In what is undoubtedly the darkest episode of the season so far, The Magicians pulled no punches in not one, but two separate power battles that converged at the worst possible moment. Notable characters were lost and the ones left standing (or rather kneeling) will never be the same. Written by Henry Alonso Myers and directed by John Scott, here is what went down in episode three, “Divine Elimination”.
POWER CIRCLE | After dealing with that teeny curse The Beast (Charles Mesure) left on the castle causing all the royals to kill each other (see below), Team Fillory regroups to set their plan in motion. With Alice’s (Olivia Taylor Dudley) power draining fast, Penny’s (Arjun Gupta) hands on the fritz, and being down to two, make that one (oh Alice), cacodemon, things are not looking optimistic. They decide to use a shield spell made stronger by three of them channeling it (explained via dick metaphor because sure) to distract The Beast long enough for Alice to power up the super spell she learned last week. They get in position in the forest and Penny poofs to where Julia (Stella Maeve) and The Beast are mere seconds from killing Reynard (Mackenzie Astin). Penny grabs The Beast but Julia manages to throw herself on top of them, bringing her along for the ride and right into the line of fire. Quentin (Jason Ralph), seeing his best friend about to be vaporized, breaks the shield to pull her out of the way but in doing so, gives The Beast enough time to almost dodge Alice’s attack. Charred down his left side, The Beast manages to poof out of there before Alice has time to recharge the spell for round two. Furious, Penny grabs Julia and brings her back to earth.
The four remaining split up for one more last ditch effort to kill The Beast before Alice’s power is gone for good. Eliot (Hale Appleman) and Margo (Summer Bishil) take off to go try and petition Ember (Dominic Burgess) for more god juice (because we all would love to relive that process) while Quentin and Alice try and track down The Beast. In the carriage on the way to what Alice is pretty sure is her final stand, Quentin tries again to apologize for everything and to hopefully one day deserve her. Elsewhere, Eliot and Margo are having a hard time getting Ember to come out and play. Turns out Ember wasn’t even home because he was busy taking an unholy dump in the Wellspring (yeah, that thing that all magic in Fillory and therefore the world relies on). The Beast arrives hoping to use it to power up just as Ember is making his gleeful exit. Alice and Quentin hide just out of sight and try to take in what this means for magic but The Beast senses them and poofs them into the clearing with him. He taunts Alice and sends a slicing spell at her but Quentin dives in between them and takes it in the shoulder. Ember, always the entertainer, sends Margo and Eliot to the site of the power battle so that they don’t “miss the fun”. Alice starts throwing spell after spell at The Beast and it actually seems to be affecting him but the last of her god power finally fades away. She tries the super spell again anyway but it is too much for her mortal body to handle and she niffins out, seemingly exploding into a ball of magical energy. The Beast is delighted and limps toward Quentin to kill him but Niffin Alice reappears and freezes him in place. Completely devoid of emotion, Niffin Alice rips open The Beast’s chest, sending all the moths (that I had happily blocked out the image of) streaming out of his chest and he drops to the ground, dead. Niffin Alice turns on Quentin to kill him next but Margo and Eliot manage to draw her attention to them instead. Quentin begs her to stop but Niffin Alice isn’t Alice anymore. He releases his cacodemon and it goes straight for her, killing her too.
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TO CATCH A FOX | Julia, Marina (Kacey Rohl), and The Beast also make a power play this week by using Marina to try and summon Reynard. Her first try is a little less than enthusiastic – think that kid in English class being made to act out Shakespeare who REALLY doesn’t like Shakespeare. She gives it another go (once more with feeling) but before they can tell if it’s working, The Beast poofs himself and Julia out of there. He points out that if Reynard senses her, he won’t show and that they’ll just have to risk Marina being horribly eviscerated in the process of sneaking up on him. Julia is furious and races back to the warehouse where Marina has already finished the summoning and left, thinking it was a dud when nothing happened. Julia panics, thinking Reynard must have already killed her but The Beast suggests that Reynard simply following Marina home to kill her there is far more likely. Sure enough, Marina gets home and puts up all her protective wards only to find she has effectively locked herself in with the murderous god. He ties her up goes to all sorts of lengths to break her including taunting her about her lack of friends, violently ripping apart her cat and placing its still twitching body on her lap, and biting off her finger (just malevolent god things). He is about to start gnawing off her toes when The Beast and Julia finally manage to break through her wards and rush in, The Beast freezing Reynard in place. Julia steps forward to kill Reynard but it is at that exact moment that Penny poofs in from Fillory to drag The Beast and by proxy, Julia, to the site of the other power battle taking place. As soon as they are gone, Reynard unfreezes and he and Marina both dive for the magic dagger. By the time she manages to get back from where Penny leaves her, Julia rushes into the apartment only to find she is too late. Marina is dead on the floor and Reynard along with the only weapon still capable of killing him, are gone.
LAST WOMAN STANDING | Before everything went up in flames for everybody, the newest royal court of Fillory had to deal with the curse The Beast left for them. Newly reunited with his friends from Earth, Eliot shows off the throne room he has managed to spruce up in their absence. He is the first to sit on his brand new throne and the second he does, the curse and the overwhelming paranoia kick in. He is convinced they are all ganging up on him to usurp him and he runs out of the room. They are all confused as to what on earth just happened but Margo’s seen weirder with Eliot so she leaves to go talk him down. Quentin’s spidey senses are tingling though so he tells Penny and Alice what Julia warned him about a curse. Unfortunately, before they can actually get much further, both Quentin and Alice sit on their own thrones and are overtaken with the burning desire to kill their fellow kings and queens. Penny, being the only one not affected by the curse, rushes to get to Margo in time but she too has sat on her throne and is in the middle of planning her elaborate poisoning scheme. Instead, he turns to Fen (Brittany Curran) and they come up with a plan to let the curse run its course while also not permanently killing them all. Penny goes to round them up and comes upon Quentin and Margo dueling it out in the hallway. Margo uses her cacodemon on Quentin, forcing Penny to use up his own to stop her. They manage to get all four of them into the throne room where Penny presents his grand plan. He has brought four syringes of potassium chloride to stop their hearts and then adrenalin to restart them once the curse has been broken upon their deaths. The four of them decide they would rather kill each other and grab the syringes themselves. Margo ends up the last royal standing (no surprises here) but the curse kicks into its final gear and makes her stab herself with the last syringe. Penny and Fen, not mad that they got to just stand back and let them off themselves, grab the adrenalin and revive each of them, now free of The Beast’s curse.
OTHER THOUGHTS:
• Not to start some kind of ‘gummy bear discourse’ but I personally hate gummy bears in my ice cream. They freeze and aren’t gummy anymore.
• Marina’s cat is named Cupcake. Marina has a cat and she named it Cupcake. I don’t know what to do with that information but I am so glad I have it.
• The credits being played without any music highlighted the DEAD SILENCE in the living room after the episode cut away from Alice’s dead body on the ground.
So what did you think? Where you expecting to lose three characters in one go? Which death left you the most shocked? Where do you think they will go from here? Let us know in the comments below!
The Magicians airs Wednesdays at 9/8c on Syfy!