abbie is truly concerned by this threat.

But then she reveals her fierceness.  When an infected Crane is dragged away from her, Abbie shrieks after him, crying "don't take him!"  She has lost so much, and the desperation that crosses her eyes as they take Crane betrays her need for him, her need to this lifeline for her fledgling trust and faith.  This prompts an obvious, but lovely moment of Abbie reaching out and finding something to believe in.  Crane might be the one physically experiencing baptism, but Abbie is the one who is cleansed.  

Some Thoughts:

In my former life as an educator, I was lucky enough to teach American history to the young whipper-snappers of the world.  When we got to the Revolutionary War, I relished teaching the tales of the lucky upstarts that were the Revolutionaries, rising to unlikely victory aided by the brave French.

Yes. The French. General LaFayette was a bad mother shut-your-mouth.

When I taught about the Hessian soldiers, the German army-by-hire that worked with the British, I took my cues from the textbook and portrayed them as toothless, sickly warriors who were easily confused by our majestic American terrain and proved to be quite useless.

What I forgot, and what Sleepy Hollow remembered and delightfully juiced up, was that the Hessians were mercenaries.  While they were probably nowhere near as sinister as the demon-raising German villains of this episode, I have to say it's an exciting and slightly convincing story.  I mean, the British used the Hessians as enforcers long before the Revolutionary War.  It makes sense that they would have some bite to them, right?  

That might just be my willingness to believe in the conspiracy going on here.  And good heavens the conspiracies and mythologies in Sleepy Hollow are being tantalizingly revealed, creating a richer picture of the End of Days and the battle Abbie and Crane are yet to fight.

In "The Lesser Key of Solomon," we're introduced to the hardcore Hessians, whose methods are about as gruesome as network TV could get.  We have writhing demons summoned from the pits of Hell, simmering and about to burst forth into this world.  We get a bit of Jenny's backstory, learning that Sheriff Corbin mentored/father figured both sisters.  One was just through legal means, while the other has been ninja-ing all over the world (a fact that clearly caught Crane's eye--let's hope they don't ply into any love triangles here.  Or love squares, if you count the witchy wife, Abbie, and Jenny).  

And last but not least, we have a name for the blurry horned demon that still maybe haunts my nightmares.  Moloch.  The one that requires Sacrifice.  What sacrifices will Abbie and Crane make in defending the world?

Some Thoughts:


-I still adore how they are showing Crane's difficulty fitting into the modern world.  The intro/previously on is genius, with Crane's narration about Katrina morphing into him speaking to the Northstar operator, who is completely smitten with Crane's courtly tone and tale of lost love.  Join the club, Yolanda.  Besides, how gentlemanly of Crane to thank her for showing him how the entertainment center works.

-They had me at Milton.  Keep on keeping on with the references, Sleepy Hollow.

-It's great that the main battle scene was Jenny and Abbie wailing on the Hessians.  I'm less thrilled with how they had Crane dramatically step into assist, but overall I'm pleased.  We need more chicks kicking butt.

"We've had this coming a long time."

A woman speaks these words, then leaps off a building.  Abbie is left breathless and terrified in her wake.

"We've had this coming."

A nightmare, a creature with darkness for eyes, sands of truth pouring from his body, infecting victims.

"This Coming"

Trust becomes key.  Who should be allowed into our space?  Who earns the right to our history?  Who has access to our minds?

In "For the Triumph of Evil," Sleepy Hollow turns away from jump scares for a chance to delve into the inner psyche.  It questions how personal demons can be more frightening than reincarnated beings, how their brand of haunting can be more intense and unnerving.  Our own inadequacies are used to manipulate  The evil Sandman turns victims into creatures who cannot handle the truth of their deed.  Like Oedipus of old they turn blind.  The sands of truth fill their eyes, which then explode under the pressure with a visceral squelch.

The villain of the episode, a creature patterned after the story of the Sandman, begins to terrorize Abbie.  It forces her to confront the past she has so dutifully repressed.  Bits of pieces of her past--the man who witnessed her and her sister Jenny with the demon, the psychiatrist who believed Jenny but did nothing to help her--confront Abbie with the need to be truthful, the need for her to rectify sins of omission.  As the Sandman stalks and slays the other silent witnesses, it draws closer to Abbie, taunting her.

To beat this new evil Abbie and Crane turn to their roots, or at least their roots as Americans.  The monster has origin in Mohawk legend, and by going down to their elemental selves the protagonists can face and defeat this foe.  With the aid of a trusty Mohawk car salesman--an interesting choice of occupation for a shamanistic Indian--Abbie learns how to beat the Sandman on his territory.  Entering a world of dreams through mystical tea and scorpion venom, and followed by the ever-endearingly chivalrous Ichabod, she finally experiences a clear conscience.  

Healing confession leaves her stronger and more able to persevere.  If, as the characters theorize, "fear is pain," than Abbie is now untouchable.  She has overcome the fear and guilt of what happened when she sold out Jennie.  She's now ready to kick trash and take names as a witness of the apocalypse.

Some Thoughts:

-It looks like they are setting up for some early American Masonic tie-ins. The "lair" that Abbie and Ichabod use has a smattering of compasses and squares.  They are even framing a set of scales in the last shot.  Coincidence?  Maybe, but I choose to think not.

-Captain Irving is evil, right?  He's just got to be.

-The creepiness of the effects continues to impress.  The white out eyes and the spun glass defeat is one of the coolest details I've seen.

There's something about comfort food and impending doom.

Maybe it's part of my conditioning, one of the quirks of living in a post-Twin Peaks world, but at this point it's practically a given that moments of darkness and terror will be tempered with sugars and fats.  When Sleepy Hollow segues from intensity to a shot of flaky apple pie drowning in smooth vanilla ice cream, it feels natural.  Right, even.

That's where this second episode, "Blood Moon," cements my love.  This show is not new.  I cannot over-emphasize that enough--innovative television, thy name is not Sleepy Hollow.  But what does it matter?  When it comes to entertainment and the pure joy of genre, this is hitting it right on the money.  Sleepy Hollow knows exactly what it is, and even if it isn't "new" per se, it grants the program a refreshing air of confidence.  Since the horror and detective-ness and shlock is all out in the open anyway, why not have fun?

One of the greatest strengths in this episode is the power of homage.  Or, to be more precise, the little winks and nods to classics, always slightly referential in tone and never a cookie-cutter lift.  It manages to reference the mood of classic horror without falling into blank puppetry of the scenes that created such tension.  From the cold open's nightmarish use of vines that seemed ripped from The Evil Dead (but thankfully didn't go all the way in the same vein), to the vaguely The Thing-esque resurrection of John Cho's Andy, rising and running about a stark medical lab, slight reminiscences run rampant.  Speaking of which, Cho-mbie's deadpan delivery as he intimidates small children and quietly stalks Abbie is as unsettling as any Hitchcock psychos.  While he's still mainly a Renfield, running about doing the bidding of the demon-in-charge, it's obvious that you don't want this fellow left to his own devices.  Who knows what fresh hell could arise.  These kinds of familiar scenes and moods are deftly used, grounding the show in supernatural horror without making it boring.  It makes me feel instantly at ease in this world, freeing the show to have fun with wordplay and relationships.

And how about those wordplays and relationships?  Good heavens.  Ichabod's matter-of-fact nature, meted with bursts of excitement about modern things, will never cease to make me grin like a little English schoolgirl.  I'm with you, Mr. Crane.  $4.95 for doughnuts is ludicrous.  The dream team of Ichabod and Abbie still surprises me with how much I like it.  Abbie is excellent at portraying the role of strong woman in the male-dominated workforce without making me feel irritable.  She's not being overly preachy about it ...*cough*Fringe*cough*..., and she's revealing slight cracks, showing internal tension as she keeps a strong face while desperately trying to handle a world that's doesn't follow the rules she believed in.

It's not a perfect show, despite all my gushing.  Not all of the special effects are wonderful--even though I loved the charred witchy villain of this week--and there are moments that don't make sense.  A mid-episode sojourn through centuries-old tunnels served no purpose, other than to introduce the third act smoking gun.  But why nitpick?  I'm happy to grab some popcorn, turn on the hall light so it's not totally dark, and watch the dang show.  

In many ways, this sets up an unlikely partnership to take on cases and save the town.  At it's heart, after all, this is another cop show.  One of the benchmarks of cop shows, since the moment the cop show crawled out of the primordial ooze, fully fleshed and mustachioed, is the partnership angle.  One follows protocol, while the other is a loose cannon.  One wears ties, while the other listens to their gut.  When supernatural elements are added to this mixture, the dynamic morphs into the believer and the skeptic.

Interest Rate: Keep it light and I'm yours.

In a world where horsemen are headless and the founding fathers have some serious magical mojo going down through centuries, can one time-traveling hero captivate modern audiences?  Only you can decide.

Here's the thing.  I think Sleepy Hollow is going to be a blast.  Is this trailer a bit on the cheesy side, with its gloriously booming voiceover narration?  Yes.  Are there jokes that just don't work--after all, hasn't every single person on earth made the Starbucks joke by now?  Yes.  But am I buying it?  Time will tell, but for now all signs point to a most definite yes.

It's been a while since the network put something dumb and fun on.  They've been trying so hard to compete with cable, amping up the gritty violence.  But try as they might the writing and acting has never matched the caliber of AMC.  It's time for the them to try something different, and Sleepy Hollow feels like a great network show.  The violence is unrealistic but enjoyable, the writing is hokey but makes you smile, and the show seems to have just enough pulpy mystery to keep me interested.  Plus, I'm a sucker for improbable Revolutionary War conspiracies.

If Sleepy Hollow can keep from taking itself too seriously, this could be one enjoyable ride.